Diplomacy is entirely broken

[Claudio]

After sleeping on it and calming down a little, i decided to give the new patch another chance. I decided to play a landlocked (ish) faction, Prussia. Wanting to unite west and east Prussia, i saved up some money and offered Poland 30,000 for Gdansk. An insult, they tell me. I save up some more and offer 50,000, plug bayonet, common land enclosures, the other tier 1 farming tech, still an insult. I move a large army to the border with Gdansk, and one to the border with Saxony, and make one last offer/threat to Poland. 50,000 and all the technology. They refuse outright. I cancel my trade agreement with Poland and declare war.

Saxony, Courland and Russia join in on the side of Poland, and i have no allies to invite. I take Gdansk, and after laying siege to and defeating a sally attempt from Saxony, leaving them with mere tatters of an army, i offer them peace and trade. They refuse, and i knock them out of the game. At this point i offer Poland 25,000 for peace and trade, to which they refuse. I offer them 25,000 for just peace on its own, they refuse. I move my army to Lithuania, leaving almost a half stack to defend what land i own. I defeat a small Polish army in Lithuania, and a medium-sized army of Courland that was hanging around in the province too. I lay siege to Lithuania, which has no garrison, and offer peace to Poland. They refuse. I offer peace to Courland, they refuse.

I take Lithuania and offer to give it back to Poland for peace, along with 25,000, they refuse. I offer Lithuania to Courland, with 25,000 for peace, they refuse. I move to Warsaw. I defeat a Polish army. I besiege the city and offer peace, plus Lithuania, plus 25,000, they refuse. I take Warsaw. I offer Poland Warsaw, Lithuania, 25,000, plug bayonets, common land enclosures, the other tier 1 farm technology, and peace. Outright refusal. I offer the same deal to Courland, outright refusal.

I use my smaller army that was left in east Prussia to defeat the army of Courland and lay siege to their only city. I offer them peace, Lithuania, Warsaw, all the technology and 25,000. They refuse. I destroy them.

I take yet another city of Poland, leaving them only 1 remaining province, feeble and destitute. I offer them every single city i have taken, minus Gdansk, all the technology, and all the money i had, around 40,000, for peace and trade. They refused. I besieged their last city and offered them the same deal yet again, every city, all the technology, money, for peace and trade. Refusal. I try one last time, this time using the threat option, rather than a regular diplomatic offer. No joy. I destroy Poland.

All i wanted was Gdansk, for i like to roleplay, not blitz.

CA, i demand you release a program that will allow me to rollback my game to the previous patch. This latest one has fixed nothing, has made the AI on the battlefield no better at all, and has made them 100% incompetent in the diplomatic department. At least in the previous version they were only 50% incompetent.

Good day.

[Sheogorath]

Back in my day we had to walk ten miles, in the snow, to get diplomacy. Uphill both ways. And we didn't have shoes. And the AI was less talkative than a rabid lion on acid.

In any case, yes, there are some 'berserker' factions in every game, it seems. It's been that way since 1.0. Most factions have, for me, responded well to diplomacy.

[Marquis of Roland]

LOL! Maybe the AI isn't into bribes I guess....In my Prussian campaign, I declared war on Saxony (Poland joins), took both Dresden and Gdansk on the same turn, and immediately after I take those cities, I offer peace ON THE SAME TURN to Poland-Lithuania for a trade agreement and they agree!

About 10 turns later, Polish guys were doing well against Austria so they declare war again....I like to roleplay too so I don't invade their lands. I just ask for peace and a trade agreement every turn. At first they were insulted, so I checked back with them about every other turn or so, and about 6 turns later, they accepted peace and trade again!

About 20 turns later Russia was about to wipe out the Poles and so I was "forced" to take Warsaw, and the Polish are no more....

[Lemur]

In any case, yes, there are some 'berserker' factions in every game, it seems. It's been that way since 1.0. Most factions have, for me, responded well to diplomacy.

Try it again with the new patch. I was playing UP on H/H last night, and had both Sweden and Prussia go completely bat-guano crazy on me, accepting no peace terms no matter how many provinces i took, no matter how generous the offer. (At one point I was offering Prussia two major cities, one minor city and 50k gold for peace. "No, a thousand times no ...")

[nameless]

The AI can be weird sometimes.

As Russia on Hard I had control of north eastern part of europe while Austria had control of the south eastern part.

We were at peace for at least 40 turns before they declared war on me.

[AussieGiant]

Just keep trying to remember stating what difficulty you are playing on. I know the red mist can get in the way sometimes.

It really helps to determine if YOU are insane to expect VH to play with any sanity, or Medium, in which sanity IS part of what I experience.

@ Sheogorath, maaate, you should talk.

Back in my day we crawled backwards 23 miles in blazing 50 degree heat just to get a trade agreement. Going there was underwater and coming back was over the Alps. All we had was a loin cloth and a banana. The AI rarely even spoke, just grunted and pointed to options we had written on paper before hand.

[Dodge_272]

Now you know how Hitler felt.

[FactionHeir]

Well, at least during 1.2, you could take France and get all of their colonies for peace without offering them anything else. Same for spain.

Not working in 1.3.

All that VH too.

[antisocialmunky]

In all honesty, TW has always had bad to crap diplomacy. Atleast Shogun was fun about it though. :)

[al Roumi]

I'm not sure if this patch is any better or worse. I started a spanish campaign last night and got as far as 1714, having completed the New Spain quest, eliminated Portugal and Papal states.

In my first turn i was able to set up alliances with Genoa, Savoy and Venice and trade with Portugal and Morocco. I was also able to swap flanders and florida with France for French Guyana and their enlightenment tech. So far so consistent with previous play throughs on other game versions.

Incidentaly, i always offer military access as a sweatener to trade agreements. More often than not it works, and as the AI can't backstab you from within your territory, it comes with minimal risk.

Now I had no illusions of a lasting peace with Morocco or Portugal, just a few turns of trade, and Morocco did duly DoW after about 4 turns. Portugal never did however, and i did the dirty on them by about turn 6 or 8.

After I'd captured dutch Guyana and Curacao from the UP, they upped their game in Europe and captured first flanders and then France! I'd not seen this before but have heard of it happening. I re-captured paris and greedily wanted to keep it. After a couple of turns it all turned to the worse and a rebelious French army appeared (without drawing me into conflict with france though -weird), so I decided to cut my losses and invest in my ally. However, I couldn't for the life of me persuade France to trade or even accept Paris back for nothing. I literally offered them France as a gift and they wouldn't take it!

Now, i'm, not sure if the presence of a rebelious army of their nation (or any) is what detered them from it but when reloading to a save immediatly following my capture of Paris, France happily accepted my gift. They still wouldn't trade it for Savoy though...

[Durallan]

Diplomacy is DEFINETLY/Entirely broken. First I thought Didz might have just been very annoyed because something really upset him, but no, playing a campaign again, diplomacy is definetly broken.

Started a Prussian campaign (M/M), Got Bavaria, Hannover Wurttemburg Wesphalia Georgia and Savoy to become my protectorates. I realised I wasn't going to get anywhere in europe so I decided I would send an army to the new world. 27 years later that still hasn't happened.

Austria declared war on Wurttemburg, so I join in to defend them. I take most of Austria bar 2 provinces, Polands protectorate Saxony decides halfway through that it wants to take my capital, my large army is right next door and destroys Saxony.

At this point Poland decides it doesn't like me anymore and declares war. I take Poland and beat it down to one province which is sieged by a full stack army.

Halfway through destroying Poland I realise that Russia is also an enemy of Poland and Austria, so I become their allies.

Serbia rebels against the austrians so I send an army to take it. End Turn. During Austria's turn it sends a large stack of those annoying irregulars along with some horse artillery. With my army heavily depleted I barely win and kill the prince of Austria aswell. When it comes to Russia's turn, they decide to DECLARE WAR ON ME.

There is no logical reason that it should have declared war on me considering I just beat 2 major nations to their knees, We were allies for a few years and had been trading partners for much longer
and both had Sweden AND Poland as enemies.

There are several nations in my game that are war with all of europe for no apparent reason. I really was hoping this patch might change things, but diplomacy is still hopeless.


Okay Russia is a similar sized country to me and to some people maybe they think russia thought it was a good time to pick on me, Then CA can at least get Russia to either send me a letter of demands before it declares war or give some sort of pathetic excuse in a news bulletin telling me why theyve declared war before the DoW panel comes up.

[Sheogorath]

In all honesty, TW has always had bad to crap diplomacy. Atleast Shogun was fun about it though. :)

Geisha diplomacy

[Lemur]

Yup, the new AI forces you to blitz or die. No room for this so-called "diplomacy."

Since I like to roleplay, and not expand much past historical bounds, I find this intensely irritating. I may have to leave ETW alone until the next patch.

[Zenicetus]

Just keep trying to remember stating what difficulty you are playing on. I know the red mist can get in the way sometimes.

It really helps to determine if YOU are insane to expect VH to play with any sanity, or Medium, in which sanity IS part of what I experience.

Seconded.

I'll jump on the "diplomacy is broken" bandwagon too, but there should be differences at the various difficulty settings. Given the limited scope of the game where territorial expansion is the only real goal, we should be expecting more hostility and war declarations at the highest difficulty settings. I'm playing my current Empire campaign at M difficulty and I'm seeing some illogical DOW's, but I don't think I'm seeing as many as some here. The M difficulty is probably the baseline where the devs are trying to make diplomacy work best, and where we can figure out what's broken or not.

If CA is using a similar "constantly degrading relations" system at H and VH settings like they did in M2TW (are they? does anyone know?), then yeah... you'll have the whole world ganged up against you, and constant illogical DOW's. That's just how the CA devs think of "difficulty" in this game, based on prior versions. It can be a trap to think you're an experienced strategy game player, and therefore you should jump in right at VH setting, and anything else is gimped. Some games like this play out more realistically (or at least, more predictably) at the medium settings, where the AI isn't acting quite as crazy (but still crazy).

[Equilibrium]

I'd say it's not broken but simply their new principle of having arch enemies that they talked about in one of the daily updates.
Just like you I've not been able to make peace with poland at any time as prussia but with the russians, france and even the austrians after taking away two provinces and destroying bavaria for a small fee of money they all agreed to peace and have kept it so far.

[Lemur]

Hmm, okay, I'll re-start my UP campaign on M/M and see if that makes a diff.

[Marquis of Roland]

Yup, the new AI forces you to blitz or die. No room for this so-called "diplomacy."

Since I like to roleplay, and not expand much past historical bounds, I find this intensely irritating. I may have to leave ETW alone until the next patch.

Same here. I'm not being forced to take more territory, but since it's a region that I need to win, I figure I'll just go ahead and take it early. This causes a chain reaction effect of the faction next to your new region will declare war, and soon its hard to stop.

Hannover used to never declare war on Prussia, but this time they did, so I got sucked into killing them, then Denmark declares war, and after I take Copenhagen Sweden declares war. Pretty sure if the Dutch didn't take Rhineland, Westphalia would've declared war too. As it is now, they're only trying to buy Hannover from me every turn.

I usually try to spread out the taking of the 14 required regions over a span of 60 years, but it's 1725 and I'm pretty much there already. I'm not gonna say the AI randomly declares war, I mean all the factions that have done so had a legitimate reason to. I will say that the AI is being unreasonably aggressive, same as it was in M2TW, and in RTW, etc. etc. etc.

On the bright side, my infantry are leveling up a lot faster than before. By 1720, all the infantry in both my field armies are 4xp.

[Sheogorath]

*Sigh*

I guess I'm going to have to rethink my general optimism on this particular subject and agree with the people who say diplomacy isn't working now.

Ten turns into my Russian campaign, I've had Georgia, Dageistan and the Ottomans on my case since turn 5. Persia jumped in recently as well. None of them will accept peace under any terms.

Can we get a hotfix, CA? I'm all for a nice bit of war every now and then, but it's no fun when everybody gangs up on you.

[FactionHeir]

Yes, make em gang up on each other, why always the human player? That's just utterly ridiculous. THis game should be fun and more or less equal for all parties involved rather than being a "bash the human" fest.

In fact, even with the constant DoWs, the AI is still no challenge for any half way decent player because they are so happily at peace with each other. If they actually fought each other like they fight the human, they could actually expand and turn into superpowers you know.

[Cheetah]

There is no logical reason that it should have declared war on me ...

1, Just tell me that in real life how many times do you see people behave logically? Since when is human behaviour motivated by purely by logic alone?

2, Why do you guys think that everyone else should behave the way you would behaved in their place? Why do you think that if they do not behave the exact same way then the game is "definitely broken"?!?

[Cheetah]

Yup, the new AI forces you to blitz or die.

No it does not. Being in war does not mean that you have to conquer. Conquering is still your choice.

In my Poland game (though it was pre-patch) I was in war with the Prussians, Austria and the Crimean-chanate. They did not send anyting to me, I did not send anything to them for more then 2 decades! It felt like total tranquility and not total war. I was able to tech up and build everything with 4 landlocked provinces!

Another example: in my GRB game the hurons declared war on me (as usual I assume). They sent a dozen or so raiding parties to Moose factory. Defeated them all; now they have not sent anyone for many years. I don't touch them, they don't touch me yet we are still at war.

I none of the cases was I forced to blitz and in both of the cases I am well and alive. It is your choice.

[Marquis of Roland]

Yes, make em gang up on each other, why always the human player? That's just utterly ridiculous. THis game should be fun and more or less equal for all parties involved rather than being a "bash the human" fest.

In fact, even with the constant DoWs, the AI is still no challenge for any half way decent player because they are so happily at peace with each other. If they actually fought each other like they fight the human, they could actually expand and turn into superpowers you know.

They do fight each other. Hell, they fight each other more than they fight me. People complain about the AI not attacking when they DoW, well this is probably why. I don't see Austria, Poland, Sweden, and Russia just drop their current choking of each other to team up and wipe me out. When I look at the campaign map during their turns, at about 2 or 3 regions change hands every turn in Eastern Europe.

So its not the AI ganging up on you, its more like you walked into a bar for a drink and there just happens to be a bar fight going on. The guy next to you MIGHT swing at you, or he might swing at the next guy. Who knows?

@Cheetah
You are exactly right, it is still up to Human players whether or not to blitz. In my case I blitzed to a bottle-neck and stopped.

[FactionHeir]

I'm not saying they don't fight each other, but rather that if you border them, they WILL always declare war on your if you fall below a certain number of enemies unless you are allied with them and have great relations. If not allied but great relations, they will still declare war on you, regardless of how bogged down they are.

Similarly, the AI declares war on the player a lot more than against other AI factions. Example fact being none of the American Indian factions declare war on the AI. They will however always declare war on you.

[Marquis of Roland]

Actually, they'll still declare war on you if you are allies. There are just some regions that certain factions take offense to other people owning. France will always attack anyone who owns Alsace-Lorraine. Spain will always attack whoever owns Gibraltar. And so on.

The AI also does not declare war more on the player than on other AI factions. Just look at the diplomacy window; most major factions are at war with more factions than you I wager.

The American Indians do attack British, Spanish, and Americans, but do not seem to attack the French. That makes sense historically, I guess. I do see a big Cherokee empire every once in awhile.

[FactionHeir]

YOu must be playing a different game then, because in none of my games, save RTI and where I was involved in getting the Natives to go to war with other factions by being an ally on either end, they never declared war on the other Euro nations holding colonies there (or the colonies themselves).

The only time there was some sort of war was Spain deciding to attack the Pueblo and then the Cherokee, but the Indians themselves never declared war. They do against the human player though.

Add to that, CA announced in the most recent patch that emerging factions are only at war with the human, not with AI, which suggests that really, its a human vs AI game rather than a free for all.

[Marquis of Roland]

Sorry, I misread your post Factionheir. I thought you meant if they attack the euro factions, not if they declare war I just know they do fight each other. How do you tell who initiates the DoW?

I agree that the game should give the AI certain advantages, the way things are now, the AI needs as much help as it can get, that doesn't mean the AI factions get together to formulate a master plan against the player though.

[FactionHeir]

Tells you in the war report at the start of turn.

[jsberry]

Actually, they'll still declare war on you if you are allies. There are just some regions that certain factions take offense to other people owning. France will always attack anyone who owns Alsace-Lorraine. Spain will always attack whoever owns Gibraltar. And so on.

.

That is one thing they did right. Do you have a list of such provinces?

[Monsieur Alphonse]

In my game the Native Americans declare war on AI Western factions. In my latest GB campaign they even declared war on each other. But of course they will DoW you when you share a border with them. As will do all the minor factions. But even the major factions declare war like madmen.

Spain started a war against me and lost Spain, Gibraltar and Portugal. Then I was able to sign a peace agreement. Several turns later they DoWed me again only to get rid of Naples and Sardinia. this left them with Lombardi. My standing with them was -934. The Spanish king must eaten English flesh for breakfast every morning. Since their hate was too much they declared war again and marched their army to wards Naples. Somehow they forgot that they were at war with Savoy as well. Bye bye Spain.

And I am at war with Poland for 70 years. We never fought a battle, but they wont sign a peace agreement.

[Fisherking]

I have to admit that it seems like AI vs. player and I think that is the root of the matter.

Since there is now the penalty for not honoring agreements the latest tactic seems to be a trade partner declares war on a protectorate. (the last one I had in a GB campaign was Sweden going to war with the 13 Colonies)

The tribes do go to war with other European factions however. The Cherokee are indiscriminate in their DoWs. The others do seem to concentrate on the player instead of AI factions from what I can see. My war with France was also over the Colonies, but they actually attacked and took some of them. Never mind that the let one rebel to become the US.

There is still the illogical behavior of blockaded ports not being cleared and trading partners seem to be top priorities for AI DoWs. I could have easily made a trade agreement with Denmark but did not just to see what happened. Denmark may be the only country in Europe who has not been at war with its neighbors. On the other hand, the Ottoman Empire has one of the strongest fleets in the game, but all their trade is blocked by a Polish Brig and they won’t clear the port. At least for another 10 or 20 turns. Still though, the DoWs do not seem to be quite as bad as in the past. I have managed to avoid most entanglements in Europe but I have one ally and no protectorates. Trade partners are dwindling and those actively trading is an ever shrinking commodity.

But this is only the first campaign with the new patch. I am not ready to condemn it across the board. But perhaps soon...