Quick Answers / 'Newbie' Questions

[LordofDread]

Two questions:
1) Anyone knows if I get a rep hit if I declare war to Iroquois having this resource deal active?

I know one usually gets a rep hit when not fulfilling a resource deal. Of note, nothing else was included in this deal when it was signed.

2) If I pillage my salpeter now, "renegotiate peace treaty" with Iroquois including them delivering salpeter, then cancel trade route in order to get war declared on me, do I get a rep hit?

 

[tjs282]

1) Anyone knows if I get a rep hit if I declare war to Iroquois having this resource deal active?

AFAIK, if through your DOW, an incomplete (20-turn) resource-export deal is broken, then yes, your rep is toast. It doesn't matter that you were being paid gold-per-turn, only that you were exporting resources, and now you aren't.

2) If I pillage my salpeter now, "renegotiate peace treaty" with Iroquois including them delivering salpeter, then cancel trade route in order to get war declared on me, do I get a rep hit?

If the salt-for-peace deal was your only active deal with Hiawatha, then definitely no. He'd be the bad guy for reneging on his delivery.

But the only simplest way (that I know of) to cut the salt-import trade-route at your end, is to unhook your capital from your trade-net. And while doing that would certainly cut off your salt-supply and thus force him to declare, it would also (and first?) result in you failing to export those 3 Luxes to him -- so again, your rep might well be toasted.

Minor edit made after quotation.

 

[LordofDread]

But the only way (that I know of) to cut the salt-import trade-route at your end, is to unhook your capital from your trade-net. And while doing that would certainly cut off your salt-supply and thus force him to declare, it would also (and first?) result in you failing to export those 3 Luxes to him -- so again, your rep might well be toasted.

Thanks

That's what I'm fearing as well and was hoping for a different answer . I can't test it in the current game, since reloading is not allowed. I suspect the game realizes the missing resource connection first, and then evaluates the impacts (DOW, rep hit, and so on).

Made this deal the turn before I attacked another moderately strong civ, but I needed only 7 turns for conquering them completely. Aggressive settlers ftw. Well I simply declare war now, no use waiting 13 turns.

 

[Spoonwood]

But the only way (that I know of) to cut the salt-import trade-route at your end, is to unhook your capital from your trade-net.

The capital does not have to get unhooked from one's intra-empire trade network. One can have say a source of wines in the Big Fat Cross of one's 2nd or third city and have it supplying wines to one's capital. That I would call intra-empire trade, since it's trade within one's empire.

What does have to happen though consists of one's trade network with the other empire getting severed.

If one's empire has no harbors or airports, the same effects can get accomplished by having no roads along the empire's borders. Ignas's saves (except the 4000 BC) indicate use of that technique.

The same effects can get obtained with a harbor city as Drazek's 1000 BC save indicates.

There also exists another method involving an isolated city with an extra luxury or resource and it's supply to one's empire getting cut with a gifted city within one's empire, which can get observed in Gyathaar's 10 AD save (the city is a Greek city named Mauch Chunk and Gyathaar played as leader of the Iroquois civ).

But, if you supply another empire with a luxury or resource, that's when such a technique can get dangerous as you've suggested tjs .

 

[LordofDread]

Well I use those techniques only in deity+ games (apart from gifted city technique), but not on emperor level games like this one. Otherwise I would not export any lux. So the needed infrastructure is not set up, although it would'nt be so hard to do it. If the Iroquois had a MPP with someone else, things would be simpler in my situation. Just declare war on their ally and attack a unit.

I declared war on Iroquois. Then checked diplomacy again. Very interesting. There are no polite ones left. Everyone dropped at least one level (from annoyed to furious, ...). Checked for possible trades. Vikings are still willing to give 23 gpt for a few lux. Don't know how much it was before, but its certainly less now. Zulu is completely different. They accept tech vs tech trade. If I then add a lux or resource to the deal it says "They would never accept such a deal". Furthermore, when I then add 600 gpt from my side, they are again willing to accept it, but not for 500 gpt. It seems in civ3 you sometimes can buy anything for the right price - even if you are a known liar?!

Until today I thought "They would never accept such a deal" really does mean never.

Edit: Removed images and spoiler section below. Some very strange things can happen. Wrong thread for this though.

 

[tjs282]

A busted rep doesn't mean you can't do any deals at all, just that you can't make any 20-turn deals which require you to remain 'honest' for the full 20 turns, in order for the AI to get its money's worth.

So you can still do per-turn deals for per-turn goods with a broken rep, and (I think) you can still pay up-front goods (lump-sum gold or techs) for per-turn imports. What you can't do anymore, though, is to pay a "fair" per-turn price for the AI's up-front goods.

E.g. with 10,000 gold in your Treasury and at least 1 gpt net-income, you should (mapsize and difficulty dependent, of course) be able to do a straight lump-sum-payment-for-AI-tech deal even into the late game , but if you then added that 1 gpt to that offer, your foreign advisor will instantly go from "This offer will probably be acceptable" to "They would never accept..."

Trying to make such a deal is actually a pretty good way to test whether your rep is broken.

 

[Samson]

Is there a writeup of how rep works somewhere? I think I used to understand it, but I cannot remember.

An addition to the above IIRC is you can still make GPT deals if the AI you are dealing with is at war with the AI you stiffed.

 

[tjs282]

Is there a writeup of how rep works somewhere? I think I used to understand it, but I cannot remember.

The definitive thread is here:

Trading Reputation

If you often wonder why AI would "almost" sell you a tech for 500g but would "never" do so if you add 1gpt, you should read on. In my opoinion, this is one of the most important game mechanisms that you have to know to play this game at the higher levels. Note, this article describes what I...

forums.civfanatics.com

It's from 2005, so should be good for the final C3C patch (1.22), but IIRC Microbe's original article made one or two incorrect assertions, so it would be advisable to read the whole thread.

 

[Samson]

The definitive thread is here:

Trading Reputation

If you often wonder why AI would "almost" sell you a tech for 500g but would "never" do so if you add 1gpt, you should read on. In my opoinion, this is one of the most important game mechanisms that you have to know to play this game at the higher levels. Note, this article describes what I...

forums.civfanatics.com

It's from 2005, so should be good for the final C3C patch (1.22), but IIRC Microbe's original article made one or two incorrect assertions, so it would be advisable to read the whole thread.

Peace treaty reputation

Well, there is no such a thing. It means if you sign or renew a peace treaty and declare within 20 turns, you do not incur a rep hit, unless by doing so you break a gpt deal (within the same peace treaty or not).

So you could attack an AI, sign peace and get several cities, and break it immediately without a rep hit. However, many consider it an exploit.

Now that I never knew, or I would have exploited it mercilessly.

 

[LordofDread]

What you can't do anymore, though, is to pay a "fair" per-turn price for the AI's up-front goods.

True. I've read Microbes thread 2 years ago. What I missed then is this passage:

Once an AI thinks you have a trashed rep, it would be less willing to or never make any gpt deals with you anymore. Note the "less willing to". Although your rep is shot, you could still possibly make gpt deal but would have to pay a lot more.

which I can confirm with the Vikings now after I suffered my Rep hit:

Of note, the Vikings are not at war with Iroquois and have never been. I think this only still works because I had two or three successful gpt trades with the Vikings in the past.

 

[LordofDread]

One last funny thing. Compare the two screenshots. Zulu would agree to trade Facism vs Medicine. If I add wines, then this happens, as we would expect:

But if I then add 1 gpt it gets really strange:

This only works if I set the science slider such that I have negative gpt (-90 in the screenshot). If I have positive gpt, they would never accept. I tried to use this illogical behaviour to my benefit, but it seems to me as long there is no "agreeable" base trade, i.e. Fascism vs Medicine, it's of no use.

 

[tjs282]

Yes, even if you had a clean trade-rep, the AI will never accept any gpt offer which exceeds your current income

 

[Samson]

Yes, even if you had a clean trade-rep, the AI will never accept any gpt offer which exceeds your current income

That is what I thought, but this shows this is not strictly true. If they would accept the deal without the GPT they will also accept it with the GPT in negative spending. The odd thing is about them only accepting it IF it exceeds your current income IF you have lost your rep.

 

[Kyriakos]

That is what I thought, but this shows this is not strictly true. If they would accept the deal without the GPT they will also accept it with the GPT in negative spending. The odd thing is about them only accepting it IF it exceeds your current income IF you have lost your rep.

So another case of fubar coding
But I didn't know of this exploit either - or the one about declaring war immediately after a peace deal, with no trade rep lost.

 

[LordofDread]

So another case of fubar coding
But I didn't know of this exploit either - or the one about declaring war immediately after a peace deal, with no trade rep lost.

Well I don't think the first one will do much harm. If anything one could try to get back some of the lost trade rep with it, if it even counts if executed this way. Getting back trade rep goes very slowly anyway, as I still remember from the earlier days.

 

[Lanzelot]

Peace treaty reputation

Well, there is no such a thing. It means if you sign or renew a peace treaty and declare within 20 turns, you do not incur a rep hit, unless by doing so you break a gpt deal (within the same peace treaty or not).

So you could attack an AI, sign peace and get several cities, and break it immediately without a rep hit. However, many consider it an exploit.

I'm pretty sure that this is wrong?! I noticed in many GOTMs, that if I make a peace deal for 2-3 size-1 towns and then re-attack shortly after to take the remaining cities, the next victim (if he knows about my betrayal) is much less likely to give me towns for peace. Maybe I get 1 town in the next peace deal. And if I repeat the scam 2-3 times, I don't get any size-1 towns in peace deals anymore.
Since I noticed that, I make sure that either no one on the other continent will get contact to other civs on my continent, before I'm done conquering it (so no one can "tell the story"...), or to honor the 20 turn duration.

 

[tjs282]

Yes, exactly, that was (at least) one of the assertions that did not ring true for me when I first read that article, and which was also disputed in the associated discussion thread.

 

[Spoonwood]

I'm pretty sure that this is wrong?! I noticed in many GOTMs, that if I make a peace deal for 2-3 size-1 towns and then re-attack shortly after to take the remaining cities, the next victim (if he knows about my betrayal) is much less likely to give me towns for peace. Maybe I get 1 town in the next peace deal. And if I repeat the scam 2-3 times, I don't get any size-1 towns in peace deals anymore.
Since I noticed that, I make sure that either no one on the other continent will get contact to other civs on my continent, before I'm done conquering it (so no one can "tell the story"...), or to honor the 20 turn duration.

I just tested it.

In the first save, one can get 1 gpt for 18 gold after making peace with The Dutch.

In the second save, I have peace with The Dutch. I had declared war immediately after making peace with The Dutch. They won't even take 1 gpt for 1 gold!

 

[WeirdoJoker]

I was looking at the Civ3C3Cdata file that came with Civ3 Complete (for something else entirely) & noticed something under the Cossack entry that, in addition to Zone of Control, it also has a "Blitz." What is that? Have I been underutilizing the Cossack every time I play Russia?

 

[vmxa]

Blitz allows an additional attack normally. Tanks have blitz.