Scripted Communication

I suspect this is something hard to code or something. Maybe not hard to code the exact event but how the AI would react to it, would it remember this "threat" you sended him etc. With just about every strategy game out there, players have wanted diplomacy options like "move your troops away" etc.

But atleast I do not know any game which has such options.

It does sound like an interesting idea. I like it.

I wholeheartedly agree, I wanted the same thing pretty much before there was a Dark Avatar.

I pine for this implementation.

I've always thought it bizarre that the AI can send me these messages, telling me what they'd like me to do, but I can't do the same to them. In effect, they can tell me to be wary of someone, or go to war with someone, while I can only tell them to go to war.

Of course, in giving that example I just realized that no AI has ever added a declaration of war to a potential trade...

Great idea, RF. I would love to have a 'back off' option before I am forced into war.

I've always thought it bizarre that the AI can send me these messages, telling me what they'd like me to do, but I can't do the same to them. In effect, they can tell me to be wary of someone

The thing is, AFAIK the AI doesn't lie when it says that. Whereas if a human player had that option, why wouldn't they just tell every AI all the time to be wary of all the other AIs? How would the AI know if you actually were concerned and lower their relations accordingly with that other AI, or if you're just trying to keep them all fighting amongst themselves so you can win easily? It's not so simple to handle something like that.

the AI doesn't lie about those things? hmm... couldn't the warnings/comments for the human players be coded NOT to appear until certain criteria have been met, that way its not so much an issue about lying, then it simply becomes does the human player want to warn his fellow allies... or not warn them and watch them fall to the unexpected sneak attack then pick up the pieces?

couldn't the warnings/comments for the human players be coded NOT to appear until certain criteria have been met

This is a good point.

Another options would be for the AI to use his own resources to determine the validity of the players claim and call him on it. The player sends the message to the Torians, "Be careful the Drengin are building up on your border." The AI checks the Torians espionage level and friendliness with other races for further intel, and realizes that the player's info is bunk, and responds with something like, "Choo keep using those words. I do not think they mean what choo think they mean." And the relation with the player from the Torian perspective takes a hit. Maybe even the relationships with some of the other races that the Torians are friendly with too, since they'd tell their friends that the player's race isn't very trustworthy all of a sudden.

I dunno, just batting ideas around.

Thanks kryo for the response. I can see where the issues come in to play now though.

Another options would be for the AI to use his own resources to determine the validity of the players claim and call him on it.

That's exactly what I'd like to see the AI do. Conversely, as Drakonfire suggested, the AI should lie to the player, forcing us to do the gumshoe work and figure out if they're telling the truth. I, for one, had always assumed this was what they were doing - if not outright lying, then embellishing a bit. (The diplomatic world gets far less interesting when I know my opponents and friends are coded so as to always tell the truth.) Even better, one AI civ could lie to other AI civs, but in a less overt way than the Drath's superability... though I think I might be hitting GalCiv3 here.

Couldn't it be handled something like this:

Humans (player) to Altarians: I think the Drengin are getting too powerful. You should do something about it!

Altarians: check the player's influence, military, and economy compared to the Drengin's influence, military, and economy, as well as its own. If the Drengins are higher than the humans, but lower than the Altarians, the response would be something like (depending on the relations), "Sure, we can help you out." If it's the same, then and the total of the humans+Altarians is greater than the Drengin, the response might be something like, "I think if we teamed up, we could wipe them out." If it's lower, then the response would be like, "I'm scared! You do something about them!" If the humans are higher than the Altarians, and the Drengin, the response would be something like, "Why don't you do something about it?"
Such an option might only also work if relations with another race are good, or if they are even allied. Otherwise, the response might be, "Sure...the fighters are in the mail," and it would just ignore the player.

Same thing with threatening. The player would send a message like, "Withdraw fighter X/starbase Y, etc from my territory, please." The AI would check to see if that object is in the player's sphere of influence. If it is, the AI will check to see if it knows how tough the player is, and what the influence is like. The AI would have the option to accept the withdrawl, or decline it.

A pie-in-the-sky dream would be to allow allies to create mixed fleets, which could be under the player control if their logistics is high enough to handle the fleet. But, conquering worlds would go to whichever civilization had the transports in the fleet. So, if I (humans) was invading a Drengin world with the help of an Altarian fleet, I sent the fighter escorts, and the Altarians provided the transports, when teh world was conquered, it would go to the Altarians. If the transports were mine, but the fighters were the Altarians, the world would be mine. If there were mixed transports (like I had one, and the Altarians had one), it would come down to a "rock-paper-scissors" game as to who got it.