Frogboy:
one of the issues mentioned above is AI related. I am not sure, but does diplomacy belong to AI or to design?
If diplomacy is AI field, i have examples from recent games of AI declaring war, not doing anything for 100 turns, making peace, and then declaring war/making peace every 10 turns or so. Never met a guy, and he got destroyed. Generally speaking, when war is declared on me, i am attacked 1 in 3 times, and then attack comes after 25 turns or so. It happens that i am attacked by guys who i do not even know where they are, their scout just passed through my territory.
Thus, AI should not take just ranking into account before declaring war, but also distance, whether they have a war already going, and if they have army to fight it. Right now low ranking means automatically a war.
End of bpalczewski's quote
I would put that into the AI area.
The AI does take distance into account when declaring war, especially in LH. That's one of the reasons why in LH, you can have powerful opponents who are hostile and have big armies but don't declare war.
However, a better issue should be that the AI should do more to prepare for war. That is, get those armies ready to go and then attack. It tries to do this but it is harder to coordinate than it appears. But that's definitely something that's actionable and that I can put time into.