Playing on normal difficulty as human there seems to be some random behavior going on.

Upon making first contact with another race, sometimes I have the option to exchange diplomats and establish and embassy which often leads to trade and research agreements as well as building up more diplomacy (purple handshake icon). Other times upon first contact, the only option available is to "propose trade" and I never seem to be able to build up any more diplomatic points throughout the game.

I can't figure out if this is something I'm doing wrong, I'm missing a required building, or a required tech. I can't find anything in the tech tree about this.

Any help would be appreciated.

I'm not sure why that might be; even if you start with a very negative initial impression, you should still be able to establish embassies at a greater cost. If you don't have enough Influence, the option should be there but grayed out.

Could you upload a game where this is happening so I can take a look at it? (Go to Options and click Upload Game Logs, then post the resulting name (game_XXXX) here so I know which one it is.)

Yes, will do when I get home from work.

Thanks.

Other times upon first contact, the only option available is to "propose trade"

Are other options not there or disabled (grayed out)? What faction you can't build up relationship with?
A screenshot might help.

game_1474 uploaded.

I had a colony in a system and one of their ships stopped by as our first encounter. No option to set up diplomacy, just trade.

Sorry, have not seen anything like it yet. My original ideas where wrong (it's good I didn't express them). I would guess (only developers can say for sure) they hate you so mach that don't want to deal with you. If it's the case - to fix your rating with Orthin you need to improve your science (a lot), it should change the rating to +3.

It's because the Orthin are Hostile towards you; you need to have Neutral or better relations to establish an embassy. There's not much you can do about the pirates, but if you catch up in technology they would like you better. Perhaps the option should show as grayed out instead of disappearing.

It's appropriate that the other races view the Humans as in league with the pirates, but -15 seems kind of rough reputation hit for something the player has no control over. I'm making a note of it.

This particular save hasn't gotten that far, but it happens with the other races as well... sometimes the first 2 or 3 I encounter will be the same way which sets me way back. If I get war declared on me early it's either use the 100 diplomacy to call for peace (and therefore not ever be able to open relations with anyone) or fold.

Maybe increasing starting diplomacy for humans would be a reasonable offset.

There are other ways to generate Influence, including building a Market.

The Human start is supposed to be tough. I think the -15 hit for being the same race as the pirates probably should be less, but the other races are not going to be well-disposed towards the Humans at the start of the game, and that's intentional.

bsquared wrote:This particular save hasn't gotten that far, but it happens with the other races as well...

Phidi value your economy, Gremak and Yoral - your military strength (enough to neutralize the "pirates" effect, I think).
Humans are officially not recommended to beginners for a reason.

Didn't realize that markets generated influence, that will help I'm sure.

bsquared wrote:Didn't realize that markets generated influence, that will help I'm sure.

We need to update the descriptions to reflect this; it's probably not obvious.

I'm not sure markets actually do. I use them constantly and don't see any improvement to influence from them.

Chasm wrote:I'm not sure markets actually do. I use them constantly and don't see any improvement to influence from them.

Neither do I.

It's possible that it's not working. I'll check it out.

edit: I was conflating two different things. Markets improve population morale, rather than generate influence.

I'd like to add something like a Spaceport station module that generates Influence, but we haven't got around to it yet.