Client states

[RZZZA]

Im curious to know what your experience has been with client states. I know in earlier TW games they were notoriously unreliable and prone to betrayal. Early into my Macedon campaign, Athens is my client and has actually grown to be more powerful than me. They own 4 cities in Greece and I sstill have my original two. I'm quite merciful and will just subjugate my enemies rather than destroying them, especially since its so costly to occupy cities in this game. You have to spend a small fortune converting each building and dealing with an angry populace on top of that. Its just not worth it in the early game when money is tight. I've also made Tylis, the city to the East of me my client. I wonder if I should expect them all to backstab me soon or whether CA finally fixed this feature of the game and made client states reliable.

[HiguraShiki]

Surprisingly as Rome, the Ventii (think that's what they are called) willingly became my client state. They've actually been a decent help, defending some territories (though I do regret not taking the province since I now do not own the entire region.

[Sun Tsu]

In fact, i think that the client state- thing works better in Rome 2 then it did in most of the other total war games... client states become your vasal or satrapy... i like it better, and it works better...

[RedGuard]

yes they've seemed to have fixed the suicidal tendency of clients to turn on their vastly superior protector, but now it seems the reverse has become(a minor) problem. Now clients will stay clients long after they've become more powerful than the protector, but that can be fixed easily with tweaking. My problem with them so far has been that they drag me into useless and fruitless wars for me and try and fight everyone around them all at once.

[#TheTBNR™]

Remember the times when your loyalist allies and vassals turned on you in Shogun 2 just because you are too powerful? No more betrayal now!

[xjlxking]

My client states are very loyal. Heck, in my current playthrough as Rome, there are always a few of those weak regions where they beg me to take them as a client state. The only problem I see with client states is that they attack my other client states. I have various barbarian tribes as my client states for a long portion of the game. It's when 2 close client states are put together that they start to fight and you have to pick one

[Aelita]

The client states system is good but has two MAJOR flaws

1- CA took away the ability to resurect dead factions as your clients, this was one of my favorite features and allowed the player to set up buffer states in the exact spots they where needed
2- If you subjugate a faction by taking all their territory the factions diplomacy does NOT reset. It will remain at war with your allies/clients and remain allied to your enemies. There is no in game mecanism to ask your client states to stop fighting each other.

Apart from the above the system is improved. the fact small nations will even ask to become your clients is awesome and they tend to not back stab you

[daelin4]

Indeed, you can't seem to raise dead factions no more, it's only the faction you just killed off. That's kinda lame, especially since THOSE now clients retain old diiplomatic penalties and hate you. And yes, they DO turn on you the next turn like in previous TW games, likely because of this.

I said this before: clients can attack your allies, putting you in a frustrating dilemma. The only hope is to do just that- hope your allies and clients just so happen to become friends. If THEY have been fighting before, then any hope is gone.

In Shogun2 this was a simple resolution- vassals cannot declare war on anyone. They fight whoever their masters fight, period. I like how that worked.

It's always those little things that really ruin the rest of the system.

[Ataegina]

about the second one, the faction only dies and gets removed from diplomacy if you kill the last army or navy. you can conquer all regions but the faction will still alive and can reclaim the lands back. so make sure the faction is 100% removed, regions and armies.

[RedGuard]

nevermind

[RZZZA]

Yeah I noticed that too, it's a real shame that client states don't reset their diplomacy after you subjugate them. I had my client Athens destroy one of my only allies because of this. There should be a way to tell client states to knock it off and attack only who you want attacked.

[BigEl_nobody]

You can´t resurrect factions as your clients??? And what is the Liberate option for when you take a settlement of a dead faction? I did that twice, liberated two cities from the arverni, resurrected both factions as my allies with a very good relationship...

On top of the client state mechanic, I also think they really improved the diplomacy in the game, especially you see now why exactly you have a good or a bad relationship to other factions!

[brandbll]

As Carthage my client states have been completely loyal. Even Carthago Nova who asked me every three turns to join it in war and was rejected, stood by my side the whole time.

[RZZZA]

So I guess the next question to ask would be...has ANYONE had a client state betray them?

[DogSoldierSPQR]

Yeah, Tylis as Macedon. Right at the start, they send you a request to be your client state. Several turns down the line they build a massive army to take you down and just backstab you. It seems rigged to me because they have asked me twice in two Macedon campaigns I have started right at the beginning.

[Aelita]

BigEl_nobody- the liberate option only exists for barbarian factions but does not make the iberated factions client states (barbarians can't have them) what CA did was basicly take a great feature and broke it up in to several less good (and in the case of client states broken) features. I really don't like the decision and hope a future patch returns the ability to resurect as clients/satraps for non-barbarian factions

RZZZA- Yes, Rhodes betrayed me after i subjugated them as rome but only because of the diplomacy not resetting (aka because the mechanic is flawed/broken/poorly designed) however any client states gained through diplomacy has not betrayed me

[Nota']

I like the current mechanics apart from the fact that they will stay at war with your allies. A subjugated state isn't exactly gonna love you for subjugating them are they?

[Cold_Mac]

The Celtici offered it to me, the next 10 rounds ended in various factions getting attacked by them As I was Egypt, betrayal was a bit off. Generally loyal, although Sparta cancelled their defensive alliance.

[RZZZA]

Well I can see the system is still quite broken. I had the Odrysian Kingdom agree to become my client despite having a larger army than me. They took one of my cities, I took one of theirs, then they offered a peace treaty and I counter offered with a client state proposal and to my surprise they accepted.

I now have only 2 cities on the Greek peninsula but am surrounded by client states, most of which are stronger than me. A bit odd. Seems CA went to the other extreme this time, instead of nobody agreeing to be a client state now they have everyone agreeing to be one.

[RZZZA]

Well I can see the system is still quite broken. I had the Odrysian Kingdom agree to become my client despite having a larger army than me. They took one of my cities, I took one of theirs, then they offered a peace treaty and I counter offered with a client state proposal and to my surprise they accepted.

I now have only 2 cities on the Greek peninsula but am surrounded by client states, most of which are stronger than me. A bit odd. Seems CA went to the other extreme this time, instead of nobody agreeing to be a client state now they have everyone agreeing to be one.