problems with latest version with unlocked teams

How long did it take for this too happen?

Usually about 1 hour in the pairs start to crash a SB chokepoint together. This rarely happened in the previous versions at any time of the game but can be fun when they occur. However, now they occur with supreme regularity on cruel or vicious (making vicious wholly impossible now). And depending on the map size and other 'barriers' (like pirate world, etc.) the triples can start to come around 90-120 minutes or so. It does vary some. The quad in my frustrating game was maybe 2 hours in. I thought I had a chance but that combo broke on of my chokepoints and they proceeded to rape and pillage my hearth worlds. What really ticked me off is I had never even seen the 4th player and he comes and crashes the party along with the other 3 (granted one of them only had maybe 300 ship points in the well). But all told it was my roughly 1200 ship points + maxed Orkulus and multiple repair bays vs a conservative estimate of 3000-3500 ship points including Ogrovs and Starfish.

I just played a locked teams game on cruel, medium large, 4 enemies. Was easy ... and boring. The map was favorable to me but the main thing is that at least one or two of the enemy AI will give up crashing you while they go after each other, while you are left with 1-2 to deal with yourself. I like to play on cruel since unfair is too easy and on cruel or vicious the enemy keeps replenishing and attacking until you take his worlds. But I really preferred unlocked teams for the variety. Well now that variety means they more or less all ally and hit you together. Sigh ...

I suppose the new relationship system just needs some adjustments. The AI relationship bonus rate and maximum has been reduced in the 1.31 hotfix because AIs tended to gang up. I guess they can do something to correct this in the particular case of cruel and vicious for the upcoming 1.32 hotfix.

With all do respect, an hour is more than long enough to get at least one ally yourself if you are aggressive with Diplomacy. The only advantage Cruel and Vicious AI have in diplomacy (I think) is that they max out their AI bonus much faster. As this means you may not be able to complete many missions, you'll need to research all the Diplomacy relations techs ASAP, quickly do as much damage to a common enemy as possible (and of course avoid hurting them at all cost), and perhaps even a bit of bribery to quickly get a cease fire so you can send envoys. Once you get a peace treaty you should be able to prevent that AI from getting a treaty with the rest, or at the very least ensure your envoys don't let their relations drop low enough to attack you.

Umm with all due respect I don't see how you can possibly research the fully diplomacy line and survive 4 cruel AIs on a medium or medium large map. The resources used will preclude any chance of mounting an effective defense (SB or otherwise). Remember they usually have close to 1500-1800 ship points minimum inside of an hour on cruel. So imagine you are getting the full force of 2-3 of those inside of an hour.

Perhaps I am not a skilled enough player but such a requirement of "going all diplo" was hardly a consideration until the recent patches. I personally fail to see that as being the intent of the developers. Remember in the game I mentioned previously two of the four players were across the map and essentially out of contact until they dropped into my gravity well together and joined in the fray. The other two had been doggedly trying to eliminate me from the get go. Quite frankly the mission system is at best muddled and slightly broken as it stands. So it would take excessive envoy deployment and bribery to get even one assailant (bad pun off my back let alone more.

But I will play around with it and see. You may be right and that is the only way to survive in the new versions. But again, is this what the devs wanted? A quick race to universal alliances against the human player? Oh and don't even get me started about two vicious AIs fighting you at your chokepoint at the same time. That is equivalent to fighting 10-12 normal AIs in one grav well. Good luck with that in the latest version.

Well honestly I didn't say if it was feasible or not. But I do know its quite possible to get a a cease fire in under an hour without too much investment. Obviously if you need to put every effort into survival even this is not possible, but in this case its really not the AI's diplomatic handicap that is causing you problems, its the economic one which is the main reason its a "cruel" AI anyways.

Well I did some more test games.

The devs have definitely made it harder to get positive diplo with the AI and likely have boosted the ability for the AIs to build relationships between themselves.

I played a game as a Vasari vs 4 cruel AIs (2 TEC, 1 Vasari, 1 Advent). I got into a brouhaha with one of the TEC out of the gate (unavoidable as he wanted my blood) but the Advent neighbor was more ambivalent. I did every mission the Advent gave me (he hated my TEC nemesis as well) and sent several envoys (which ultimately still got blown up by the Advent player). The big thing I did is to not go after the Advent. I even conceded him one planet that he seemed to really want. My relations with him kept oscillating from ~1-2.2. Until ... I got strong enough that (a) I was not smallest fleet and (b) started pounding the snot out of the TEC. Then my diplomacy boomed into the 5-5 range, albeit then the Advent were attacking more but half-heartedly.

I even went so far as to not have my ships or Orkulus attack the Advent early on when he came in with small forces into my northern checkpoint (used 'hold position'). Eventually he retreated and I guess his attention was focused elsewhere. This turned out to be a good choice since the Vasari player who was on the opposite side of the map from the Advent and behind the TEC I was hammering was in full alliance with the Advent after an hour (no idea how). Fortuitous since the Vasari player was at the time the strongest player on the board. Made my heart skip when the two jumped into my grav well but then the Vasari offered me cease fire (I was doing his missions also), which I took instantly. But if I hadn't already taken out 2 planets of the TEC who both parties also hated I would have been wiped out at that battle.

The biggest thing I can see is to bend over backwards to not piss off one of the neighboring AIs. But the new version no longer lets the human player manipulate things so easily with envoys and missions. Takes longer than before. Much longer. Meanwhile the AIs accrue diplomatic relationship between themselves MUCH faster. So be advised. It certainly introduces more randomness in the mix (staring conditions, etc.) Still on the balance locked teams are so boring and so damn easy.

Alright case in point.

Just finished a medium large map with 4 cruel Ais (three Vasari and one Advent with me as Vasari). Weirdest map I ever saw as all the worlds within reach were volcano or asteroid. In fact I had 4 volcano, seven asteroids and my HW in my colony expansion rush.

Ran into the Advent on one side and a Vasari (orange) on the other. Ok fine. The Advent side has a clear chokepoint. Nothing close to a chokepoint exists on the Vasari border. All seems fine. Then about 50 minutes in a player (green) I haven't even seen since he is on other side of map and comes at me via a wormhole, is allied with the Vasari (orange) pounding on me and joins in on two different grav wells. Turns out he also allied with the last remaining Vasari (purple) who is pounding on the Advent on the opposite side. Orange has a cease fire with purple. So green and orange both are using their full fleets across three of my planets on orange's border.

The orange player has a clear chokepoint that I assault ... no go ... since green is backing him up. Through all of this the orange and green together are continually smashing several of my worlds over and over since no chokepoint exists for me. Finally I can use phase stabilizers, condense my fleet and jump to wherever they are incoming on a dime. Eventually purple and I independently bring down the Advent player (thankfully). Eventually I push green off some worlds near the Advent and then squish orange like a rotten grape once I have my max fleet. With his buddy orange dead I went through the aforementioned wormhole and beat green silly leaving me with a maxed purple which just took time to bring to bear (no kosturas used btw).

The point here is there was absolutely no way to prevent any of the enemy alliances. Orange had been hitting me from the get go so my own populace hated their guts. I sent envoys and researched the diplo buffs. No go. Green I hadn't even seen until he crashes the party. By then green and purple had almost a 20 / 20 relationship (with full pacts I presume). Advent fortunately while they disliked me were often busy with purple. Note I did every one of the orange missions in the beginning. Ironically he had a relation of 4.5 from his side but my people rapidly hated his guts.

I'd appreciate any insights of how to prevent the orange and green double team inside of an hour.

Any recommendations are welcome.

Patch 1.32 seems to fix this (at least when testing on cruel).

Thanks to the devs for fixing this issue.