Abusing the AI - Gold before DoW

[Old Peter]

I loved the great fall patch. But there is one major major problem still in the game: Offer the AI a trade gold vs gold/turn. Then declare war.

This ruins late game. If you are pressured it is hard resist doing it, it is just too easy.

Why not just patch this? The solution I offer is: If you make a trade to receive gold you cannot declare war in 10 turns. This would solve the whole thing.

How can we come in contact with the people patching the game?

Please help.

 

[smallfish]

The thing is, you can abuse this too by selling stuff constantly before DOW, so you could probably have a DOW-free game just by trading alone.

But in spirit of this thread, 10 turns is too long. Make it 2 turns - then both you and AI can enact backstabbing diplomacy normally. Nations have traded with each other, and some of them were each others' biggest trading partners, before they suddenly went to war after all...

 

[Greizer85]

Make it so the human can only trade lump sums. It's a harsh solution, but it works; you'll just have to wait a bit for gold to accumulate if you want to make trades, and the exploit is totally eliminated.

 

[Old Peter]

The thing is, you can abuse this too by selling stuff constantly before DOW, so you could probably have a DOW-free game just by trading alone.

But in spirit of this thread, 10 turns is too long. Make it 2 turns - then both you and AI can enact backstabbing diplomacy normally. Nations after all have traded with each other, and some of them were each others' biggest trading partners, before they suddenly went to war after all...

I do not understand what you mean. What I am talking about is that you have 0 gold in the bank but a yield of let's say 300 gold/turn. Then I want to attack a computer opponent and right before i DoW him I make a deal where I receive 6000 gold for 300 gold/turn, then bam, declare war. No losses at all for me. And the game basicly won, and all excitement gone.

It is such a huge abuse and just soo easy. I just cannot for the world understand why this is not being dealt with.

 

[Old Peter]

Another solution could be a max gold trade at any turn of let's say 500.

The problem is when you do this and receive like 7 k gold.

 

[smallfish]

I do not understand what you mean. What I am talking about is that you have 0 gold in the bank but a yield of let's say 300 gold/turn. Then I want to attack a computer opponent and right before i DoW him I make a deal where I receive 6000 gold for 300 gold/turn, then bam, declare war. No losses at all for me. And the game basicly won, and all excitement gone.

It is such a huge abuse and just soo easy. I just cannot for the world understand why this is not being dealt with.

Let's say you figure your foe will DOW you before long for some reason - so maybe you trade your gpt for said gold. There, nobody gets to DOW for 10 turns and after those turns you can simply renew deal so there will be no DOWs from him at all. Do you see what the problem with this is?

 

[joncnunn]

I loved the great fall patch. But there is one major major problem still in the game: Offer the AI a trade gold vs gold/turn. Then declare war.
Why not just patch this? The solution I offer is: If you make a trade to receive gold you cannot declare war in 10 turns. This would solve the whole thing.

Oh, there's a much simpler solution for that. (Restore Civ IV trade rules) It does though require they first remove the bug in which the AI gives you LESS gold over 30 turns when you allow part of it in installments.
(e.g. if you let the AI pay 1gpt, it only will pay 209 instead of 210; at 2 gpt it's only 177 it will pay instead of 180; this would only give us 7 gpt instead of 8 gpt if only gpt used)

 

[WarIsPeace]

tommynt has vigorously defended this practice so not everyone dislikes it. Personally, I agree with you. I don't like it either. If you don't like it, don't do it. Lots of people add arbitrary limitations to their game play. For instance, I always play the start that I'm given. Is it an exploit that one can restart over and over until one gets a favorable start position? Maybe...it's all about how you like to play the game.

Now, if I think an AI is about to DOW me, I like to try to sell them as much stuff as I can for lump sums. If they still want to DOW me after that, it's their choice. I don't have a problem with that.

 

[Battlehelm043]

They cant, look up the prisoners dilemma and you'll see why this mechanic or ability to blatantly screw the computer over is left in game. If you limit it, you actually damage the diplomatic abilities in the game more than they are now. This happens a lot in the real world, but due to this being a game and diplomacy being pretty weak, the way to screw someone or the computer over is by Dowing them after the agreement.

 

[BBMorti]

I do not understand what you mean. What I am talking about is that you have 0 gold in the bank but a yield of let's say 300 gold/turn. Then I want to attack a computer opponent and right before i DoW him I make a deal where I receive 6000 gold for 300 gold/turn, then bam, declare war. No losses at all for me. And the game basicly won, and all excitement gone.

It is such a huge abuse and just soo easy. I just cannot for the world understand why this is not being dealt with.

I have not seen a computer with 6k gold after the fall patch, or anything near it.

 

[dangermouth]

Maybe have the AI only willing to give a lump sum in exchange of a per turn item for a period, only if there a Declaration of Friendship between the trading partners that lasts at least a certain portion of trading period. At least the DOW would have negative diplomatic consequences.

 

[FeiLing]

Do it twice and nobody in the world will ever give you their gold/stuff for gpt ever again. Easy solution, isn't it?

 

[Old Peter]

Problem with this abuse is the size of the abuse.

Any other solution would be better, anything! Or make it a setting. Just something. It ruins the game I think.

When the computer is on top it is just very tempting. You know there is always a quick, easy way out to win the game always in late game.

 

[smallfish]

Well, there's a solution

Multiplayer

 

[iamdanno]

Just force trades involving cash to be gpt, or make trades continue after DOW, or a combination of both.

 

[Old Peter]

Well, there's a solution

Multiplayer

I never find people in mutli

 

[Xahz]

Just don't do it. I'm perfectly aware of this and choose not to do it because it feels exploitative. There's no reasonable way to stop this that doesn't involve restricting diplomacy beyond what is acceptable (either by preventing DoW for X turns or by preventing exchanging GpT for Gold).

Also, since the patch, you're unlikely to get more than 500g out of this at any one time. And it's a one-out since the AI will most certainly not trade with you for quite a while even after you make peace.

 

[Woodszilla]

Do it twice and nobody in the world will ever give you their gold/stuff for gpt ever again. Easy solution, isn't it?

Yea I would think an easy solution is something like this. Either just a diplo penalty with other civs, or have it make other civs wary of giving you "loans" in the future.

 

[iamdanno]

Another option is to have the AI refuse to do "loans" but instead have a mechanism whereby a player can borrow from the world bank, but has to pay interest. If you borrow a lot of money, and then crater your economy, you must disband units and/or sell buildings or even cities.

Could be interesting. . .

 

[n00bxqb]

The AI does the same thing to me (or tries to), except usually w/ Research Agreements.