Diplomacy "What's it good for"

[rah]

Ok, I want to hear the stories on the highest score your relationship was with when they declared war on you.

Last night I was playing bts, aggressive AI, random personality.
I even did the crappy build castles quest to get a +3 with everyone. Never will waste my time on that again.

I'm the egyptians, starting next to the native americans.
Friends from the beginning. Sharing religions, blah blah blah, married daughters blah blah blah.
So they go to war with our neighbor roosevelt. And ask me to join. NO PROBLEM FOR MY FRIEND

My mod is up to +17. I'm well a head on points and considerably up on the power graph.

So I move a stack out of my territory to support a city attack that he's doing and the next turn he declares war on me. WTF is that. I even checked to see if he changed religions that turn, (he didn't)

Now granted I'm used to getting backstabbed but +17 and you're supporting his war effort.

Of course I just swatted him down and within 5 turns every one of his neighbors could smell the blood and moved in for the kill so he's down to a couple of cities soon to be eliminated.

But again, why should I put any effort into diplomacy when it really doesn't matter. You can always find trade partners.

Ok so what's the highest mod you've ever had when you got backstabbed? (please don't bother listing it if you were on the bottom of the power graph and every other civ was laughing at you behind your back.)

[jbp26]

i think it was around +10. the real kicker was, i had a defensive pact iwth the person who declared war on me, and i was #1 in score, #3 in power. also it was saladin, not one of the bloodthirsty civs.

[BigWilly1974]

I think it was +11, and it was last night. Catherine attacked me (Survayman II/Khmer). Shared religions and all that.

Monarchy level, aggressive AI. It was around 800 AD, and I was well out in front in score, so I'm assuming that is why I got attacked. Meanwhile I was already engaged with the Incans, and 2 turns later Shaka jumped on me on the other front. I'm now down three cities, and tied with Catherine in score after she took 3 cities from me I'd only very recently pilfered from the Germans.

But her attack on me was I believe the first time I'd ever had someone attack me when the relationship was "Pleased".

[JimMac]

Re: Diplomacy "What's it good for"

I think you are all being far too understanding! This simply shouldn't happen, in my view.

As you say rah:

why should I put any effort into diplomacy when it really doesn't matter.

Diplomacy SHOULD matter, otherwise I may as well play a simple Empires-type war game.

I wonder if it a symptom of Aggressive AI?

[Indalecio]

Maybe they were given a bribe of epic porportions?

[Blake]

Diplomacy is always a gamble. It's still a gamble often worth making.

I suspect that in BTS, random war declarations can come from:
Events, AP

An AI will not ever choose to engage in a second war. AI's will also not ever choose to declare war on someone they are friendly with.
This means such war declarations are either due to the AI already being on the warpath, or it's a "forced" war declaration via something like an event, AP resolution or defensive pact.

One useful way to tell what kind of war declaration it is:
If the AI declares war and immediately bowls up with a large stack, that means it's almost definitely a planned war.
If there is no stack - especially if there are no units in your territory at all (the AI declares planned wars by moving a unit in) - it may be a forced war, or it may be a bribe by another party (although AI's can't be bribed under circumstances where they wont choose war).

But anyway.

Diplomacy is always a gamble, but it's a gamble often worth making.

[Solver]

It's worth adding that there are no events in BtS that cause a declaration of war, at least not among the core game events.

[JimMac]

Originally posted by Blake
AI's will also not ever choose to declare war on someone they are friendly with.

That is reassuring!

Originally posted by Blake
Diplomacy is always a gamble, but it's a gamble often worth making.

Fair enough; I think a gamble is reasonable, so long as it is worth making the effort.

[Kataphraktoi]

Im not seeing any of these random war declarations. Im seeing the AI wars coming a mile away and am always prepared, so far. Even on Emp i havnt been surprised yet.

One of our lan guys has played on noble, and has claimed to be backstabed in this fashion. I suspect he wasnt paying attention, and was simply unprepared for any type of war. ''presumed innocent until proven guilty'' but im pretty skeptical of these ''AI backstabbed me as friends!'' stories I just havnt seen anything like it, at all

[frenzyfol]

Blake or Solver might be able to answer this one.

Does the AI have any any concept of "trustworthyness" or reputation?

For example In warlords you could demand money from someone and then turn around and declare war on the very same turn.

This should make other civs less likely to heal to your demands.

[Risa]

IIRC, in BtS, once a demand or a help request is agreed, a 10-turn peace treaty follows.

[Solver]

Yep, there's the BtS 10-turn peace after demands, and reputation is handled indirectly in BtS. When you declare war on a civ, you get negative modifiers with their friends. Which, in turn, make them less likely to accommodate you. I don't believe they track reputation directly, though. It's a whole exploit nightmare, in fact.

[Fidel]

last night a pleased wang kon attacked my ethiopian cities in a pretty stupid amphibious attempt and got slaughtered. he was tied with me in power and score slightly above middle (12 civs, prince, aggresive ai, hemishperes). we shared religion. go figure.
granted, friendly civs never attacked me, but friendly status is devilishly difficult to obtain. also, it seems that there is NO WAY to bribe ai if they are pleased with someone. not sure about 'cautious'.

[Fidel]

btw, does ai always attack the one who is down on the floor or does it have something like strategic approach ('i better help the small guy fight the big one because the big one is my main rival')?

[Wiglaf]

more likely in that case would gang up on the small guy and take a few cities