So, diplomacy...

[Egnarts]

I just had my third play through, and I still have no idea what the different diplomacy options does.. Can someone fill me in?
I get that co-op is playing nice, and secrecy agreements is being naughty and all that... But anyone know what they actually do? If anything?
Pretty sure I can still trade with the AIs regardless of what option I choose...

And another thing, any clue how you get to stop an AI from attacking your allied city states? Whenever they start attacking one and I pledge to protect it all i get is an apology and they just merely continue bashing my friends.

 

[Nunya]

The pacts themselves don't do anything directly. They just shape AI behaviour. I suspect (but I'm not sure) that a pact of cooperation increases the effect of positive diplomatic actions (like accepting a research agreement). It also means that the AI you're pacting with will react more negatively if you refuse their offers for trade and research.

A pact of secrecy is basically a secret agreement that you won't trade or do research with the target of the pact. Any kind of positive interaction with the target of the pact is going to make your partner angry with you.

 

[narmox]

In my games (10 or so by now), pacts of secrecy always eventually lead to a war declaration request against the targeted civ. And they're very pissed if you don't accept...

Same as Nunya said for the pacts of cooperation.

It's basically how alliances are forged in the game, rather than religion/civic similarities in Civ4.

In my latest game (which I just lost at 2050 AD, for lack of being able to punch through the superior Russian forces with my small 3-city + 2 puppets Babylonian empire), there were basically 2 "blocs":

Me, Monty and Alex VS Washington, Catherine, Hiawatha, Liz and Rameses.

In the beginning it seemed like I was getting more favours from the Washington-Catherine civs, but as Catherine got more imperialistic, and as I made more deals with Monty (he had over 5000 gold and I milked them all from him over the course of a millenium), and with Alex (to counter Egypt which was getting more powerful on his continent), alliances changed slowly..

...And very abruptly when I conquered a city-state at the request of Ragusa (I needed food!!!). Suddenly I was seen as an evil warmonger, and the Washington-Hiawatha-Liz-Ram-Cat bloc turned against me. Good thing I was still friendly with Alex and Monty, otherwise I don't know how I would have fared.. and also those Bab scientists which kept me ahead in tech until Catherine grew big and sped up ahead of me...


Ahem. To sum it all... It's WAY better than the civ4 system, in that if you cultivate your relationships with others and work towards common goals, they have much fewer chances of turning on you (at least until the rest are dead), as opposed to Civ4 where suddenly your dear ally for the last 3000 years changes civic or adopts a new religion and gets a -10 modifier towards you and hates your guts...


Narmox