Rivalry and its complete insanity

[Borse]

Hello again, gang.

I rather enjoy EUIV, but I have an issue, and I wonder if there are any plans for changing this "feature".

It concerns, of course, rivalry. I find that the game is quite exciting in the early years, but once I grow a bit it simply gets repetetive and tedious. This is caused mostly by the rivalry mechanic. When I expand, I know with 100% certainty that once I reach a certain size, england will go from stellar relations to being a rival.
The result, of course, is that I will be at war with England every five years (or whatever the truce is). When a truce begins, I know that when it ends I will be at war again. And if I simply crush England, I will then be a rival of France, and will have to wage war on them every 5 years.

Why can I not maintain good relations with similar sized countries just because they are a neighbour? This is completely redicilous. I should not have to be in a permanent state of war with a country just because I border them. There should have to be a reason, or at the very least, something I can do to maintain good relations.

Knowing that you cannot really do anything other than wait for the next war to begin and drain all your resources again gets old rahter fast.

Any opinions on this?

 

[Chris2013]

I think the attitude system in this game in general needs reworking (if not complete removal). Half the time a country will rival you or even be hostile for no reason at all. I am baffled for why in my Byzantium game, Russia is hostile to me. We have no borders and are actually a good distance apart, I have no territory that they have claims on, we share the same religion, good relations, no AE, I am MUCH weaker, and yet they still want my destruction.

I'm not sure if opinion affects attitude, but maybe what they could do is if you've been allied with someone for a certain amount of time (say 100 years) you'll both get the historical friend bonus to each other. Maybe this would keep allies from rivaling each other for no reason.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

I'm not a fan of this particular aspect of relations either. I've seen AI drop an alliance to be "hostile" without the player doing anything; neither side got into a war or altered their position whatsoever, but instantly the AI will dissolve the alliance and go "hostile" if it's in the mood for it.

 

[Contiguous]

Yeah, rivalry is weird. I've had good relations with plenty of nations (as in, no negative modifiers whatsoever), when suddenly! Alliance broken and they've rivaled me. After an alliance lasting 100+ years.

I've even had, as Castile, a strange situation. Aragon, Portugal and I were all allied to each other. Then Aragon for no goddam reason whatsoever decides to rival me. So I invade. Repeatedly. Every time Aragon calls Portugal against me. Every time I thoroughly demolish Portugal. Every time, as soon as the war is over Portugal allies me again. This happened several times until we both become colonial powers when they decide to rival me.

 

[Red John]

I'm not a fan of this particular aspect of relations either. I've seen AI drop an alliance to be "hostile" without the player doing anything; neither side got into a war or altered their position whatsoever, but instantly the AI will dissolve the alliance and go "hostile" if it's in the mood for it.

God I hate this. Bohemia broke our 200 year long alliance because of... Nothing. It took a province, suddenly went hostile and broke our alliance.

Same happened with Poland in my Sweden game, except this was sorta kinda justified, as I'd just PU'd Muscovy.

Except they suddenly went back to the green heart one 3 months later, and I got my alliance back.

 

[Great One]

Yeah, rivalry is weird. I've had good relations with plenty of nations (as in, no negative modifiers whatsoever), when suddenly! Alliance broken and they've rivaled me. After an alliance lasting 100+ years.

I've even had, as Castile, a strange situation. Aragon, Portugal and I were all allied to each other. Then Aragon for no goddam reason whatsoever decides to rival me. So I invade. Repeatedly. Every time Aragon calls Portugal against me. Every time I thoroughly demolish Portugal. Every time, as soon as the war is over Portugal allies me again. This happened several times until we both become colonial powers when they decide to rival me.

When this happens, it is time to carve Portugal down to size and make them a vassal. You can declare war on Aragon, Portugal honors the call, you take a couple of Portugal's provinces and get a separate peace with them before taking a couple of provinces from Aragon. Rinse and repeat as necessary until both are your vassals. Once Aragon is your vassal you can inherit and form Spain (although you might want to wait and feed them a bit first). As for Portugal, let them colonize South America for you. You can annex them later on in the game. It is like getting double the early colonization!

 

[joelzhl]

"Similar sized country" - that's the keyword. AI tends to rival neighbor countries similar to their power. That's pretty much what happen historically and the game simulates that very well. The only areas that needs improvements are probably more transparency on why they are picking you as rival and less erratic behaviors switching back and forth between friendly and rivalry.

 

[grommile]

The result, of course, is that I will be at war with England every five years (or whatever the truce is). When a truce begins, I know that when it ends I will be at war again. And if I simply crush England, I will then be a rival of France, and will have to wage war on them every 5 years.

Beat your rival properly. Don't just make them Concede Defeat or pay you ducats; make some of their land stop belonging to them (ideally, in a way that lets you expand without paying full AE for it).

Eventually, you will reach a point where nobody is going to declare war on you.

Why can I not maintain good relations with similar sized countries just because they are a neighbour?

Because, being their neighbour, you are in the way of their expansion.

 

[Anthropoid]

"Similar sized country" - that's the keyword. AI tends to rival neighbor countries similar to their power. That's pretty much what happen historically and the game simulates that very well. The only areas that needs improvements are probably more transparency on why they are picking you as rival and less erratic behaviors switching back and forth between friendly and rivalry.

+1

 

[Sepulcher]

This happened in real life; it was very rare to have two nations of similar power next to each other with friendly relations, eg: England/Scotland, Russia/Ottomans. Countries usualy allied nations that were close by but not bordering them, eg: England/Portugal.
Not only is it historical, but players also act in a similar way. How many times have you broken an alliance to complete a mission?

 

[Mindmeld_me]

In my current Brandenburg game the year is 1550. for about 50 years I have had a pu with poland. Austria has been my ally tge entire time as well with friendly relations. however I am now big enoigh to challenge them for hre emperor and I switched to protestant a number of years aho. now thdy are swit hed as rivals. couple religious events and relations are -200. no war is declared on me. why? I have had a royal marriage with them since game start and I think the ai will not take the stability hit. I even got my relations with bohemia up to 100 positive but they would not switch off rivalry either. however from a reality stance it makes sense to me. I am now bigger then them and blocking their expansion.

 

[Zenneh]

I find it historically appropriate that this behaviour occurs in the game. You only need to look at the relations between the countries during this period - For a good example England/France/Spain during certain periods England was allied to one or the other to keep a balance of power. This is the reason when you gain say one province will make the AI countries rival you as they see you as a perceivable threat. But unfortunately this does have the domino effect Player defeats country A gets rivalled by country B and wins that war and gets rivalled by country C and so on and so forth.

Lets face it, even if you improve relations to a country for 100 years if you grow large enough and then border them then tensions will obviously rise. However it is saddening to see royal marriages and proclaims of guarantee to be ignored. It usually is impossible to have friendly relations with large countries that border you.

 

[Thrake]

Not only is it historical, but players also act in a similar way. How many times have you broken an alliance to complete a mission?

Never. A good alliance is the key to victory. I pick my allies so that I don't plan any war against them on the long run. Only in very rare situations, I pick some that I expect to war with on mid term if I desperately need alliances (start with OPM in tough situations,...). I also see no sensible reason (gameplay wise, not historically wise) to pick an ally as "rival" when we are both hated by all the surrounding nations, as a couple of wars often drags in all the surrounding neighbours. I'm also reluctant to crush country X whom we've helped one another to grow for more than a century. At worst, I diplo-vassalize them (not annex) once I've grown big enough and they did not switch to rival, but perhaps I'm too sentimental.

I'm not sure it's very historical though, that a country switches from +200 relations to -50 in a day. It's however a good way to strike a country lacking good alliances.

 

[unmerged(804580)]

What is your nation anyways? Are you Netherlands? If the geopolitics tells you that you can't be friend with France, then so be it. It's just going to be the way it is. The AIs are likely to pick rivals depending on the size and turn hostile if they want to expand into your realm, but after all, you may just have chosen wrong people to ally in the first place. AIs are not maniac and they can keep long-term alliances, even France.

Ulm is allied to France and the Ottoman Empire.

Ulm is still allied to France and the Ottoman Empire, as well as Russia. You think by now France would set you as a rival? Neh.

Ulm is still allied to all three of them. The alliance with France, in particular, is unbroken for three centuries by then. Russia once rivaled me and broke the alliance, but I got it back. Russia once CTA'd me against the Ottomans, but I got it back.

And notice how I share land border with all three of them. I don't have much border with France, but the one with Russia is particularly long, but still Russia is cordial with the green heart. Ottomans as well. France is threatened for some reason, but with +40 trust and +100 longtime alliance bonus, they still join every offensive war despite the threatened attitude.

There is a dangerous line where an ally now sees you as a rival. This is less likely to happen when you two border the shared rival (in my case with France, Austria and later Castile). You need to call them into offensive wars as often as possible, and widen the gap between you and France. I did this by dismantling Denmark (allied to Castile, our shared rival) while France was depleting itself in Iberia. Since I am a republic, it doesn't matter how much France gets hurt, as long as I'm in a revolutionary war and it's sufficient to get 100% on Denmark. Keep your allies busy, tired and depleted and feed yourself with their blood.

 

[Rabid]

I'm actually mostly OK with rivalry, it's just the AI changing spontaneously from friendly to enemy (the one with the flame) attitude that annoys me. Happens even when we are the only 2 nations of our religion left in existence with multiple countries separating us, instantly breaking our alliance.

 

[S0ny B1ack]

It is certainly possible to keep an alliance up, even if you get big adn share a border - in my first game I was allied to france from 1444 to around 1780... Eventhough we had some common borders and later France got the -25 penalty for me beeing a great power as well. What killed the love in 1780 was some small country using the espionage action to sabotage my reputation (which gave anoterh -50 opinion modifier to Frace, which lead to them cancelling the alliance and of course going hostile soon)

 

[unmerged(82265)]

It seems a lot of people just want to conquer the world with no resistance. I think the rivalry system is just fine. If you are similar sized and bordering, then you are A) a threat and B) In the way of their growth. I give the AI kudos for having diplomacy at all when compared to other strategy games. I don't think any of the games in the past had alliances and rivalries that actually made an impact on the game at all much less have factors that drive them!

 

[QzY]

i disagree with what most people have said, ive been an ally (as france) with austria for longer then 90 years of border friction, (burgundy king died), competing great power modifier -25 and me eating spain and england almost completely. until i started take a province from the HRE and refused to return it, then they started to become hostile, which makes sense of course.

 

[wetblowdryer]

"Similar sized country" - that's the keyword. AI tends to rival neighbor countries similar to their power. That's pretty much what happen historically and the game simulates that very well. The only areas that needs improvements are probably more transparency on why they are picking you as rival and less erratic behaviors switching back and forth between friendly and rivalry.

"similar" no

I disagree with you.

http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum...ing-to-rival-you-now!-Now-we-insult-you!-quot

Please don't get me started on them insulting me when they had zero allies.

 

[Stratagyfan101]

I wouldn't bother me if the attitude changes were tied to monarch deaths and stats in just some way. Also some more random events that cause relations to blunder.

The AI, in my experience is fairly rational in changing its statuses. If you get too big, big enough to stop it from achieving its goals, it will rival you. If the you decide to build up an AI ally, while building yourself, it rivals you, because you are now the main competitor for dominance. I'm not saying the system is perfect, but it is far better than the perpetual alliances of EUIII where the AI allowed the human to blob just waiting to be gobbled up.