diplomacy and territory

I think we should be allowed to negociate virgin territories or borders with other civilizations. Just an example, you begin in Africa and you're alone on that continent. Why not clailing this territory as YOURS even before you build cities there. It could take two ways :
- threat : "this is MY territory, build a city there and it's gonna be war"
- negocation :"I want this territory for my own, what can I give for this ?"
The limits of the revendicated territory could be marked up by "flags"

If borders with a neighbours ( determined by cultural influence ) don't fit you, why not negociate and exchange, buy or sell some territory square ? Imagine you builded Dover and you have territory in France, accross the Channel. It is useless for you ! Why not selling this to France in exchange of peace, gold,...

The only problem is : isn't this too complicated for the AI ?

What do you think ?

Relative values should be considered the length of the game. I do not see this as difficult.

Would be great if you can buy a patch of land on the other side of the world. You could then build an airbase overthere and garrison it. That would make it much easier to project your power overseas.

I agree completely. Culture borders in Civ 3 were a good idea in the beginning, but they are a pretty lame substitute for true, national borders.

The flag idea is quite good, but what about the same style of borders like in Civ 3, but you use a drawing tool? Say that you scout a rather large area of land, and decide that it's YOUR territory, because nobody has claimed it. Just pick the border tool, and draw a nice, large border.

Culture conversions should still stay, but they should occur much less frequently (too many times have my cities gone over to the French, just because they want Bach's Cathedral). Culture should extend to your national borders, even if you only have one city.

But, having borders like this doesn't mean that you can't be invaded as easily. It's just how borders in Civ 3 should have been, instead of the "cultural borders" that extend over time, having no control over them.

I like the idea of a drawing borders around claimed territory.

There would also be some kinf of "credibility". If you claim a large territory and are unable to defend it, you'll look weak. There would be tough negociations for some geostrategic territories such as Suez, Bosphorus or Panama.

I think this concept would enhance the game.

When you claim a peice of territory there are a number of factors the other players would take in consideration when deciding if they should grant you the territory. These factors would make a "cliam-rating' for each territory.

The Factors:
1) If you were the first to discover that peice of land.
2) The distance between your cultural borders and the territory.
3) How big the peice of territory you want to claim is.
4) If your cultural borders surrond the peice of territory you want to claim.
5) If the territory is between your cultural borders and water, there is no land route to another civ.
6) more, I can't think of them now.

i like it especiaslly with GEze's modifications, perhaps when you claim a territoryyou get a pop-up saying the following people have accepted our claim to our rightful territory: blah blah blah, however the evil blah blah blah have rejected our claim to this territory.

I don't like the drawing idea. This would result in (at least) the human to draw the borders as far away as possible, and then sit and wait what's going to happen.
Furthermore, on which data should the AI's decision about accepting your borders be based?
In another thread someone proposed to have borders being based on military garrisons.
This idea seems much more logical to me.
To claim a certain territory, you would have to build some "forts" over there, and the size of the territory would be depending on the location and garrison strength of those forts ... almost, as it has been in real history.

I agree with Bello here - I think actually going there and making the claim is more realistic.

Okay, I think the territorial borders idea is really good, but what about this -
If you claim a piece of land as yours, and it is own by a civilization you have not met (you would only be able to see the teritorial borders after you have met the civ, but you could cross the land without the owning civ noticing, unless they had a unit stationed there); you will be forced into a war to fight for the territory . . .

o, and i almost forgot - negotiate a right of passage within certain cities/territories only . . .

LordBaraka said:

Okay, I think the territorial borders idea is really good, but what about this -
If you claim a piece of land as yours, and it is own by a civilization you have not met (you would only be able to see the teritorial borders after you have met the civ, but you could cross the land without the owning civ noticing, unless they had a unit stationed there); you will be forced into a war to fight for the territory . . .

Click to expand...

that's stupid. that does not happen first they negotiate to see if they can work it out. and if they cant, wellmaybe they'll go to war, but the real issue is what the other civs consier it. if they cant work it out themselves they try to convince the other civs why its there. of course there would still be an option to go to war, but not automatic

A way of trading any tile anywhere in the world for anything at all would be nice. If I was a strong country, I could demand a small, one tile island in the middle of a large ocean from my weaker neighbor in exchange for a Mutual Protection pact and then create an airbase and naval station there.

Not a bad idea I always thought there needed to be a better border system, maybe this is it. I get pissed when there is some unclaimed territory in the middle of my kingdom and an AI player plops a city there.

This is actually a good idea. But how would negotiations go?

Would you have to name what tile you want to get? Like coordinates 38/24:41/28?

For this idea I'd see units dropping flags. When your scout or warrior explores fresh terrain it would drop flags, and these would be edges of your national border. Cultural border would be still similar as it is now.

This whole border thingie would work well only in => large maps, thou.

In the thread Less culture, more diplomacy! Nachos calls for a more deplomatic mechanism to settle the borders. I partly agree on that, but would like to see the cultural border evolve as they do now.

Instead there should be, as Aussie Lurker has argued in the same thread and elsewhere, that forts have an impact on the borders. Aussies way is to treat occupied forts citylike. They have a cultural sphere:

Aussie_Lurker said:

Occupied forts SHOULD be a means of annexing territory, but the extent to which this can work should be limited to the cultural strength which underpins your nation!

Click to expand...

Or you could treat the forts differently, by way of not military might instead of cultural strenght:

Commander Bello said:

To claim a certain territory, you would have to build some "forts" over there, and the size of the territory would be depending on the location and garrison strength of those forts ... almost, as it has been in real history.

Click to expand...

The problem of the first option is: How should a fort gain cultural value? In this version we would have to expect that the forts draw their cultural influence from the overall cultural value of the nation. The other suggestion would also demand a new way of calculating the border. How much impact would an army have in that fort? Would the military or the cultural strenght of the other nations reduce its impact on the border?

Whichever version we would like to apply, there will be a problem of using the forts to "eat you way" into a neighbouring country by building forts along your border. Maybe that is ok, and not a problem, as the neigbouring country also can build forts along its border as a defence - just like the border between South and North Korea.

If we accept the idea of forts determining the borders, I think we would also have to give the cities the same power. Cities with huge military might, should aslo have an effect the bordes, not just forts.

I agree that forts should influence borders, as it is I think forts are almost usless, come on why would I built a fort when I can plant a city + there quicker to build.
It would be an incentive to build forts.

As for factors that should determine if you are granted the land maby....

- your relations with the known civs that surround the land.
- military power compared to your # of cities
- the usefulness of the land (lux, resource, desert, tundra)
- the access to the land, with this I mean that if the land is on the other side of a mountain range then you would not be able to defend it as good because other or new units would have to come from the other side of the range.

If other civs still disaprove you could stil take the land and risk a war.

Al this would work alot better if there were less cities and more open land.
So cities would have to become less important for border expansion.

Well, the way I put it in earlier posts was that a fort/outpost could only EVER have a border of a certain maximum radius-no larger. How large a border could be would depend on TWO factors-how many troops have you garrisoned there AND what is your current culture.
For instance, a civ with a current culture of 100 might only ever be able to get a fort/outpost radius of 1 hex, wheras a civ with a culture of 1000 might allow a maximum of 3 hex radius. Of course, in order to GET this 3 hex radius that civ would have to garrison 3 units in the fort/outpost.
Culture would also effect how far from your own borders you could perform an annexation. For example, the 100 culture civ will only be able to annex territory that is flush with its own borders, wheras the 1000 culture civ may be able to annex territory as far as 3 hexes from its own natural borders.
Remember, also, that annexing territory which already belongs to someone else (or later comes under their control) will be considered 'disputed' territory, and neither side will gain any benefit from it.

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

Good Idea, but mainly that what your units are for, to at least 'negotiate' by blocking travel and capturing their settlers.

Once you have an embassy with them, that'd be a great idea. It might be hard for an AI to decide on their own borders, and if they want to comply with yours, but it wouldn't be hard for them to actually comply with them. It'd probably have to be for less than 20 turns, since the AI would probably cripple itself permamently if it ever agreed to one that long.

An 'Imperialism' agreement might be interesting. Kind of like a Military Alliance, but instead you agree to pre-divide up some territory between yourselves, regardless of what's there already (uncontacted civ's or not). It'd kind of be like an offensive Mutual Protection, but without the chance of turning into an actual Military Allianace, and without the chance of ruining your rep for wimping out. If 'Imperialism agreements' were multi-party, they'd be pretty realistic, like our continent versus theirs, without all the reputation politics.