When any of your scanners — on a ship or a planet — picks up another empire's ships or planets for the first time, you establish First Contact. Both players are notified that a new empire has been discovered. If the other player belongs to an alliance, you also learn about that alliance.
Every relationship between two players falls into one of these categories:
| Status | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Unknown | You haven't encountered this player yet |
| Neutral | You've met, but have no agreements |
| Friend | A mutual friendship — both players agreed to it |
| Non-Aggression Pact (NAP) | A timed treaty — stronger than friendship |
| Alliance | Members of the same alliance |
| At War | Open hostilities — the only state that allows combat |
Diplomacy is a step-by-step process. You can't skip ahead — trust must be earned:
Requests expire after 300 days if not answered. Both sides must agree for any upgrade — diplomacy is always mutual.
NAPs last for 300 days and automatically renew unless one side opts out. If either player cancels the auto-renewal, the pact expires and the relationship drops back down to Friends — not enemies. Both players are notified when a NAP expires.
Unlike friendship, war is one-sided — any player can declare war on a Neutral or Friend without their consent. The target receives an immediate notification. Once at war, both sides can send ships to attack each other.
You cannot declare war on:
Declaring war on a player who is in an alliance also costs you protection. For the next 300 days, every other member of that alliance may declare war on you regardless of rank. The confirmation dialog warns you before you commit, so check who your target is allied with first.
To end a war, both sides must agree to peace — sent the same way as a friendship request. A successful peace negotiation resets the relationship back to Neutral, and you can rebuild from there.
Ranked Combat protection rules (below) add a second filter on who you're allowed to declare war on regardless of relationship state.
Joining an alliance automatically sets your relationship with all other members to Alliance status. If you leave an alliance, those relationships become NAPs with a fresh 300-turn timer — a cooling-off period so former allies don't immediately become vulnerable to each other.
AI-controlled empires participate in diplomacy too. They greet you on first contact, respond to war declarations with threats, and will always reject friendship or NAP proposals.
AI empires never declare war on you — the only way to end up at war with an AI is to declare it yourself. If you do, expect a threatening message in chat (yes, AI players read and react to what you say), but the escalation is always your choice.
Leave them alone and you can sit at Neutral with an AI indefinitely.
Ferion uses a Ranked Combat system to prevent powerful empires from freely bullying weaker ones. Your rank on the leaderboard (based on total population) determines who you can and cannot declare war on.
You are allowed to declare war on another player only if at least one of the following is true:
If none of these apply, the war declaration is blocked. This means mid-ranked players are largely safe from being targeted by much stronger empires looking for easy prey.
In certain situations, the normal ranking restrictions are bypassed:
Both overrides are temporary, and the 300-day clock always runs from the most recent trigger. Declaring war on that alliance again, or catching another spy from the same player, restarts it. Once the window closes, rank protection returns automatically.
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