Why does France declare war on a peaceful (relatively) Germany?

[unmerged(99323)]

... in particular since any sane person just ups the domestic spies to 10, uses them to drive off every foreign spy (greatly reducing the chances of a smear campaign ever being used against them), and then stops bothering with this micromanagement hell for the rest of the game.

People actually do this?

I'll send spies for intelligence sometimes (less and less though) but I found pretty much the whole intelligence section to be way too much micromanagement (and money) for very little benefit so since the AI never managed to do anything remotely threatening, I just won't touch that part of the game...

 

[unmerged(13610)]

I always do it.

At the very least take my spies to 10 and eliminate the enemy, but almost always i wage avery active spying campaign. My best run to date was 5 consecutive succesful "steal blueprint" missions.

 

[Azazel]

I always do it.

Same here.

My best run to date was 5 consecutive succesful "steal blueprint" missions.

Very nice!
My best run so far is 3 consecutive successful "steal blueprint".

 

[Shadow Master]

In "my current game" tread, I have annexed Spain outright, accepted all event driven takeovers, and my bel is 50.

 

[unmerged(98135)]

Do You have any troops at the border to france? If not then France will Dow You even when You have little or almost no belligerance, (it just happened to me!). Load Your autosave, (hopefully only a month old ) , and place around 10-12 divisions in the regions bordering France. This should solve the problem and France will no longer be tempted to just dow you.
When war eventually breaks out do not be afraid to lose one or two of those provinces , just concentrate on finishing the war with Poland fast, then strategically move all Your troops to one of the bordering provinces and strike fast and hard and cut off his troops ...usually ends up with a pocket around 25-30 divisions. Now encircled and out of supply, hit them hard before they get any nasty ideas. The endresult is usually a Vichy france around the end of november, dependent on the number of panzers You have.

 

[Azazel]

Do You have any troops at the border to france? If not then France will Dow You even when You have little or almost no belligerance, (it just happened to me!).

That is strange, a democracy should not be able to DoW you a long as your belligerence is below their DoW threshold. Do you have the "Democracy can start war" option turned on?

 

[unmerged(48091)]

One of the AI nations could have inluenced the global opinion of Germany. I saw Japan Influence the Global opinion of USA recently. By early 38 USA had a beligerance of 54. They had not done a single thing. Germany is usually hit by 2% dissent spies, at least in my games. That is the single reason why i purge Germany of foreign spies. UK usually have about 10 spies in Germany by mid 37 in my games. I am not sure what France AI spy activity is set to do, but they might focus on Global opinion.

 

[Shadow Master]

Guys, this was figured out many posts ago!

I was playing at normal difficulty. The event happens regardless of difficulty setting. France is a socialist democrat that needs 64, I have 65 belligerence.

 

[unmerged(101730)]

Guys, this was figured out many posts ago!

Well, yes, but we still ask ourselves how a normally played, "peaceful (relatively) Germany" can have a badboy rating of sixty five before Barbarossa ...

 

[unmerged(105989)]

The only other way beside intel ops, and blatant other invasions, would be if the German player got stuck in a protracted war with someone. Doesn't "Hitler's little gift" on the BB scale work opposite in times of war? Though according to the OP, he didn't get involved with the SCW. The only thing I can think (besides intel) is that he got Nationalist spain into his alliance, and was unaware that he was at war with Republican spain, and then the war dragged on for a while.

 

[Shadow Master]

Well, yes, but we still ask ourselves how a normally played, "peaceful (relatively) Germany" can have a badboy rating of sixty five before Barbarossa ...

Good point.

The only other way beside intel ops, and blatant other invasions, would be if the German player got stuck in a protracted war with someone. Doesn't "Hitler's little gift" on the BB scale work opposite in times of war? Though according to the OP, he didn't get involved with the SCW. The only thing I can think (besides intel) is that he got Nationalist Spain into his alliance, and was unaware that he was at war with Republican Spain, and then the war dragged on for a while.

I have hit, and exceeded, 65 bel, but only by fighting and annexations which OP says he didn't do.

 

[Starcraftmazter]

If you're playing DAIM, France likes to declare war early, in 1938 if you don't have enough infantry. So if you plan on building just IC up until 1939, you should change your tactics and start off with 3 serial runs of infantries.