WHEOOHRN Hiding

[Roland Johansen]

The examples I gave were just that, examples. The point was that it would be nice if the message: 'we have enough on our hands' would not give away the AI's intentions in the somewhat rarer instances that it occurs now. Ideally, I wouldn't want to be able to deduce the AI's war intentions at all by hovering over the red option. That could be achieved by creating a single diplomatic response that combines the instance 'we're planning a war' with some other instances (like for instance the examples I gave in my previous post).

The goal is not to make the AI good at deceiving the human as it is unlikely that it can be programmed that smart. However, the player shouldn't be 100% sure that the AI is planning a war (when not active in one) just by reading the diplomatic text 'we have enough on our hands'. That's just too dumb for the AI to give away those war plans.

 

[DaveMcW]

However, the player shouldn't be 100% sure that the AI is planning a war (when not active in one)

If the player checks every turn, the change in messages makes them 100% sure.

There is no way to fix that besides making warring AIs bribable, or removing all bribes.

just by reading the diplomatic text 'we have enough on our hands'.

So you want to make it harder for casual players, while having no effect on hardcore players?

 

[phungus420]

If the player checks every turn, the change in messages makes them 100% sure.

There is no way to fix that besides making warring AIs bribable, or removing all bribes.



So you want to make it harder for casual players, while having no effect on hardcore players?

I'm trying to see the truth in this statement, but I can't. If the AI hates you, it'll keep telling you it hates you, where is the change in message?

 

[Roland Johansen]

If the player checks every turn, the change in messages makes them 100% sure.

There is no way to fix that besides making warring AIs bribable, or removing all bribes.



So you want to make it harder for casual players, while having no effect on hardcore players?

I actually don't think that casual players even know what the message 'we have enough on our hands' currently means.

What I meant is that the same message could be shown when the AI will never agree to a war bribe due to planning to attack someone and when it will never agree to a war bribe due to for instance investing a large share of it production power into a few world wonders. (that's just meant as an example and might not be a great reason to avoid war) So when the AI finishes these world wonders and immediately decides it's time to plan a war, the human player won't notice because the diplomatic message would be the same. As long as many of the situations result in the same message, the human won't be able to deduce a lot purely due to diplomatic messages.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

I'm trying to see the truth in this statement, but I can't. If the AI hates you, it'll keep telling you it hates you, where is the change in message?

If you can bribe an AI for 10 turns, then on the 11th all of a sudden you can't, that indicates a change in its plans. Under current mechanics, it basically guarantees that the AI is plotting war or that someone declared on it. This is indeed something very difficult to get around in current civ IV.

 

[Roland Johansen]

If you can bribe an AI for 10 turns, then on the 11th all of a sudden you can't, that indicates a change in its plans. Under current mechanics, it basically guarantees that the AI is plotting war or that someone declared on it. This is indeed something very difficult to get around in current civ IV.

In some cases (like the one you mention above), the player can be sure. But we can limit these cases by removing the one-to-one correspondence between the diplomatic message 'we have enough on our hands' and the AI status 'we are at war or planning to'.
If the AI has 'enough on it's hands' for a newly added reason not related to war for turns 1 till 10 and on the 11-th turn it starts planning a war, then you won't notice the difference.