Diplomatic Victories - AI still too easy!
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I've been playing a 5C for the last few days, and have adopted the perfect strategy; unfortunately, it is pretty easy to do and needs some tweaking to prevent!
I head first for diplomacy(dip translators) then for basic life support(?) (whatever gives aphrodesiac) and build/buy them asap. Virtually any empire I run into will sell their entire empire (all ships, $, influence and planets) for those two. If I ask for much _less_ than everything, they refuse. Not sure exactly what the threshold is, but once I ask for most of their stuff it goes green. A very few times I have had to reduce my offer by 1 planet or the empire's survey ship to get it green. If the empire only has one planet it is kind of iffy - sometimes they'll sell, often not. Minors won't sell out, but they provide all of my funding - I set my taxes low and spend at 100% until midgame, the minors start with 5k and will spend 3-5k on the two trade goods noted above. If I can spot 2 or three minors I am golden for a long, long time. By the time that cash runs out I have a good trade network set up (including planets that later joined me).
Suggestion: tweak AI judgement on when to sell out. They should be willing to do it in the right circumstances, i.e. if all their planets are unhappy due to my influence (this never works now). Right now, they are too easy.
Scott
I head first for diplomacy(dip translators) then for basic life support(?) (whatever gives aphrodesiac) and build/buy them asap. Virtually any empire I run into will sell their entire empire (all ships, $, influence and planets) for those two. If I ask for much _less_ than everything, they refuse. Not sure exactly what the threshold is, but once I ask for most of their stuff it goes green. A very few times I have had to reduce my offer by 1 planet or the empire's survey ship to get it green. If the empire only has one planet it is kind of iffy - sometimes they'll sell, often not. Minors won't sell out, but they provide all of my funding - I set my taxes low and spend at 100% until midgame, the minors start with 5k and will spend 3-5k on the two trade goods noted above. If I can spot 2 or three minors I am golden for a long, long time. By the time that cash runs out I have a good trade network set up (including planets that later joined me).
Suggestion: tweak AI judgement on when to sell out. They should be willing to do it in the right circumstances, i.e. if all their planets are unhappy due to my influence (this never works now). Right now, they are too easy.
Scott
