Does the AI value good relationships properly?

A lot of talk about the issues with the diplomatic AI in CiV, but on the bottom line, I think the diplomatic AI by now has reached a point where it is sort of able to use it in a meaningful way - at least for a while. Sadly, I don't think that the AI seems to value good relationships properly, and this tends to make the diplomatic system deterioate with time. Does other people have the same expression?

Let me give an example:

I have a game as Siam. After an early war with Denmark I'm friends with him, and we have a common neighbour Egypt who keeps attacking us (I'm small and tall cultural, Denmark is just small, which makes Egypt who is wide consider us easy targets).

Around Industrial, two global factions have formed:
- Me, Denmark, Sweden, Austria
- Egypt, Polynesia, France, Inca
I'm all green modifiers (DoF, friends with same leaders, denounced same enemies, etc.) with the guys in my faction, and we all share the same dislike for the other faction.

Then comes the problem: Suddenly Sweden forms a DoF with Inca, which makes me get a red modifier with Sweden for having denounced one of their friends. Sure enough, after a while, my DoF with Sweden runs out and he denounces me. This gives me a red modifier with Austria for being denounced by one of their friends, and sure enough after our DoF runs out she declines to renew it and after a while denounces me also. Denmark stays on my side for now as we are neighbors and he is bottom civ and needs my protection against Egypt.

So what do you people think of such a series of events, which is pretty much standard for how things go in most of my games - are things working like they should? Was this a clever move of Sweden to freeze me out, or was it just a random decision that lead to the collapse of the diplomatic stability? Personally I lean toward the latter and would like for the AI to value good relations more and thus be less inclined to DoF someone that their friends have denounced (or conversely, punish you less for having denounced someone they subsequently DoF). The problem is that it seems to evolve always in a downwards negative spiral where in the end, everybody hate everybody which is just counterproductive.

This happens in many of my games too. From what I have seen the defection of allies usually occurs due to expansion. For example, I had Japan as a neighbour and I went out of my way to keep him happy as our borders were close. I happened to expand over him, cutting off his natural expansion and as a result he only had 2 cities up until almost the industrial era. At this point Ethiopia and France joined in with our alliance and the other half of the world was at war with us. Eventually Japan marches an army up to Ethiopia and takes one of their cities. Japan still likes me and France but Ethiopia denounces all of us, befriends the rest of the world and I'm eventually left with only Japan as an ally.

It's hard to tell how much Japan and Ethiopia actually liked one another but I don't think they were friends, however, they had never denounced one another. There was little reason why Japan would choose them to DoW besides relative army strength so I would assume that trying to retain friends is low on their list of priorities.

THis is the reason :
it just a random decision that lead to the collapse of the diplomatic stability

The biggest problem in civ 5 is that there aren't that many positif modifiers so as soon you're decleration of friendship expires they suddenly don't like you anymore because there are thousand of other negatif modifiers kicking in. warmongering, covet land , wonder coveting , denouciations, bulding to much cities and so on...



Firaxis can simply fix this problem by let the AI pick one enemy AI that he will hate througought the game So you can actualy see blocks happening.. (Just like in civ 4 you would see a leaders worst enemy and it will stay that way for a long time)

Olso adding more positif modifiers would help..


But I am not so sure if all this would help because the AI is playing to win like a human player the only question you could ask you'reself why did they all put those diplomatic options in the game if the AI doens't reconise them?

There are nice human players btw... even in NQ

apocalypse105 said:

Firaxis can simply fix this problem by let the AI pick one enemy AI that he will hate througought the game So you can actualy see blocks happening.. (Just like in civ 4 you would see a leaders worst enemy and it will stay that way for a long time)

Click to expand...

That does generally happen in Civ V as well. But yes, in the late game (especially if those long-term enemies have gone or are no longer a problem) alliances tend to break down. I can quite often remain on good terms with both factions despite having the 'friends with their enemies' option.

The more factions in the opposing alliance, the more fragile yours will tend to be, since there are more potential DoFs. Most often the games where I have really long-lasting alliances are those in which everyone decides early to dislike one or two other factions; the combination of denouncements and wars vs. multiple allies makes it impossible for them to 'come in from the cold' and make friendships with any of the allies.