How CIV5 diplomacy works

[Bibor]

Players seem to be frustrated by diplomacy in CIV5. Granted, its somewhat limited compared to civ4, but it is very powerful and actually quite fun.

Lets start with a typical example:

In the first 100 turns of your game you've met four civs and three of them offered various "pacts of secrecy" (which you declined; to keep trade possibilities open) and two offered "pacts of cooperation" (which you agreed upon since it seems to bring only benefits; which is true). You also started some luxury trades with some of them.

What we just did in this example is basically begging the AIs to DOW us.

Why?

Lets look at the known diplomatic negative modifiers:
1) starting an offensive war
2) bribing a city state in another civ's "zone of influence"
3) proximity
4) wonderbuilding (to at least some civs)
5) buying tiles near borders
6) settling near borders
7) killing off other AIs
8) attacking weaker civs

CIV5 diplomacy is a big cauldron of various inter-civ relationships. You need to be stirring it, you need to initialize the chains of events, because if you wait - the AIs will play it out among themselves. Which usually means that you are the next target. This is because, surprisingly, AIs also sign pacts of secrecy against you and they may also bribe each other to go to war with you. If you also kill off a civ early (usually a result of an early rush), you became the villain.

Here's another example, this time a working one:

We meet 4 civs. We pick one to be our first victim. We sign pacts of cooperation with everyone but this civ. We sign pacts of secrecy with everyone against this civ. Next we bribe one other civ to make war on our victim. You just made yourself safe from two civs: the one fighting the defensive war and the aggressor (neither want a war on two fronts). If you do want to dogpile the defender, do so. But make sure that the other aggressor is the one killing off the civ. Now he's the villain. And your next diplomatic victim.

Stir the cauldron yourself and make the AIs hate each other more than they hate you. To do this you cannot rely on bonuses (trades, open borders, cooperation) - you need to put other civs into negative to be sure.

 

[SureYouCan]

Very true. I just had 200+ turns of peaceful border touching(sounds naughty) co-existence with Wu Zetian in a pact of co-op. Even bought out one of her city states without her breaking the pact. We had a pact of secrecy against Hiawatha which I honored all game.

An interesting note, Wu actually went out of her way to attack other nearby AIs and citystates when she needed more land rather than me. The pacts eventually got broken with Hiawatha and Elizabeth ran away with double the score and Wu only had 1 city left on my border.

At that point I assume her AI logic told her that between Hia, Elizabeth and I, I was the weakest and the only way she would get more land. Elizabeth now bordered by Hiawatha and Ramses chose me as her next target as I was the weakest.

Unfortunately the only way I managed to do this was with a 5 gold income due to the army I had that kept me 1 rank above Napoleon. Napoleon became the AI to dogpile. Of the three War Monger AIs who dogpiled him Wu Zetian was the weakest and became the only target the AIs would actually go to war against.

So the question now becomes how do we maintain an army big enough to ward off aggression while maintaining huge swaths of land and have a 200+ gold income.

 

[jaycuhbbb]

Do you get a reputation hit if you declare on a civ that you have a cooperation pact with?

You bring up some nice points, but I disagree. The AIs are psycho and I have no doubt they don't give a flying crap about settling close to another civ, bribing an enemy CS, refusing requests... anything! Unless you are trying to anger a civ, most likely another civ will annoy them much faster. In any case you should always have a military ready to defeat the AI. It is not that hard for the human to play defense.

In other words, the only point of diplomacy is milking other civs for cash. There is no depth to the diplomacy system, it is worse than even CivIII, despite your valiant efforts

There is no such thing as allies in this game, it is a free for all where everyone is just waiting for the moment to pounce. Ironically realistic and yet maddeningly "gamey".

 

[aimlessgun]

You bring up some nice points, but I disagree. The AIs are psycho and I have no doubt they don't give a flying crap about settling close to another civ, bribing an enemy CS, refusing requests... anything!

Except they do care.

 

[DaveGold]

Stir the cauldron yourself and make the AIs hate each other more than they hate you. To do this you cannot rely on bonuses (trades, open borders, cooperation) - you need to put other civs into negative to be sure.

My experience of trying this has been less than positive. If they're a long way away from you on an islands map then they'll rarely declare war, will tolerate some troublemaking, and will keep trading. Open borders always wins. If they're on your continent they'll settle on top of you, declare war, mess you about, and swindle you on trades. It doesn't matter what you try.

If you use a pact of secrecy to skilfully isolate a neighbour it only tends to mean that the AI has deprived you of a trading partner. Since patch 62 it's also very hard to trades at all so losing the right trading partner could be costly. It's also very difficult to pick out which AI you need to isolate in the early game, apart from your neighbours who always hate you eventually. It only needs a nation to build one city in a stupid place and it changes all the diplomacy on the continent.

 

[DaveMcW]

In other words, the only point of diplomacy is milking other civs for cash.

This is true, but only because the AI is so bad at war.

If they were competent you would have to treat them with more respect.

 

[aimlessgun]

My experience of trying this has been less than positive. If they're a long way away from you on an islands map then they'll rarely declare war, will tolerate some troublemaking, and will keep trading. Open borders always wins. If they're on your continent they'll settle on top of you, declare war, mess you about, and swindle you on trades. It doesn't matter what you try.

If you use a pact of secrecy to skilfully isolate a neighbour it only tends to mean that the AI has deprived you of a trading partner. Since patch 62 it's also very hard to trades at all so losing the right trading partner could be costly. It's also very difficult to pick out which AI you need to isolate in the early game, apart from your neighbours who always hate you eventually. It only needs a nation to build one city in a stupid place and it changes all the diplomacy on the continent.

But it does matter what you try. I have successfully turned AIs on each other and gotten them to ignore me, on a crowded pangea where I was smack in the middle of the landmass.

To pick an AI, best case is 2 people come to you asking for PoS vs a certain guy, meaning they're leaning against them anyways, but otherwise just pick someone you think is most likely to settle near other AI's.

Your neighbors don't always hate you eventually if you keep them hating other people.

 

[ohioastronomy]

Until they fix the game and make actual friendships possible it's hard for me to be inspired to try. I can just wipe out my neighbors easily, and the ones with an ocean between us will be more or less peaceful with me. This always works. Or I can try and get frustrated by obvious bugs (like the inability to tell between defensive/offensive wars, or whether they or I settle a city that makes us close) or get subject to constant threats that my army is too small/too many wonders/they don't like my blue shirt. The attitude of the programmers creates an atmosphere in the game that I simply don't like, right down to the childish trash-talking. Even from Gandhi.

 

[E66man]

We meet 4 civs. We pick one to be our first victim. We sign pacts of cooperation with everyone but this civ. We sign pacts of secrecy with everyone against this civ. Next we bribe one other civ to make war on our victim. You just made yourself safe from two civs: the one fighting the defensive war and the aggressor (neither want a war on two fronts). If you do want to dogpile the defender, do so. But make sure that the other aggressor is the one killing off the civ. Now he's the villain. And your next diplomatic victim.

Stir the cauldron yourself and make the AIs hate each other more than they hate you. To do this you cannot rely on bonuses (trades, open borders, cooperation) - you need to put other civs into negative to be sure.

About what does it take (in cash, GPT, luxuries, etc.) to bribe an AI to attack another AI if they weren't about to do so on their own hook anyway?

 

[aimlessgun]

About what does it take (in cash, GPT, luxuries, etc.) to bribe an AI to attack another AI if they weren't about to do so on their own hook anyway?

So far it has ranged from 1 luxury (early) to 1 luxury + few hundred gold. These are wars I am sure would not have started without my prompting, but between Civs that I had set up POS's beforehand and I knew probably had a least a few negative diplo hits from being nearby each other.

 

[sabinfire]

I wonder what is so difficult about programming a halfway decent AI.

If I liberate a city back to a AI civ, that should improve relations. If I agree to go to war alongside a civ, that should improve relations with that civ. I shouldn't be called a warmonger by the very same person that asked me to join in their war. That lacks common sense.

It's also funny when civs call you a warmonger because of one incident while they themselves have been steamrolling other weaker AI civs for centuries, but they don't hesitate to call YOU the bloodthirsty warmonger because of some relatively trivial conflict. I guess they got political hypocrisy right if nothing else.

Defensive pacts never seem to work. I've only gotten one civ to agree to a pact and they were conquered by another civ on the next turn.

Why do I keep getting pop-ups from other civs "asking" for free donations of gold or resources? Why would I agree to this? Gifting an AI civ will not improve relations. They could very well ask me for 800 gold, I agree, and then they DOW a few turns later.

If I can't open up my diplomatic window and request free gold or resources from AI civs, and actually RECEIVE them sometimes, then why would the programmers make the AIs proposition me in the same way? I'm really interested in what the developers thought process was behind this.

It seems like the more I play Civ5, the more it begins to look like the game developers were more interested in just giving the appearance of diplomacy rather than actually creating a system with rhyme and reason.

The attitude of the programmers creates an atmosphere in the game that I simply don't like, right down to the childish trash-talking. Even from Gandhi.

I've got a problem with this as well. Seriously, are they simulating playing against 12 year olds on Xbox Live? Great leaders don't make childish insults against other great leaders. That is not very diplomatic.

 

[Tyrael]

It seems like the more I play Civ5, the more it begins to look like the game developers were more interested in just giving the appearance of diplomacy rather than actually creating a system with rhyme and reason.

Now that you mention it, you don't have to make diplomacy good if nobody can figure out what's going on or how it works. If you just slop together something with enough randomness, there will be enough people defending it because they remember the few times it actually worked somewhat logically. As a bonus, nobody can complain that you did a terrible lazy job, because nobody knows for sure what's going on! This leads to vauge complaints- instead of "elements x, y, and z of diplomacy don't make sense / are broken", you just get vague "diplo is terrible" which comes across as whining, which makes detractors look less credible.

 

[aimlessgun]

Now that you mention it, you don't have to make diplomacy good if nobody can figure out what's going on or how it works. If you just slop together something with enough randomness, there will be enough people defending it because they remember the few times it actually worked somewhat logically. As a bonus, nobody can complain that you did a terrible lazy job, because nobody knows for sure what's going on! This leads to vauge complaints- instead of "elements x, y, and z of diplomacy don't make sense / are broken", you just get vague "diplo is terrible" which comes across as whining, which makes detractors look less credible.

How many games would I have to replicate diplomatic success in to convince you? Serious question.

 

[PJyang]

One problem with Civ5 diplomacy is that you have no options to make AI like you. You do everything just to avoid hostility, and that's all. After thousands of years of mutual war, you buy a tile adjacent to your border, they show up calling you "plaguing the land" and "consider our pack of cooperation ended".

 

[aimlessgun]

Do leaders buddy up in real life? Would you expect your king to sacrifice the well being of his nation just because he 'likes' another leader?

 

[Bibor]

It is interesting to observe that if one removes the actual numbers, people start treating the AIs as dogs: they expect of them to be friendly and respond to every "go fetch".

Also what's interesting that players have no problem with killing off an AI (or all of them), mercilessly grabbing its land, conquering whole continents... but when AIs do the same - players get offended. Lmao!

The developers said "the AIs now try to win", and this is exactly the difference between CIV4 and CIV5. The AI won't sit at +14 while you're building your last spaceship part. Not if it can help it.

There's no such thing as having a relationship with an AI set in stone. Even in CIV4, as free religion and more civic options became available, diplomatic relations shifted drastically.

Diplomatic relations often shift, and often shift away from your favor. Maybe you got stronger than that particular AI. Maybe you suddenly border it because of conquests. Maybe you killed off a CIV in meantime. Maybe it doesn't fear your military anymore.

Even if you do everything right, the bigger and more powerful you become, positive diplomatic relations will shift away from your favor; this is why smaller civs have an easier time maintaining good diplomatic relations.

EDIT: It's possible to make AIs "like you". It really is. 100% tested. As long as you're on "their level" and there are some bigger threats around (threathening to win) - they'll be friendly to you. But they'll attack you if by conquering you their chances of winning go significantly up. Oh wait, that's your reasoning as well!

 

[Sullla]

Lets look at the known diplomatic negative modifiers:
1) starting an offensive war
2) bribing a city state in another civ's "zone of influence"
3) proximity
4) wonderbuilding (to at least some civs)
5) buying tiles near borders
6) settling near borders
7) killing off other AIs
8) attacking weaker civs

So if the AI will declare war on me for going to war, and declare war on me for allying with city states, and declare war on me for being near them, and declare war on me for building wonders, and declare war on me for purchasing tiles, and declare war on me for settling other cities, and declare war on me for having a large army, and declare war on me for having a small army, and declare war on me for helping them in their own wars... ummm, what exactly am I supposed to be doing, again?

 

[Unearthly]

So if the AI will declare war on me for going to war, and declare war on me for allying with city states, and declare war on me for being near them, and declare war on me for building wonders, and declare war on me for purchasing tiles, and declare war on me for settling other cities, and declare war on me for having a large army, and declare war on me for having a small army, and declare war on me for helping them in their own wars... ummm, what exactly am I supposed to be doing, again?

I haven't seen anyone declare war because I had a large army, just using it. So:

1) Have a decent (at least parity with your neighbors) army.
2) Establish your borders using cities closer to your capital than theirs.
3) Use culture to expand borders, not buying tiles (if the bought tile borders them).
4) Peacefully tech/build buildings? Though I have seen the AI cancel pacts of cooperation when I finished a slingshot 1/2 eras ahead of everyone else.
5) Don't abstain from diplomacy. As the thread describes, get everyone around to go to war with each other while you sit out.

 

[DaveGold]

Your neighbors don't always hate you eventually if you keep them hating other people.

Yes it's a great principle. They settle one city near you then cancel the pact of secrecy, cancel open borders, and leave you fuming.

 

[aimlessgun]

Yes it's a great principle. They settle one city near you then cancel the pact of secrecy, cancel open borders, and leave you fuming.

The settlers beelining to your capital are pretty bad, I admit. You can deal with it by blocking them though. 3 units can block a settler forever (my current game I've been blocking 2 settlers for nearly 70 turns now. Huge pain to micro that every turn though ><)