Master of Orion/Diplomacy

There are multiple different facets to the diplomacy game. There will probably be multiple different races in any given game, and unlike most other games the Master of Orion AI is programmed to be "self serving" not "player harming".

The AIs tend not to gang up on the player automatically. The enemies are not, by default, automatically all allied in one big alliance versus the player.

Each AI will try to do what it can to increase its own standing, both against the player and against the other opponents.

There is some coding failures in this regard, like the fact that the computers will ensure some other race wins a galactic election by giving them their votes rather than you, if they happen to be at war with you.

Apparently, this is just to spite you. Either that, or to help get an ally that they can use against you. Either way, they still lose if someone else gets voted in as the galactic ruler. This is something they don't seem to see sometimes.

Other than that, the AI is pretty good about helping their own race rather than helping "the team".

The AIs commonly declare war on other AIs if they think it will make their race better off or if they happen to have an Erratic personality.

There are certain races that are blood enemies of each other, but even they will still agree to ally (in some cases) against a common enemy.

They AIs also appear to prefer to be part of at least "some" alliance rather than having no allies at all. Most of the time an AI will have at least one ally.

Strength in numbers is often a strategy that the computer will try to use. They will make allies to hopefully keep others from declaring war on them, allowing them to be the ones that dictate when declaring war happens.

As they say in G.I. Joe, knowing is half the battle. Knowing what the computer is trying to accomplish with diplomacy is the first step towards competing well in the diplomatic game.

Another thing that it is helpful to note is that the AI tends to either divide itself into two "mega alliances" with multiple members each, or that everything is just complete diplomatic chaos. There are almost never 3 major alliances at the same time. It is either going to be 2 alliances or everyone for themselves, most likely.

Another thing that is very good to note is that trade treaties are very very good.

What a trade treaty does is allow you to get "free money" with no strings attached and to divide that up equally among your planets and significantly boost their base production.

To get to this point, a trade treaty needs to be in effect for quite some time. Usually it takes about 30 turns to start getting the maximum value of a negotiated trade treaty. If a new trade treaty is agreed in order to increase its value you still keep some of the duration of the old treaty, not setting you so far back, but you still get quite a setback in even the best cases.

It is not a good idea to re-up the treaties every time a higher amount opens up. It is much better to only re-up when you can double or better the current agreement, because the numbers work out better this way and you don't lose quite so much resources and you increase in the gains faster this way to make up for what you do lose.

Generally speaking, you want trade treaties with every race you think you can trade with and keep those treaties intact.

The worst situation is to make a new treaty, spend 6 turns losing money on the deal, and then have it cancelled on you when the opponent declares war on you. Avoid this at all times if you can. If you think you can go 30 turns without warring the civilization, make the treaty.

The thing about treaties is that both participants are benefited and all the opponents are not. Both of the participants are then better off, in comparison, against all the other races in the galaxy.

The AI knows this, so their plan is to make treaties with everybody possible. The AI figures if it has a treaty with 5 different races, each of those races is benefited once and it is benefited 5 times itself, putting itself far ahead of the other races.

The biggest problem with this is that all the other AIs are doing the same thing, so nobody is actually getting ahead this way. This does, however, speed up the game by a lot and that is probably good in general.

Also, note that if the player is left out of this massive exchange of trade agreements the opponents will all be operating at double productivity and the player will be flying solo and only at normal productivity. Even with sub-optimal play the enemies will be way ahead of the players if every turn they are making double per world compared to what the player makes.

As a player, you WANT to be in on this action if at all possible and to the greatest extent possible. Every time you can double the value of the treaty you probably should. Every time you can get *any* agreement that you think will be in force for 15 years or more you probably should set it up.

There is no reason not to always negotiate for the best possible trade value at all times unless you don't think the enemy will accept high treaty values. Sometimes they do prefer to start low, but it is the rare case when this is true. Usually they see right away that trade treaties, like many areas are the game, are better the bigger they are.

Winning the diplomatic game involves milking the diplomacy system for all it is worth. There is nothing unethical about taking the maximum advantage of the diplomacy system. If you don't do it you are going to be behind the curve, because that is the goal of all of the AIs. They aren't trying to "play fair" they are trying to win, and you should be too.

If using and abusing your allies is the best way for you to win, you should do just that. They would if the tables were turned.

Also, note that unlike in Master of Orion 2, there is code present in Master of Orion 1 that makes computers go back on agreements. There will be non-aggression pacts and alliances in Master of Orion 2 that last beyond when the last other race has been eliminated and both races will operate in harmony until the player decides it is time to backstab their enemy and win. The computer will not go back on the alliance even if it is strong enough to instantly defeat its' ally.

In Master of Orion 1, the AI doesn't act like this. If it knows it is the #1 race in the galaxy and it knows that you are the #2 race in the galaxy and if it knows that it can decisively end your threat to its empire it will drop you like a bad habit and attack you right away and try to put its only competition out of commission.

A strategy of "Do unto others BEFORE they do unto you" is followed quite often by the computer AI in this game.

Also, note that there are a lot of things you can do to make your relations worse with all the other races in the game. The biggest one of those things is "having too much population". If you control a huge portion of the galaxy you can expect that the computers will see the writing on the wall and try to war you before you are ready to finish them off.

Having a tremendous population count in comparison to the individual AI civilizations is one of the few times in the game that you will consistently find the entire galaxy allied against you as a player. Your allies will freely drop you and join the enemy team if they think you are going to get to the point where you can vote yourself into the seat of galactic ruler without aid.

You will generally be prepared for this ahead of time because they will tell you over and over to quit expanding if they think you are getting too powerful. At least if you are going to keep getting too powerful anyway you can prepare to meet a tag team head on. It is very unlikely to sneak up on you, they will definitely let you know what is coming if you keep acting like you are.

This is normal and to be expected. If you are getting these messages you are probably about ready to take all the enemies at the same time anyway.