When do we get a warlords epic?

[Iustus]

Ah If the Vassal seeked a master voluntarily then his master joins the war!

So in my game(s) he was forced into vassalage by my ally which resulted in peace and in yours( and others games) they sought a Master to protect them and so the master declared war to save his new vassal.

Right.

The first report I read about this mentioned an ally which turned to be an enemy guess it was only a peacetime-ally then.

Right.

If the 'ally' was Alexander, then he would have to be FRIENDLY, not even PLEASED is enough to stop him from turning on you, as can be seen from the file CIV4LeaderHeadInfos.xml (in assets/xml/)

Another possible fix is to actually do something more sophisticated with the comparisons of attitudes amongst the various parties.

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I actually found what I think is another bug with the whole thing. If I am reading the code correctly, then there is no random check, or basically any decision process at all for an AI to decide when to offer itself as a vassal.

As soon as it can, and every turn thereafter, every single AI will automatically ask every civ it can to be its master. AIs are prefered over humans, lower numbered civs are asked first.

I swear I must be missing something, because this cannot be right, but I cannot find it.

Human players are only asked once every CONTACT_PERMANENT_ALLIANCE turns (from the xml), but AI players are asked every turn.

There is not even a check about power that I can find. So if I am reading it correctly, it is just as likely for a powerful civ to become a vassal of a weak civ as the reverse (voluntarily).

However, 10 turns later, it will cancel the deal if it values it as poor. Has anyone seen a lot of vassals happening then canceling 10 turns later? I swear I must be missing something.

AI_considerOffer is called on deals against human players to cancel them if they are no longer good.

getTradeDenial is called on AI vs AI deals to cancel them if they are no longer good.

Both are done on voluntary vassal deals.

But neither call is made, as far as I can see, when the first deal is proposed (or accepted if it is asking a computer AI)

I did not step through the code as it was running, so it is entirely possible I missed something.

-Iustus

[Qwack]

Alexman on civfanatics said patch will be released around mid-october. It would be nice to have some adventures when the vassal states feature is fixed in the patch

[edit] UG already beat me to it

[Rowain]

I actually found what I think is another bug with the whole thing. If I am reading the code correctly, then there is no random check, or basically any decision process at all for an AI to decide when to offer itself as a vassal.

As soon as it can, and every turn thereafter, every single AI will automatically ask every civ it can to be its master. AIs are prefered over humans, lower numbered civs are asked first.

I swear I must be missing something, because this cannot be right, but I cannot find it.

-Iustus

I guess there is something missing because in all my games I have not seen a strong AI becoming the Vassal of another AI.
I have seen AI becomming vassal of the AI that did stomp on it.
I have once been asked to become Master of an AI that was just at war with 2 bigdogs and got nearly extinct. After I declined it became vassal of one of his enemies.
But peacefull Vassalage I have not seen yet.

[Dunedine]

I am going to wait until Civilization: Chronicles is released before I get Warlords along with all the other goodies. It comes out in October, so right about when I get it the patch will be released. It works out perfectly

[T-hawk]

Otherwise, they will eventually try to find another master, lets say Whyatia, who will declare war with you if they accept Examandia as their vassel.

Here's what I think is the missing link in all this. The player should be given the option of making PEACE when a target civ becomes the vassal of someone else. You should have the choice between prosecuting your war against the new combined entity, or relenting and not taking on a powerful master.

Let's use the Korean War to illustrate a real-world pseudo-example. If the United States was at war with North Korea, and hypothetically North Korea became a vassal state of China, the United States should be able and smart enough to immediately make peace with the new bloc rather than automatically going to war.

The concept of "protection" by a vassal master can and should be implemented also as peacetime deterrent, not only as hot military war.

[Qwack]

t-hawk, I believe thats the thing which will be fixed in the patch. I have had to play my warlords games with vassal states off due to this bug, but it being fixed will be very nice.

[dsplaisted]

I am going to wait until Civilization: Chronicles is released before I get Warlords along with all the other goodies. It comes out in October, so right about when I get it the patch will be released. It works out perfectly

I'm almost certain that Chronicles does NOT inlude warlords.

[Strauss]

Indeed:

The only item not included in the box set is the Civ4 Warlords expansion pack.

[EricStratton]

Again, I know my opinion ranks pretty low on the totem pole since I haven't officially played an Adventure or Epic (I gave Ad13 a shot on my own) but waiting for a Warlords patch (which is only a month or so away) before starting Warlords games doesn't sound like a terrible idea.

I still think there might be a problem w/ calculating a combat winner but I'm far from a Civ expert and would rather hear from more experienced and better players before declaring anything.

[Iustus]

Here's what I think is the missing link in all this. The player should be given the option of making PEACE when a target civ becomes the vassal of someone else. You should have the choice between prosecuting your war against the new combined entity, or relenting and not taking on a powerful master.

Let's use the Korean War to illustrate a real-world pseudo-example. If the United States was at war with North Korea, and hypothetically North Korea became a vassal state of China, the United States should be able and smart enough to immediately make peace with the new bloc rather than automatically going to war.

The concept of "protection" by a vassal master can and should be implemented also as peacetime deterrent, not only as hot military war.

From what I can tell, this is not the approach Firaxis is taking in their fix.

While this would be nice, I am not certain your real world example applies in many real world cases.

I think there are plenty of real world examples of the reverse. A regional conflict escalates when first one side, then the other team up with a big brother to aid in their war. When troops are in the trenches fighting, the other side might not know you have a new ally until that ally starts shooting.

The exception is when the enemy wants peace, and itself asks for peace from you with the threat of its new alliance. This is the aspect that would be missing, the possiblity that your enemy might demand peace in the same breath as mentioning its new alliance. In Warlords, like in many (but not all) real world conflicts, one the big brother is called in, the little guy no longer has a say in when the war ends.

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I have been reading up on other bugs in vassal states and I would agree that at a minimum this feature should be turned off for any events prior to the upcoming patch. That said, the patch is so soon (less than a month), I am not sure there is even time to fit in a new adventure prior to the patch release.

The patch also addresses Trebuchets by increasing the number of hammers they cost, making them more expensive than Macemen.

-Iustus