The Beautiful Mysteries of Diplomacy

[PershsNhpios]

I finally have my 'show on the road'!
I tried my 2nd campaign as the Casse, I assaulted Ratae solely with my faction leader, while then I mapped out the route the large field army would take to come to the settlement's aid, and set an ambush with many iosotae.
And little by little, never once going into debt, I played a guerilla campaign against my fellow britonic tribesmen.
Until I was marching up to the walls of Ictis, bombarding them with shot, then charging in with a few mercenaries.

I don't know how I compare to other Casse players, but it's 250BCE and I just united the entire British Isles.
My problem was thus; I wanted unconsciously for my men to win purely by valour and not by cunning. Which is rather barbaric of me.

Anyway, I can continue my AAR later in a more artistic manner.

The thread is written on the topic of diplomacy.

As a crafty leader of the United Chiefdom of Brittania, I decided to get very involved with Northwestern european politics very early on.
I kept in alliance with both Gallic factions, made an Alliance with Sweboz, and procured trade rights all the way to Sparta.
Then the wars in Gaul started to shift balance, and the Aedui was winning out.
Suddenly Rome made an alliance with the Arverni and then very mysteriously the Arverni, though recently bankrupt, was coming up with many many half-stacks, more than the Aedui.
I also caught a few Roman officers through the provinces of the Sequani!

I soon decided that I must play my role as puppet master also, and began lengthy discussions with the Aedui towns, I cancelled my Arverni alliance and started sending 600 mnai per turn to the Aedui.
Needless to say, within 10 turns the 4 Arverni provinces were surrounded by Aedui.
This didn't stop the Roman republic, who, although they two were pushed back to Arretium by the Aedui, bypassed them through Massilia and sent many maniples up almost as far as the Belgae.

So I snuck through to Italy, down to Taras and made an alliance with the Epirotes, paying a deal of 450 mnai per turn and here's where I began to wonder....

--

I also asked them to attack the faction of Rome, it took alot of persuading, but they agreed to it, and a notice came up:
Assistance granted against: S.P.Q.R (abbrev.)

I was thrilled! Because they immediately allied with the Aedui.
It was logical they were about to make a dual assault, as the Aedui had two full stacks on the Patavium border (This is 250 BCE).
So I looked to see the Epirote offensive with toggle_fow two turns later... And there was nothing.

Here's where I need experienced help, I want to know how to make the factions attack each other, I know it isn't always possible due to the objectives, but I want to know how to get them to mount an offensive.
If I can, I plan to make the Sweboz cross the Rhine and enter into war with both Gallic factions, as I land in the territory of the Menapii.



I have had the Getai launch assaults on my command before, what am I doing wrong now? I also cannot bribe any Eleutheroi, although this may be deliberate.


Please share the secrets of manipulative diplomacy, I wish to handle it without cheatin like I have all my campaign.
I just would like to know how this "Attack Faction" works.

[bovi]

Hehe. You want diplomacy and play RTW? Wrong game, sorry. The AI couldn't understand how to respond to your manipulations. In RTW, adopt a more direct approach: Invade them. Your policy of aiding allies will work in general, but you have no control over where they'll choose to deploy their forces. Persuade a faction to attack an enemy, and the next turn they may become allies with the same. Surrender and become a protectorate to another power at their suggestion, and expect them to attack you the very same turn.

If you want to have diplomacy that really counts, you may want to play another game like Galactic Civilizations II or Europa Universalis 3. Both are excellent, and you can do all the twisted machinations you like.

[PershsNhpios]

Then how did I persuade the Getai to send their only army into Italy??

[pezhetairoi]

...sheer luck, I guess. XD Coincidences happen, yanno...

[bovi]

You tell me. I've never had anything but treachery.

[Puupertti Ruma]

Glenn, what difficulty are you playing on? What I have gathered from these forums, it seems that with medium campaign difficulty AI does not act like the rabid dog it is in very hard campaigns. Also, playing as Casse has the advantage of not having a land border with any AI factions, a situation which has the tendency to make AI's binaric eyes glee with maniacal battlelust.

In accordance to how to machinate AI attack, I can only speculate. When things work out it, it might be that AI isn't in a war with anyone and has enough troops and when the declaration of war was made it chose to attack it's new enemies. If things don't work out, it might be that AI didn't have enough troops to attack, or it had another goal in mind and couldn't change it (AI cannot handle 2 fronts at a time).

RTW diplomacy engine is quite limited in options, has been butchered by the systems unmoddability and AI's warlust against human player and suffers from the not-so-bright AI. Still, when stars are aligned correctly and everything works right it can stretch to good deeds, what is clearly shown in Glenn's post.

[Lusitan]

If you want to have diplomacy that really counts, you may want to play another game like Galactic Civilizations II or Europa Universalis 3. Both are excellent, and you can do all the twisted machinations you like.
I'm a Paradox fanboy here, but "excellent" is still perhabs a bit too much for Eu3. Peace resolution is still in need of considerable fixing

...even if eons ahead of anything CA ever did.

[Dram]

AI is always ridiculous if you play on VH campaign. It has one objective- attack and inconvenience you at all costs no matter the odds. The moment that you share a border with them, its total war.

If you play a game on M campagin, youll notice that the diplomacy is actually quite intelligent. Some examples (playing as the Romans).

Factions that border with you rarely suggest alliances, but ones that are between you and another faction will be the most likely to suggest them, which makes sense. For example the Sweboz offered me an alliance when I shared a border with the Arverni/Aedui, and the Seluicids offered me an alliance as soon as I shared a border with the Ptolemaoi. No other factions suggested them unless this sort of criteria existed.

KH and Macedon where at war with each other, but when I attacked KH, they immidiately ceasefired each other and both attacked me. I was the most powerful faction in the game at the time. This exact circumstance also happened when I attacked the Aedui, who where at war with the Arverni.

During the early game, Carthage (allies) sent armies into Italy and stood next to towns I was besieging, in order to help me with reinforcements. This happened a few times.

The AI prefers to attack rebel towns rather than yours, if avaliable.

Having said all that, M is too easy because the AI armies are not very aggressive and they dont have as much money. It seems also that they dont produce troops every turn even when they have the money to do so. I think it would be interesting if you could play on M and have the script make the game difficult, since the diplomacy would be better.

[Jarardo]

I spent a long time trying to manipulate the AI to do what I wanted, it was fun trying, but the results eventually left me very dissapointed. There are some guides to diplomacy, I think this one stopped being updated after 1.2, but it's where I started.

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=36993

And Frogbeasteggs guide talks about it a little too.

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=38382

I use my Force Diplomacy Mini-mod to make to AI act sort of sane, but even that is very limited.

[polkcountydude]

This is my first post, but I am a long time lurker. Anyways, from what I surmise, the AI responds differently to a little bit of treachery on one's own part. I primarily play as Romanii, always VH/M, and experience confirms that a human player's treachery deters treachery on the part of the AI. The AI is far less likely to attack unprovoked, if, at select times one strikes slyly, deceitfully, and surprisingly at opponents' vulnerable concentrations of power. For example, the Romanii (in real life), despite their professed respect for treaties and nonaggression, sometimes attacked other nations with trumped up charges of disrespect to their sovereignty. Bordering nations rarely attack me without provocation because I am an unknown quantity. In my opinion, people don't give the diplomatic system enough credit.

I wish I was posting this in XP rather than OS X, but I will switch over later and edit this with exact information. It might take a few days because I have my first exams next week and I am taking 18 hours as an Accounting major. My strategy essentially boils down to allying with as many nations as possible during peacetime. I am allied with the Lusotanna, Q, Makedonia, Pontus, Ptolemy, Aedui, Sweboz, Getai, Baktria, Sab'yn and Sauromatae. I think that's it, but I could be wrong. So, in my current campaign, I own all of the Italian peninsula, Illyria (including all of the Adriatic, Segesta, Bononia, Patvium...etc.), Corsica, and Sicily. That's 18 provinces in all. Well, KH and Q have made a couple naval invasions (playing BI) unprovoked, but otherwise the Aedui, Q, Epiros, and KH have been nonentities to me so far till the current 246 BC. I assure you that I have not been ruthless to the AI; I have tried to roleplay, but the damn AI is so stupid. Those are just my thoughts. I look forward to further discussion. I'm pretty drunk too, woohoo!!! Only one class tomorrow, but lots of studying, eating, drinking, smoking, and football this weekend!

Whoops accidentally put Aegean up there instead of Adriatic. Changed it now.

[PershsNhpios]

I am pleased you have been brought out of the shadows by this thread, I too have always, except for the odd occasion which completely lost me, found the AI Diplomacy to be very human.
This is because, if they were human, they would not trust the player to do everything in earnest, which they don't, and they would not agree to any deal that does not bring them any benefit, which we do also.
But other things, by their distrust, become unrealistic, such as refusing gifts of great reward and such.
Which is where the force comes in.

But thank you for your contribution, I wish some would post in my thread about sacking settlements, however I think they were deterred by the name.
Which is disappointing, as it was named so as to get people interested!

[woirble]

I've found one form of diplomacy that works. If an AI faction sends spies against you and masses armies on your border, it is going to attack you.

However, if you can mass an equivalent or greater force on your side of the border before the AI faction actually attacks, the AI seems not to attack.

[Dram]

the ai always knows precisely how much troop strength you have in each region, even if they cant actually see. however they dont attack unless they share a border. your troops can be anywhere in the region and they wont attack unless they have equivalent or more in autoresolve army strength. you can have a full stack army 1 step out of the region and the enemy will attack with 2 units if thats what they need to beat the garrison.