City State Diplomacy Mod (Updated)

12.0 posted- see page 1 for changelog. getting near a final release on this, guys. Exciting stuff!


Hard to keep up with all these changes :)
I mean I have no time to test this fast...

I hope that map size scalability can be put in!
(you know, with map size and number of CSs...)
 
Yes, great to see the continual updates and all the work being put into this.

Played a game through to the 1800s yesterday. I noticed an AI envoy pass through my territory on his way to a CS despite no open border treaty with that nation. Is this intended? (didn't see it mentioned) He sat many turns within the borders of another CS close to me that we were having a tit for tat diplo war over (quite entertaining actually). He never dropped his payload, however. Then he just bolted through my territory, hopped in the ocean and landed near another neighboring CS where he completed his mission. Curious (if not surprisingly intelligent) behavior :)

edit: That was with v10, btw
 
Hard to keep up with all these changes :)
I mean I have no time to test this fast...

I hope that map size scalability can be put in!
(you know, with map size and number of CSs...)

I would love to have scalability, however, at this point, there is no way to code it in.

I tried having a separate UnitClasses.xml mod for 'low,' 'medium' and 'high' numbers of diplo units, but it caused problems.

Yes, great to see the continual updates and all the work being put into this.

Played a game through to the 1800s yesterday. I noticed an AI envoy pass through my territory on his way to a CS despite no open border treaty with that nation. Is this intended? (didn't see it mentioned) He sat many turns within the borders of another CS close to me that we were having a tit for tat diplo war over (quite entertaining actually). He never dropped his payload, however. Then he just bolted through my territory, hopped in the ocean and landed near another neighboring CS where he completed his mission. Curious (if not surprisingly intelligent) behavior

edit: That was with v10, btw

Yes! That is normal. All diplo units have the promotion 'enter rival territory.' This is by design, as diplomatic units (being peaceful and neutral) should be able to pass freely across the land. The reason he waited around is that the AI does a scan of all CSs every turn to see which ones are un-allied and which ones they are already allied with are about to un-ally. Thus, he decided to go somewhere else (probably because it was unaligned). The AI also knows to target CSs near a player they are hostile with– a game I played yesterday saw Alexander v. Harun Al-Rashid fighting over a single CS, with Alexander allying with 4 of Harun's neighboring CSs, one of which took a city from Harun. Was epic and perfect. Now if I can just fix that damn escort system...

To retaliate, though, you could attack it and keep it from getting there– thus why it is not a good idea to send diplo units across hostile territory!

Right now I am working on the MUinit.xml to try and get the diplo units to more reliably strike out on their own (as opposed to waiting for an escort). Having a bit of trouble with that.

G
 
I love the idea in this Mod, but I think it needs to be rethought in order to work properly.
Right now the AI can still buy alliances gold gifts normally, so the whole system feels a little broken and unfair. I also don't much care for the fact that diplomat class units cost double to rush, effectively meaning that a player CANNOT use gold for diplomacy in any shape or form, which I find rather extreme. A better system, would be as others have mentioned, to keep gold gifts in the game but tone down their effects and use them in conjunction with diplomacy units. Flavors can encourage AIs to favor diplomacy units so that they don't waste all their money on less-efficient gold gifts, but I don't know of any way in which you can prevent the AI from gold-gifting in the absolute.
 
Right now the AI can still buy alliances gold gifts normally, so the whole system feels a little broken and unfair. I also don't much care for the fact that diplomat class units cost double to rush, effectively meaning that a player CANNOT use gold for diplomacy in any shape or form, which I find rather extreme. A better system, would be as others have mentioned, to keep gold gifts in the game but tone down their effects and use them in conjunction with diplomacy units. Flavors can encourage AIs to favor diplomacy units so that they don't waste all their money on less-efficient gold gifts, but I don't know of any way in which you can prevent the AI from gold-gifting in the absolute.

While I appreciate the feeback, I think you are mistaken on a few points:

I have done extensive testing to make sure that the AI cannot use gold to buy influence. The only way to get influence is via diplomatic units, which they are very adept at doing. In a game I played last night, AI Alexander (using diplo units) befriended 8 of 16 CSs and used them to kill his neighbors.

If you have evidence that the AI can still buy influence, let me know so that I can look at my xml files.

While I admit the costs are extreme to purchase diplomatic units, this is part of the design philosophy- I want gold taken out of the diplomatic equation because, frankly, its gamey. I think influence should be an actively-pursued decision, not something haphazardly undertaken or pursued on an ad-hoc basis.

Furthermore, gifting gold takes away importance of geography, which is another big theme of this mod.

I mean no offense by this, but have you actually played the mod? If not, I heartily recommend that you do.
 
Nice mod, good fun to use and more enjoyable that the vanilla cash for loyalty system.

One question, in v13
-nerfed CSs a little bit to make them just a little weaker

I also use CCMAT, including Thal's Balance - Diplomacy mod which also adjusts the CS. Will these two mods trip over each other?
 
Nice mod, good fun to use and more enjoyable that the vanilla cash for loyalty system.

One question, in v13
-nerfed CSs a little bit to make them just a little weaker

I also use CCMAT, including Thal's Balance - Diplomacy mod which also adjusts the CS. Will these two mods trip over each other?

Should be okay- CCMAT's diplomacy balance focuses on the bonuses the CSs give, not on their demographic/economic schematics. I recommend loading my mod second (click on its green check second) so that units, etc. show up properly.

G
 
While I appreciate the feeback, I think you are mistaken on a few points:

I have done extensive testing to make sure that the AI cannot use gold to buy influence. The only way to get influence is via diplomatic units, which they are very adept at doing. In a game I played last night, AI Alexander (using diplo units) befriended 8 of 16 CSs and used them to kill his neighbors.

If you have evidence that the AI can still buy influence, let me know so that I can look at my xml files.

While I admit the costs are extreme to purchase diplomatic units, this is part of the design philosophy- I want gold taken out of the diplomatic equation because, frankly, its gamey. I think influence should be an actively-pursued decision, not something haphazardly undertaken or pursued on an ad-hoc basis.

Furthermore, gifting gold takes away importance of geography, which is another big theme of this mod.

I mean no offense by this, but have you actually played the mod? If not, I heartily recommend that you do.

Not sure if this is sufficient evidence, but for what it's worth I just created a custom map with four civilizations, each with 100,000 starting gold, and scouts placed close to city state starting locations, and all mods disabled except the newest (v13) of this mod.

I'm sorry to say that Siam and Arabia immediately spent their gold on city states by the 2nd turn.



At any rate, I may have my criticisms but this mod is a noble effort, and I'm sorry if I sounded too critical. This game really needs more unit-and-tile action that doesn't involve purely military stuff, I was really hoping they'd take advantage of the new tile system to really revolutionize Civ, but it looks like it's the mod-ers' jobs to do that now, so thanks for all your efforts!:goodjob:
 
Busy real life makes it sometimes take days/weeks for me to finish big maps. Plus I enjoy the micro management too much hehe. Anyway, I just finished a map using version 5 of your mod, which was the latest at the time I started that map. Setting up for next map, browsing the mods, and to my delight I find you have done many improvments. It seems v13 will solve some of the issues I had with v5, but there are still some problems not covered by your version history. Perhaps they are outside the scoop of this mod.

If I play Babylon, with double greater scientist rate, I only get scientists. That is good except city states sometimes give quests to make engineers, merchants and artists. There is a wonder for 2 artists, but there is only one method of getting a greater engineer or greater merchant, and that is a gifted unit from city states using the Educated Elite policy. They are still very rare. In 400+ turns I only got 6 units, of those where 2 healers and 3 diplomat types, plus one artist. As a result I had 4 city states with unsolved quests asking for engineer/merchant. I wished your mod did not add healers or diplomats to that list of possible gifted units. After all, I can build them myself, and they are not expensive. I have not been able to find any setting for this in your mods files. My guess is the tag <Special>SPECIALUNIT_PEOPLE</Special> is what places them in that list, since in vanilla civ5 only the greater people have that tag. It would be great if you could somehow solve this!

Another problem is with city states not mining coal or aluminium. Perhaps they don't se them, not having the techs. But I saw them and it was frustrating when 2 very nice and loyal maritime city states sat on 21 coal and 16 aluminum while I had none. I am sure they would gladly have given them to me, had they but seen them.

I recommend loading my mod second (click on its green check second) so that units, etc. show up properly.

Interesting, are you saying there is a hidden install order of mods? Will those I click last overwrite those I clicked first, if there is a conflict?
 
Busy real life makes it sometimes take days/weeks for me to finish big maps. Plus I enjoy the micro management too much hehe. Anyway, I just finished a map using version 5 of your mod, which was the latest at the time I started that map. Setting up for next map, browsing the mods, and to my delight I find you have done many improvments. It seems v13 will solve some of the issues I had with v5, but there are still some problems not covered by your version history. Perhaps they are outside the scoop of this mod.

If I play Babylon, with double greater scientist rate, I only get scientists. That is good except city states sometimes give quests to make engineers, merchants and artists. There is a wonder for 2 artists, but there is only one method of getting a greater engineer or greater merchant, and that is a gifted unit from city states using the Educated Elite policy. They are still very rare. In 400+ turns I only got 6 units, of those where 2 healers and 3 diplomat types, plus one artist. As a result I had 4 city states with unsolved quests asking for engineer/merchant. I wished your mod did not add healers or diplomats to that list of possible gifted units. After all, I can build them myself, and they are not expensive. I have not been able to find any setting for this in your mods files. My guess is the tag <Special>SPECIALUNIT_PEOPLE</Special> is what places them in that list, since in vanilla civ5 only the greater people have that tag. It would be great if you could somehow solve this!

Another problem is with city states not mining coal or aluminium. Perhaps they don't se them, not having the techs. But I saw them and it was frustrating when 2 very nice and loyal maritime city states sat on 21 coal and 16 aluminum while I had none. I am sure they would gladly have given them to me, had they but seen them.



Interesting, are you saying there is a hidden install order of mods? Will those I click last overwrite those I clicked first, if there is a conflict?

Thanks for the post- yes, much has changed since v5! Medical units and Suleiman's trait are now independent mods, and I've been focusing heavily on integrating AI support for the diplomatic system.

I'm not sure what you are saying concerning the <SPECIALUNIT_PEOPLE> tag- are you saying it caused the CSs to ask for them as quests or that it gave them to you as bonus units? It shouldn't ask for them as quests – the CSs quests are predefined, and I've never seen them ask for said units. In any case, I'll poke around and see if that's possible.

If it is gifting you those units, though...that is a problem. I'll look into it. Honestly never though about it. :lol:

As per the load order thing, its an assumption that I'm making purely on speculation of what has worked for me. I have no scientific evidence to back it up.
 
Not sure if this is sufficient evidence, but for what it's worth I just created a custom map with four civilizations, each with 100,000 starting gold, and scouts placed close to city state starting locations, and all mods disabled except the newest (v13) of this mod.

I'm sorry to say that Siam and Arabia immediately spent their gold on city states by the 2nd turn.


At any rate, I may have my criticisms but this mod is a noble effort, and I'm sorry if I sounded too critical. This game really needs more unit-and-tile action that doesn't involve purely military stuff, I was really hoping they'd take advantage of the new tile system to really revolutionize Civ, but it looks like it's the mod-ers' jobs to do that now, so thanks for all your efforts!:goodjob:

After reading your post and adding my reply, I too started researching if it was possible. The solution, silly me, was right in front of me! I simply added this string:

Code:
<Update>
			<Set Value="0"/>
			<Where Name="MINOR_GOLD_GIFT_LARGE"/>
		</Update>
		<Update>
			<Set Value="0"/>
			<Where Name="MINOR_GOLD_GIFT_MEDIUM"/>
		</Update>
		<Update>
			<Set Value="0"/>
			<Where Name="MINOR_GOLD_GIFT_SMALL"/>
		</Update>

and voila! Problem solved. Now the devious AI can't break my mod! Bastards. :)


Thanks for your research - expressing emotion through the internet is hard. My reaction to your first post was :) not :mad:. I'm just happy to get feedback!

Look for a v14 in, oh, 15 minutes with this problem (hopefully) solved.

Update: Actually, I see what the problem is. I had the fix in there all along, I had just disabled it as of version 11 by accident. I c&p'd a string in and accidentally clipped off a '>' mark. Oops.

Backups are wonderful things.
G
 
I'm not sure what you are saying concerning the <SPECIALUNIT_PEOPLE> tag- are you saying it caused the CSs to ask for them as quests or that it gave them to you as bonus units? It shouldn't ask for them as quests – the CSs quests are predefined, and I've never seen them ask for said units. In any case, I'll poke around and see if that's possible.

If it is gifting you those units, though...that is a problem. I'll look into it. Honestly never though about it. :lol:

As per the load order thing, its an assumption that I'm making purely on speculation of what has worked for me. I have no scientific evidence to back it up.

Thanks for speedy response! What I was trying to say is that the city states had normal quests asking for greater engineers and greater merchants, but they spawned units added by your mod, such as healers and diplomats. I tried to find a way to stop the city states to spawn healers/diplomats but could not find any tag with a label that clearly had this function. I speculated that if there was any method of changing this, it would possible be to not use the SPECIALUNIT_PEOPLE tag.
 
I am quite partial to this mod. First one I tried. :D

Are you planning on adding icons to the build menu for the new units any time soon?
 
Really enjoying your mod - with the patch my latest game has been much more engaging diplomatically! One suggestion: You have the diplo units scale by price which makes total sense, but if possible, maybe you could scale their effectiveness as well? I.e., have the messenger give 30 influence, the envoy 40, etc. The movement point scaling up is not enough (for me anyway). A couple of times in my game (v11) I actually put off getting a couple of the diplo unit techs so that I could continue to produce cheaper diplo GPs since they all have the same 50 influence points that I've noticed. IMO, there should be more incentive to want to really gun for those techs. I see in the notes that the price scaling has increased, so this might become more of an issue for people playing that version.
And one small bug: Siam kept two diplomats sitting next to a CS I was allied to for about 2000 years, evidently patiently waiting for me to lose my allied status. Don't know if that's faulty AI or something you can affect, but I thought I'd just throw that out there!
 
Well it seems I've run into a snag or two.

Actually disabling gifting has opened up a new can of worms.

The AI has decided that, since it can't gift, that it is going to auto-suicide every diplo unit it produces.

Well, it did, until I fixed it!

My only fear is that the AI will now have more money than it knows what to do with (literally- it hates buying stuff, just land and influence).

I need to work on that some more.

Look for v14 in a lil. :)

Sorry Heinous_Hat, I've failed you :)
 
I am quite partial to this mod. First one I tried. :D

Are you planning on adding icons to the build menu for the new units any time soon?

Do you mean icons that are different from the dove on blue background icon? Then perhaps yes. I might simply give each one a new color background.

With good time.
 
Really enjoying your mod - with the patch my latest game has been much more engaging diplomatically! One suggestion: You have the diplo units scale by price which makes total sense, but if possible, maybe you could scale their effectiveness as well? I.e., have the messenger give 30 influence, the envoy 40, etc. The movement point scaling up is not enough (for me anyway). A couple of times in my game (v11) I actually put off getting a couple of the diplo unit techs so that I could continue to produce cheaper diplo GPs since they all have the same 50 influence points that I've noticed. IMO, there should be more incentive to want to really gun for those techs. I see in the notes that the price scaling has increased, so this might become more of an issue for people playing that version.
And one small bug: Siam kept two diplomats sitting next to a CS I was allied to for about 2000 years, evidently patiently waiting for me to lose my allied status. Don't know if that's faulty AI or something you can affect, but I thought I'd just throw that out there!

Scaling wise, there's no way to set a new influence amount for the next level of diplo units (I'm using the merchant 'trade mission' system, which has but one modifier XML). Thus I opted to make the differences movement and price based. I realized that players would avoid new techs because of cost and, admittedly, am at a loss as to how to prevent this. Since the techs the units are tied to (civil service, mathematics, globalization, etc.) are all quite useful in themselves, I hoped that would be enough to make players 'bite the bullet' and jump to the next tier.

Someday I hope to do this, once the DLL is unlocked.

Also, awesome job Siam AI. I can't tell the AI what to do in that situation because those are backend calculations. Were they escorted by soldiers or alone? The escort system was causing problems, so I axed it in the latest version (13). If alone, they should be more willing to sail/run/fly/jump across the map to get to their place.

Funny story, that: bismarck was on an island with no CSs and built all possible diplo units up to navigation. Once he got navigation, he scouted a nearby continent filled with CSs. All of a sudden, Bismarck sent 8 diplo units across the water simultaneously and made lots of friends. I really wanted to have 'ride of the Valkyries' playing in the background, as they were all in a horizontal line. Awesome.

Ok, back to work. :crazyeye:
 
Also, awesome job Siam AI. I can't tell the AI what to do in that situation because those are backend calculations.

So, you can't tell the AI to use the diplo unit to get influence when other player has the CS as allied?
Does the AI have to wait until CS gets out of allied status?
 
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