Weird AI behavior?

[mfisher12]

I'm playing with the latest patch of SRCW, in a sandbox game as South Africa. My original plan was to establish some sort of non-aligned empire on that continent featuring the most advanced economy and technology. (Upon reading more on this board it appears that remaining non-aligned may be a pipe dream, but I digress).

I ran out to 1954 and had good relations with both spheres. I could not manage any alliances, however, though I did convince Israel to sign a mutual defense treaty. I subsidized the Israeli military as they defeated Egypt and annexed them.

The problem in SRCW which does not exist in SR2020 is that most of the African continent has been colonized by Europe. You can't swing a recoilless rifle around without hitting a colonial power. This limits your options if you hope to maintain any sort of cordial relationship with anyone else or at least avoid going to war with a major power.

At any rate, when I felt I was strong enough I decided to go into "megalomania mode" and attack Angola. Angola is a colony of Portugal and Portugal is allied with the US, Canada, France, Britain, Italy and most of the rest of the West. I mainly just wanted to see what happened.

The invasion wasn't that difficult, though I also had to take on Mozambique on my eastern flank (another Portugese colony). As expected, Portugal declared war on me. But since I hadn't technically attacked anyone else, the British, French, Belgians, et al., didn't DOW. They just sent troops.

Lots and lots and lots of troops. See the screenshot below. My forces in Mozambique and Angola have been killing British, French, Canadian and Belgian troops whenever there is contact. Despite that, no one else has declared war on me. And now I see this immense line of merchant ships streaming from Europe and N America headed straight for Angola -- I cannot attack any of them in the open sea (at least, not a default attack and I haven't tried to specifically order the sinking of an Allied ship), but once they enter my territorial limits or Angola's, my air power and navy are wiping out the helpless merchant ships in droves. It's a turkey shoot.

And still no DOW.

I guess I just wanted to post this weird looking situation. I'm sure others have seen something similar. I have gone to war with many nations in SR2020 just by opening fire on one of their units, but apparently in SRCW it's open season on everyone as long as they're within an ally's colonial territory.

[number47]

It's not wierd, it's proxy warfare (WorkingAsDesigned)...all those countries are assisting their ally in a war against you. Proxy allows them to do it without declaring war on you. You can attack them only inside your or your enemies territory (proxy rules). Proxy (in your case) can be both bad and good. Bad in a way that your enemy can receive enormous amount of help from his allies and good in a way that you, fighting his allies through proxy raise your CB against them so when the time is right, you can DOW them with minimal repercussions (when CB hits 100%).

[mfisher12]

Thanks, number47.

As you can probably surmise, despite having played the Supreme Ruler games for years I haven't kept up with the rules changes in CW. My first few attempts at a campaign were the most boring exercises in my gaming history and I left CW in a corner of my hard drive, through mulitiple patches, while I played other games.

I have mixed feelings about proxy war - it adds another component of international tension (something CW needed), but I'm not sure I like it. In most cases it probably works quite well, but I enjoy playing improbable, unforeseen hypothetical history scenarios. Proxy wars adds an element that actually restricts my freedom to create havoc for better or for worse. I guess my main issue is trying to get my head around the idea of killing thousands of Commonwealth troops and all they do is send more troops to die. Kind of senseless, especially when it reduces the British, French and Belgian ability to deter a Soviet attack in Europe.

I won't have any trouble fending off that huge stream of troop ships headed my way for now, but I don't think I'll be able to talk Portugal into a peace treaty without many months of no combat and lots of economic bribes, if then. If the war raised my Defcon to max, giving me the efficiency bonuses, I wouldn't mind. But it doesn't seem to have any benefits other than allowing my enemy to bring in his big brothers.

Is there an article somewhere that explains the details of proxy wars? If I am no longer adjacent to any Portugese colonies will there be a period of relative peace? (unless Portugal is foolish enough to try an amphibious invasion - my air force would decimate them) Trying to invade Portugal and taking their capital is not a project within South Africa's means. Just looking down the road at how this might all be resolved with them and it's unclear.

One thing it has cleared up for me is whether I should try to take the British colonies near me. Short answer: no way in heck. The British army units stationed in Bechuanaland (Botswana) and Zimbabwe aren't shooting at me so I should probably just leave them alone for now unless I want to incur the full wrath of the Queen Mother.

[forumname]

If you will bide your time, many African colonies will gain their independence from Britain as actually occurred in a historical context. (and spoiler: Portugal will war/invade the South African area in the late 50's)

The worst place for the proxy effect, however, is the English channel.

For example if you are Russia, attacking France, any ships that attempt to traverse the channel will be decimated by the British and French (and others) ships, but will only return fire against French ships.


This is the part of proxy that seems broken to me. At sea, if attacked, units would defend themselves, regardless of the flag flown by the attacking ship.

I just absorb this situation as added "difficulty", even though it makes no sense whatsoever in the real world, or just declare war on the entire western hemisphere and western europe so that my ships will actually return fire.

[mfisher12]

Given the advanced dates of some of the national independence movements, I elected not to wait. My game is in 1954. Angola isn't independent until 1975. Zimbabwe in 1979. Mozambique in 1975. DR of Congo 1997. I don't have that much patience.

So I started a war I thought I could win. I still think I can win it with some patience. That massive stream of troop ships has abated, some of it turning and landing in DR Congo to invade overland. I'm fighting (and defeating) British, French, Belgian and American forces in northern Angola right now. And Mozambique is nearly finished now that I've taken the capital and routed the British and American forces there. I estimate at least one more year of war before the shooting stops.

I expect that once those two territories have fallen I'll sit tight, build my defenses (lots of units in repair) and try to diplomatically charm Portugal. I can't invade them, not within another 5 to 8 years of game time. I'd need to march north and take more of Africa, piss off the rest of the world and probably instigate a general war. Discretion is the better part of valor at this point, but one never knows when megalomania will strike again.