Read the MPP Contract Before You Sign

[jshelr]

I've got a question about MPPs.

Persia was reborn on a pathetic spit of land in a current emporer game and has been forced to weather a continuous stream of attacks from larger, fortunately not very competent, neighbors for more than four millenia, meanwhile blessed with too few luxuries and possessing unhappy citizens in overabundance.

Having eliminated Greece, Rome made a MPP with my large southern neighbor China and immediately attacked my carefully fortified and forest-cleared choke point in the North.

Based on limited experience with MMP rules, I was careful only to fight on my turf. (Fighting both Rome and China would be suicide and the Alamo game is next in the cue. I can only take so much beating.) After five turns (I'm a bit slow on the uptake) it finally occurred to me that I might ask Mao for a MPP of our own. I was willing to pay up big time.

I pull up the MPP and RoP option and the message is "This probably will be acceptable." For free!!

Mao then declares on Rome even before Rome attacks again me on my turf.

Finally, the question: What the heck are the rules for an MPP?? I sort of vaguely know, but what is the actual contract I'm signing when I sign one and how often do these slimy leaders actually do what they promise?

[dunk]

MPPs to me seem somewhat poorly done.

What an MPP does is this:

1) If someone attacks a military unit for China, you must declare on that civ.

2) The reverse for China.

3) You must remain in the war until the MPP is disolved after 20 turns or you will take a reputation hit.

MPPs can be a pretty sleazy exploit. I avoid them like the plague unless I am in a situation similar to yours. Usually, if I sign one with a civ who is at peace with everyone, the next turn they declare war on someone, dragging me into it as well. I think they were meant to represent what Europe was like before WWI, with all those huge alliances that drug the entire continent into a war over an assassination.

[vondrack]

OK, a question here:

Suppose I am asked for an MPP. I sign it. Next turn, my new ally declares a war on somebody, forcing me to do the same. Do I take a reputation hit then? I mean, it is obvious that I do for the civ I am forced to declare war to, maybe for the allies of this civ, too. But what about those that are not directly, nor indirectly involved? Is being dragged into a conflict considered "bad"?

[dunk]

Well, declaring war doesn't really hurt your reputation unless you have a "per turn" deal (gold per turn, resource trade, alliance, ROP, another MPP, embargo) with the civ you just declared war on since the deal will be broken.

Which is why I avoid MPPs like the plague. And they can easily put you into a war which you are not ready for. As long as you have more power than Switzerland, you can take their role inthe world.

[DeepO]

Originally posted by vondrack
Suppose I am asked for an MPP. I sign it. Next turn, my new ally declares a war on somebody, forcing me to do the same.

When you are in a MPP, it doesn't mean that if your partner attacks, you are immediately involved in the war, your ally needs to be attacked for that. In many situations, you're ally wil not be attacked in the first turn, which gives you a bit of time to shuffle trades and further alliances.

But indeed, declaring war to come to someones rescue is not considered a bad thing, it's the loss of trades that is.

DeepO

[jshelr]

Questions:

What precisely does "your ally needs to be attacked" mean? Does it have to be on his home turf, or can it be a "defensive" attack on the turf of the civ your ally has attacked. (China let me "attack" Rome for five turns.)

How does the game decide who I'm at war with if I've MPPs with civs that begin a war? Is the target civ the civ that actually declares war? Or is territory where the conflict takes place the key factor?

Are you automatically at war with all civs that are already at war with any civ you sign an MPP with? How does cascading work when "everybody has MPPs with everybody?"

[Alex]

Very good questions here. I am a bit confused myself.

[DeepO]

Originally posted by jshelr
What precisely does "your ally needs to be attacked" mean? Does it have to be on his home turf, or can it be a "defensive" attack on the turf of the civ your ally has attacked. (China let me "attack" Rome for five turns.)

For an attack which triggers the MPP, it has to be within your cultural borders, not outside of them. Bombardment also counts: bombing something inside the cultural borders willl trigger MPPs, bombarding troops outside does not. I think there is only one exception to this, and those are colonies: destroying a colony also triggers the MPP (I think, but I haven't seen it for a while so I'm not sure).

This is important, as you are perfectly allowed to bombard e.g. ships, as long as they are not in their own territorial waters without provoking the MPP partners into the attack.

How does the game decide who I'm at war with if I've MPPs with civs that begin a war? Is the target civ the civ that actually declares war? Or is territory where the conflict takes place the key factor?

You can have a MPP with both sides, and when war breaks out you do not automatically have to chose sides. But, the first one that is being attacked on his territory will trigger the MPP, and you will side with him.

Are you automatically at war with all civs that are already at war with any civ you sign an MPP with? How does cascading work when "everybody has MPPs with everybody?"

See above. You are not automatically at war when signing a MPP, someone has to be attacked for that. Cascading the same thing, you need attacking sides for that.

One great way of starting a world war is that you sign MPPs with everyone who wants to. If you do this in the course of a few years, most AIs will sign MPPs of their own as well. If you then declare war to someone (preferably someone with a lot of MPPs), and bait him with a worker just inside of your territory that he can attack on the first turn, he will attack, and all of a sudden the whole world is fighting each other. If you plan it right, you can make it so that you're only at war with 2 or 3 AIs, while these are at war with 6-7 of their own. In such a highly MPPed world, never start the first fight or it has to be on your own territory (or outside of the enemy's territory to be precise), or everyone will start a war with you. Just one turn of defense, and the fun may commence

DeepO

[DeepO]

Oh, BTW, baiting the AI with a worker has another big advantage: even if you declare war, the first aggresive action will mean a big hit on the War weariness scale. If you are sneak attacked (thus someone declates war and has the first aggresive action), your happiness will go up. If you declare war and the other has the first attack, it more or less stays the same. If you both attack and declare war, your people will be a lot more unhappy the next turn. This, in combination with MPPs, is why I will always play a first defensive turn in the modern age, or I have to be sure that I can squash my target in just 2 or 3 turns.

DeepO

[Arrian]

Avoid MPPs unless you want to go to war. The AI will always drag you into one.

If your MPP partner attacks another civ and takes a city, and then that city (which is now theirs, within their cultural borders) takes a counterattack.... guess what - you're in a war.

I know that bombardment counts, by the way. I triggered a MPP (AI to AI) once when I bombarded my enemy's coastline with a Battleship to cut their oil.

-Arrian

[vondrack]

DeepO, thanks for clarifying this. I haven't seen it worded that understandably anywhere.

It seems that the model is actually acceptably reflecting the MPP, which is a Mutual Protection Pact... you can't fool another civ into your war, unless your chosen "victim" actually attacks you on your soil. Only if the AI was smart enough to realize it... and did not take the DeepO's worker bite...

[jshelr]

Thanks DeepO. One last question from me. Does the AI always obey the letter of the law on MPPs or is there some back stabbing involved from time to time?

[DeepO]

jshelr, there is no back stabbing, but in rare occasions I've seen MPP partners declaring war on me. But this will mean that they are the first to chose to go to war, not following someone else. If you only defend, no MPP partner is allowed to chose the other side when you are attacked.
And as MPP partners are mostly polite or better towards you, backstabbing is rare, and takes a b*stard AI to do it (I've seen it happening with the Russians twice, and once with the English I believe, and each time it was when I was nearly winning)

[Inverse Icarus]

i hate MPPs.

I swear the creators of civ3 made a "world war 1 era" in every game.

The second nationalism goes all around, everyone signs an etangling web of MPPs, and then someone sends a suicide warrior to start the war up.

[DeepO]

welll, I love MPPs

Not because they are good in protecting the peace, but because you can use them to your advantage when you're in need. In many of my games, a lot of MPPs get signed when nationalism is discovered, but as everybody is most of the time too busy building up their territory, it will take at least 20 turns before the first wars start... by this time I find a lot less MPPs, the AIs will grow tired of them.

But this depends on the situation, if they feel their threatened by your growing power, they will sign MPPs, and even start wars themselves. When this happens, the best thing to do is to sign MPPs of your own, and let them be the first to attack. After the first few turns, you can just sweep up what's left of them.

DeepO

[edited: too many typos]

[Catt]

Let me add my $0.02. It's been a while, but I'm pretty sure attacking a unit in its territory or in neutral / third party territory will trigger that unit's MPPs. In other words, you may safely attack all units within your own cultural borders without fear of triggering an MPP - but bombarding that pesky destroyer which keeps coming to shore, bombarding, and then evacuating into "international waters" will trigger the MPP.

Also, although the "must attack unit" rule is generally true, I've found that if I sign up an MPP while I am at war, and my enemy has units in my territory when I sign up the MPP, then my new MPP partner will immeidately declare war and come to my protection (as in jshelr's example) without an attack occuring. It may actually require that enemy units be in territory and have completed an attack (and used up all movement points?), because it doesn't seem like units in transit will always elicit the immediate declaration, but my point is that sometimes a partner's agreement to an MPP will result in an immediate declaration of war.

Finally, the MPP is the one treaty that simply can't be ignored - by you or the AI. The only way to end it before 20 turns run is to go to war with your MPP partner. You can freely make peace with a mutual enemy without destroying the MPP -- it will survive -- but you will almost assuredly be right back at war the next turn (and violate your 20-turn peace agreement) when the enemy attacks your MPP partner.

Catt

[DeepO]

Catt, I beg to differ regarding the attack in third party territory. I admit I'm not 100% sure as it was a couple of months ago, but in one of my games I was fighting off some civ (say the Germans) in another civ's (say the French) territory, when the French had MPPs with both me and the Germans. Eventually, the worker bait for the Germans made the French declare war. And neutral fighting surely does not trigger the MPP, that one I observed only a few weeks ago while ending MT IV.

However, it is entirely possible that the MPP partners declare war without being obliged by the system, that I saw happening many times before. When in a war, signing a MPP with a civ that wants a piece of the cake makes him declare war as well, because he feels backed by you. This does not mean that he is forced to, he just sees an opportunity to join. Many times, these MPPs are cheap, a MPP+ROP without any gpt is possible. In the cases where an AI does not really want to join the war, it is either extremely expensive (think 1000 gpt, a few techs, and lux), or simply not possible. Military aliances can be cheaper at that moment.

DeepO

[Catt]

Originally posted by DeepO
Catt, I beg to differ regarding the attack in third party territory. I admit I'm not 100% sure as it was a couple of months ago, but in one of my games I was fighting off some civ (say the Germans) in another civ's (say the French) territory, when the French had MPPs with both me and the Germans. Eventually, the worker bait for the Germans made the French declare war. And neutral fighting surely does not trigger the MPP, that one I observed only a few weeks ago while ending MT IV.

Could very well be true - I haven't run across the situation in a long time. I could have a bad memory (I think my wife would eliminate the "could" from that clause ) and/or it could have been an undocumented change in one of the patches - because I have a pretty clear memory (again - subject to my wife's caveat ) of attacking an enemy unit in unclaimed land and triggering an MPP. I was so surprised that I reloaded and ran a few experiments - bombarding / attacking ships in international waters, attacking units in 3rd party territory, etc. This was all a long time ago (could have been as far back as 1.16f or even 1.07f).

Maybe someone with access to the game could dig up a saved game and run a few quick experiments?

However, it is entirely possible that the MPP partners declare war without being obliged by the system, that I saw happening many times before. When in a war, signing a MPP with a civ that wants a piece of the cake makes him declare war as well, because he feels backed by you. This does not mean that he is forced to, he just sees an opportunity to join.

Good point - I hadn't considered that, and I'm sure it happens all the time.

Catt

[DeepO]

I have access to the game ATM, and would like to test it... however I'm in the middle of MT V(quite literally, it is still running in the background), and I can't remember if I have some game laying around where there were MPPs... I clean out my saves folder from time to time... I'll take a look when possible, because this intrigues me, if we both have different memories on this, someone's memory has to be wrong. And if your wife would know me, she might as well say my memory isn't very accurate from time to time neither

Now, if only I would remember when it happened in the MT IV game, it could look it up easily. But I have some 50 saves from that game wasting space on my HDD...

DeepO

[DeepO]

I just tested it (sorry it took a while ), and I was right. You can safely attack any unit in neutral, or in third party's territory without triggering the MPPs that unit's civ has. This includes bombing, so you can bomb enemy ships outside of their territorial waters without them triggering their MPPs.

There is one thing I didn't came around to test, as I couldn't find a good save, and that is whether it is allowed to bomb a hostile unit in the MPP partner's territory. I know you can attack it, and would think that bombing is also allowed (as long as you don't hit anything other than the unit, of course. If you bomb a road away you declare war!), but I'm not 100% sure.

DeepO

[Catt]

Thanks for checking when you could have been playing.

Catt

[Capt Dizle]

One of the gross flaws in Civ3 game design is that there are no factors that lead one into conflict other than the desire/need to get bigger and the inane diplomatic model. MPP bah!

Throughout the history of the world conflicts between civs/nations occured due to many factors none of which Firaxis managed to put in the game.

Maybe next time. At least some game developers are aware of this, in EU you had religion as an element of gameplay. Medieval Total War will have crusades. Firaxis thinks the sum effect of religion on world history amounts to a need to build temples.

I am not saying you couldn't make a good game out of the concept of having a temple building contest, but gee whiz.

[vondrack]

Originally posted by jimmytrick
One of the gross flaws in Civ3 game design is that there are no factors that lead one into conflict other than the desire/need to get bigger and the inane diplomatic model. MPP bah!

Throughout the history of the world conflicts between civs/nations occured due to many factors none of which Firaxis managed to put in the game.

Maybe next time. At least some game developers are aware of this, in EU you had religion as an element of gameplay. Medieval Total War will have crusades. Firaxis thinks the sum effect of religion on world history amounts to a need to build temples.

I am not saying you couldn't make a good game out of the concept of having a temple building contest, but gee whiz.

jt, I think this is a bit complicated...

For the HUMAN player, there are many practical reasons to go to a war against an AI - territory, resources, luxuries, techs, money... but these are just "sub-reasons" - everything boils down to winning the game eventually (which is the crucial difference from the real world, which you do not play "games to be won" in). I do not think it would make much sense to add religion to these... since humans would always know that the AI religion is just a set attribute. You could add the element, but it would be just another lame excuse for the humans to stomp upon the poor AIs.

OTOH, while the AI has exactly the same palette of reasons to fight the human, there are still cases in Civ3 when it declares war with no apparent reason - even worse, with no apparent possibility to gain ANYTHING. Although these wars are not explicitly called religious, I tend to understand (some of) them in this way... the AI simply does not like me, for one reason or another... it might be a nice touch if one of my Advisors told me that the actual reason for being attacked was that my nation believes in a different God, but I do not think it would be much more than cosmetics.

Or, how would you like to implement the element of religion?

[Capt Dizle]

Well, it really can't be implemented within the existing framework of the game.

You would need to start from scratch and redefine the gameplay. In Civ you control your population to such an extent that they are just objects.

It might be nice to find a civ-like game where you had to take your pops as you find them, where you find them. Building gameplay around controlling an empire of pops with differing ethnic and religious makeup might be interesting.

[dunk]

Originally posted by DeepO

When you are in a MPP, it doesn't mean that if your partner attacks, you are immediately involved in the war, your ally needs to be attacked for that. In many situations, you're ally wil not be attacked in the first turn, which gives you a bit of time to shuffle trades and further alliances.

True, but it will happen within 3 turns. I hardly ever sign MPPs. I will ROPs and MAs out the ying-yang, but never MPPs.