Gunboat diplomacy: Does it work passively, or actively?

[mfly6148]

So for the first time I've adopted the Autocracy ideology, and just picked up gunboat diplomacy. How does it work? Do I just park some military units in the vicinity of some CS's and wait? or do i have to actually interact with the CS -demand tribute, etc?

[Austellus]

Passively. If you hover over the city state and it mentions that they recognise your military strength and will give in to tribute demands, you'll get the bonus.

[mfly6148]

Ah, ok! thanks; that's good to know. :)

[di eshor ribly]

I usually end up parking a single Missile Cruiser armed with Nuclear Missiles near city states. They ally with me pretty quick after that. Quite possibly my favorite way to make 'friends' with CS that involves almost no effort after you get it.

[Jimib4158]

OMG ...so funny wwhen you do hav a nuke, your rival friendly civs go from friendly to afraid

[mfly6148]

Good times. In my current game, almost all my military assets are being used to try to take down Siam's capital (it's a tough nut to crack), but as soon as I've taken it (or when there's a peace agreement), I'm off to impress the CS of the world...

[Austellus]

Siam is a worrying one. They act so friendly while they buy out all the city states then turn on you. Last time I was up against them the entire second half of the game was a terrifying cold war as we both built bigger and bigger armies which were sat on our border. Must have had a few dozen units each by the end, and both armed with nukes.

[mfly6148]

Indeed! Siam is one of my *least* favorite civs to have in the game. Usually they're very expansionistic, and competing for most / all of the same wonders.

[m.d.nealy]

The closer the CS is to one of your cities the more likely they will fear your military. Sometimes I build a new city around a cluster of distant CS and or send a Navy to give them something to fear. I love the gun boat policy.

[mfly6148]

Good idea, m.d.!
EDIT: i often take Freedom, and really like the treaty organization tenet there. But I'm appreciating how this gunboat diplomacy works. The major downside seems to be that if you're actively at war, many of your units are going to be otherwise occupies - too busy to 'babysit' CS....

[gia]

passively due to size of military compared to enemies
actively if you move units nearby to speed this up (you have to have a lot of units for the passive to do all/most of the the job by itself)

what Im not sure is that once the city state is "scared" they dont seem to lower their scare, so you can move your units to the next city state (city states start with a gunboat scare factor of +3 or somehting like that, it doesnt really move until you move units close and raise the "nearby military factor to +50", once they get scared it raises and then if you move your units away the gunboat bonus stays

maybe th emilitary of allie dcity states counts? so clusters will apply the fear on each other

[Ainsley]

theres a modifier for it if you read it. it also actually makes it harder to keep that bonus with them if you demand tribute because they become more immune to it happening again

[mfly6148]

Originally posted by a big fat hairy gorilla:

theres a modifier for it if you read it. it also actually makes it harder to keep that bonus with them if you demand tribute because they become more immune to it happening again

Does this also apply to those annoying CIVs (like Attila, and others) who constantly demand tribute from 'your little friend, CS X, who is so easy to push around'? I might be less inclined to attack that CIV for bullying my CS ally, if I knew that their bullying carried its own punishment. I guess I'm thinking not of gunboat diplomacy (Attila et al start demanding tribute of CS way before ideologies) but of the CS becoming immune to tribute demands. A little off-topic, but I've been wondering about that.

[AceTheGreat]

I can tell you, it's effective for city states near your borders.
I have a few with 500+ influence.