One aspect in the 4x games was the race interaction when the rubber hit the road.

I never liked the Moo2 diplomacy that would play out, every time, in this order

Alliance with race A:

Scenario 1
Race A asked you to go to war with Race B
You choose to war with Race B
Race A then made peace with Race B
Race A would then ally with Race B then go to war with you (thanks)

Scenario 2
Race A asked you to go to war with Race B
You choose not to go to war with Race B
Race A hates you and breaks off Alliance
Race A makes peace with Race B then Allies with Race B
Race A and B make war with you (thanks again)

yes yes alliances are forged and broken in time, but the pattern of this just always frustrated me. There was never any middle ground.
Support Ally in war economically.
Support Ally in war Technologically.
Support Ally in war Defensively only.
Fully support Ally in war.

Have a chart of the agreements of the Alliance from the start, or even have an evolving agreement as time goes by.


Undying ally

I've felt sorry for races being slaughtered by another and took steps to take pressure off their smaller colonies or even attack enemy fleets before they attacked. I would love a joint effort in a single player game but I've never seen one. I even remember taking over an enemy controlled planet, building up that planet then giving that planet back to its original race. Wouldn't that be a sure fire solid Ally right there? You saved their planet or their race from extinction? Short of killing them off yourself or small rebel pirates, you would/should have a life long ally as a result.

I guess it's all about how detailed you wish to go into a 4x game, but Diplomacy always seemed to be a Race A likes you while Race B hates you but due to a high diplomacy rating, you can make agreements with both. Yet at any time the same issues can plague your diplomacy.

Being able to make and keep long-term allies is, I think, a key feature of a good diplomacy system. As Sven has said before, we feel that AI factions should act like characters in a story, rather than as players who are aware they're in a game. Civilization 4 and Master of Orion 2 did allow you to (occasionally) to make long-term friends. Their systems were not very robust in this regard (until Civ 4 introduced vassal systems), but it could happen in the right circumstances. One of the many disappointing aspects of the Civilization V diplomacy system is that it's virtually impossible to keep long-term friends.

We're still working on our diplomacy design documents, but here are some principles that I think are important in 4X game diplomatic systems and AI:

• A faction's current state of friendship with you should color all interactions with you. A friendly state should be more willing to overlook your transgressions against a third party (especially if against a disliked third party), but should take extra offense at transgressions against him (or a friendly party). Conversely, an unfriendly faction will amplify negative and dampen positive effects.
• Similarly, context should color actions. An unprovoked war of aggression should not have the same diplomatic penalties as a war of defense with clear casus belli. Certain actions should classify as provocations, which should dampen diplomatic penalties toward certain acts in response.
• Successive positive acts or successive negative acts should incur extra bonuses or penalties. "There they go again..."
• Declaring war or helping in a war should be HUGE penalties or bonuses. These are not things that are easily forgotten.
• Faction AI should have some self-awareness of its own attitudes when considering relations with others. One of the biggest immersion-breaking elements of diplomatic AI is to have a faction that has attacked you three times denounce you as a warmonger, or to have the faction who just plopped down a colony in your system complain about your expansionism. Similarly, it's absurd when a faction that hates you and has denounced you asks for help (and expects it).
• Friends should ask for help when in trouble. In Civilization V , you're constantly bombarded with requests to go to war against a third party, but never are you asked to help defend someone under attack.
• Having to expend resources for diplomatic actions (gold, trade goods, diplomatic capital) is almost a must. Otherwise you just pound the button until they're your friends.
• It helps to have some meta system (ideology, alignment, racial attitude, religion) to get things moving in one direction or another.
• Minor factions can be an important tool in diplomatic interaction, especially if they are the same race as one of the major factions.

Having complex, robust agreement structures is probably important both to good diplomatic gameplay and to good diplomatic outcomes.

Would saving them from Genocide be a factor to a life long ally?

Captainspire wrote:Would saving them from Genocide be a factor to a life long ally?

I'm not sure how the game would recognize being saved from genocide. The AI may even have trouble recognizing that it is losing a war. But agreeing to intervene in a war started by someone else should pay big diplomatic dividends.

Arioch wrote:

Captainspire wrote:Would saving them from Genocide be a factor to a life long ally?

I'm not sure how the game would recognize being saved from genocide. The AI may even have trouble recognizing that it is losing a war. But agreeing to intervene in a war started by someone else should pay big diplomatic dividends.

Makes sense to me.

Arioch wrote:

Captainspire wrote:Would saving them from Genocide be a factor to a life long ally?

I'm not sure how the game would recognize being saved from genocide. The AI may even have trouble recognizing that it is losing a war. But agreeing to intervene in a war started by someone else should pay big diplomatic dividends.

The only thing I can think of is a big bonus for capturing and turning over control of their homeworld, or something similar. That doesn't give you any incentive for stopping the planet from being taken in the first place though (maybe even accidentally encourage players to allow allies planets to be taken so they can reap the benefits?)

diji wrote:

Arioch wrote:

Captainspire wrote:Would saving them from Genocide be a factor to a life long ally?

I'm not sure how the game would recognize being saved from genocide. The AI may even have trouble recognizing that it is losing a war. But agreeing to intervene in a war started by someone else should pay big diplomatic dividends.

The only thing I can think of is a big bonus for capturing and turning over control of their homeworld, or something similar. That doesn't give you any incentive for stopping the planet from being taken in the first place though (maybe even accidentally encourage players to allow allies planets to be taken so they can reap the benefits?)

Most 4x games are big into the Exploration and the Expand aspects as we always try to acquire as much "space" as we can, build it's defenses and our tech stuff and use it as a power chip to better Exploit and Exterminate. As you'll see though, the Exploit part is most likely the least used of the 4x features. Sure diplomacy will get your ally to give you stuff, trade stuff, and even attack your enemies from time to time, yet in no time at all, they are having other races do the same thing to you then war.

I always like the Idea of Exploit in more the positive than negative way, even though the term "exploit" is rarely used for honorable reasons. My desire is to have a game where an ally is your ally and no force in the universe, short of war, would change that.

The best example I can think of that has been used in a game is Star Control 2-3 I thought the overall story of SC3 was spot on, it's everything (and I mean everything) else that made the game so forgettable. Never the less, the Ur-Quan Kzer-Za (green spider things) were your mortal enemies because of a long long long history of being slaves from another race. At the end of SC2 you took out their main ship when the Ur-Quan Kzer-Za (black spider things) were going to use it to wipe out all life. Because of your efforts, the Ur-Quan Kzer-Za (green spider things) in SC3 were your life long allies. This is a very watered down version of events, but the point is, there is just about zero chance, aside from you trying to enslave or kill off all the Ur-Quan race, would they even consider betraying you or attacking you. They are not humans and would not, over time, just hate you because others hate you or others tell them to hate you. In fact, their race constrains them to act unified, be it now polarized between to sects of the race, and not betray you.

A better example are the now Chmmr. You brought two cultured together and as a result they are also your allies not out of gratitude, but the fundamental changes you made in their (at once two) species and now they are superior in every way, yet they allow you to lead and guide them. Again, provided you do not go genocidal on them.

Masters of Of Orion, regardless of anything you do, to or for any race, will eventually betray you and go to war with you. That makes the Exterminate part of the 4x too most of the game and diminishes the Exploit factor.