Undocumented benefits of having vassals

[roidesfoux]

In my most recent game, Wang Kon picked a fight with me, so I counterattacked until he capitulated. Much later in the game, I got Steam Power, and saw that the only source of coal I could reasonably get was from a barbarian city over on his borders. I sent a small army, which arrived just in time to see the Korean army conquer it. Then I got the message: "You have conquered <city>. What do you want to do with it?" Apparently vassals conquer cities for you.

The other (so far as I know) undocumented benefit that I know of is that under Mercantilism, you can still trade with your vassal's cities. What other benefits have people noticed?

-RdF

 

[Refar]

The Mercantilism / Foreighn trade from Vassal thing is known, but you are probably right about it beeing undocumented.

Vassals conquer cities for them self.
The situation you describe must have beeen a weird glich (which i never heard of so far). Or maybe your Vassal liberated the city to you - but i think the message would have been different then.

 

[roidesfoux]

They definitely didn't liberate it, as I had never possessed that city. I just glanced at the popup, but it seemed to be the same message that you get when you capture a city. And in fact, the message banner at the top of the screen said "You have captured <name>."

Unfortunately, the oldest autosave is the turn AFTER this happened, so I can't reproduce it.

 

[JujuLautre]

You can still get the previous autosave and replay your turn

 

[Nestorius]

Yep, I've seen that happen, too, with the patch before this one. My vassal immediately handed over to me a city it conquered.


Or, to be more precise, not my vassal, but a capitulated civ was doing this for me....

 

[Commodore Nate]

This happened to me as well. Although I'm not complaining-there was a "liberate to vassal" option as well as "Install a new governor..." and "BURN BABY BURN!"
And I must say that it's a good thing, since it allows you to keep vassals under your thumb.

 

[Refar]

They definitely didn't liberate it, as I had never possessed that city. I just glanced at the popup, but it seemed to be the same message that you get when you capture a city. And in fact, the message banner at the top of the screen said "You have captured <name>."

Unfortunately, the oldest autosave is the turn AFTER this happened, so I can't reproduce it.

You deont need to have had the city to get it liberated to you - just need to have some cultural influence there.

 

[blitzkrieg1980]

Refar, it appears as though others have seen this in their games as well. Perhaps it is a different patch than yours.

 

[KrikkitTwo]

It probably liberates to you IF you have more culture than your vassal there.

 

[DutchJob]

i had it too.

 

[LegionSteve]

There was a weird bug (one of many ) in 3:13 where if you captured a city it would sometimes automatically give it to your vassal without asking. Bhruic's patch fixed it. This sounds like the same thing in reverse.


I've never seen it happen that way but then I'm still playing 3:13 + Bhruics. Could all the people who have seen it please tell us what version it was in?

 

[foobarred]

Hate to resurrect this thread, but I was searching for a reason as I just had it happen in 3.19.

 

[sydhe]

Are you and Wang Kon on different continents and the city on a continent where you have a city and he doesn't?

 

[Oldlamehand]

The same thing happened to me. I have BTS version 3.19. My vassal (who
capitulated to me) captured barbarian city and I got exactly the same message and options as I get, when I capture city. I had no cultural influence in the cit before It happened. It was on Island far far away from my nearest city.
I wanted to give it to the vassal, but I had no option to liberate the city.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Thread necro, but yes this is common and AFAIK documented multiple times, though not neatly or where one could find it easily.

Undocumented penalties >>> undocumented benefits, especially before 3.19 where they are at least forced to trade techs as if friendly.

 

[Unconventional]

It might be kind off topic but I'd like to ask a question about vassals and their benefits.I was reading Sisituil's ALC game threads and noticed that he ordered his vassals to attack enemy cities and they did. I mean when I tell my vassals to do that I've never seen them doing it.They say 'We'll do our best!' but they don't do anything! Is it because my vassals are weaker than the enemy so they don't have the guts to attack, or something else? Any ideas?

 

[Ataxerxes]

It might be kind off topic but I'd like to ask a question about vassals and their benefits.I was reading Sisituil's ALC game threads and noticed that he ordered his vassals to attack enemy cities and they did. I mean when I tell my vassals to do that I've never seen them doing it.They say 'We'll do our best!' but they don't do anything! Is it because my vassals are weaker than the enemy so they don't have the guts to attack, or something else? Any ideas?

Your problem is more common than effective vassal attacks, in my opinion. It depends on who the vassal is. Some vassals are notorious for doing absolutely nothing in war, and, yes, the vassal could be weaker. Mansa, Gandhi for example vassal easily and do zilch in a war. They vassal themselves to somebody else so they can win culture while somebody protects them. Underhanded, but an effective strategy.

Sometimes, some of the AI's do make good attack dogs. The sociopathic unit spammers do this very well IF you can vassalize them without wrecking them. One AI that works well for me is Cathy. I've had wars where she took more cities than I did (admittedly not important ones).

 

[BigChiefLizzy]

Your problem is more common than effective vassal attacks, in my opinion. It depends on who the vassal is. Some vassals are notorious for doing absolutely nothing in war, and, yes, the vassal could be weaker. Mansa, Gandhi for example vassal easily and do zilch in a war. They vassal themselves to somebody else so they can win culture while somebody protects them. Underhanded, but an effective strategy.

Sometimes, some of the AI's do make good attack dogs. The sociopathic unit spammers do this very well IF you can vassalize them without wrecking them. One AI that works well for me is Cathy. I've had wars where she took more cities than I did (admittedly not important ones).

Shaka makes an excellent attack dog as well, for the reasons above, even better if you gift him military techs to get his forces 'Up to Date'.

However as you probably had to make him forcefully capitulate, be very careful to keep an eye on his land % etc compared to yours so you can check he is not about to break free and turn on you, 'biting the hand that feeds him'

Speaking from experience it's really bad news when you unleash him on ghandi and isabella, only for him to capture so many cities, so quickly, before you realise the danger that he breaks free.

And this is after I gifted him rifling and military tradition

 

[CHEESE!]

Refar, it appears as though others have seen this in their games as well. Perhaps it is a different patch than yours.

Refar just got a telling-to.