Diplomacy and Reputations a bit of a rant

[Ciddler]

Now I am also playing as Turkey and it was completly normal for me to notice that a whole bunch of nations hated me when a crusade was declared on Antioch. However only 1 nation got through with an army (Polish) the rest had crusade armies but offered me cease-fire agreements, so they only joined the Crusade to impress the pope but lastly did not act on it.

However I would like to know how to improve my stance towards others besides bribes. I was betrayed about 4 times by the egyptians and they got a really bad name for themselves, I however got the exact same stance as he does now even though I was always the one attacked (except for a Jihad on Constantinople). How can I make other nations like me on a long-term basis. I give them money, we even get in alliances but after around 10 turns they just say "hey I like that city" and attack me. No matter what I do I can't get our relations above "very weak".

[Debe2233]

I think diplomacy is better but far from perfect, the main concern for me being enemies not agreeing to a cease-fire, i was Milan the enemy was Byzantium i had 15 cities they had 3, my power was absolute they were bottom, i offered them 20,000 for a ceasefire... they wouldnt accept it, i mean... WHY i have never attacked them, they got involved because they were allied to an enemy that attacked me at sea when their fleet was nearby.

The reputations as well seems strange, i've never broken an alliance or attacked someone without provocation yet i have an awful reputation... how come?.

On the other hand i find keeping good relations with other factions can be fairly easy and from my personal experience allies which have good relations with you are unlikely to attack unless your in the only direction they can expand.

[Sheogorath]

Diplomacy does need some work. Take my Portugal campaign for one.
Ive been at war with France since, oh, turn ten.
The French wont give up. They refused to accept a ceasefire on reasonable terms (Oh, lets see, I give you three regions, a lot of gold and my world-wide map for a 'balanced' agreement? Whatever.), so basically Im on turn 60-something now, my politics has mostly consisted of being very angry at Milan, the only state who would ally to me.
Y'see, our relations took a hit for some random reason, they were at 'reasonable'. The following turn Milan, which didnt ally to France (and I had just paid them 2000 gold to get in on the damn war), attacked me by blockading my ports.
W
T
F
?

I got mad at that point, so I sacked Paris and demolished everything in it except the church. Then I let it rebel and sacked it again. Now Paris is a 'minor city' and Im happy again.
I plan to wipe out the remnants of the French shortly.

There was also a phase where we had a French Pope who threatened to excommunicate me every time I sieged a city for more than two turns. However now the College of Cardinals consists of me, Poland, and a single Hungarian.
No assassins needed, I just handed the Pope 5,000 Florins and suddenly French cardinals started to die and be replaced my my own.
Sometimes the AI amazes me ;)

[Chrisky]

I played a whole campaign as HRE and NEVER started a war, neither by trespassing on foreign ground or sinking foreign ships. My reputation was always really bad, diplomacy only served me for bribing the pope.

It seems to be impossible to get
a) a decent reputation, even though you don't harm anyone (unless they started).

b) (thanks to a)?) no other power accepts anything in the fair range of offers.

I have been attacked by allies (France, Poland and Denmark), alliances had no effect in any case at all.

The only useful thing i found that denying trade rights in the beginning keeps foreign merchants away for a while so you get time to soup yours up...

Overall I must say that whoever tested the game in advance has utterly failed. I just quit the game after having to wait through an attack of danish AI who obviously thought different when on the battlefield... Sorry, getting offtopic...

[Lusted]

a) a decent reputation, even though you don't harm anyone (unless they started).

Im my Venice campaign my reputation is outstanding, as i never break alliances, always the defender in wars, and do whatever the Pope says. But with the HRE, it looks like most factions are set to dislike you more anyway.

[econ21]

Im my Venice campaign my reputation is outstanding...

What's the difficuly setting for your Venice campaign? I wonder are you actually conquering provinces? My reputation on VH England is almost universally absymal (except for a heavily bribed Pope) and I've done nothing "wrong" except work towards the 45 province target (through turning the tables on aggressors).

[Dooz]

What's the difficuly setting for your Venice campaign? I wonder are you actually conquering provinces? My reputation on VH England is almost universally absymal (except for a heavily bribed Pope) and I've done nothing "wrong" except work towards the 45 province target (through turning the tables on aggressors).

The "abysmal" part is your relation with other specific factions. Reputation is another issue all together, which is your reputation as a faction across the board, and can be reliable or so-so and all that other stuff. That's related to not breaking treaties and all that jazz. I have mine at reliable basically by keeping alliances and listening to the Pope (and giving him money once in a while). As far as the relations are concerned, they're all poor or worse, even with my closest allies, and for the life of me I don't know why.

I do know however, giving other factions gifts of the monetary persuasion every once in a while does increase your relations with them. A thousand gold (maybe 2000) pieces will take you up from very poor to reasonable I believe. Until now, that's the only way I've found to really improve and maintain relations... I guess it's kind of realistic in that way eh? Still, I wish there was more that could be done and the rating wouldn't go down the crapper by just doing nothing.