Retaining good relations with an AI

I was wondering if anybody in here has any tips regarding how to prevent an AI from starting a war against you. I usually (as AS) try to keep Bactria from attacking me (and thus instead having them attacking Pahlava) by giving small donations of 100 mnai now and then, but actually Im not even sure if it helps (the reason is that I dont want a full-scale land war in Asia nor even a full-scale Asian empire anyway, so I'd rather my eastern border was just left alone). what actions succeeds in winning the goodwill of the AI and which will it just ignore as it prepares for war?
this goes for both neutral and allied-but-soon-to-betray AIs :)

You basically need a "hard border" rivers, forts watchtowers and patrolling armies. It's 190 BC in my Campaign and I've had total piece with the Getai in Makedonia.

Aside from using the force diplomacy mod to force peace every time they siege you... the previous poster is right.

Enter alliances with your neighbors. I find that they are less likely to invade you that way.

However, you then have to watch for "wandering" armies of your allies.

Once I was playing as Rome and an allied Carthaginian army "wandered" up Italy and sacked Capua when I had moved its garrison out to deal with some pesky rebels.

Also I think I had an effect with giving AI a small tribute every turn. In my makedonia campaign in 0.81 I gave Seleucids 100 gold as a regular tribute for maybe about 100 turns and had land border with them for a good while until they attacked. Everytime the tribute would end I extended it for another 30 turns or so, until one day I forgot about it and of course they attacked.

Well I can't be exactly 100% sure if the tribute made any difference but it's worth a shot. Just remember to keep the money rolling all the time, occasional gifts probably won't do it. It's plausible that the AI doesn't want to attack you as it sees that it will lose income by doing that.

Of course, as Wigfert said a really good defence is often the best defence :)

A bit of money here and there doesn't really cut it. Regular tributes, even if they're trivial amounts work better. As in 50 mnai a turn for 15 turns, and keep renewing it. Otherwise make it costly to attack you, ensure your bordering provinces have strong garrisons.

I've had Massilia for about 20 years bordering on both Aedui and Arverni, and neither have attacked me. I don't even give them money, but there's nearly a full stack sitting in the city, which seems to deter them.

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Originally Posted by Dhampir

Enter alliances with your neighbors. I find that they are less likely to invade you that way.

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I find it more the opposite. For example, playing the Romans I took Massalia very early and so have a border with the Arverni who are not my allies. Nothing has happened there so far. But my allies the Sweboz dropped a full stack on Mediolanum the very year after we shared border along the Alpes.

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Originally Posted by konny

I find it more the opposite. For example, playing the Romans I took Massalia very early and so have a border with the Arverni who are not my allies. Nothing has happened there so far. But my allies the Sweboz dropped a full stack on Mediolanum the very year after we shared border along the Alpes.

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I would be tempted to employ my strategic nuclear arsenal.

:clown:

In my experience, having a massive military rating (on the faction rankings graph) probably has the most effect. After seeing the "have a border = declaration of war" behavior of the AI on VH campaign difficulty in my 0.8 Rome campaign, I've mostly played on M to try to avoid that. Yet under 1.0, I played a M Hayasdan campaign and still got jumped by both AS and Pontus in particularly stupid ways (both were allied with me and involved in other wars). Whereas I played around with a VH AS campaign and nobody lifted a finger against me (except the Ptolemies, with the starting war continuing as long as I played that campaign). Military strength is the only explanation I can think of for that behavior, though I'm still a bit surprised Bactria left me alone.

Experience with another mod also circumstantially supports the military rating hypothesis, for what that's worth. So I'd say just go out and keep your army as big as your economy can support - which you probably want to do anyway for other reasons. ~:)

make sure your military rating is equal or higher than the AI, when that is maintained, just park 1 full stack in one of the border cities. the AI will not attack unless it's sure it has advantage.

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Originally Posted by Dhampir

Enter alliances with your neighbors. I find that they are less likely to invade you that way.

However, you then have to watch for "wandering" armies of your allies.

Once I was playing as Rome and an allied Carthaginian army "wandered" up Italy and sacked Capua when I had moved its garrison out to deal with some pesky rebels.

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On this side note, Cartaginian stragglers that go on for excursions of their own in peace time accross the length of Italia annoy me greatly as well. An effective way to prevent that from happening is to place a single unit at the tip of the Italian peninsula, on the east bank of the continental bridge where Italy and Sicilly meet. One such placed unit effectviely blocks the passage of all other units towards the mainland and the only way to move past it is for them to attack it, in which case you'll have some time to recruit some defences in your hinterland to meet the threat. ~:)

I think a tribute definitely helps in relations. The core diplomacy engine when it comes to that is presumably similar if not the same as M2TW, and there you can see the relations clearly. When you have even a small tribute going constantly, your relations rise or are maintained, putting off war for just that much longer.

Of course, the strong military doesn't hurt either, although perhaps more expensive in the long run, if their sole purpose is to be camped at borders and dissuade attackers... but if you got money to spare, then you got nothing to lose.

Oh yeah, and Medium campaign difficulty won't hurt either.

These three things oughta keep you at peace for a lot longer than you're used to.

Thanks :) I'll try the tribute thing... and besides I know which town they'll attack first so I know which one to garrison. Btw I'll have to agree with the statement that its always your allies that attack you and *never* the neutrals, but... whatever ;)

I never ally with anyone throughout most of the game, and later on tend to be fending off requests for alliance from almost everyone.

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Originally Posted by QuintusSertorius

I never ally with anyone throughout most of the game, and later on tend to be fending off requests for alliance from almost everyone.

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When your faction gets powerful the AI gets scared of you, they want to be your ally so you don't attack them. Very sensible really.

But someone above said that the relations mechanic works the same as in M2TW and in M2 everybody gangs up on the strongest.

The "strongest" everyone invariably gangs up on is the Seleukids.

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Originally Posted by QuintusSertorius

The "strongest" everyone invariably gangs up on is the Seleukids.

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Part of the reason for that is the Seleukids tend to attack every one on their borders.