RTW: unable to offer an alliance

[axons amok]

Why am I unable to offer an alliance to a faction?

I'm the Scipii, trying to get the Seleucids on my team so that I can pincer the Egyptians. I've got a Trade Rights treaty with them, but when I send in my diplomat, I don't even have the option of offering an alliance.

I'm not allied with any of their enemies, and I'm not at war with any of their allies. What gives? :wall:

[Neco]

It may be that the seleucids are allied with someone who is in turn allied with someone who you are at war with.

That's what I assumed in my spain game when I couldn't ally with pontus. They were allied with parthia, who was allied with numidia, whom I was at war with.

[axons amok]

Hmm... The Seleucids are allied with Parthia and Armenia, who are in turn allied with each other and Scythia.

So, Seleucids <-> Parthia <-> Armenia <-> Scythia all form one big alliance.

I'm not at war with any of these folks.

What's even better is that the Scythians are allied with Pontus, who are kicking the Seleucids' asses. Maybe I should declare war on Pontus?

Could the Senate's wishes be involved here? The official Senate policy towards the Seleucids is that in the interests of Rome, friendly diplomatic relations should be established, and that these people should be weakened or bled white in anticipation of eventual conflict.

[axons amok]

Hmm, they won't even take a cash gift from me (I offered 1000 denarii with no strings attached). I would think that means they're getting ready to attack me, except we're not neighbors at all. Weird.

[Ciaran]

That´s RTW´s diplomacy for you...
It has its peaks, mainly offering way more options than MTW, but the downside is, sometimes it is just weird.

[Avicenna]

You should always use the vanilla... after BI diplomacy is practically nonexistent: one unsuccessful negotiation lost my 3 wreath diplomat all his wreaths once.

Allying is no good as well: just tell them to attack the Egyptians. Usually after an alliance they still just sit there doing nothing much unless you tell them to attack.

[shadowarmy75]

Are any of your allies at war with any of thier allies?

[Ciaran]

Sometimes you can´t offer alliances even if both you and the faction you´re asking have no alliances at all. I see it just now with me (Egypt) and Numidia. We´re both at war with the Roman factions and have no other allies, still I can´t even offer them an alliance. Not that it´s much in the way of a loss, as alliances seemingly are just for the purpose of getting backstabbed. It happened three times in my current game, the factions I was living side by side with only trade rights granted never were any trouble.