I have claimed a territory with an outpost, yet i am getting constantly attacked in it even though we are not at war. What is up with this?

On a related note, if i have an Open Borders policy with another empire, the second I move a scout into their territory they attack me. Isn't it implied by an Open Borders that we can move freely in each others land without attack? The way this works is very confusing and not intuitive.

Outposts are not Fully your territory.  You can get attacked anywhere outside your city territories unless you have a non aggression pact.  Open borders just means you move through their territory, not that they won’t attack you there.

Outposts are not your territory - you have no border police there for example. They are claims, much like the newly founded colonies in the Americas around 1500-1600. If you zoom out of the map you will see that any outpost is not fully coloured, meaning that it is still not fully part of your country.

When you are at peace consider it more like a cold war, like in Endless Legend and Space. The AI can and will attack you outside of your official borders. You will need to sign a Non-Agression pact for them to stop harassing you. On the up side, you can do the same to them. :)

It seems like you should be required to sign a Non-Aggression Pact before you are allowed to sign an Open Borders pact because as it stands now its nearly worthless (if you dont also have a non-agression pact) for the human player because within 1 or 2 turns of moving a unit into their territory its attacked and killed. The way its setup is confusing and misleading to a human player and does not make intuitive sense.

Why would a nation grant access to their land if their actual intent was to attack anyone that does come in? That just doesn't make sense.

I have been able to bomb players who I'm not in war with and destroy their districts that belong to their own cities, this can happen if for example an enemy unit or district in enemy territory stand next to another player city, the bombing will cause damage to all tiles around the target tile and thus you can destroy another player districts if those districts happen to be inside the damage radius. This can also happen with units.

As long as you can beat them, it's ok to be attacked because it gives you another grievance - which is free money and extra war score. You can even retreat and still get the grievance. And then let them attack you again. Lots and lots of free grievances.

@Possibility

That is indeed how the AI acts - it first asks for a Non-Aggression treaty and then eventually for open borders. Some Personas have the Treacherous trait would prefer to have only an Open Borders treaty so they can stab you in the back.

That is also a quirk of this game - the AI Personas can have a different behavior, irrespective of your difficulty setting.

Possibility wrote:

It seems like you should be required to sign a Non-Aggression Pact before you are allowed to sign an Open Borders pact because as it stands now its nearly worthless (if you dont also have a non-agression pact) for the human player because within 1 or 2 turns of moving a unit into their territory its attacked and killed. The way its setup is confusing and misleading to a human player and does not make intuitive sense.

Why would a nation grant access to their land if their actual intent was to attack anyone that does come in? That just doesn't make sense.

Agreed it should be an extension from non aggression in my opinion. But I haven't really experienced open borders as I have never allowed the AI that ability. Except the one time I made a ally. I'm usually a warmonger lol