Diplomacy is clearly an issue of frustration from some players who really haven't thought outside the Civ4 box, and a lot of of it has to do with the perception of a lack of control over dealings with the world, and I partly agree.
With this in mind, and more generally with the desire to improve and enhance the diplomatic game, I want to make a few suggestions.
Note that negative values are (good) diplomatic modifiers, while positive values are (bad) modifiers.
The key thing is Relationship Management.
I recently examined the GlobalDilplomacyAIdefines xml and noted the game is largely geared towards punitive modifiers. This is a fairly conservative approach and punitive toward acts that can be seen to be aggressive while leaving few avenues for players to assuage relations. The diplomacy system assumes, correctly, the human player is cutthroat and likes to exploit/game the mechanics. However, not everyone plays the same way. What is missing is a general lack of levers to 'manage' relations, even with difficult rivals, and most importantly, people/civs you want to keep on-side. Some movement has been made recently to fix this but it's really early going still.
0.332 patch added a new trade modifier that gave AI a favourable rating of your Civ if there are lots of trades and they get a good deal out of it. But this is fairly reliant on them getting a 'good' deal, which leans heavily on bribes.
With this in mind, I would like to suggest the following to massage relations and cement relationships a bit better over the long term, to stabilize some of the late game 'weirdness' that some players don't like.
Relationship modifiers
More things to do (outside of co-op war and research agreements)
Add more cooperative mechanics to counter some of the inherent enmity gain as the game wears on.
Diplomatic Symmetry
An area of concern is the lack of symmetry in relations. AI can request 'gifts' when there is a DoF, but human players can't. Most players are weary to use the demand button to ask for anything or to simply ask for something without offering anything back. Perhaps this is by design, but there should be a clear way for humans to ask for the same type of gifts (within reason) while there is a DoF active. Rules/limitations applied could be only 1 gift request per DoF, can't ask for last instance of a resource, more than 50% of gold, more than 40% of gpt etc. etc.
Similarly, there is a lack of symmetry in Taunts. AI can taunt, while human players can't. (This brings us back to the point of 'management' and control) and perhaps some leaders would fold and accept the taunting, while others would fly off the handle and DoW. It would be a nice thing to be able to taunt an AI into DoW. Perhaps one where you've already had multiple wars with who are just rearing to war. This could allow the AI to prematurely declare war, or allow humans to sort of 'game' the DoW a little bit and force a DoW on a time of their choosing.
I understand some of the suggestions are more detailed than others, but the general concept here is 1) management 2) more co-operation.
The size and scale of these modifiers can be adjusted on balancing/playtesting. I am not suggesting Civ5 diplomacy turn into a peacemonger's paradise, and in fact, some new penalties could be added related to these agreements, but I really want to push for MORE diplomatic options and deeper diplomacy. This is something I haven't changed my mind on since Civ3 my days (10 years !)
Cheers
With this in mind, and more generally with the desire to improve and enhance the diplomatic game, I want to make a few suggestions.
Note that negative values are (good) diplomatic modifiers, while positive values are (bad) modifiers.
The key thing is Relationship Management.
I recently examined the GlobalDilplomacyAIdefines xml and noted the game is largely geared towards punitive modifiers. This is a fairly conservative approach and punitive toward acts that can be seen to be aggressive while leaving few avenues for players to assuage relations. The diplomacy system assumes, correctly, the human player is cutthroat and likes to exploit/game the mechanics. However, not everyone plays the same way. What is missing is a general lack of levers to 'manage' relations, even with difficult rivals, and most importantly, people/civs you want to keep on-side. Some movement has been made recently to fix this but it's really early going still.
0.332 patch added a new trade modifier that gave AI a favourable rating of your Civ if there are lots of trades and they get a good deal out of it. But this is fairly reliant on them getting a 'good' deal, which leans heavily on bribes.
With this in mind, I would like to suggest the following to massage relations and cement relationships a bit better over the long term, to stabilize some of the late game 'weirdness' that some players don't like.
Relationship modifiers
- Trade duration modifier to maximum -20
This adds a fixed modifier -2 per 10 turns for having an active trade/open borders/RA with a Civilization - At Peace modifier to a maximum +10 to -20
This adds -1 per 10 turns of uninterrupted peace. A DoW immediately resets the value to +10 and will have to be earned back. - 'Enemy' Modifier Less an opinion modifier but a general modifier to AI decision making. If certain arbitrary conditions are met (a good way is to use -20 at peace) apply a flat modifier, subject to RNG roll to reduce chance of that AI civ 'turning against' their friends. This is largely again to stabilize relations a little bit in the late game when the player feels they have earned certain friends
More things to do (outside of co-op war and research agreements)
Add more cooperative mechanics to counter some of the inherent enmity gain as the game wears on.
- Protect City State Together with AI as lead ally (30 turns - tied to pledge to protect) (-5 for agreeing to do so +10 for stealing the CS, +5 for allowing the CS to be conquered +20 for killing the CS)
- Protect City State Together with Human as lead ally (30 turns - tied to pledge to protect) (-1 for agreeing, -10 to +10 for allowing city state to be conquered > value dependent on leader flavour )
- Agree not to build X military units over X numbers (yes,players can try to cheat and game the AI, but this is where a spy unit may come into play or in the case of Atom bomb, you can't cheat)
- Agree to Liberate cities / city states These cities can be former CS allies, a conquered city, or someone else's city done for political reasons/grand strategy
- Agree to 'Free' Trade This brings back trade routes but it doesn't have to be done per city. It will add 10% of the total value of the other civ's total trade network to your GPT. See yes, no flat bonuses, and smaller Civs will be less valuable as trading partners!
- Alliance agreement Add in 'Declaration of Alliance' as an option with a flat modifier. And some unspecified/fixed/rng dependent decrease on likelihood of the AI reneging and backstabbing/ declaring war. This will put 'friendships declarations' in context, as breakable amity agreements.
Diplomatic Symmetry
An area of concern is the lack of symmetry in relations. AI can request 'gifts' when there is a DoF, but human players can't. Most players are weary to use the demand button to ask for anything or to simply ask for something without offering anything back. Perhaps this is by design, but there should be a clear way for humans to ask for the same type of gifts (within reason) while there is a DoF active. Rules/limitations applied could be only 1 gift request per DoF, can't ask for last instance of a resource, more than 50% of gold, more than 40% of gpt etc. etc.
Similarly, there is a lack of symmetry in Taunts. AI can taunt, while human players can't. (This brings us back to the point of 'management' and control) and perhaps some leaders would fold and accept the taunting, while others would fly off the handle and DoW. It would be a nice thing to be able to taunt an AI into DoW. Perhaps one where you've already had multiple wars with who are just rearing to war. This could allow the AI to prematurely declare war, or allow humans to sort of 'game' the DoW a little bit and force a DoW on a time of their choosing.
I understand some of the suggestions are more detailed than others, but the general concept here is 1) management 2) more co-operation.
The size and scale of these modifiers can be adjusted on balancing/playtesting. I am not suggesting Civ5 diplomacy turn into a peacemonger's paradise, and in fact, some new penalties could be added related to these agreements, but I really want to push for MORE diplomatic options and deeper diplomacy. This is something I haven't changed my mind on since Civ3 my days (10 years !)
Cheers
