Yet another warmonger question: Liberation War

[Booker]

Playing a marathon game I realized that Rome would win unless I did something since he'd conquered several capitals.

So.... A chance to declare liberation war came up and I took it. After a really good series of fights (he was better equipped than I'd realized) I was at the point where I could start rolling him up. Made a point of taking a city to keep followed by a city to liberate back to original owners; repeated this a total of 5 times. At the end of it the only warmonger penalty was -2.

Then I made peace with him and he ceded all the 5 cities I had taken for my own. Still looked good warmonger wise right after the peace was negotiated but the very next turn the warmonger penalty was now -50!!!

So what caused this huge jump? Was it the fact that I got him to cede the cities? Or just the mechanics of peace followed by a new turn? Anyone got any idea?

[Glemt]

I think it was the ceding. Liberation war negates penalties for cities you liberate, but nothing else. Since you took enemy cities they still belonged to your enemy until the war was over. Then you are either occupying them, or they are given to you (ceding), but both carry warmongering penalties. So I don't think you will be able to see the exact penalties until after the war.

[Omegilla]

Its stupid, but the fact is taking cities that Rome didn't conquer himself nets you warmonger. I mean, if you breathe in anyone's general direction you'll still be a warmonger, but thats how that scenario plays out.

But then again, theres a thousand things you could have done to net you warmonger penalty so who can say? Firaxis was more concerned taking down war mechanics because war-bad-peace-good that they didn't bother to really make the system knowable and there are no real alternatives since diplomacy is non-existent.

[Lemurian1972]

In a liberation war you have to give them back to their original owners. If you take cities that didn't belong to anyone other than the person you took them from and keep them for yourself, normal penalties apply. In the peace negotiations you don't mess around with .return or .cede. You just declare peace under whatever terms you agree to, without messing around with cities.

[BladeSe7en [ICON_RESOURCE_FURS]]

Glemt and lemurian1972 are both correct. Liberation Casus Belli nets you zero war monger penalties for liberating occupied cities. Your penalty jumped to -50 because you conquered and kept 5 of thier original cities

[blkbutterfly]

Always always always opt to capture settlers over cities

Even if you have to declare a formal war capturing settlers and using them to settle your own cities far outweighs possessing a foreign city.

Late game Protectorate and Liberation Wars are great cos you get the opportunity to raze cities (which should've been what you did) at NO warmonger penalty frequently. Just settle another city there quickly. (Late game shouldn't be difficult to build/buy a settler)

[Lemurian1972]

Originally posted by DI-blkbutterfly:

(which should've been what you did) at NO warmonger penalty frequently. Just settle another city there quickly)

Why? The game operates under the "what they don't know, won't piss them off" principle. If you're quick in the early game you could knock out a civ or even two, before you and they find several other opponents, and when that happens there's no warmonger penalties. No need to fart around with razing and replacing when no one else knows it is happening.

[blkbutterfly]

Originally posted by Lemurian1972:

Originally posted by DI-blkbutterfly:

(which should've been what you did) at NO warmonger penalty frequently. Just settle another city there quickly)

Why? The game operates under the "what they don't know, won't piss them off" principle. If you're quick in the early game you could knock out a civ or even two

Yeah, if you can eliminate the civ then yes, you can keep it. But I was talking about the example @Booker spoke of

[Booker]

After reading these replies (Thanks guys) I dug up an old savegame and made peace without getting Trajan to cede them. Sure enough, no warmonger penalties. Still left with a bunch of occupied and unproductive cities though.

So went back to my original game where I was able to start another liberation war against Trajan ( he'd declared war on Russia about 5 turns after I'd made peace with him and taken the Ruskies capital). This time I only retook the former Russian capital, handing it back to Peter and negotiated peace. My warmonger penalty went from the -33 to nothing. Nice'n'tidy

So, like so much else in this game, you have to manage warmongering. The mechanics of it are not particularly transparent but I guess thats part of the "Voyage of Discovery"