Possibilities to take your vassal's cities ?

[Boodler]

Hi !

In a recent game, I attacked Charlemagne and captured some of his cities, but since Montezuma and De Gaulle also attacked him, I was afraid he will capitulate to one of them so I decided it's better if he capitulates to me.
Now Charlemagne has two (maybe three) cities and is my vassal.

Are there any options to launch an attack on him while he is a vassal of mine or somehow I must find a way for him to earn his freedom through the population, area ratios ?
I already tried demanding resources, but he never refuses.

Thank you in advance !

 

[macmert]

I think you can release him from vassalage, but then he might capitulate to others...

maybe you can try culture flipping if you share borders

 

[Gwynnja]

You can't release him from capitulation, and you can't declare war on him so long as he provides you with whatever resource you ask for. The ai's capitulate in order to preserve what's left of their empires; if you could simply dow on them what would be the point of their capitulation. If you really want his cities you have two options: 1. you can make him give you all of his resources and hope he refuses, or 2. you can go to war with a third civ and hope they take some of his cities, then take them for your own. You cannot dow on your vassal.

 

[gfm]

Are there any options to launch an attack on him while he is a vassal of mine

There is no way to declare war on your own vassals. They can, however, declare war on you if you demand tribute (resources or per turn) and they refuse.

If your power rating is high enough compared to theirs, they will simply give in and never refuse your demands, however unreasonable they may be. You can, however, gift them back (liberate) some of their cities, which might make them cocky enough to eventually refuse one of your demands (and declare on you). As for me, I would simply leave Charlie be a semi-useless vassal and start shifting my attention to Monty.

 

[Bleys]

This actually came up in a recent game for me. I vassalized Freddy pretty early, and used his land to springboard an attack on Sury, who I didnt share a border with. Sury decided to let my stack roll across his land and instead of defending, he sent his own stack to attack Fred. So I let him. Poor Fred lost 3 cities to Sury, which I re-took pretty easily, as well as a few of Surys.

So about the only way for you to get more of your vassals cities is to let another AI take them.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

You can still culture flip vassal cities. Not easy though.

 

[Boodler]

You can still culture flip vassal cities. Not easy though.

Especially if the capital is a holy city.


Thanks for all the responses and help !

 

[Solo4114]

Only other option is to turn off vassal states when you start the game. The vassal mechanic is interesting, but it can get annoying when you're THIS close to putting the guy away and he vassals up with someone else.

On the other hand, you don't have the ability to create colonies without the vassal option, I think, so that's a problem.

 

[gfm]

The vassal mechanic is interesting, but it can get annoying when you're THIS close to putting the guy away and he vassals up with someone else.

At least since 3.13 (I think), an AI is much more likely to capitulate to the player who did him the most damage. Look at it this way : vassals can really speed up domination and conquests victory (because of the snowball effect of vassals on your power rating and the "land target" rule) but you still have to compete with other players to obtain the allegiance of a fallen civilization. So I really think they add a fun twist to the game, but they come with their own specific challenges.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

At least since 3.13 (I think), an AI is much more likely to capitulate to the player who did him the most damage. Look at it this way : vassals can really speed up domination and conquests victory (because of the snowball effect of vassals on your power rating and the "land target" rule) but you still have to compete with other players to obtain the allegiance of a fallen civilization. So I really think they add a fun twist to the game, but they come with their own specific challenges.

I like them but the mechanics behind when a civ caps or doesn't is questionable.

It depends on:

1. Your power
2. The average of all civs power
3. Whether the people who are at war with your target immediately border them, regardless of damage done by said bordering civ or if it even has meaning full power
4. Their vassal's power
5. But NOT your vassal's power.

They're still useful though, because:

1. They speed up dom/conquest
2. They will suck in AI attacks, in territory where YOU have the mobility/first attack advantage, and will possibly even destroy a few enemy units.
3. You can airlift to them although I rarely do so.
4. They can chain capitulations if they border future targets correctly.
5. They vote for you unless they're eligible.
6. If you have corps and FM they let you manage foreign land (albeit poorly, but it still won't be land used against you) without incurring mass colony expense.

 

[gfm]

I like them but the mechanics behind when a civ caps or doesn't is questionable.

I fully agree with you : the capitulation threshold mechanic is based on questionable factors. However, I know of a certain warmongering shadowaholic who has abused it more than once...

 

[Solo4114]

I agree that they're an interesting twist, but sometimes I wish they could simply be eliminated over time -- like you absorb them into your civ gradually (perhaps via the culture mechanic). Just another of those "I gripe about it, but I can't think of a better way to do it" things about Civ IV for me.

 

[Skallagrimson]

If I'm doing a continents space race strategy I don't accept vassals on my land mass. If they sprouted island colonies I'll accept a capitulation. If I'm doing one of those pangea steamrolls to early domination, then yeah, vassal it up. Ap palace abuse and it's done.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

I fully agree with you : the capitulation threshold mechanic is based on questionable factors. However, I know of a certain warmongering shadowaholic who has abused it more than once...

.

Just because I don't agree with the rules doesn't mean I won't learn them and how to work with (or around) them .

Probably the best use of vassals is a localized staging point for further offense however. It's not a big deal if your VASSAL loses a city to the AI, as long as it doesn't put it under 50% original land instantly (would be rare). You can take it back with EXTREMELY favorable siege logistics (and minimal losses), and even gain diplo for gifting it back to your vassal . Meanwhile, this makes your target more likely to also capitulate, as it grants you very favorable k/d even at tech parity and probably incurs the "land target" rule to raise cap odds further.

My LHC post shows a very good example of this (ab)use. Two major wars, one at tech parity and one substantially worse than tech parity, each won via launching an assault through vassal territory, followed up by some nasty siege-spam to overwhelm the AI cities. Mobility matters so much in civ IV wars between 2 major stacks, because of how collateral works. Vassals give you unbelievable flexibility with your SoD, all the while completely ignoring the negative effects of pillaging, losing cities, etc .

 

[Bleys]

Vassals give you unbelievable flexibility with your SoD, all the while completely ignoring the negative effects of pillaging, losing cities, etc .

This is especially true on some of those Fractal maps, where each civ basically has a chunk of the land, from N to S, along a snakey land mass with one AI on his west and one on his east. I love jumping vassals on those maps, especially once I have tanks. In fact, I dont mind if my vassal gives up a city if I can take it and keep it.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

This is especially true on some of those Fractal maps, where each civ basically has a chunk of the land, from N to S, along a snakey land mass with one AI on his west and one on his east. I love jumping vassals on those maps, especially once I have tanks. In fact, I dont mind if my vassal gives up a city if I can take it and keep it.

I only keep those if they're very valuable, because they culture flip without extreme garrisons normally .

 

[Gwynnja]

Fractal maps are what I play ~90% of the time, and my strategy is usually conquer whatever land I have access to pre-astronomy, then if I have to sail to get a Dom Vic, then I'll vassal someone on the other continent or sometimes colonize captured cities. If I have a significant tech lead, this allows my new vassal a set of the most modern units for defending their new cities. The problem I've found with this strategy is that I don't want to keep most of the cities I capture and if I form a colony, I can't gift the cities back to their original owner for diplo points, I can only gift them to my colony.

 

[Solo4114]

If you treat vassals the way the USSR treated the satellite soviet republics in eastern europe, they make sense. Buffer zone, staging point for attack, etc. Otherwise, I find vassals to be kind of annoying. I'd rather have ALL their land than only get credit for some of their land.

 

[gfm]

If you treat vassals the way the USSR treated the satellite soviet republics in eastern europe, they make sense. Buffer zone, staging point for attack, etc. Otherwise, I find vassals to be kind of annoying. I'd rather have ALL their land than only get credit for some of their land.

Still that's an interesting choice : conquer them completely because their remaining land is great and you'll manage it better or vassal them to use as a buffer. It is also a lot of fun to turn your worst rivals into second-class nations that are forced to give in to your unreasonable demands.

Yeah, I'm quite the sadist

 

[Solo4114]

But the problem is that conquering them entirely is often difficult because they'll cozy up with usually another powerful civ (who'll force you to declare peace or fight a bigger war). I suppose you could say "Screw it" and try to take out the one civ while holding off the other and then sue for peace, but that's often a roll of the dice I'm not willing to take. Then again, I freely admit to being weak on warfare (and the associated production/economy management during wartime).