ArrowLance wrote:
Open borders.

I am amused by this post.



"I'm having trouble creating peace because the AI empire is too close to mine."



"So make an open borders treaty."



Lolwhat.



You need peace before open borders, and you need posititive relations before peace. You can't use open borders to get positive relations.

Just want to throw my hat into the ring here. I agree with what being said here, Diplomacy has some real fundamental problems right now and is probably one of the weaker parts of the game. The core system is good, and I really like the amount of direct and immediate feedback you get (being able to see the modifiers), but it's impossible to forge friendships right now with any faction that impacts you (why would I want a friend on the other side of the galaxy?) and it's really lacking in character.

Photon_Ventdesdunes wrote:
I suppose advanced diplomaty and creation of whole political systems will be a the main feature of a dlc after release on the final version.

Like spying and advanced sabotage another one.



I think I read it somewhere.

I hope not. Putting something as essential as a decent diplomatic system in DLC would be a total d*** move and would lost this game fans fast. If they don't have the time to implement it by release then fair enough, but in that case they should either release it as a free update or wait and create an expansion-pack similar to what SOaSE did. The diplomatic system as it stands is relatively useless and needs some improvement before the final release IMO.

The new alpha only allows those diplomatic actions when you are at better than cold war with someone. You've got to get peace before you trade.



If that's not your problem, I dunno...

and how exactly do i improve relations with them?

You wait...



As far as I can tell, that's it. If you're bordering them, you're out of luck because they're gonna get mad no matter what.



Gradually their opinion of you will go up, generally, and if you're above 0 diplomacy you should be able to offer a peace deal.

yeah, thanks for the clarification. i always get a huge minus on relations for 'close borders'. but i play mostly small maps, and always have close borders.. so i don't know.



guess i'll just keep playing and figure things out. good thing is i love this game. haha! :P

What bugs me is when the AI colonizes close to MY borders and then gives me a penalty for it.

jordanjay29 wrote:
What bugs me is when the AI colonizes close to MY borders and then gives me a penalty for it.

That's pretty realistic.

The massive negative penalty for being neighbors is massively annoying. It makes diplomatic play, even in very large maps, a total crap shoot. If that penalty simply has to stay in, there should be options for countering it like certain structures, diplomatic ships or just straight up bribery.

HSTiberius wrote:
The massive negative penalty for being neighbors is massively annoying. It makes diplomatic play, even in very large maps, a total crap shoot. If that penalty simply has to stay in, there should be options for countering it like certain structures, diplomatic ships or just straight up bribery.

Open borders.

There should be more diplomatic options you can engage to build a better relationship with your neighbors.

Now there is only heaps of ways to lose standings and not regain it.



Relief Efforts, if they have a new colony next to your space. You can transfer X amount of food per turn to a agreed planet.

Transfer X amount or % of Sci per turn to another race. Same can be done for Dust.

And reversed, where you can rent Production/Science.



Defense Pacts, share relations.

All building up standings over time.

I suppose advanced diplomaty and creation of whole political systems will be a the main feature of a dlc after release on the final version.

Like spying and advanced sabotage another one.



I think I read it somewhere.

so i havent played in a little while but when i started playing today i couldnt do anything diplomatic like; give dust, trade planets, research, or resources. Is this a bug? And before you ask yes I have researched in diplomatic and trade all the way to the 7500s unless it is farther ahead, and if thats the case that is stupid all of the other races are "intimidated" of me and im fighting on 4 fronts without being able to do anything.

There is already a diplomaty system in the game. It needs some corrections as the game is an alpha but already there and will be decent. When I talked about advanced, it meant a chapter including much much more extra-stuff.

After, I should find where I thought I read this

I posted a very similar question regarding diplomacy and trade and the apparent AI schizoid relationship options in another section of this forum and one of the moderators replied there that the future Alpha 2 release should resolve some of these diplomacy issues and allow for the ability to possibly meet these endgame scenarios.

VARRAKK wrote:
Relief Efforts, if they have a new colony next to your space. You can transfer X amount of food per turn to a agreed planet.

Transfer X amount or % of Sci per turn to another race. Same can be done for Dust.

And reversed, where you can rent Production/Science.

I agree, but I'd much rather transfer dust than science. You don't want your enemies to gain a technological edge.



There needs to be some way to improve relations effectively.



Here are some of my suggestions (+ to plus relation; - to minus relation):

+ Common enemies: Destroy ships/fleets of common enemies; break siege on target player's colony

- Non-common allies: destroy ship/fleet of target players ally (when their ally is your enemy)

I think the ability not to negotiate anything before your relations go above 0 is not realistic or anyway game improving. In the classical age the diplomatic relations between the Roman Empire and the then Han Chinese Empire was concluded through exchange of both economic and cultural gifts (Silk for example). These 2 empires were as alien against each other as the current view human-alien would be.



EDIT: But of course you could let certain diplomatic options be available dependent on the race characteristics.

supersoaker9 wrote:
I agree, but I'd much rather transfer dust than science. You don't want your enemies to gain a technological edge.

That can be avoided by only selling off your lower-tier techs. If it's a good design, the enemy won't sell you their most strategically important techs either. I think tech trading can add an interesting dimension to the game. Unfortunately the current overabundance of dust makes it a moot point. There is no need to sell tech when you're swimming in gold (er, I mean dust).



Tech trading also needs to be carefully balanced when it's done between other factions. I remember a persistent problem in GalCiv2 was the way other factions seemed like they were trading techs much more freely among themselves, than they would with the player. Many people just turned off tech trading as a result. Which brings up another point: it would be a good idea to have tech trading an option in the galaxy setup, rather than a fixed part of the diplomacy design. Some people may want to play a Sophons game where they can maximize their research advantage, and avoid having other factions trading tech among themselves to reduce that advantage.

There needs to be some way to improve relations effectively.

I keep saying this in other threads, but I think a big problem right now is that we don't have any default ability to trade or negotiate treaties on First Contact, when you run up against another faction very early in the game.



You have to specifically research those skills, and many people will go for other parts of the tech tree in the first few turns of the colony rush. On smaller maps, it's too easy to get into a cold or hot war through territorial conflict, before you've had a chance to set up trade relations or treaties.



I think diplomacy would work better if the left-side tech tree items for trade and diplomacy were designed to enhance a baseline diplomacy ability, rather than to allow diplomacy at all.



Of course there should still be certain factions that would be less interested in diplomacy than pure conquest on First Contact. Like a Kzin-type race, where they assume any other race they find is food or slaves. Shoot first, ask questions later. But they shouldn't all be like that.

Yeah there's a general lack of control in this area at the moment which is quite glaring if this isn't your first 4x.