Diplomacy
Empire Forge Conquests supports several forms of diplomacy. In one sense, diplomacy could just be talking with other players and agreeing on common goals. However, the game allows players to formalize their plans with treaties. In addition to treaties, the cede and gift orders allow players to trade areas and gold.Treaty types:
Neutral
All players start the game at neutral relations. This state implies neither peace nor war, and there are no penalties when switching from neutral to war.
Peace
Players who want to establish good relations and reap some gold benefit, but who are not ready to become allies can form a peace treaty. To establish the treaty, both interested players must issue a peace treaty order with each other on the same turn. Players can "downgrade" a peace treaty to neutral unilaterally with no penalty by issuing a neutral treaty order. Players who break this treaty by switching directly from peace to war must pay a victory point and gold penalty. Once established, a peace treaty grants each player 1 gold per turn in trade, but no other benefit.
Alliance
Players who want to establish the strongest possible relationship can become allies. To establish the alliance, both interested players must issue an ally treaty order with each other on the same turn. Players can "downgrade" unilaterally to peace from an alliance with no penalty (except unit-loss penalties, see below). Downgrading directly to war or neutral causes gold and victory point penalties to be paid, as well as any unit-loss penalties. Allies receive 2 gold per turn in trade, can see each other's areas, and can move units through each other's territory. Allies' units will aid each other in combat, as well. More details on allied combat can be found on the combat page. If a player has units in his ally's territory and the alliance treaty ends (either through downgrade or a broken treaty), those units are destroyed. The player who caused the units to suffer this fate by ending the treaty will have to pay an additional penalty of gold for each unit lost. The fee is 1 gold per level of destroyed ally unit.
War
If you want to conquer another player's area, you must first be at war. There is no penalty to declare war if you are neutral with the other player, but declaring war when you have a peace or alliance treaty with another player causes penalties. The only treaty that can be reached from a state of war is neutral, and both players involved in a war must issue a neutral treaty on the same turn to end the war.
Breaking treaties:
As mentioned above, there are penalties for breaking some treaties. In addition to what is listed for each treaty (see especially the alliance treaty above), here is a list of the exact penalty values:
Peace directly to war, gold penalty = 15
Peace directly to war, VP penalty = 6
Ally directly to war, gold penalty = 30
Ally directly to war, VP penalty = 15
Ally directly to neutral, gold penalty = 15
Ally directly to neutral, VP penalty = 5
Costs incurred from breaking treaties can cause a player to go into debt. He will be unable to purchase units until he recovers to positive cash flow.
Cedes and gifts:
A player can cede one area per turn to another player. An area that contains a magic structure cannot be ceded, and no capitals can be ceded. No units can be present in the area that do not belong to either the giving or the receiving player (if you cede an area to a non-ally and you have units present in the area, you will lose your units). A player must pay a 1 gold fee to cede an area.
There are no limits on giving gifts of gold, as long as you have the needed gold available to send. You can even send gold to the Outsiders, though they will likely just use the gold to buy more units to destroy you.