How do I surrender?

[Sniveling Rat]

How do I surrender? My allied got attacked by a Fallen Empire and this Empire seems to be only interested in destroying every bit of mining station and fleet that I have and not my ally. they have sent 3 100k fleets to my empire who is faaar away from them, and I can't surrender, at the same time I am getting invaded by other empires, I really have no interest at all in continue this save (or even playing the game for a long time) if I have no option at all to actually negotiate a surrender with this Fallen Empire. I simply wish to surrender, last time I checked my empire is not a kamikaze/bushido orientated Japanese Space Empire so this should be fully acceptable and logical thing to do when they massbombard my capital.

[tempest.of.emptiness]

Check the war status button (in the lower-right of the screen). If you can surrender that is where the option will be. It sounds like it might be time to start a new game, though.

[Vardis]

You can't, if you weren't the one attacked directly. Bad design decision.

[Mansen]

Originally posted by Vardis:

You can't, if you weren't the one attacked directly. Bad design decision.

Not really - You agreed to help them if attacked. You are - Your best bet is to let the FA steamroll enough systems and planets until they force their demands, and pray it doesn't include your planets too much.

[Vardis]

Originally posted by Mansen:

Originally posted by Vardis:

You can't, if you weren't the one attacked directly. Bad design decision.

Not really - You agreed to help them if attacked. You are - Your best bet is to let the FA steamroll enough systems and planets until they force their demands, and pray it doesn't include your planets too much.

No, it really is a bad design decision. Agreeing to help if attacked isn't the problem. The problem is then you are then locked in and along for the ride. A better design would be to allow for a separate capitulation, for just this sort of issue. Or to have the chance to break your treaty as war starts, with a substantial trust penalty and perhaps loss of influence.

[Radiosity]

It also doesn't help that fallen empires have a nasty tendency to go straight for the player regardless of who initiated the war or who's involved. Had a fallen empire do this several times and every single one resulted in them attacking MY home system before the enemy they actually declared war on.

[Mansen]

Originally posted by Vardis:

No, it really is a bad design decision. Agreeing to help if attacked isn't the problem. The problem is then you are then locked in and along for the ride. A better design would be to allow for a separate capitulation, for just this sort of issue. Or to have the chance to break your treaty as war starts, with a substantial trust penalty and perhaps loss of influence.

It's not like your empire is going to suffer immensively from being along for the ride though - It might not be optimal design, but your suggestion sounds a lot worse, since you'd never want to use it anyway in fear of being untrustworthy towards everyone else in the universe.

[Sniveling Rat]

Well that's 30 hours down the drain. Spent probably 1-2 hours just planning and setting up different defence stations along my borders against my neighbors, for nothing because of the Fallen Empire. The Fallen Empire have just rendered me defenceless against a much smaller neigboring empire that DOWed me. Both wars I have no say in because I am not the main defender, but they still obviously want my planets.

No other PDX game have this feature, all the others you have the option to negotiate and peace out earlier than your allies. Ah well, I played this game on release and stopped playing for a year. Will probably do the same here.

[Mansen]

Originally posted by Toll:

Well that's 30 hours down the drain. Spent probably 1-2 hours just planning and setting up different defence stations along my borders against my neighbors, for nothing because of the Fallen Empire. The Fallen Empire have just rendered me defenceless against a much smaller neigboring empire that DOWed me.

You DO realize they can fly right past your borders, right?

[The Hat]

Alliances and treaties need work yes.

I would like it so after a time you should be able to negotiate peace at a penalty, both losing relations with your allies and planets. That would seem a logical trade off, otherwise defensive pacts are a cheap way for the player to exploit the AI if they can just go for a white peace. - I would want this player only however, else the AI will tap out quick against a tougher opponent, so I am not sure if it is viable.

NAPs also need work, no idea why you can't close your borders after someone else breaks a NAP with you.

[Handiry]

It isin't the best decision when you decide to gaurantee or defense pact another empire, only for them to do something stupid like anger an F.E, declare war on a 5 nation federation, or do anything that is just plain dumb. The fact that you're pretty much forced to fight until the bitter end isin't nice. I agreed to defend them, not sit there and watch as the AI bombs me for years straight until entire worlds are filled with tile blockers and the corpses of my once proud species, all because he wanted some 1 mineral system on some guys border and refuses to surrender.

In any realistic circumstance, your leader would just decide "Nope, my nation is screwed and my allies clearly have no interest in supporting me, might as well surrender..", instead of being purged through a full bombardment stance....

[Jerubius]

Originally posted by Mansen:

Originally posted by Vardis:

No, it really is a bad design decision. Agreeing to help if attacked isn't the problem. The problem is then you are then locked in and along for the ride. A better design would be to allow for a separate capitulation, for just this sort of issue. Or to have the chance to break your treaty as war starts, with a substantial trust penalty and perhaps loss of influence.

It's not like your empire is going to suffer immensively from being along for the ride though - It might not be optimal design, but your suggestion sounds a lot worse, since you'd never want to use it anyway in fear of being untrustworthy towards everyone else in the universe.

What he explained is basically how war in EU4 works, and it, well, works. CK2 works similarly to Stellaris in this regard, except you have very little at stake when when honoring a call to arms. In Stellaris I accepted the complete vassalization of an ally to peace out of a losing war before any of my stuff was taken too. The guy wanted my capital and most productive system, as well as the vassalization of my federation member. No way I was giving up my land, and apparently the defensive pacts I had to stop exactly this from happening got annulled when I started a federation, so I needed to get out of the war fast and build up some proper allies to stop this from happening again. If I was in my ally's position I would not be happy in the least. So yeah, not being able to negotiate on your own behalf when your own stuff is at stake is not a good situation to be in.

[Sniveling Rat]

Originally posted by Mansen:

Originally posted by Toll:

Well that's 30 hours down the drain. Spent probably 1-2 hours just planning and setting up different defence stations along my borders against my neighbors, for nothing because of the Fallen Empire. The Fallen Empire have just rendered me defenceless against a much smaller neigboring empire that DOWed me.

You DO realize they can fly right past your borders, right?

Well they are more than welcome to fly past, because those other systems without any stations are worthless, so they are more than welcome to travel there instead.

[RunzWithScissors]

The diplomacy/war/alliance systems are in some desperate need of some love. There are too many times where you are forced into actions you REALLY would rather not take. You should almost always have a way to break a deal, the consequences just might be dire.

I was thinking of how it might be interesting if you can bail on a defensive pact, but give it empire wide consequences. Obviously, you would have the diplomatic consequences. Everyone's trust in you would go down, with the allie you bail on going down dramatically. The trust of your other defensive allies and Federation members would plummet and they would likely boot you from their agreements. You would basically take a big diplomatic hit. In addition to that though, you would take an empire wide hit. Depending on your trust level with your defensive ally, you would take a massive civil hit across your empire. The more well liked your defensive ally, the bigger the hit. You could even have it spawning mutinies of some of your military units to join your defensive ally. If your trust was very low, the civil penalties would be much smaller. Xenophiles and militarist would hate you, while xenophobes and isolationist might not be bothered.

I think they can add enough penalties to bailing on ally that people wouldn't take that option lightly when confronted with a big fight.

[Vardis]

Originally posted by Mansen:

Originally posted by Vardis:

No, it really is a bad design decision. Agreeing to help if attacked isn't the problem. The problem is then you are then locked in and along for the ride. A better design would be to allow for a separate capitulation, for just this sort of issue. Or to have the chance to break your treaty as war starts, with a substantial trust penalty and perhaps loss of influence.

It's not like your empire is going to suffer immensively from being along for the ride though - It might not be optimal design, but your suggestion sounds a lot worse, since you'd never want to use it anyway in fear of being untrustworthy towards everyone else in the universe.

My suggestion sounds worse because people would never use it? Really? Clearly *I* would use it, because I suggested it. ;)

The exact numbers on the penalties weren't even mentioned, so it's a little early to be saying they'd be so punative as to make the option meaningless.

You could even have different penalties depending on the situation. It could take into account the relative strength of the attacking empire, whether it's a FE, if the ally provoked the attack by throwing insults, etc.

It's more work, sure, but diplomatic options like that are the sort of thing that enhance the game.