Why did this happen?

[Aries]

Ok im the Romans, and I share a continent with the Russians and the Iroquois. There are 9 other civs on two other continents. It is the end of the middle ages.

At one point I get fed up with Cathy’s insane demands and her constant trespassing and I declare war (without any troops in her territory, or any active trades). The next turn I sign a military alliance with the Iroquois against Russia (mostly to keep Russia from getting them on her side). We start kicking Cathy’s butt (she doesn’t have any iron) and eventually im just waiting for the military alliance to run out so I can sign a peace treaty with Russia.

The entire game up to this point ive had polite relations with all of the other civs, and have many active luxury trades going on (importing and exporting). In 950 B.C. all my relations (besides Russia) are polite. I hit enter to end my turn. During the AI turns I get the message “The rampaging Iroquois forces have wiped out the Russians”.

When its my turn again I notice that ALL of the civs are now annoyed with me, and even LARGE gifts (techs and/or luxuries) wont change them to polite. Why did this happen? Did I get a black mark on my reputation? If so, how could I have avoided this?

 

[Catt]

Originally posted by Aries
Ok im the Romans, and I share a continent with the Russians and the Iroquois. There are 9 other civs on two other continents. It is the end of the middle ages.

At one point I get fed up with Cathy’s insane demands and her constant trespassing and I declare war (without any troops in her territory, or any active trades). The next turn I sign a military alliance with the Iroquois against Russia (mostly to keep Russia from getting them on her side). We start kicking Cathy’s butt (she doesn’t have any iron) and eventually im just waiting for the military alliance to run out so I can sign a peace treaty with Russia.

The entire game up to this point ive had polite relations with all of the other civs, and have many active luxury trades going on (importing and exporting). In 950 B.C. all my relations (besides Russia) are polite. I hit enter to end my turn. During the AI turns I get the message “The rampaging Iroquois forces have wiped out the Russians”.

When its my turn again I notice that ALL of the civs are now annoyed with me, and even LARGE gifts (techs and/or luxuries) wont change them to polite. Why did this happen? Did I get a black mark on my reputation? If so, how could I have avoided this?

First off - there is an important distinction to be made here. "Reputation" and "Attitude" are two different things. Reputation refers to other civs' willingness to enter into "per turn" deals. Break a few per turn deals and your reputation is affected. Attitude is other civs' current state of mind towards you (Gracious -> Furious). Attitude can be affected by a number of factors - some that have nothing to do with breaking or keeping deals.

You can have a bad reputation and still enjoy a very positive attitude from a rival civ (i.e., I have had a Gracious civ, while smiling graciously at me, say something like "After what you did to the XXX, we cannot possibly enter into any such deal"). Similarly, you can have a spotless reputation, and suffer the heated glares of furious rivals.

Without knowing more about the specific example, I will hazard a guess or two regarding your situation. My first and best guess is that you are more powerful than the other civs - AI civs tend to have a bad attitude towards you if you are more powerful than they are. If you're the biggest, baddest civ on the block it will be difficult to maintain postive attitudes from your AI rivals. Did your successful war against Cathy allow you to become bigger and badder than the other civs on the crowded continent? Second (less likely guess) is that maybe Cathy had previously captured wortkers from the other civs, and you subsequently captured the workers from Cathy? If you have slaves from one civ working n your empire, that civ's attitude towards you will be more negative than it otherwise would.

 

[Aries]

thanks for the reply, catt

the war did make me more powerful than the others civs according to my military advisor. but the attitudes of all of the civs went from polite in 950 bc to annoyed in 925 bc (when the Iroquois eliminated them in between) and i didnt get any more powerful in that span (it had been at least 5 or 6 turns since i had conquered any cities or built any units), or really do anything at all on my turn in 950 bc. I have been using russian slave labor but did not capture any workers of other nationalities from russian cities. However, before the war started i had purchased workers from several other civs (greeks, americans and egyptians) and had used them without any damage to their attitudes toward me.

If it was just a case of me becoming more powerful i can understand, that has happened to me before, but the way that everyone went from polite to annoyed in the same turn that the iroquois eliminated the russians made me wonder if that was the cause, and if so why

 

[Cartouche Bee]

Did you raze any cities during that war? The other civs really hate that.

 

[Aries]

i razed all seven cities that i captured- but i hadnt done any war movements for at least 10 turns before the sudden change in attitudes- i was just waiting for the alliance to run out before signing a peace treaty. after razing those seven cities, everyones attudes were still polite for several turns. then the iroquois eliminate them and suddenly everyone is annoyed with me. i just dont understand why the attitudes switched when the iroquois eliminated the russians.

 

[Cartouche Bee]

Yes, but when the war ended or in this case the civ was finished off, the results from the war are then tabulated. It does not matter that you are in alliance or MPP or not, raze a city and the AI remembers.

 

[Catt]

Originally posted by Aries
If it was just a case of me becoming more powerful i can understand, that has happened to me before, but the way that everyone went from polite to annoyed in the same turn that the iroquois eliminated the russians made me wonder if that was the cause, and if so why

Interesting. And now that you mention it, I think I can recall experiencing a dramatic attitude adjustment at the conclusion of wars, even if I didn't break an alliance or do something else to sully my reputation and/or cause offense.

Anyone else got a theory?

 

[Parmenion]

In my experience eliminating another civ is always 'bad juju' as far as the rest of the world is concerned. Although it was the Iroquois who comitted the actual genocidal final attack, you are still viewed as being a baddie as you were at war with the Russians in an agreement with the Iroquois.
Look at it this way: If the US were to really hit certain Middle Eastern countries hard due to certain actions that are threatening national security, then not only would those Middle-Eastern nations view the US as being the Great Satan but they would also look unfavourably upon the allies of the US such as the UK and others of her western allies.
Thus you are as bad as the Iroquois who did the deed.

 

[kring]

Ypu declaring war is probably a factor since you are viewed as a warmonger. The razing cities also contributed as well.

 

[bobgote]

the razing cities is probably your trouble. eliminating a civ i think makes them respect you more, and they're less likely to bully you. But since you didn't eliminate them, this wouldn't apply anyway.

 

[kring]

Destroying a civ, or being part of the destruction, is less likely to be viewed more respectfully but instead fear that they will be next. Which based on many people's play style is accurate.

If I saw you destroy (either by yourself or with help) another civ, you would not get my respect, just me building massive amounts of units to prevent you doing it to me next.

 

[Catt]

What intrigues me about Aries' question is that the other AI civs were "polite" right up until the point that the Iroquois (not Aries) destroyed the Russians - their attitudes didn't slowly change with the razing of cities. Of course Aries was allied with the Iroquois against Russia, and so may be considered as the "destroyer" of Russia.

Is it the consensus view then (and can someone step up and say, after much experience, that it is not just opinion but fact) that the destruction of a civ deeply scars one's standing with the remaining civs? Or is it that attitude changes that flow from war-time behavior (razing cities) don't really take effect until the war concludes, on way or the other?

I will watch for this in the future in my games, but it seems to me to be a pretty important fact to know during gameplay (at least for those of us who try and avoid bad juju whenever the strategic and tactical environment allows ).

 

[Aries]

i agree cat and parmenion- since i was allied with the iroquois when the russians were exterminated, it must have affected everyone elses attitudes towards me. it also appears that my reputation was affected as well- now in order to make per turn trades (to obtain luxuries) i must pay MUCH higher prices than i did just ten turns ago.
It kind of sucks because i always try to keep a spotless reputation and play honorably (at least as far as no sneak attacks or breaking treaties and/or trades, and i only raze cities for the workers and to prevent them flipping back), but i definitely brought it upon myself by starting the war and then signing the alliance. i just had no idea the iroquois would be so successful in their campaign. lol

 

[kb2tvl]

from my experience, I have had civs go from furious to cautious after killing off a civ.

I have had civs go from polite to furious after disbanning some warriors and replacing them with conscript infantry...

I have had a civ go from furious to polite after sealing a deal where i play them $$/turn for a lux.

In any case, if you want to know if your rep is ruined, try for a per turn trade deal. If you cant get one where you pay no more than 10% more per turn, your rep is ruined.... that is, if the comp wants 1k for a lux, ask to give them 55 per turn and see if they bite...(try for lower amounts first. =) )

*edit*
ack almost forgot, attitudes can be related to their culature or your military strength. It can also be related to how they see you as a threat to winning. If you are a rising star, they want to push you down before you can become a threat to their country.

A comp will also attack if you have luxaries that they want for free. Depending on how advanced your neighbor is, that can be a reason.

 

[Chieftess]

I wonder if the allience had anything to do with it, since the other civs would see you taking part in destroying another civ. Even though the Iroquois did the destroying of the civ... maybe the other civs look at the allience as 1 civ, and any action the other civ does effects you.

 

[john heidle]

What I find most interesting about this discussion is how many players of Civ3, me included, can not understand diplomacy and reputation. Firaxis has done a very poor job explaining this and with their final 1.29 patch, we will never get any good understanding of how reputation is affected in the game.

How many of us have had these bizarre AI statements about how we mistreated country X when we never did anything to country X ? These may occur when a trade between two countries is broken by war events completely out of one's control, but a typical player is simply baffled by these AI statements. We can't understand why they happen and what we could do to prevent them. Present a problem but leave the player with no way to solve it.

Firaxis tried to improve Civ2's diplomacy with MPP and trade agreements, but like most of Civ3's 'improvements upon Civ2', they take a good idea, implement it poorly, and explained it even worse (ex. = culture). I love the Civ series but many of the design decisions for Civ3 were very poor:

-- the horrible F4 diplomacy screen
-- culture flipping without warning signs instead of emigration
-- fighting without Zones of Control or stacking limits resulting in stacks of doom wandering around

Civ3 is an interesting failure even though I'm been addicted to it since early January when I got a new PC. Firaxis made the game very confusing for most players and very tedious (trade negotiations with the getting closer message, trying to keep your cities in WLTK mode, pollution clearing and having to put your citizens back on tiles, using that wretched F4 diplo to figure anything out, etc.). Most of us love the Civ series and like the ideas incorporated into Civ3, but the implementation and explanation of the ideas may be turning off a lot of Civ players.

 

[bobgote]

I haven't had a problem after destroying a civ at all. My rep with the others doesn't change according to that, but more the other things i do (ie trade etc).

The foreign advisor comment i find most amusing is "We know ___ has betrayed our friends the french" when i never liked the french at all, in fact, i killed them off and oppressed their people for years. They don't seem to understand who my friends actually are.

 

[Gastric ReFlux]

Originally posted by bobgote


They don't seem to understand who my friends actually are.

Perhaps they subscribe to the theory the only good friend is a dead friend.

I must thank my friend Abraham Lincoln for building that GL for me at Emperor level which gave me about 8 techs when I took Washington.

 

[alpha wolf 64]

AI civs allied with you will be polite only as long as you have a common enemy. then they hate you. It just seems that the AI is destined to hate the human player no matter what.

 

[Catt]

Originally posted by alpha wolf 64
AI civs allied with you will be polite only as long as you have a common enemy. then they hate you. It just seems that the AI is destined to hate the human player no matter what.

Nah. I have AI civs "gracious" or "polite" to me all the time. It's harder to do when you're the biggest, most powerful civ on the block, but it is certainly doable.