Wait, when did I declare war?

[Zaklog]

I'm playing Fall from Heaven 2 for my first extended game. (I had several false starts where I kept on getting trashed early on.) I'm playing as the Elohim led by Ethne. There is an entire web of alliances and vassal states. I have two vassal states and Thessa has one, namely Keelyn. I'm also teamed up with the Mercurians, whom I gated in, but chose not to take direct control of.

Everything is going fine. Almost the entire world is at war with Faeryl Viconia, including me, but I have no problem with that. Then all of a sudden, I start turn 405, and I'm told that I declared war on Keelyn, causing Thessa (who, if the power graph is accurate, could trash all of the rest of us by sneezing in our direction) to declare war on me, my vassal states and my teammate. The Armageddon Counter, btw, was at 14.

I looked carefully at the event log and it says that I declared war on Keelyn, and there was nothing before that. She didn't declare war on one of my allies, nothing. Just at turn 405, I involuntarily declare war on her, getting myself into a situation where I will be thoroughly destroyed.

Can anyone explain what's going on here? I'm attaching the save game file, if that helps to figure this out. If I can't undo this, I may have to abandon this game, which would suck, because up till now, things were getting interesting.

 

[civ-wrecked]

I'm at work and can't look at the save file but my guess is that Keelyn just adopted the evil religion causing an automatic DoW from the Mercurians.

 

[Jarrema]

Maybe not everything is lost yet?
Does Thessa follows a good religion? Like Order, Empyrian or Runes of Killmorph?
If so, she will strenghten your Mercurian allies with every ead unit of her. It may save you. Remember, that to some extent you can guide actions of Mercurian ally through the diplomation screen

 

[Zaklog]

A. If I declared war because the Mercurians had, wouldn't the event log first read the Mercurian's had declared war? It made no reference to my allies doing so first. Besides which, I don't think anyone had changed the state religion. Keelyn had founded Ashen Veil some 10 or 20 turns before, but had never switched. Which leads to . . .

B. No, neither Keelyn nor Thessa are following an inherently good religion. They are both adherents to the Fellowship of Leaves, as am I.

 

[Jarrema]

Maybe you have used some kind of area spell? and incidentally damaged one of Keelyn units?

 

[Breunor]

Maybe you have used some kind of area spell? and incidentally damaged one of Keelyn units?

That would be my first guess. Unfortunately, vassals can be tricky and I think they sometimes declare war and you can get caught in it, but I'm not sure about this point.

I can probably look at the save over the weekend and see if there is anything weird going on. One idea to try is to load before the DoW, and make sure you don't cast any area of effect spells (and hope your vassal doesn't either!).

DoW's can also occur because you are building the Tower of Mastery or the Altar, but then they would declare war on you.

Best wishes,

Breunor

 

[Breunor]

Zaklog,

I couldn't open your save file, it crashed when I tried. Are you sing the latest patch (o)?

Best wishes,

Breunor

 

[Zaklog]

What's the version number of the latest patch? I think I am, but I'll have to look at the build to make sure.

And no, I didn't cast any area of effect spells either. To be clear, I ran this several times from two or three turns earlier, and consistently when I got to 405, I (involuntarily) declared war.

I just realized that since I haven't used Sanctuary, I might be able to get through this, if I can negotiate peace before those 30 turns are up. I'd still like to know exactly what happened, though.

------
Edit: No, I was not running the latest patch. Now I am. . . .

Did I just lose all of my saved games?

 

[Breunor]

Alas yes, patch o breaks previous saves.

I strongly suspect that your vassal declared war and you got dragged in. Please note (if I understand correctly) that this feature is a core BtS feature, it isn't 'changed' in FfH.

Best wishes,

Breunor