Judging value of a trade?

Since the possiblities in a trade are so varied the color of the deal text is the only real indicator.

If it's a multipart deal I normally just keep adding things until the text turns green and then try subtracting things while still trying to keep it green.

The value of technology is determined by how long it takes to research. The longer it takes to research the more it's worth in a trade.

Hit the submit button too quickly.

The AI is still not completely in place and so far they will not initiate a trade.

They will sometimes ask for peace, though, and depending on how desperate they are, you can get a lot of techs or money from them.

Another thing, one that may not yet be in place, is that trades should be tempered by the intelligence of the race. It should almost be possible to get a race set on the lowest setting to give things away, but races on the highest intellegence settings should be almost impossible to convince that a trade is fair.

Cari,
I've never had a race offer me peace yet! Even when I'm had them surrender to other races but never offer peace.

Paul.

Well, I've had it happen to me. I don't know what triggers it though.

Just today the Drengin begged me for peace TWICE! I took them for all their tech and a few planets each time... Being the leader of an Evil War Party is fun.

I actualy conquered a race this way. Right from the start I was super agressive to one neighbor, destoying every ship I saw. Within a short time they contacted me asking for peace ... I demanded 2 of their planetary systems Next turn I attacked again, few turns later same deal - they asked for peace, I agreed in return I took 2 more systems. Pretty soon I had all but one of their planets which I soon invaded and won. Thing is this tactic had no consequences in the relations with the other civs ... other games of this type would penalize you by having the other civs consider you 'bad' because you broke a peace treaty etc. I guess the problem here is that peace treaties have no set duration and so you have no obligation to continue at peace for more than it takes to close the screen IMO when you agree to a peace treaty it should be binding for a set duration - 10 years or whatever. Going to war before that time will result in other civs thinking less of you and putting a check mark under your name labeled "untrustworthy", which would make them less likely to trust you in the future.

Right now its very easy to exploit this weakness.

Myros

I find it difficult to see the realism in peace treaty durations. Have we had any in the history of our planet?

Perhaps this peace treaty duration could be optional, installed by an UP vote, like creating some galactic peacecorps to prevent further war.

I have already seen a UP issue mandating peace over a duration, but I don't think it is quite the same. The UP issue is imposed upon the waring races whether they agree or not and carry a big penalty if they don't comply, whereas a negotiated peace between two waring parties is voluntary and expected to be permanent (at least, until one or the other party decides the other party has violated it, or just plain wants to kill the other) with the only consequences of breaking the treaty being the loss of the benefits of the accord.

Yes I think history would back this up, dont you think there would be consequences if the US had signed a peace treaty with Japan, then the walked out the door and bombed them again? A treaty should be binding, else what the hell is it? Not that it cant be broken years, months or even minutes later but there should be consequences to doing so.

Myros

One obvious consequence is the empire you just backstabbed should not turn around and give you more planets for peace again. and again. There should be some sort of hidden trustworthy meter (or lets just call it memory if you will) and as the other empires see you break peace treaties soon after making them they should remember that and not be as willing to negotiate for peace with you. Perhaps this could just be rolled into the morality system. If you break a treaty soon after making it, you should move towards the Evil end of things. And the AI should be less willing to make peace with Evil empires.

In the OS/2 version, after the AI got screwed that way a couple of times, they let you know that you would never get anything from them again. I think this should be added before the game release.

Sounds good to me. A broken peace treaty causes consequences between you and the other party and some suspicion by the other civs.

Violating a mandated peace should be dealt with more harshly, however. As I recall, the stated plan was to require the civ to withdraw from the UP before breaking a mandated peace, hence, loosing all of the benefits the UP provides.

BTW: when I saw the issue voted upon I did not see any of the expected actions. A couple of the other races were at war before AND AFTER the issue was voted upon and passed. Is this because the supporting code isn't there yet?