Patriotism/civ flaw?

[Lecturelad]

Go easy on me folks, this is my first post on this forum, but I have been checking out the site off and on for the last year or so and I have learned a lot. I could'nt find another thread where this was addressed, so if this has been asked and answered elsewhere, please redirect me to that thread.

I love CivIII, and I usually play Conquests, but I have one problem wuth the game that really bugs me, and I want to find out if there are others out there too ith the same feeling. possibly this is something that can or will be addressed in Civ4.

I'm playing as a Democracy, and another civ that is puny & backwards technologically compared to me, but has superior numbers to me in a locallized area launches an attack and either captures & keeps, or more often razes, one of my cities. Frequently, this is immediately followed by a ludicrous demand for $ & techs, which if I refuse, I'm either overridden by the senate or I end up in anarchy!. This seems stupid to me. I realize democratic govs tend to be hypersensitive to war weariness, but this is a sneak attack on my own soil, much like Pearl Harbor or 9/11. In both real life cases, the democracy I live in in real life was more than ready to go to war to defend itself.

It seems to me that the computer is clearly keeping track of who founded a city for culture flipping purposes, so why can't it have a filter that treats war weariness differently when simply attempting to retake your own soil as opposed to trying to capture new territory from an opponent? Or am I simply missing something?

Anyway, I find it enormously frustrating to be caving in to insane demands from a civ I could crush like a bug if only all my cities weren't burning themselves to the ground.

Any help/ideas on this?

Thanks!

 

[gunkulator]

There is no senate in Civ3 so you cannot be overridden. Perhaps you mean something else?

Losing a city causes a lot of war weariness. It is the worst thing to have happen to you. Lose enough and your Democracy will descend into anarchy.

Although you say you were ready to defend yourself, you really weren't due to the fact that you lost cities. You must defend your borders. Another mistake was too small of a military. The AI is programmed to attack when it feels it has a stronger military. In this case, it was right. While you compare the sneak attack to Pearl Harbor, recall that the Japanese gained no territory in that attack. Hawaii remained in the hands of the US.

Sometimes the best thing to do is to cave into those outrageous demands to get peace. That will immediately elimate the effects of war weariness and give you a chance to build up a decent military. If you're really that much stronger than them, bide your time while you rebuild and then you can smash them. War weariness is only slightly affected by going into the AI's territory and there is no penalty at all when your attackers fight and win!

Oh, and welcome to CFC!

 

[nullspace]

Recapture your city and take one or two of theirs ASAP. That's usually enough to get peace on even terms.

The easier alternative is to give in to their ludicrous demands. Really, giving tech to a backwards civ costs you nothing. It's not like they'll suddenly become a contender for the spaceship, and you apparently weren't thinking of fighting them soon. As long as you're a bit ahead, keeping the rest of the civs approximately balanced is a good thing.

 

[wilbill]

There is no senate in Civ3 so you cannot be overridden. Perhaps you mean something else?

That's a Civ II thing. But culture flipping is Civ III. Perhaps you're playing a hybrid?

At any rate, if you're frequently losing cities to "puny backward" civilizations, you need to protect your border cities better. That would eliminate the problem.

 

[Lecturelad]

Great responses all.

I played both Civ2 and Civ3 on different computers at different times last weekend, so I mixed the two together in my head when I made my original post and I referenced getting overruled by the senate; it does indeed happen in Civ2 sometimes.

I have come to recognize from reading posts on many different topics here on the board that I have a tendency to leave cities underdefended, it's something I'm getting better at but sometimes I get too hasty about building some improvement ( i.e. temple) that I leave myself open to attack. I also just figured out from another thread that the AI always knows where you are weakest and attacks there. I hate to admit it but the idea that the AI basically has never-ending intel data on your troop strengths just didn't occur to me. That is part of why I read these boards - sometimes something that is painfully obvious to one player is not to another & vice versa.

After re-reading my first post, ( and cringing at the typos!), I see that I didn't really clearly state what my beef was. So let me try again.

I guess my frustration with Civ3 is that it seems to me that war weariness should be reduced when playing as a Democracy when you are only at war because someone has declared war on you. It seems it shoiuld be further reduced or even eliminated if you are simply trying to repel invaders who are slaughtering your people! And it might even make sense to have it further reduced if you are defending/recapturing your original founding city (capitol). The way war weariness plays now seems to completely discount patriotic feelings in a democracy. And when people say words to the effect of " well, just be sure you fight a short war by having overwheming might" how late game are we talking here? I dont seem to be able to assemble that kind of military juggernaut unless I'm talking very late game or very easy difficulty settings.Also, I'm referring to a surprize attack here, not an offensive war I would have prepared for.

BTW, I DO build temples ( always!) , cathedrals, sometimes coloseums, + any wonder that makes/keeps people happy and of course Univ Suff. if available but war weariness doesnt seem to come any slower with any of that ( except Univ. Suff.).

So, it seems when surprize attacked and I'm playing on Dem., I can either chose to descend to ararchy for a bunch of turns to some form of gov that will let me defend myself, leaving me horribly exposed with no production capability in the meantime; OR I can stay on Dem knowing my I will quickly descend into anarchy anyway, without the payoff of getting to switch govs.

For a game that is realism driven if many of its basic concepts, this inability of a democracy to reasonably defend itself ( plus the excess corruption problem) is a bit of a drag. I have a good friend who simply gave up on Civ3 because of this. I like the game too much for that. I'll assume that I'm doing something wrong & hope to learn to play better.

 

[greekguy]

BTW, I DO build temples ( always!) , cathedrals, sometimes coloseums, + any wonder that makes/keeps people happy and of course Univ Suff. if available but war weariness doesnt seem to come any slower with any of that ( except Univ. Suff.).

build police stations. they reduce war weariness as well.

 

[SJ Frank]

The thread regarding the mechanics of war weariness is here: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=61628

The game does model patriotism: when an AI sneak attacks you, you get 30 points worth of positive war-happiness. War-weariness isn't neccessarily a by-product of war, rather, it is a by-product of losing the war. And it is completely possible to engage in war without accumulating war-weariness, but that's another topic all together.

Does the game model war-weariness in a democracy accurately? I don't think we really know yet. Since the greatest democracy in the world, the U.S. of A., hasn't experienced the kind of loses that you experience in your game, not since the War of 1812. For example, do we know how the Americans will react, if 7 divisions of its infrantry were wept out on its own soil, and St. Louis was captured and razed by a foreign power?

I guess we won't find out util the day the Aztecs nuke Seattle

 

[Lecturelad]

First thing I learned from this thread is that losing cities is the quickest way to increase war weariness; that explains a lot! I guess sometimes I think too literally about these things...all I know is, I live in the world's greatest democracy, and if invaders came in and burned my city to the ground, let's just say they better not be dumb enough to leave me alive....

Anyway, the lose a city = big jump in war weariness pretty much turns on a lightbulb for me.

Thanks folks!