The dark side of the rivalry system.

[Wizzington]

This is something I want to improve on. The problem is getting the balance right so we're not back in the early patches where the AI would just switch rivals at the drop of a hat.

 

[Wizzington]

Is there a light side to the rivalry system ? You still have cases where despite having 3 nations rival you, you can't select more than 1-2 rivals, making the patch notes for rivalry remain inaccurate ever since the change was implemented, literally the entire existence of the current implementation :/.

This shouldn't happen, so please provide a save so I can take a look.

 

[Wizzington]

Lack of coalitions against AI powers has less to do with lucky reduction, more to do with the fact that the AI doesn't expand that quickly. Coalitions in HRE are common due to the very high AE there. If you pace yourself you won't get large coalitions either.

 

[Wizzington]

Since it's not an issue, the AE impact can be removed from the AI handicap then? :wub:

Most likely, yes, though I'd have to test the impacts of such a change.

 

[Wizzington]

yea, i kicked castille out of spain (ok so i left them the canaries), they now have a few provinces in africa, a 34 land force limit, and france is still able to keep them a rival when their force limit is in the low 200's, i'm thinking something wonky with the calculation of strength from the 2 colonies they have, one of them stronger than they are

also up until france finally annexed burgundy, they were also able to keep them with just 2 provinces as a rival (antwerpen and another high BT tax dutch one, but still)

i was until recently weaker than france, and i got messages 30, and 60 years ago respectively that castille and burgundy were no longer valid rivals

This is a problem caused by mutual rivals never invalidating because someone who's rivalling you is always a valid rival. It's fixed in 1.8.

 

[Wizzington]

That would be awesome!

Although, I have posted in other threads, and I feel the same about this that it is not earth shattering and I'd hate for you to force it in if it takes away from other things you're working on for the patch. I know you don't need my permission for that, but just wanted to make sure anyone else reading those posts and this one doesn't feel I'm being a hypocrite (at least not for this reason )

Even if I change it, it probably won't be for 1.8 just to be clear. But I wouldn't mind axing it in the future if it proves unnecessary.

 

[Wizzington]

Yeah, the challenge is making the AI break alliances/change rivalries in a sensible fashion. People rage quite enough that the AI dares have its own priorities even when it's actually being sensible about it.