Territorial Authority - Firaxis fix it! It stinks!!!!

[Lt. 'Killer' M.]

I cannot believe this! I always had a certain feeling that the rules for when you have to leave right away or declare war and the for when the AI has to do so are not equal, but what happened jsut now really takes the cake!


The usual, a unit is suddenly landed on my shore despite England having bought my map the previous turn. They want war - I already know that. Luckily, there is a Swordsman handy to throw the bloody bastard into the sea.

So I talk to Liz, and, no surprise, I cannot force her to leave immediately.

Next turn: the Horseman has moved, but now he is next to a city, second turn on my territory, now I surely can throw him out!.....

NOPE!

to my utter surprise he is here to stay!!!!! If I land troops, more often than not I have to leave right away on the first turn, even if it is a lone worker, but I alway have to go on the second turn. But somehow, Liz can do thing a human simply can't.

Now he is threatening a worker that cannot escape and is out of range of all attackers I have nearby. Surprise surprise, now I can throw him out!

What will Liz answer?????

what else


Firaxis - the way these things are handeled is absolutely ridiculous!!!!!

Please fix that, give us both options to choose from all the time! After all, the AI manages very well to keep my units out of its territory - I want to have the same capabilities!

 

[narmox]

give us both options to choose from all the time! After all, the AI manages very well to keep my units out of its territory - I want to have the same capabilities!

I agree. It seems a little random. sometimes I rarely see the option, sometimes I always see it without even going throug the "please leave, please please please please" option (which of course means the AI doesn't leave even if they accept).

 

[Catt]

It usually takes me three turns to get to the "Leave or Declare War" option - BUT, I thought that the "War" option always appeared when a military unit ended its turn next to a city (as happened in your example in turn 2). I guess not.


BTW - shouldn't this post go in the Newbie or FAQ thread?

 

[Lt. 'Killer' M.]

Catt: it should

 

[mad_stork]

It seems to me that you don't get the option to force them to leave or declare war until the AI can achieve it's "goal." In this case the AI goal was to get to your worker (we all know how the AI loves workers), but I've seen the AI walk right next to one of my cities and I can't force it to leave until it gets to the other side, thus letting it jump to land it couldn't get to without going through my territory. I'm sure that in that case the goal of the AI was to get across my territory so it could build a city on the other side!

I agree that we should always have the option to force them to leave or declare war, but since the odds of that happening are pretty slim, hopefully someone from Firaxis will go on record and tell us what criteria have to be met to get the option to force them to leave.

 

[Lt. 'Killer' M.]

mad_stork: absurd as it may seem, but that Horseman attacked the fortified Spearman in the city, retreated and gave me a promotion when I killed him.

Another related thing i posted waaaaaay back: if an AI unit has a goto to a certain tile, a unit of the human player that has to leave cannot jump to that tile despite it being empty. That way, an AI managed to block a two-tile isthmus to my Impis - they had to go two tiels back instead of one tile further on (where I wanted them to jump to).......


All in all, the 'leave-right-now'-thing is absurd, as is the AIs willingness to ignore borders.

on the other hand I have indeed seen games where AIs have held back - in one the Zulus respected my borders for over 3000 years. only when i gave them ROP did they start hunting barbarians on the other side of my territory.

 

[Qitai]

You don't get the leve or declare war thing if you send just one attacking unit into AI territory. But I think it last only a turn. But this needs further testing. Sending more then one gets the leave or declare war thing right away.

 

[Lt. 'Killer' M.]

Quitai: thanx, i didn't know that exactly.

 

[Lt. 'Killer' M.]

wait a minute - that means I can land 1 Modern Armour, move it up to a city and then blitz down three defenders and take it without the AI having a chance to throw me out before - ridiculous!!!!

 

[Dynamic Cow]

nah... its just logistics, really.

 

[Tassadar]

This is the second most annoying thing in civ3, different rule for human and a.i. Ridiculous sure, i agree with you 100%. That s another reason why i became a genocidal maniacs in this game.

Now everytime an a.i. fool around( settler with spearman,ect..) I DECLARE war, even if iam a republic, raze 1 or 2 a.i. city and then you can get several gold per turn from them for peacekeeping. If they do that again, declare war again, raze another 1-2 city and collect gold. Beleive me that weaken them a lots, they lost settler after settler( which decrease their city size) and when peace come they have to pay you.

This is the way to handle those cheater a.i.

 

[Scientia]

In my current game, I had a ROP with Rome, who had been "polite" the entire game. The classic trademark of a pending AI "sneak" attack is when they land a large stack of forces on your main continent (hey, just visiting . . . . yeah right)

So I figure that I'll force their hand and take away the initiative. I cancel the ROP (fortunately, it had already exceeded 20 turns and was not renegotiated). Now I figure that since there are foreigners on my soil without a ROP, I should see the "remove your forces or declare war" option when conducting diplomacy.

Nope. No dice.

I was hoping on provoking them into declaring war so I could obliterate their forces on my turn without a reputation hit.

Oh well. I pretended to act surprised when they attacked immediately after I ened my turn.

To be really mean, I should have renegotiated the ROP with a huge GPT deal so that they really fouled up their reputation. With my luck though they probably would have got back on the transport.

 

[Crow T Robot]

My experimentation has led me to believe the WAR option is offered as a function of the aggregate attack strength, number of units encroaching and the distance inside the territory they are.

This is why an explorer can wander all over with no war ultimatum. Leave him camped too long in one spot though and the MOVE or WAR ultiumatum DOES get issued.

I often split empires in two weakening them by passive resource denial. The AI will then send workers from East France to West France to do stuff. It is difficult to eject one worker (though they can survey the terrain and develop a map as well as any mil unit); even when the AI sends 10 they have to move 2 or 3 tiles into your space before the ultimatum is available.

In some cases, you can USE the ultimatum to get places quicker. Trickle 4 or 5 workers towards the East then in 3 turns have a Cav unit follow behind. When you decline to declare war, the first workers get jumped to the East, the Cav unit and other workers get jumped back to the west. I use it and the AI has too at times.

Send a lone warrior and he can wander farther and deeper than most other units. Let a Modern Armour touch a blade of Egyptian grass though and the ultimatums fly.

It *seems* like it is a 'next to the city' condition because it often takes 1 to 3 moves to get next to the city. And if you are creeping up to attack, you didnt send a lone warrior but 5 swordsmen making the ultimatum come sooner.

In the case presented, a single horseman is not a gigantic threat so he can get further than a platoon size force.

I dont think it is a case of different rules for AI vs peeps, but that we dont know the precise conditions that trigger it. I wouldnt expect the ultimatum to come for a single horseman until he was 3-4 tiles deep.

 

[Mad Bomber]

I'M sorry, But I really don't see the problem here, If I know that the A.I is up to something I will only ask twice, If they do not leave then I just renegotiate the peace treaty. Fight wars on your terms, not the A.I.'s

 

[Lt. 'Killer' M.]

Mad Bomber: the problem is that even signing a ROP will not help sometimes. The AI can wander into your land, happily signing treaties you know it will break, then strike on ITS terms.

imagine this in reality: a group of heavily armed Germans starts running around the East Coast. Asked what the **** they want they promise to leave, but instead start heading further inland....... what would the US do???????


Arrest them and kick them out!!!! But no, if they do that, in Civ3 it is considered treaty breaking!

 

[Tassadar]

Originally posted by Lt. 'Killer' M.



Arrest them and kick them out!!!! But no, if they do that, in Civ3 it is considered treaty breaking!

Our human history is full secret treaty and betrayal, the brithish in medieval era were pretty good at it. Sometime it is better to break a treaty than beeing backstabed, it is matter of survival sometimes.

So me i dont care about breaking a treaty ( i feel like Mister W) if i can get an adventage on attack. The best defense is a strong attack.

 

[Lt. 'Killer' M.]

Tassadar: then you are limited to one kind of play: conquest.

 

[Tassadar]

Originally posted by Lt. 'Killer' M.
Tassadar: then you are limited to one kind of play: conquest.

Ya i know, in my hall of fame i got several " Master the conqueror).

IMO it is much more fun than trying to manage cultur flip or trying to keep a good reputation while a.i. backstab you without reputation hit. When i razed about 6 a.i form the map i feel great.

If i remember well, in civ 2 we were not allowed to raze city( disband with settler ok but not raze with military units) so this razing option is in the spirit of this game.

 

[Lt. 'Killer' M.]

Originally posted by Tassadar

If i remember well, in civ 2 we were not allowed to raze city( disband with settler ok but not raze with military units) so this razing option is in the spirit of this game.

spirit

 

[Qitai]

And yes, Crow T Robot is right that if your troop is able to get beside a city on turn 1, you may still get the leave or declare thing. The precise rule bluff me as well. But total unit strength, proximity to city and length of time seems to the three factor that affects the ultiumatum.

One way to test if the game is fair. Do what the AI do and see if you get the same treatment. So far we know a few "AI advantages". And on this terrority right thing, settlers leaving on the otherside of your border seems to be the obvious unfairness I see so far. I do suspect though that AI gets the ultiumatum earlier then human players, maybe due to the turn rotation thing. But the even if there is any advantage, it is at most slight. I always get to ask them to leave or declare if there are at least 2-3 combat units on my grounds. So no problem there.

Maybe someone can do a detail research on this.