hey... don't go... come, play in MY sandbox!... (13 colonies vs. British) [AI woes]

I am returning back to EB 1.2 after having played ETW for 2 days as British.

I had the 13 colonies declare war on me while they were my protectorate with VERY FRIENDLY RELATIONSHIPS. Declaring war would have been fine, mind you, if they stood ANY chance at the time... In full view of the 13 colonies, my 2 full armies just having defeated Hurons, Iroquois and Inuit Polar(!!) Lancer(!!) hordes(!!) were marching towards the coast to sail to India.


The armies changed course, of course, and 'cooked' the 13 colonies instead. In 3(!) turns: no more 13colonies... The stupid AI had literally no armies at the time it decided to declare war on the British, which was the biggest power on the map...

ETW campaign AI needs SERIOUS modding...

Well, that's on the strategic map AI design side. On the 'buggy side': All the while (all 3 turns) I was busy occupying one 13-colony capital after another, the 'missions' interface was still displaying the suggestion to 'conquer x provinces and maybe the 13 colonies will join you then... make sure you maintain friendly relationships with them until then..." yeah, sure... once my backstabbing protectorate is all occupied by my noble troops i sure made sure we maintained 'friendly relationships'. Guess what, I occupy all the US provinces, the faction is destroyed message pops up, and... I STILL have the mission "conquer x provinces and maybe the 13 colonies will join you then"... Seems like a bug to me. Oh, yes, all the time I was clubbing them up, the tooltip hovering over their provinces suggested they were my 'protectorate'. Hmm... THEY declared war on me.

We know.

wtf?

I've never had this sort of thing happen before.

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Originally Posted by A Very Super Market

wtf?

....

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yes, my point exactly...

wow they must have been angry

In my French GC my protectorate Louisiana declared war on me. They even had at least two full stack armies but never moved. After conquering the territories needed to complete the mission my warlike protectorate joined me without any issues. :wall:

Oh well I wish I still had those minor bugs to worry about. These days (after the 25th march patch) my game crashes after any battle...

I think something is happening behind the scenes with inter-AI stuff. In my current Prussia game, the UP or Sweden got the British to break their alliance with me.

As you conquer more territory in any theatre, all remaining factions there dislike you more and more. It's one of those things that makes sense on paper but when applied to all the minor powers in game results in a neverending series of free territory for you until you run out of idiot principalities that decided they could take on the local empire.

CA implemented a great little tooltip that shows this on the diplomacy panes, which is mentioned nowhere and only displays for a second or two thanks to yet another example of sloppy QA and no playtesting.

I dunno, Russia and the Ottomans are my buddies and I cover most of Europe in blue.

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Originally Posted by antisocialmunky

I dunno, Russia and the Ottomans are my buddies and I cover most of Europe in blue.

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The Ottomans apparently don't care about the European theatre (who knows), no idea about Russia as I've never played as them. As mentioned, provided you're a speed reader, you can see who hates you for what.

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ETW campaign AI needs SERIOUS modding...

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Unfortunately things don't look good in that department. It seems, so far, all you can do is set the AI priority for a pre-defined list of behaviors. There is the faction standing file that I haven't figured out yet, but that appears to be all thats relative to the AI.

I had US emerge as a one-province faction in my GB campaign, while I was busy trying to accomplish the mission to get the "13 colonies". The "13 colonies" were something like 6 or 7, anyway. I offered cash, US accepted protectorate and some turns later they attacked. Diplomacy still insisted they were protectorate. Well...

Another funny diplomacy. Due to my expansionist behavior, everybody hates me, of course, so I imagined taking Vienna from the Prussians and giving the region as a gift to Austria (reduced to only 2 provinces), long time ally/military access etc, might have been a good idea.

Their answer: "never has been this nation so insulted..."

Well, excuse me, m8, then I'll keep it :laugh4:

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Originally Posted by Ordani

The Ottomans apparently don't care about the European theatre (who knows), no idea about Russia as I've never played as them. As mentioned, provided you're a speed reader, you can see who hates you for what.

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The Ottomans don't care about any theater! As both GB and Maratha, the Turks have absolutely loved me, even as I march up to their borders, conquering those pesky Persians. Luckily for them, they have been my second (after Russia) or third (after Sweden) biggest trade partner in both games.

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Originally Posted by Ordani

As mentioned, provided you're a speed reader, you can see who hates you for what.

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You don't have to be a speed reader. A statue is more appropiate, since the tooltip dissappears if you even do so much as breathe in the general direction of your mouse or touchpad. If you don't, it'll stay longer. Well, as long as you can hold your breath anyway. Probably a good idea to move out of the range of any webcams you might have installed as well in case the games tracks your movement.