Hello there and greetings from Spain!

First of all, I need to say that GalCiv4 Supernova is, in my opinion, the best entry in the series by far.  I am really enjoying every minute of it.  I am an experienced fan of 4x space games and this one is headed to be the king.  Many thanks to Stardock and to Brad Wardell!

I have some doubts that have arisen while playing the latest Supernova updates:

1) When you declare war, now you have the option of choosing the type of war you want to initiate; the difference seems to be a diplomatic penalty, which you get and seems to go away with time, if I have perceived it correctly.  What does stop me from always choosing the lowest penalty (which corresponds to the lightest and less aggressive war)?  Are you forced to finish the war in a specified number of turns depending on your election?

2) Why isn't there a scientific victory any more?  Why was it removed?  Will it come back?

3) The diplomacy seems to be quite nerfed compared to GalCiv 2 (where it was way too powerful) and even compared to GalCiv 3 (where it was not as powerful as 2 but still powerful, more realistic in my opinion).  I used to win a lot of games by diplomatic victory in 2 and 3, but in 4 I struggle to even position myself in a good diplomatic position, even with a civilization with great diplomatic bonuses and with all diplomatic technologies investigated.  Am I missing something or it is like this in 4?  This is made even harder because of the new "war penalty".

4) Connected to this, the AI seems way more opportunistic than 2 or 3.  Being a great diplomat does not guarantee peace, and a civilization that is in good terms with you may suddenly declare war just because they "covet your worlds".  I really struggle to predict their behaviour.  I appreciate the most realistic approach to real world diplomacy, but I am finding myself being able to win only by conquest or similar (note: I do not use prestige victory).  Even if I go for diplomatic victory, because of the harder diplomacy in this game I find necessary to engage in A LOT of conquest and allying with the remaining races.  Also, if I try to win by cultural domination, I find this impossible to achieve without a lot of war and conquest, as the other civilizations get really angry at my actions.  Actually, if I choose to be pacific, another civilization will ALWAYS attack me eventually if it becomes powerful enough, despite all my best diplomatic efforts.  This means that the easiest games have been, by far, when I choose a military civilization and wipe everyone out of existence, with care to destroy them BEFORE they reach a certain power level.

Am I doing something wrong or missing something?  If I am, please help me here, and if the game is designed this way now, I would really suggest that is modified to allow the pacific victories of 2 and 3.

Best regards and thanks again for this amazing game,

Jose