What does cede city do?

[hobbes94]

I am playing the vanilla Civ 6 version and are confused by this option in peace treaties. When the AI cedes their cities to you, after the peace treaty you still get a 18 point penalty with them for occupying one of their cities.
Whether they cede a city to you or not after the peace treaty its status will change from 'Occupied' to a normal city.
I really cannot see the point of the cede city option.

[kbmodigity]

If they dont cede the city to you then even if you took it over in war it will go back to them after the war. For you to own the city after the war they need to cede the city to you or you need to completely wipe them out.

[leandrombraz]

You can't see the point because there isn't one, cede is completely useless in the base game and R&F, you should never ask the AI to cede cities to you. When you conquer a city, you get half the warmonger penalty for doing it, then the other half when the AI cede the city to you, so if you ask the AI to cede, you're hurting yourself and getting nothing in return. Just don't do it, ignore cede.

The mechanic make sense in Gathering Storm because cede is automatically added to deal. Removing it add "return city" to your side of the deal, so you either ask to cede or you return the city.

The -18 "you occupy one of our cities" diplomatic penalty has nothing to do with cede, even though it seems logical. You remove that penalty by giving a city to the AI, only one city and it can be any city, either in the peace deal or later in a normal trade. I usually conquer one more city than I plan to keep and then I give it back to the AI, to remove the penalty. You can also settle a city nowhere and give it to them. Just give a city, the penalty is removed, everybody is happy and the cede mechanic still sit there, useless, unless you have gathering storm, then you're forced to cede.

[leandrombraz]

Originally posted by kbmodigity:

If they dont cede the city to you then even if you took it over in war it will go back to them after the war. For you to own the city after the war they need to cede the city to you or you need to completely wipe them out.

It works like that only in Gathering storm, in the base game and R&F you aren't forced to ask to cede, you add it to the deal if you want.

[kbmodigity]

Originally posted by leandrombraz:

Originally posted by kbmodigity:

If they dont cede the city to you then even if you took it over in war it will go back to them after the war. For you to own the city after the war they need to cede the city to you or you need to completely wipe them out.

It works like that only in Gathering storm, in the base game and R&F you aren't forced to ask to cede, you add it to the deal if you want.

Didnt know that,, thanks, my friend just got me gathering storm and I thought something had changed.