EP Cost of Trade Alliance (2.3.7)

[dadacp]

I can start work on a new diplomatic treaty even if I don't have enough credits to pay for it. If I don't have enough credits, the treaty will simply take whatever I have and leave me with zero credits. I tend to use up my credits on improvements to my colonies and then get the diplomatic treaty for next to nothing in terms of credits.

I started work on a new treaty, a "Trade Alliance". The text says that it costs 250 EP and 1000 credits with a 65% chance to succeed in turning a trade route into a trade alliance. Since I had only 79 credits left after spending the rest, and produced 129 EP per turn, it seemed to be obviously better than "Trade Treaty" (which costs 200 EP and 400 credits with a 50% chance to succeed in turning a trade route into a trade alliance). I would spend the same small amount of credits and anyways be finished in 2 turns either way. But it didn't work out that way. 2 turns later I look and see I have spent 269 of 500 EPs needed to finish "Trade Alliance". If "Trade Alliance" actually costs 500 EPs, it make no sense to ever choose it unless I am producing over 500 EPs per turn.

After 4 turns I get the message "Project 'Trade Alliance' successful", but I don't know if it extended my existing Trade Alliances or not.

So, to list the bugs:

1. Diplomatic treaties don't actually require the credits stated.
2. "Trade Alliance" misstates the EP cost.
3. "Trade Alliance" is imbalanced relative to "Trade Treaty".
4. When project "Trade Alliance" is successful, and there are Trade Alliances in effect but no Trade Routes in effect, one does not know what successful completion does.

I have the saved game files and can send them by email if desired.

I do love the game, and have purchased it for both my Android phone (Google Play) and my PC (Steam). I prefer playing on the PC, with the bigger screen and the chance to easily back up my saved game files (to be found in Windows 8 under Users/<name>/AppData/Local/FactionWars).

[fallen]

1. This is not a bug and is intentional feature. When an empire is breaking financially, politicians are willing to compromise. If you keep your empire near 0, be warned that you have a very weak empire.
2. Are you running multiple treaties at the same time? If so, this most likely what led to your miscounting on the cost of the Trade Alliance.

Thanks for the feedback, we'll keep working to improve. I hope my responses have helped clear up the misunderstanding.

[dadacp]

 I later saw that a "Trade Treaty" also took twice as many EPs as expected. It seems that the diplomatic system works similarly to what I just read in the Star Traders RPG forums. On Hard difficulty the treaties take twice as many EPs to complete when they are not fully paid for in $.

[fallen]

dadacp - glad that we got it worked out! Thanks for the posts and welcome to the forum!