POPULARITY AND AI

AI countries

Some countries in the game may be controlled by AI (Artificial intelligence). They serve the purpose of keeping the game round challenging and entertaining, by emulating human-like playstyles. There are 3 reasons a country may be controlled by the AI:

• The country was not picket by a joining player. The AI will play the country until a player selects it.
• The player picking this country was not active in the round for the last 2 days. The AI will resume playing until the player becomes active again.
• The country is too small to be played by a human player, and thus cannot be selected. It is permanently played by AI.

Diplomacy with AI

You can determine if a country is controlled by a human player or by AI in the diplomacy list, where you can also alter your diplomatic relations to improve your popularity.

On mobile

First, open the diplomacy menu at the bottom of the screen.

1. On the left side in the Diplomacy menu you can see colored dots in the corner of the player flags. These colors represent the status of the player. Green indicates that the country is played actively by a human, red indicates that the country is controlled by an AI. Use this information to prioritize your attack targets around your country, or to alter your diplomatic relations.

2. You can change your diplomatic relations towards other countries. Consider granting AI controlled countries Right of Way or Shared Map, this will improve your popularity with them. If your popularity is high AIs might even return the favor after a while and allow you to move through their country as well. But stay cautious when granting this to Ais that control inactive player countries, as those players could still return in the future. To avoid this, you can sart granting only small and unplayable AI countries these relations.

On desktop

First, open the Diplomacy menu at the left side the screen.

1. The "AI" column in the Diplomacy menu shows an icon depicting a human player or a computer screen, indicating if the country is controlled by an active human player or by an AI. Use this information to prioritize your attack targets around your country, or to alter your diplomatic relations.

2. You can change your diplomatic relations towards other countries. Consider granting AI controlled countries Right of Way or Shared Map, this will improve your popularity with them. If your popularity is high AIs might even return the favor after a while and allow you to move through their country as well. But stay cautious when granting this to AIs that control inactive player countries, as those players could still return in the future. To avoid this, you can sart granting only small and unplayable AI countries these relations.

Popularity

AI players also serve as a balancing factor in the game round and usually try to prevent dominant players from taking over the world. To achieve that AIs may decide to declare war on aggressive nations. How likely it is for an AI to declare war is determined by a leader's popularity with the AI country.

There are multiple factors that influence a leader's popularity with AI nations positively or negatively.

Positive popularity influences

• Being at war with nations that the AI fights or that are unpopular already
• Being friends (having Right of Way or better relations) with the AI country
• Being friends (having Right of Way or better relations) with the AI country's friends and allies
• Buying or selling resources from/to AI nations on the Stock Market
• Receiving war declarations or surprise attacks from other nations

Negative popularity influences

• Being at war with the AI country
• Being at war with the AI country's friends and allies
• Declaring war on popular nations (surprise attacks have the same effect as declaring war)
• Being friends (having Right of Way or better relations) with the AI country's enemies
• Amassing a big army while already being unpopular with the AI country
• Moving troops through the AI country without having Right of Way
• Getting spies caught that were deployed in the AI country

Checking popularity

You can check your and other's popularity in different panels. You can use this information to better influence your own popularity.

On mobile

First, open the Newspaper via the menu at the bottom of the screen.

• In the articles tab, scroll down until you find the statistics called "The world's most popular nations" or "The world's most dreaded nations". In these lists countries are ranked by how popular or unpopular they are respectively. If you are high up on the most dreaded list, you can expect AIs to attack you soon, so beware!

• You can also use this information to improve your own popularity with AI. For example you could declare war on most dreaded nations, or you could ally yourself with most popular nations.

On desktop

In the Diplomacy Menu, open a nation profile with the Info button.

• At the bottom of the nation profile you see how popular you are with this particular country. You can check the profiles of different AI nations to determine which ones like or dislike you.

You can also check popularity statistics in the Newspaper.

• In the statistics tab, you may find statistics called "The world's most popular nations" or "The world's most dreaded nations". In these lists countries are ranked by how popular or unpopular they are respectively. If you are high up on the most dreaded list, you may expect AIs to attack you soon.

• You can also use this information to improve your own popularity with AI. For example, you could declare war on most dreaded nations, or you could ally yourself with most popular nations.