How do I get the AI to like me in 1.3?

       In the only game I played so far me as TEC and a TEC player right next to me, I did everything but clean he's shoes, and he would not befriend me.  It said I needed a certain relationship level to communicate, I went well beyond it and he would attack me, which I in turn had to defend myself and there we went in a downward spiral........

Not really sure how I did it but in my first 4 player FFA I got 2 of the players to give me a cease fire. You definitely need to max out the Diplomatic research (as do they), then try and get a trade alliance as soon as possible. As I wasn't attacking either of them nor were they attacking me, eventually the military assistance bonus was high enough to get a cease fire, after which the AI eventually sends envoys at which point your relationship problem is no longer an issue.

    We we close neighbors, maybe the friction of the outward expansion did in any peaceful means? I though the fact that we were both TEC meant getting an cease fire to be a no brainer. I had envoys on all his planets and gave him all the cash and materials he asked for.

    I actually got a cease fire from a Advent player that very game, one that I had hardly any contact with and no envoys. So somethings not right, I buttered up that TEC player so much he should have been my best friend, and the Advent player who was on another star wanted a peace fire?

He probably liked you just fine, its just that you didn't like him very much. The player is now under the same relationship status system as the AI is, and things like envoys, missions and bribes only effect how they view you. The trick is to get the AI to do those things as well.

But yes, modifiers like adjacent territory and military actions means its much easier to get alliances with players that are farther away. The reason you could get a cease fire with that advent player was simply you actually liked them more than the TEC player you were buttering up to, even though that TEC player liked you more.

For example you and the Advent probably both had a +5.5 or something relationship modifier, good enough for a cease fire, while the TEC AI probably had a much higher, say +10 towards you while you only had a +2 towards it. Since both players need to have the required relationship level, you wouldn't be able to get the cease fire no matter how much you tried to befriend him. Your TEC "friend" basically needed to return the favor before that happens.

So what could I have done differently to befriend the TEC player nearest me? In a world that makes sense we should have been allies easily, to take on the other races. Thanks for the tips and your time btw.

Well think of it this way. Before you were like a totalitarian ruler, able to solely decide who you wanted your friends to be because you were the only one that mattered. Under the new system, you still control all the action, but now how your people feel about a given faction influences your diplomacy. As an extreme example, before if you spammed enough envoys you could raise an enemy's disposition high enough to stop a war on a dime just because you thought it was politically convenient. All that mattered was how your enemy felt about you. Now, in that same situation, the people of your Empire might not want to stop fighting an enemy that's killed their friends and family unless they do something to redeem themselves.

In other words, now both you and your enemy need to spam envoys and other methods of mutually improving relations, not just unilateral action by yourself. I'll admit I'm still figuring out the system as well, but early on get all the relation modifiers upgrades, then try to befriend an ally that you won't be having skirmishes with. This can be frustrating because if an AI you want to ally with decides they want to attack you your basically out of luck and need to find a different friend. Eventually, just because of the damage you inflict on other factions will improve to the point of getting trade relations and cease fires, at which point you can easily start full alliances with whomever you wish.

But be careful, every treaty you make with faction A will hurt relations with their enemy faction B. Trade alliances and cease fires are combined are only -0.25 (though its per player), but any more than that will start getting serious penalties. Hopefully this means you will no longer be able to ally with every AI player now, and it should lead to groups of allies instead of the haphazard diplomacy of before.

Kinda sounds like diplomacy is a little tougher but more fun.

That's what I think. A couple of details will be smoothed out in the next hotfix, but even as of now I think its a better system.

That's actually a reasonable explanation, and I really appreciate it since I was having a tough time understanding why the game should be telling me how much I like another faction (when after all, being me, I know).  Even with the explanation, I am not at all sure what I think about it though.  

It seems weird that I can't decide how much I like another faction.  I mean, no matter how much the game says I like another faction there is nothing that would stop me from launching a massive attach on their homeworld, and there is no penalty from the fact that I attacked someone the game says I like.  But my ability to have good relations and enter into treaties, etc., is constrained by how much the game says I dislike another faction, it seems.

Why is it necessary, or better, that the game tells me how much I like another faction?  I think I would prefer to be able to decide for myself and be free to make whatever relationship decisions I think in my best interest without being controlled by the game mechanics.

While that's certainly arguable, as of the last patch, human players had a huge built in advantage in Diplomacy over AI in that they could freely do haphazard diplomacy while the AI was completely frozen by this relations system. The result was that it was incredibly easy for a human player to ally with every single one of the computer players while they were still all at war with each other. This is obviously in your "best interest", as you can ensure you are apart of the winning team no matter what happened, but is horribly unrealistic and bad for interesting gameplay.

Part of this was the bad design of the relations system not taking into account your other alliances, but the main thing I think was the complete freedom human players had in comparison to the AI.  While the ideal solution would be to make the AI as capable of understanding Diplomacy as the player, sadly that's just not possible with today's technology, so they had to restrict the players' freedom somewhat. Also attempts to give AI a compensating advantage with each others Diplomacy via handicaps tended to lead to AIs ganging up on the player, which is probably the worst possible outcome.

OK.  I at least see the issue, so thanks -- that helps.    I sure agree that a set up that would have the AI all gang up on the human player would be the worst.  I'll play for a while and see what I think.

I wonder if it could be made so that an alliance with one faction resulted in a penalty (or greater penalty with the relations with other factions -- particularly if you develop a relationship with a faction that they dislike.  

i suppose that under the old system I could have allied myself with every faction.  I never did because I would actually chose alliance based on what made a more interesting game.  But I can see how most people would find it pointless to not exploit every advantage you have under the game mechanics.  So to that extent I see the need to make a change.