TheHarshax
Warlord
Ive only played right the way through late game once using this mod so maybe others find it different.
I found that it was a little too easy later in the game, maybe the influence required should scale up a bit more, or diplo units could have less of an effect forcing you to complete more missions. Early game I think the effort required to gain CS is a bit more testing.
Then perhaps a few more difficult missions could be introduced (if this is possible). It would be interesting if city states asked you to capture certain cities or other objectives like natural wonders.
I'm curious what SP's you had in play. I agree that late game can be easy, if you optimize for diplomacy. The biggest reason, is that many of the quests are for Great Persons, which can be fulfilled by other CS's if you have the full Patronage tree unlocked. The next most common quest, in my opinion, is build such-and-such wonder. If you're a production powerhouse, this is easier too. There are three other quests: build road, find natural wonder, find Civ. These are nominal. Building roads is probably the biggest investment for any civ, because those roads cost $ per turn. The other two require exploration. If you are going for a diplomacy victory, you must put a priority on exploration. I've found that you don't get offered quests from CS's until you a) meet them, and b) establish a minimum amount of influence. The best Diplomacy strategy is to explore, find CS's, get $ from meeting them, send at least 1 envoy and then be pestered forever more by their quests. Once you have most of the map uncovered, the two dominant quests are Great Persons and Wonders, followed by Resource requests.
This mod (which is one of my must-haves by the way) compounds the values of wonders and great persons, by giving you the both a City State influence bonus (food, culture, units), as well as the benefit of said building or person. Therefore, I'd be inclined to reduce the frequency of City State quests.
Now, I've specifically attempted a diplo victory as Alexander, on a small map, King Difficulty. My early game strategy was similar to a cultural victory so I could a) unlock all of Patronage, and b) build the Foreign office. Once established, I started modest expansion and bee lined all diplomacy techs and the WTO. By end game, I was popping influence all over the place because of GP generation, and cranking out wonders faster than anyone else because of my strong tech lead (Patronage + Freedom + Reason + Landed Nobility). I also use CCMAT as mentioned earlier.
This mod makes Diplo victories as decision intensive as the Domination victory, and I applaud its design wholeheartedly.
ideas:
1) Reduce quest frequency
1a) Quests to generate Great Person requires that you gift Great Person to that City State, in turn, get HUGE Influence benefit.
2) Create ability to gift a resource to a Civ for influence
2a) Specific resources give more influence than general ones. Strategic gain greater influence over Military, subject to era necessity (iron less useful in Modern era). Luxury greater influence over Cultural and Maritime.
3) Ability to sell resources for fixed GPT to city states. (It sucks to have no customers, because the AI is spamming cities and has locked all the resources down)
4) Gift workers