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  • Diplomacy

    This has been mentionned before many times in various posts covering various areas of the game, bu so far as I can tell it should be addressed specifically. The AI is simply too demanding from a diplomatic point of view. Example:

    I am bordering on an empire of roughly equal strength, they may be slightly stronger militarily, but this is an illusion because I take quality of troops and military / logistical organization over quantity (the AI never seems to disband old obsolete units...). This empire is at war with every neighbor bordering him. Our current relationship is Respect / Vigilance. We continually exchange maps, but neither for advances nor cash will he enter into anything other than a peace treaty with me, moreover this treaty has been in effect forever and it does not seem to have had any effect on my regard / perception in the eyes of others. It makes sense for such pacts to exist.

    It makes sense for such pacts to exist and makes the game much, much more interesting. Why not agree to a mutually beneficial trade pact with someone? Why not? That is the question! If everyone refused to enter into diplomatic agreements with those weaker in some area than themselves then no pacts would ever be made. Coercion is not the only sauce in diplomacy and behaving honorably toward others should have a greater effect on your empire's prestige than it currently does.

    When the patch comes out (if only to stop the game from crashing and performing illegal operations) I pray it relaxes the diplomacy engine. The options available are fabulous, but hardly seem to come into play unless you are absolutely dominant militarily, despite the fact that it is often in the AIs best interest to accept.

  • #2
    Magus38, I have found a few things about diplomacy I should share.

    The #1 most important thing to remember is that a nation's personallity has a very significant impact on what they decide to do. I played one game where I ran into the Americans. I played the friendmaker with them, and now have an alliance, research pact, trade pact, and trade techs with them every four turns. Very nice. They were listed as srhewd opportunistic trader or something like that.
    Then, on a different game, I ran into "Evil Genius" Indians, "Aggressive Imperialist" Incans, and some other nasty guys. I never could forge peace with any of them, they just wanted to wage war. Managed to get a few cease-fires but they were broken soon after. I conquered several Indian cities and after being attacked by another hostile power sued for peace. After working carefully on the relationship, I eventually got the Indians into a peace treaty and a research pact, and was happily trading techs with them in no time. The incans and the Russians, however, never wanted peace. Even after I beat them up awhile, they still wanted more war.

    Ok, that said, there are a couple other important things to keep in mind:
    1. Give gold. Often. Gift about 1/10th of your treasury to people you want to befriend every turn. It helps. Really.
    2. Remember that nations will only agree to a treaty if they percive a benefit in return. Oddly enough this means that a nation will only agree to a trade treaty if they have trade routes going into your nation (so they will profit some). Research treaties are more acceptable apparently; but a nation which is far behind you in research and/or doesn't like/trust you may not agree to it. Simply offering $6000 in exchange for a trade treaty doesn't work for some reason.
    3. Try to get a nation to love/trust before getting the higher treaties like trade, reasearch and alliance. Give gold, and get out of his country when he tells you to leave. Don't break peace treaties with other nations.
    4. Stay out of their nation. Even under alliances, don't even go in to see whats going on. If you must know, send diplomats. They don't seem to mind them. But water-transports do tick them off. Remember, that if you can get a friendly nation, they will willingly stay out of your territory, quite dependebly.
    5. If you want to befriend a nation, get the peace treaty. Once you have that, get a embassy with them. Once you start forging pacs and/or trading techs, the friendship will truly flourish. The trickiest part is the peace treaty.

    The AI in this game is not busted and in fact works better than most I have seen. Pay attention to whats going on and you can get diplomacy to work for you. The Brazilians have become my research budies and effectively doubled the rate at which I get techs (through trades). We are decades ahead of all the other nations, and really good budies to boot.

    [This message has been edited by Cyrius (edited November 30, 2000).]

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    • #3
      If you're a lot stronger (and I think it looks at overall strength, not just military), you can usually threaten them into an agreement. I've gotten lots of peace treaties and alliances by threatening them with war...make peace or I'll kill you, something like that...

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      • #4
        I think diplomacy is especially important at the harder levels. My 2nd game is at the most difficult level. I didn't get a chance to build wonders or compete at science, so I concentrated on military might and expansion and eventually befriended an "ideologically agressive academic" civ.

        Just when I was about to give up on him (he wanted too much money for advances), I threatened him with destruction of the city that I had surrounded. He still would only give me Economics for about 16,000 gold, but when I tried another tech, he accepted. After that it was all down hill and now he 'loves' me and will give me tech any time I ask! No trades required! He is running Democracy and I have gone Communist now.

        I am not sure what motivates him, but I have gladly offered to conquer his enemies as we are in alliance now, etc. So, I will keep him to the end game as my research arm.

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        • #5
          even though I agree with what was said here about diplomacy I do have a strange occurance. The Irish I currently have an alliance and a science agreement. They love / completly trust me but they keep landing spys on my territory and trying to steal my technology. I keep expelling the little bastards. My intelligence says they are angry at my expulsion of their units but they still love / completly trust me. Strange is it not??

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          • #6
            Heh.. That just makes me think of Saddam Hussein as portrayed in South Park: the movie...

            "What? you kicked out my spies? Hey! Relax guy! I can change! Take a load off!... I love you! Here.. have a spy, guy.. you know you want it... "

            pretty messed..
            Don't like to wait? Program your own bloody game.

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            • #7
              I am playing at Hard level, and am having trouble with the Scots, who are "Evil Genius". They won't agree to anything. They will take whatever gold or advances I give to them, and their face gets more and more "smiley", but try and get a treaty or a pact? No way, buddy boy.

              On the other hand, my Irish next door neighbor loves me, I got a Peace treaty just from giving him gold till he was beaming smiles at me, and then he just agreed to it. Then the Research pact, then a Trade pact. Somewhere in the Great Library, it says that in order to get an Alliance you needed a Military pact, but I never got one with him, but he Allied with me anyway.

              My third neighbor, the 'Patriotic Imperialist' or some such thing, went with the Peace treaty, Trade and Research pacts, but refuses any alliance.

              I did all of this with gifts of Gold, establishing embassies, and throwing a few Receptions, until their 'smiley face' got to 'beaming'. So far, I am very happy with the way that things are going, but a few things disturb me. The guy I have an alliance with IS sending units into my area. They aren't doing anything but snooping around, so I think that they are scouting. I say this because, although I have been Allied with him for the last 50-80 turns, in the Great Library, it says that you share your maps with your allies, and they are updated each turn. Well, while bringing a Trireme back home from scouting the other side of the world, I noticed some Irish city lines where they shouldn't be, and sailed through the area, and he had a size 7 city there. I then passed a city I had seen before that WAS size 7 when I was there, but when I got next to it, it was size 14.

              Maybe it's because I don't have the Military pact, but somehow got the Alliance. I don't know, but man-o-man, jeezo-peezo, I wish there was something like, say......A MANUAL that would explain the diplomatic rules of this game a little more clearly, so I know what the heck I'm doing. Or trying to do.

              All in all, very enjoyable playing a Diplomat for a change instead of the land-grabbing empire builder.

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