I get more or less the same thing and it is really causing problems.

In a 6 - 8 skirmish I may enter into an alliance with one or two other factions. Then, when I am getting massively hit by the AI's factions (this may involve 2 - 4 factions) I will get my allies to defend my planet, but low and behold, my ally is in a truce with ALL OF THE AI FACTIONS that are attacking me!!

Essentially, all of the AI factions have a truce, so my allies are useless in helping me defend. I just quit a game because I was being overrun by the enemy AI faction (3 combined factions on hard) and my allies main fleet just sat in the same system that they were destroying, then proceeded to follow the enemy through my systems watching them destroy my worlds, and I had 100% happiness with that ally!

This is seriously making the game unplayable with out setting teams.

Any way this might be fixed???

I forgot to mention it, but what pbdr describes is my problem exactly - *ALL* the AI players tend towards a mutual cease fire, whether they are my ally or not. The other problem is that they seem to have a random "backstab" chance. I've had an AI ally, with 90% friendship, suddenly declare that being my ally no longer served it's needs. Of course, it did this as it's massive fleet was sitting in orbit around one of my colonies watching another AI trash the place.

As is, the built in diplomacy engine is essentially broken. Which is a shame, since otherwise this in an excellent game. It's not a huge deal, since there are ways around it, but it is a little frustrating.

After probably two or three hundred hours of play so far, I'm inclined to agree with the complaints I've read here, and was considering making a post about it myself.

Usually what I do in these situations (although it's really only possible in smaller games) is sign cease fires/treaties with everyone except my target, and then slowly I'll turn on my allies one by one as I run out of hostiles to kill. Unfortunately, in larger games this usually doesn't work (and even in the smaller ones you often find yourself restricted to the "give me stuff" missions since the AI invariably asks you to attack your strongest, closest ally) so locked teams is more or less a necessity which is a pity because an 8-man FFA has some wonderful potential for diplomatic chaos.

I agree that the diplomacy in this game is generally broken, but I'm probably handicapping myself more than I realize when playing against Unfair AI's. I don't particularly find "Hard" to be that challenging, but in games where every faction has a cease fire with every other faction (except me, of course) I all too often find myself defending a single colony or a pair of colonies from constant attacks, one right after the other, always with enormous fleets in the midgame. The last game I played against Unfair AI's saw two of them banging their head against one of my colonies (A Volcanic planet that I named "Maldis"--$1 to anyone who can spot the reference without using google) for about two or three hours and then eventually they both gave me easy missions and I wrangled a cease fire out of them. The game changed completely when I got these cease-fires: it enabled me to clear my left flank, eliminate a player, and establish a position of more or less complete dominance. That's all well and good I guess, but this is a game that strikes me as predominantly military based; Diplomacy need not be my only option for a chance at victory.

The problem I've been having with the Diplomacy in this game is that it essentially makes it so you ever only play one kind of game--there isn't much breathing room in terms of diplomatic meta-strategy. If you don't complete every mission you possibly can, you find yourself on the business end of what appear to be coordinated strikes by rival factions who are now and always at peace. They don't seem to hit at the same time; rather one faction will send in a 50+ ship fleet while another waits one jump away, presumably to swoop in and steal he colony. If you manage to fend off the first attack--guess what? Another one's already on its way.

So yeah, I'm about as sick as anywone else is about the ganging up, which I was under the impression had been fixed in a previous patch. Perhaps they're not intending to go after me at first (and they usually don't) but somewhere between early and late midgame they all seem to end up with cease fires, leaving me the only one at war with (usually) multiple factions. It's getting pretty tiresome.

What surprises me is how the computer players remain at peace when they should presumably be getting kill missions at some point. The computer players obviously never fulfill these kill missions, so shouldn't the alliances eventually break?

Hi!

When I checked the missions statistics I was the only one who got them. So no negative/positive effects for AIs from (non)completing them.


I wonder too. If they do it at all, not just some random roll for peace/war.

BR, Iztok

I have the same problem. Thank god it's not just cuz I suck. I've been trying 40-102 maps with 7-9 other AI all on hard and unlocked teams. The most success I've had recently is by starting with 4 allies in a 5v5 unlocked. So far no one has switched because some of my guys are getting hammered by other teams. I don't pitch in which forces the other AI's to come in and attack keeping animosity between AI's high. I'm focusing on light blue while I ignore the others.

It's kind of a shame to have to play this way. I'm considering quitting this game and doing a 2v2v2v2v2 locked. I imagine that will be fun but it'd be nice if the full extent of diplomacy in the game could be explored in an upcoming patch.

Also: I saved and then sent about 10k creds worth of $, Metal, Crystal as a donation to a guy wanting me to take out someone smaller than him. I didn't go up one single % in friendliness. I tried spreading it out over time. Although they thank you verbally it seems to have no affect on your relations...another thing I found kind of disturbing.

Thats because they were doing what was best for them. They wanted to be on the winning side. Don't tell me you never see that in human history.

namekino - That would be fine, if the AI also betrayed *EACH OTHER.* They don't. Ever. Once two AI players reach Cease Fire, they're friends for life. And without spies, sabotage, threats, extortion, bribery, or any of the other diplomatic options that are standard in a game like Galactic Civilizations 2, there is no way to break up whatever unholy alliances the AI makes. In most cases, the only advantage of an AI ally is that they aren't shooting at you. For the moment. Until they randomly betray you for no apparent reason. They can't help defend you, because they won't shoot at anybody. There isn't even a setting for launching a propaganda war at them - you can't even control who is affected by your Culture stream.