World Congress how will it work?

My worst fears is the world congress won't be great in functioning with the AI I that it won't end up like this. ( I used this from a spam thread that was closed this creation that I thought was funny is added is my example on what I think it will work out like. I found it too humorous to be wasted.

I think it's like this.
Actors: India, America, Byzantium, Polynesia, and Persia

Polynesia: I have found the world congress!!!
Byzantium: Oh joy, does this mean I have to get off my sofa?
America: No it doesn't, I think we should declare free trade for all!!
Polynesia: Washington we have to vote. Allied city-states give you +1 vote.
Persia: Fine but I am the most powerful state so I should be leader of the world.
Byzantium: (Theodora falls asleep on her sofa.)
India: I have the nukes.
America: I vote we should ban nukes from India. I also propose a standing tax army for Persia.
Persia and India: No way are you nuts!!!
America: What do you think we should do Theodora?
Byzantium: ZZZ (Theodora sleeping in her sofa snoring).
Polynesia: Hold on everyone I think as the founder I am leader and I think we should ban nukes.
India: I am going to build more nukes and destroy you for denying me nukes!!!
Persia: Ghandi eat a snickers.
India: Why??!!
Persia: Because you become a nukemonger when you're hungry, better?
India: Better.
Byzantium: ZZZZZZ!!!!
Polynesia: Shut up Theodora!!
Persia: That's it I am taking over the world by force! ( Leaves world congress)
America: What do we do now?
(30 turns later)
America: So much for your idea for world congress Kamehameha. Now Persia has enslaved us all.
Byzantium: (Theodora wakes up) What's happening? Are we still voting for a new leader?
India: No were all slaves of Persia. If we didn't vote out nukes I could have defeated Persia.
Persia: Shut up slaves get to work!

And that is how the world congress will work. (I hope not)

There is a purpose to this thread 1 its a non spam one. 2 Post your worst fears on how the world congress will work. Try to be funny and be a good sport. There is always a method to my madness.

Edit: Maybe a mod could alter the thread title so it reads world congress how will it work (Worst fears) I accidently forgot to add that.

Hah! Although it does raise an important point - can you leave the World Congress? That'd certainly cause an upset with the new diplomatic victory condition.

My most serious concern about the World Congress is that the might AI think a little too human when it comes to the resolutions. If the AI is essentially predisposed to agree to enact all the positive bonuses and none of the negatives then the feature will fall seriously short in my eyes. Of course, this is based on the assumption that the negative resolutions (like a standing army tax) do not come with a payoff in some other area.

In Civ4 you could refuse to accept UN decissions resulting in you being seen upon as a bandit state.... Hopefully it's still viable.

Nebuchadnezzer: Okay, what's on the agenda today?
Sejong: We're voting whether to execute Oda on war crimes.
Oda: Wait, what!?
Nebuchadnezzer: All in favor, say aye.
Everyone: Aye.

Here lies Oda Nobunaga
Leader of the Japanese People
-4000 BC to 1875 AD
"My only mistake was not giving
Gandhi Advanced Ballistics in exchange
for his vote."

Japan loses its leader and UA.
This is definitely a bad idea. So why does a part of me want to see it in the game so badly?

My worst fear is that there is 'no escape' from the resolutions, and its effects will be so powerful that every civ will want to war solely to weaken and divide the immense bonuses other players experience. That is, the diplomatic tool will make diplomacy even more a crapshoot than now.

My second worst fear is that the WC will be optional to any civ, and so weak that no player can afford to heavily ostracize the players who avoid it. That is, it will come to be nothing more than extra clicks (and the A.I. acting dumb).

I just want World Congress to be a way for civs enjoy deeper, logical bonuses through collaboration, bonuses that interact with the games' other systems; and to present a form of growth competitive with warmongering (when circumstances allow). It will be super difficult to get right, but I'd rather err towards it being weak. The culture system is what's going to carry the new diplomacy game.

@fuzzatron: I like your skit.

Veneke and Horseshoe hermi you bring up good points and scary fears but I still hope firaxis makes WC useable. I

@MatThePhat because it would be funny but maybe you wouldn't lose your UA but make a generic leader if the main leader gets executed could fun but possibly might not work.

@Lucystrike77 That could be interesting but as Veneke said it could mess up the Diplo victory but again it could be interesting, it could possibly spice things up though.

Luckystrike77 said:

In Civ4 you could refuse to accept UN decissions resulting in you being seen upon as a bandit state.... Hopefully it's still viable.

Click to expand...

My concern with that would be if you took out the bandit state everyone else would denounce you as a warmonger.

tranger66 said:

My concern with that would be if you took out the bandit state everyone else would denounce you as a warmonger.

Click to expand...

Maybe the World Congress could make a resolution to have a few "Guardian" states declare war on the bandit state

My hope is that the WC finally gives the weaker civs a little more backbone. As it is now, whenever a runaway civ declares war on a weak civ, it’s the runaway who comes to me and asks if I’ll join them in the war. The weak civ never comes asking for help defending against the superpower civ. The WC offers a few opportunities for the weaker civs to take the runaway civs down a peg or two. But my fear is that the weak civs will continue to cower and not stand up for themselves for fear of retribution.

shaglio said:

My hope is that the WC finally gives the weaker civs a little more backbone. As it is now, whenever a runaway civ declares war on a weak civ, it’s the runaway who comes to me and asks if I’ll join them in the war. The weak civ never comes asking for help defending against the superpower civ. The WC offers a few opportunities for the weaker civs to take the runaway civs down a peg or two. But my fear is that the weak civs will continue to cower and not stand up for themselves for fear of retribution.

Click to expand...

This, so much.

The weaker AIs need to learn to collaborate against the stronger AIs/the player, since that's where the threat lies. Instead they're just like school bullies who squish the weaker AIs just because they can. This is a big part of why the late game is currently so boring - you become so powerful and so advanced that they won't even try to stop you.

shaglio said:

My hope is that the WC finally gives the weaker civs a little more backbone. As it is now, whenever a runaway civ declares war on a weak civ, it’s the runaway who comes to me and asks if I’ll join them in the war. The weak civ never comes asking for help defending against the superpower civ. The WC offers a few opportunities for the weaker civs to take the runaway civs down a peg or two. But my fear is that the weak civs will continue to cower and not stand up for themselves for fear of retribution.

Click to expand...

That's how I feel too. When you try to build a coalition to take down the runaway, all the AIs seem to act as if you are asking them to attack the runaway by themselves. They don't understand that they will be joining forces with one or more civs whose combined strength exceeds that of the runaway.

So I fear that they will not vote against the runaway for the same reason they won't join forces against one. They don't want to be the first dog to bite the bear.

This is also my hope to, but as my skit shows that is showing the fear of what my fear thinks will happen.

Luckystrike77 said:

In Civ4 you could refuse to accept UN decissions resulting in you being seen upon as a bandit state.... Hopefully it's still viable.

Click to expand...

Yeah, the vote choices were:
- Yes
- No
- NEVER! (defy resolution)

I don't really remember how the "supreme ruler" victory went, but IIRC it had a lot to do with the AI voting you in (which other human players would usually not do).

In 5 currently, it only makes sense because CSs (together) account for more weight than normal civs. Now with this "full civs get more diplomats" situation, I wonder what they have up their sleeve to make it viable to win this way. Even in G+K, the AI is unlike humans in that they will vote their favourite civ for victory (based on relations), whereas most humans would vote for whoever is least likely to win from it.

I don't know if you can defy the resolution, but at least you can get your ducks in a row, become a resolution proposer and bribe everyone to repeal the resolution you don't like.

headcase said:

Yeah, the vote choices were:
- Yes
- No
- NEVER! (defy resolution)

I don't really remember how the "supreme ruler" victory went, but IIRC it had a lot to do with the AI voting you in (which other human players would usually not do).

In 5 currently, it only makes sense because CSs (together) account for more weight than normal civs. Now with this "full civs get more diplomats" situation, I wonder what they have up their sleeve to make it viable to win this way. Even in G+K, the AI is unlike humans in that they will vote their favourite civ for victory (based on relations), whereas most humans would vote for whoever is least likely to win from it.

Click to expand...

I remember that I have a tendency to pick NEVER! because I loathed the environmentalism civic thingie that AI loves for some reason through the UN Votes because it will always pass.

I have a tendency to become the pariah state when UN is involved. And the goal of the pariah states is to raze the city containing UN to the ground to remove the unhappiness from the citizens because they no like being a pariah along with me.

Quite a few UNs was razed to the ground via hit n run nukes or just plain old outright invasion. They hate me forever for it but what can they do about it? Throw feeble units against my superior defenses?

Current UN only makes me depressed because it's the economic victory. Boring.

Ones of my fears is that the pariah state is mighty enough to raze the city with world congress inside but it' doesn't do that. :/ Especially if the resolutions is driving the pariah nuts.

I was lying in bed tossing and turning this morning and I had a thought:

The runaway civs tend to have a lot of Gold from conquering cities and a lot of GPT from all their Gold-focused puppets. Also the large acquisition of territory gives them access to more different Resources as well as more of each Resource. So what’s to stop the runaway civ from using this excessive amount of Gold, GPT, and Resources to convince the weaker civs to vote against proposed WC resolutions aimed at stifling the runaway civ? There is a period of turns, between the resolution’s proposal and the actual voting, that would allow the runaway civ to buy the votes of the weaker civs to assure their runaway-itude goes unchecked.

Callonia said:

I remember that I have a tendency to pick NEVER! because I loathed the environmentalism civic thingie that AI loves for some reason through the UN Votes because it will always pass.

I have a tendency to become the pariah state when UN is involved. And the goal of the pariah states is to raze the city containing UN to the ground to remove the unhappiness from the citizens because they no like being a pariah along with me.

Quite a few UNs was razed to the ground via hit n run nukes or just plain old outright invasion. They hate me forever for it but what can they do about it? Throw feeble units against my superior defenses?

Current UN only makes me depressed because it's the economic victory. Boring.

Ones of my fears is that the pariah state is mighty enough to raze the city with world congress inside but it' doesn't do that. :/ Especially if the resolutions is driving the pariah nuts.

Click to expand...

World Congress ain't a wonder, and the chances are the U.N (if it stays as a wonder) will be built in a Capital, which is unrazable.

Actually, when you look at the resolutions that are designed to harm the runaway, most don't. The runaway has enough money to throw around so that the resolution is just an inconvenience for them, but harmful to smaller civs.

It kind of relates to real life. You typically think of government regulation as being harmful to major corporations, but the major corps usually have enough resources to allow them to adapt to the regulations. The regulations end up forming a Barrier to Entry for small entrepreneurs trying to compete against the big corps.

So when you pass a resolution increasing unit maintenance costs, the runaway can absorb the increase, while the puny civ they are finishing off doesn't have the kind of cash to keep up, so they are ruined.

The boosts to Wonders, Natural Wonders, and Landmarks that can be voted on also benefit the Runaway because they are likely to have the most of them.

And the World Games, World Fair, and International Space Station all benefit the runaway because they can divert much more massive production into those projects.

The Trade Embargo stops incoming trade to the Runaway, but it doesn't stop the runaway from having outgoing trade.

The World Religion resolution probably helps them too if they have made one.

The Scholars in Residence is about the only one that actually works against the runaway. But if the Runaway is beelining, it helps them make up the backlog of techs they skipped.

Eagle Pursuit said:

The Trade Embargo stops incoming trade to the Runaway, but it doesn't stop the runaway from having outgoing trade.

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And they're likely to have a lot of internal trade routes from roads connecting all their cities. Oh god, this could get very ugly!

. . . unless resolutions like the Standing Army Tax can be proposed against a single civ rather than against everybody.

TheKingOfBigOz said:

World Congress ain't a wonder, and the chances are the U.N (if it stays as a wonder) will be built in a Capital, which is unrazable.

Click to expand...

Eh i´d rather have it to be destroyable and force the builder to build another one.

Not even our UN can withstand nukes.