I don't like the way City States work in Civ VI

[BomberEscort]

Things that would help City States are:

1. When I take control of their military allow the City State borders to be considered friendly territory so I can upgrade the units. Currently I have to move them to my territory to upgrade them.
2. Allow the CS to heal my units as in friendly territory if I am the suzerain
   
3. Give me a discount for upgrading CS units (25%-50% discount)
4. Allow me to purchase by coin or faith units for the CS from their city when I have control of their military
   
5. Allow me to gift a CS a unit
6. Allow the CS to upgrade their own units. I assume they can but never see them do it. If it is a cash flow problem then give them a discount.
7. Currently I can delete CS units if I take control of their military. Definitely exploitable.

 

[Big J Money]

Just wanted to drop in here and point out a no-win situation I just encountered that CBs can't solve. I allied with Scythia and had been friends with her since turn 10. It's now the industrial age, and she DOWs one of my City States. And now I'm SOL. I either piss off my longest standing ally and make an eternal enemy out of her, AND the rest of the world because I'm breaking an alliance (so CB has no effect). Or she just gets to gobble up my City States whenever she feels like it. It's utterly moronic.

It's really more a matter of perception than anything. Look, here:

First of all, Scythia is not your friend. Neither are you Scythia's friend. Scythia may be friendly to you, but the empire still has an agenda and a set of priorities, and at some point in the game those priorities are going to tip them against you. Attacking that CS was the tipping point. Are you upset because you didn't get to backstab first?

Also, being denounced happens all the time. The annoying thing is that we mostly only get to see when we're denounced. But when Scythia attacked that CS, she killed her relations with every other Civ in the game (including you) except perhaps any she was friends or allies with in extremely good-standing.

What you call a no-win situation is exactly how the game is supposed to work. You can't have your cake and eat it, too. You have to make choices; sometimes hard choices. The choice you already made was, do I become friends with another Civ and put myself in the position to be backstabbed later? Now the choice is, is it worth staying friends with Scythia and keeping your reputation for the rest of the world, or are you going to get revenge for the backstab? But nothing unfair is hapening here. As a player you can attack any CS with a Suzerain too, if it's on your agenda.

I'm actually curious why you declared friendship with Scythia in the first place if you weren't prepared for this happening. Unless you're learning that it's not a good idea to be friends with someone just because you can.

 

[Yzman]

The Casus Belli to defend city states comes way, way too late. Move it to the classical era. And have it grant a bonus envoy or two if you use it. The AI is really aggressive against city states in the early game, and the game isn't offering sufficient diplomatic tools to handle it.

Agreed. I started near Germany and he destroyed Hong Kong who I was using...and I couldn't really do anything about it. Later Germany declared war on me and I took over and liberated Hong Kong. I didn't notice a diplo penalty of any kind so I think that worked nicely.

 

[nzcamel]

It does state in the Civilopedia that one of the possible "Let's Discuss" options is "Stop attacking my CS." However I never got that to trigger in my game, even when my allies were attacking CS I had control of so I think it may be glitched.

My biggest gripe is that there is no way to declare war on a CS with Casus Belli, like it's not even an option. In my current game Preslav is blocking my access to the only coal on the continent and they aren't advanced enough to mine it, so even though I am Suzerain I don't have access to it. I want to take them over but I don't have the option without incurring egregious warmonger penalties.

As Suzerain you can improve the coal though right?

 

[dexters]

Agreed. I started near Germany and he destroyed Hong Kong who I was using...and I couldn't really do anything about it. Later Germany declared war on me and I took over and liberated Hong Kong. I didn't notice a diplo penalty of any kind so I think that worked nicely.

There is some precedence, at least in the west, that a purely defensive alliance was rare until Pericles proposed it as a way for Athens to keep the 30 years peace during the brief period of peace between Athens and Sparta after the 1st Peloponnesian war.

All alliances at the time were both offensive/defensive. Pericles proposed a defensive only alliance with Corcyra in hope it would show Sparta that Athens had no aggressive intention and would only come to Corcyra's defense if attacked by Corinth.

So It would make sense to unlock something similar in the early game, allowing for a purely reactionary casus belli only if a city state is attacked. The protectorate casus belli still comes too late, IMHO, but at least that can still come later.

 

[Arkatakor]

+1 OP. The fact that the AI can attack a city stated that you are a Suzerain of without declaring war on you is ridiculous.

 

[Ozisl]

I really miss Civ5 Austria's ability to annex citystates easily...

 

[beorn]

Actually, the fact that there is tension between your wanting a beneficial relationship with a small country, and your wanting a beneficial with a large country that is attacking the small country -- that part sounds highly realistic to me.

Not being notified that a CS for which you are suzerein is being attacked, that sounds like a problem. And, of course, more immersive relationships with CS's would be better, although I am not sure what that would look like.

 

[TehJumpingJawa]

In their current state, city states are utterly failing at their primary purpose; to be political pawns in the diplomacy game, driving intrigue and alliances.
It doesn't matter though, because diplomacy as a whole is an imbalanced broken mess of exploits and illogical behaviour.

 

[Big J Money]

+1 OP. The fact that the AI can attack a city stated that you are a Suzerain of without declaring war on you is ridiculous.

What's ridiculous about it? You can do the same thing to the AI.

 

[LDiCesare]

What's ridiculous about it? You can do the same thing to the AI.

It's infuriating that you can't even tell the ai not to attack this ai. The diplo is ridiculously limited.
"Please stop attacking XXX?"
No, you have to declare war until they make peace with XXX, and everyone thinks you're a warmonger even though you saved everyone else's envoys and the corresponding benefits.

 

[zattin]

As Suzerain you can improve the coal though right?

No it wasn't actually in their borders. It was on a coastal tile that jutted just out of their borders with no other tiles around it that I could settle on.

 

[ltccone]

Its still isn't enough people will stil be unfriendly with you

As far as I can tell they will almost always be unfriendly with you. I was fighting a war with the Aztecs (who are REALLY bad neighbors) that Sumeria asked me to join, even though they had only a scout on my continent. My friend, the Arabs, declared war on me. I captured one of their two cities, made peace with them, and then annihilated the Aztec army that was hanging out on my border. Sumeria makes peace with the Aztecs and then denounces me for a warmonger.

Now, I don't care what any other civ thinks of me. The Aztecs just declared war on me for like the tenth time, and I'm not stopping until every one of their cities or captured or torched. And then I'm going to wipe out the Spanish (another REALLY bad neighbor who declared war on me numerous times). And lastly I will take Cairo. And if the Sumerians, Indians, or Brazilians from the other major continent show up on my continent, I will slaughter them too. Auferre, trucidare, rapere, falsis nominibus imperium; atque, ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant.

 

[KrikkitTwo]

No it wasn't actually in their borders. It was on a coastal tile that jutted just out of their borders with no other tiles around it that I could settle on.

giving them more envoys gives them more tiles...although that is a long way to go about it

 

[DocRock]

Love this. Scythia captured my city state. I declared war on them, got the CS back, liberated it and made peace. I didn't even attack any other city. And everybody in the whole world is now telling me I'm the warmonger.

Stop defending this, the game is next to unplayable. It's like Germany annexing Switzerland and everybody around is to say "well whatever, that's fine guys" or they get denounced as a warmonger.

 

[Roxlimn]

You can Declare Protectorate War. If you declare this war and use it only to liberate your protectorate city state, you should have zero warmonger penalties. I tested it out already with Sumeria and Arabia. Fought the war, liberated the City State. Everyone loves me.

 

[nzcamel]

No it wasn't actually in their borders. It was on a coastal tile that jutted just out of their borders with no other tiles around it that I could settle on.

Frustrating...but V would've been just the same right? Maybe while you're suzerain, the CS's culture spread priorities should also take into account resources you have access to rather than only the CS. That way it could spread faster to said resource.

As far as I can tell they will almost always be unfriendly with you. I was fighting a war with the Aztecs (who are REALLY bad neighbors) that Sumeria asked me to join, even though they had only a scout on my continent. My friend, the Arabs, declared war on me. I captured one of their two cities, made peace with them, and then annihilated the Aztec army that was hanging out on my border. Sumeria makes peace with the Aztecs and then denounces me for a warmonger.

Now, I don't care what any other civ thinks of me. The Aztecs just declared war on me for like the tenth time, and I'm not stopping until every one of their cities or captured or torched. And then I'm going to wipe out the Spanish (another REALLY bad neighbor who declared war on me numerous times). And lastly I will take Cairo. And if the Sumerians, Indians, or Brazilians from the other major continent show up on my continent, I will slaughter them too. Auferre, trucidare, rapere, falsis nominibus imperium; atque, ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant.

Yeah Japan's second declaration of war against me cost them Osaka. Hojo feels the need to remind me of this often enough; and I wish I could point out to him that I'm the peaceful one!