A bug in IP game - AI sells or buys the same thing twice

[Kirov]

I've never heard of this bug, so I'm reporting it here. It seems that when you play IP, every minute action related to AI must be synchronized among all computers before it takes effect. Which is why it is entirely possible that the AI can buy a tech from you, then it doesn't know it already has this tech and buys it second time. Conversely, it can offer you to sell one tech twice. It is only after you close the diplo screen that the AI gets synced and 'realize' what your tech status is.

This bug is particularly annoying, because unlike with other exploits, where you can simply refrain from any abuse and you're fine, not exploiting this one actually hurts you, i.e. you're worse off compared to the baseline situation if there was no bug in the first place. The AI doesn't like being nagged with many phone calls and you always want to do and trade as much as you can in one sitting. So I can perfectly imagine that players agree to allow to exploit this bug, rather than risking "XXX is ignoring our transmission". Still, either option sucks and I'm not sure there is anything possible to do about it.

Any thoughts?

[JarlWolf]

The AI has Alzheimers. Living for 900 years will do that to you 

[Yitzi]

To make sure I understand correctly...It buys something from you, then tries to buy it from you again?  That may be fixable, though I'd need to run an IP game to test it and track it down, and it probably won't be one of the highest priority fixes.

[Kirov]

Yes, it offers a tech for my InfNet, then offers another one for the same. Conversely, it sold me one tech and immediately tried to sell it again. Everything gets synced all right once you close the diplo screen, but as I said, usually you don't want to do that.

Which reminds me - have you done anything with the energy stockpiling in your patch yet? Because we weren't sure if this exploit works or not.

[Yitzi]

Yes, it offers a tech for my InfNet, then offers another one for the same. Conversely, it sold me one tech and immediately tried to sell it again. Everything gets synced all right once you close the diplo screen, but as I said, usually you don't want to do that.

Which reminds me - have you done anything with the energy stockpiling in your patch yet? Because we weren't sure if this exploit works or not.

Fixing it is the next thing on the list.