How CIV5 diplomacy works

[Roxlimn]

I don't see the incongruence between asking for Open Borders and immediate war. This is I do to scope out the AIs deployment of forces. Lots of players Open Borders and then declare war immediately after in previous games. This got to be such a problem that rules were instituted to prevent this from being too powerful. It's an eminently sensible move, and I've always abided by it.

If the AI isn't behaving super-friendly, he's got a large army, and it's asking for Open Borders, imminent war is the only possibility. As long as the AI can't tell exactly how weak your army is, it will be more likely not to declare war.

Of course, the AI has strange criteria for judging strength. Then again, because of how the combat AI works, so do players!

 

[Bibor]

AI attacks even without open borders agreement; not opening borders won't tip the scales in your favor. They can see the exact demographics (army size) anyway.
An AI not attacking is either conent with its land, has its eyes on someone else or simply calculates its too risky to attack you.

 

[Danceofmasks]

Just keep yer eyes peeled for potential warmongers, and bribe them to attack someone else.

When their army is busy, backstab them.

 

[Roxlimn]

Bibor:

Actually, I have reloaded games with Open Borders as the factor for war. They will declare even without OB, but they are more likely to declare sooner if you OB and they perceive your army numbers to be weak. Conversely, I've observed Alexander back away when I OB and present a very strong army (numerically speaking).

 

[Jaycob]

How Civ5 AI is broken
I just had to laugh at the latest game I played. Third attempt at Deity and I was ranked 8th in soldiers of course, and the Mongols started to swarm my borders suggesting a war declaration was imminent. The units were all trash- swarms of warriors, archers, and horseman. With a tight grid and archers/horses it was suicide so I wasn't worried. I decided to see if he would buy any of my luxuries or strategic resources despite that he was obviously about to attack me. His greeting message was that he was worried about the positioning of my military. Of course he agreed to buy some resources for 250g. The next turn he declared and suicided his units against my cities, 2 crossbowman, and 1 horse.
Those of you defending the Civ5 AI as simply "different" and "more realistic"-IMO it is a just clearly a step backwards to even the Civ4 AI. In Civ IV, you were prevented from abusing war declarations because AIs would never buy a resource for straight gold. Obviously designed to fix two major flaws in the Civ3 AI; first, the AI has problems recognizing when a human is about to declare war or even that itself is even plotting a war. lol This abuse is back in full force in Civ5. The Mongols claim they fear the positioning of my army lol and buy 250g worth of luxuries (for 1 turn?) which leads any reasonable person to believe that the Mongols are not plotting a war with me. Oh my Firaxis, the AI sure is TRICKING ME!!! Obviously they are not tactical geniuses, there is just some disconnect there. Secondly, I really like the idea of having 1 military unit per turn concept. Unfortunately the AI lacks the tactical "cunning" needed to leverage their 5:1 unit advantage over me. In Civ4, you do everything possible diplomatically to avoid confrontations with powerful warmonger Civs early in the game. If the Mongols attacked you with a stack of doom on even Immortal in IV, you were in for a rough game . Here, wars (even 2 or 3!) only suck because you lose another AI to milk 300g/150g from every 30 turns. The elimination of the stack of doom concept seems to have harmed the AI more than the player.

 

[aimlessgun]

The military side of the AI has been much discussed. But yes it is rather silly that they will buy your stuff just before the DoW.

Another bit of diplomacy info (seems pretty obvious though): AI civs are pretty hard to bribe into a war against a superior military. If you're having trouble bribing people into a war with someone, try bribing the guy with the highest troop count in the demographics screen. Unless your target is that guy, in which case your best hope is to bribe him into attacking someone else

 

[Bibor]

Yes, CIV5 diplomacy is the ******ed baby brother of CIV4 diplomacy. But it still exists.

Now that the game sold in large quantities due to brand, simplicity and graphics, one can only hope that at least the expansions will... well, expand the game to its previous levels.

 

[Sonereal]

Yes, CIV5 diplomacy is the ******ed baby brother of CIV4 diplomacy. But it still exists.

That's pretty mean. Civ5 diplomacy is the younger, more secretive brother of Civ4 that doesn't like to explain himself.

Now that the game sold in large quantities due to brand, simplicity and graphics, one can only hope that at least the expansions will... well, expand the game to its previous levels.

Civ5~Civ4 vanilla in terms of content. Space victories have been expanded a bit. Diplomacy victories lessened. Domination simplified. Cultural made interesting.

I could care less about expansions. I'm waiting for the DLL.

 

[Mannu]

That's pretty mean. Civ5 diplomacy is the younger, more secretive brother of Civ4 that doesn't like to explain himself.

Civ5~Civ4 vanilla in terms of content. Space victories have been expanded a bit. Diplomacy victories lessened. Domination simplified. Cultural made interesting.

I could care less about expansions. I'm waiting for the DLL.

We maybe need a patch/mod that will at least explain some of the AIs reasons so we can learn how to play the great game. Then we could work on starting to fix it. Right now we can't even tell where it's broken.

I'm not sure there will be expansions for CIV5, probably more likely to just be DLC.

 

[Sonereal]

We maybe need a patch/mod that will at least explain some of the AIs reasons so we can learn how to play the great game. Then we could work on starting to fix it. Right now we can't even tell where it's broken.

I'm not sure there will be expansions for CIV5, probably more likely to just be DLC.

There'll be expansions or large, sweeping DLC similar to the $10 pieces they had for Fallout 3. In any case, no one for sure can say if diplomacy is broken simply because no one understands how it works. Maybe its working exactly as intended?

 

[Smash83]

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?

Leader buddy up quite well in real life. Hitler + Stalin = Poland invasion.
Kings could do really various things in the end their were kings.

 

[Sonereal]

Leader buddy up quite well in real life. Hitler + Stalin = Poland invasion.

There are at least five things wrong with this single statement. Namely, Hitler and Stalin did not buddy up. At all.

 

[aimlessgun]

There is at least five things wrong with this single statement. Namely, Hitler and Stalin did not buddy up. At all.

Imagining Hitler and Stalin chillin', drinking some natty ice and playing gamecube.

 

[Sonereal]

Imagining Hitler and Stalin chillin', drinking some natty ice and playing gamecube.

Hitler looks more like a PS2 kind of guy. Stalin seems like he's into Xbox.

Great, they didn't even like each other's gaming consoles.

 

[Druin]

Imagining Hitler and Stalin chillin', drinking some natty ice and playing gamecube.

Prolly met on the internet with screen names like "chadbrochill" and "familyguyfan" right?

 

[Crow, of Earth]

Nice tips.

Dunno about other players, but the reason I am frustrated with the diplo is that all AIs are immense hypocrites. It's a shame that there are no honourable ways into diplomacy which can work.

 

[IgnatiusTBarfat]

After the patch, I had an interesting interaction with Sulieman on Immortal: I was situated on the eastern half of a continent with Sulieman on the west. My military was two musketeers and he has a mess o' janissaries swarming on the border. He proposed a research agreement and as part of it asked that I give him 100 gold. Sure, I thought, I'll do this, at least it will give me 30 turns of peace for 100g + the RA cost. Well, 26 turns latter he war dec's me which cancels the RA. Thankfully I had teched through to rifling and fought him off.

I don't recall seeing the AI cancel an RA pre-patch.

 

[Smash83]

There are at least five things wrong with this single statement. Namely, Hitler and Stalin did not buddy up. At all.

Care to name this at least 5 things? Of course until you really take buddy up literally...
...then do not bother.

 

[Sonereal]

Care to name this at least 5 things?
Lol, yeah they just hand shake in the middle of Poland for no reason...

Leader buddy up quite well in real life. Hitler + Stalin = Poland invasion

1. Hitler and Stalin headed idealogies that stood at stark contrast to one another. The Nazis constantly called for living space in the east.

2. The Germans in the 30s were styling themselves as being a shield against Communism.

3. Hitler was going to invade Poland regardless of the pact at some point. Neither side was friendly, they just didn't want to go to war yet.

4. Chamberlain and Hitler shook hands following Munich. I wouldn't say they were friends either.

5. Barbarossa.

6.

The heaviest blow that ever struck humanity was the coming of Christianity. Bolshevism is Christianity's illegitimate child. Both are inventions of the Jew.
Adolf Hitler
Remarks June 1941 recorded by Martin Bormann, published in Hitler's Table Talk (1953

)

These guys were hardly buddies.

 

[Jaycob]

Another interesting diplo situation .. First time this happened... on DEITY? T58 I tell Bismark to stop settling cities next to me when he builds one right up against my borders, he declines, and so I declare war. t60 Napoleon asks for a pact against Bismark. t61, Napoleon complains that I'm picking on weak leaders "Bismark". The human... picking on AIs... on deity... in the ancient age.... bizarre The AI is truly insane. And horseman