(2-VT) Proposal: Change Deal Price for Human-AI Trades

[azum4roll]

Part 1 of the 2 proposals that aim to reduce gold income. This conflicts with the proposals that try to change gold yields and gold buildings like the Market one, but is not exactly a counterproposal.

Glossary:
buy price = the maximum value the buyer is willing to offer for the resource
sell price = the minimum value the seller is willing to sell the resource for
deal price = the actual value that the resource is being traded for

The proposal:
AI offers to buy a luxury resource from human at the average of their buy price and the perceived sell price of the human. This price CANNOT be increased (AI treats this as their actual buy price for deal purposes). Both AI and human gain trade opinion modifier with each other based on the difference of deal price and buy/sell price.

When human wants to buy a luxury resource from AI, AI should charge them the average of AI's sell price and the perceived buy price of the human. This price CANNOT be decreased (AI treats this as their actual sell price for deal purposes). Both AI and human gain trade opinion modifier with each other based on the difference of deal price and buy/sell price.

Example 1:
Civ A, a human player, is trying to sell Cotton to Civ B, an AI player. Using resource valuation, the AI is willing to pay 72GPT for the Cotton, and it thinks the human wants to receive at least 6GPT from selling it.
CURRENT behaviour: AI offers the deal at 72GPT, and the human happily accepts it.
PROPOSED behaviour: AI offers the deal at 39GPT, the human cannot increase the price but still happily accepts it, and the AI likes the human more now as if the human just gifted it 33GPT.
Note that if this was an AI-AI trade instead, the deal would have gone through at the same price, and both sides gain the positive opinion.

Example 2:
CIv A, a human player, wants to buy Silk from Civ B to start WLTKD. Using resource valuation, the AI is willing to part with the Silk for 4GPT, and it thinks the human is willing to pay at most 32GPT for it.
CURRENT behaviour: AI offers to sell at 4GPT, and the human happily accepts it.
PROPOSED behaviour: AI offers to sell at 18GPT. If the human accepts it, the AI likes the human more as if the human just gifted it 14GPT.
Note that if this was an AI-AI trade instead, the deal would have gone through at the same price, and both sides gain the positive opinion.

Rationale:
1. The human is gaining a lot from luxury deals as sell price and buy price differ too much. This is unsolvable through changing the valuation formula since a duplicated luxury really does worth nothing 99% of the time.
2. This reduces human gold income and may make working merchants and building gold buildings viable again.

Note: This only affects luxury trades, but if devs think it's easier to code if this extends to all deals, I can modify the proposal.

 

[Stalker0]

Basically the proposal is: AI treats a human as another AI for the purpose of deal making. That seems very reasonable to me.

 

[ma_kuh]

Just out of curiosity, where does diplomatic opinion factor into deal making? Is it applied to the perceived values, or does it influence the middle point of the deal somehow?

I like this approach, it seems reasonable. Makes me want some sort of UI/advisor tip that says how far off your "expected value" a deal is, but it's probably confusing to have +/- influence in the top bar of the diplo screen? Makes you think you should be able to charge more?

 

[CppMaster]

How AI know how much I value a resource?

 

[rkkn]

seems legit

How AI know how much I value a resource?

my assumption is that it's just how much the AI would value it if it suddenly took over for you

 

[azum4roll]

Just out of curiosity, where does diplomatic opinion factor into deal making? Is it applied to the perceived values, or does it influence the middle point of the deal somehow?

It's applied to perceived values. AI has a perceived approach from every civ, or they can use the true approach (if an AI suddenly takes over the human player). Dev's choice.

 

[nekokon]

I don't think this would change anything for human player (aside from being sneaky about "real price", where if you accept the deal AI offer you would get less in exchange for a small diplomacy boost). Human player usually opt for maximum gain from trade and try to leverage diplomacy with other easier methods anyway, having this as default options would just be a hidden mechanic that secretly nerf your gain for something else you might not even need, veterans would just initiate the trade themselves while newbie falls for the trap.

 

[azum4roll]

You CANNOT make the deal better (haggle) by modifying the values.

 

[nekokon]

That's why I said veteran players would just decline the offer and initiate a trade with the maximum gain value instead of minimum gain plus diplomatic boost.
Newbie would just decline or accept since they can't haggle during the offer and doesn't think about initiating one on their own afterward.

Or did you mean to forcefully apply the diplomatic boost regardless ? I'm quite against that notion, not every trades are meant to get on the good side of other civs. If I want to butter them up there're better methods, if I want to trade I want to get the best deal economically.

 

[Rekk]

if I want to trade I want to get the best deal economically

So should the AI. Right now, it's not acting in its best interest with regards to the player. It knows how much you should value said trade, so should act accordingly.

 

[nekokon]

While this sounds fair on paper, in practice it would simply reduce all trade value to player by a significant amount and railroad everyone into buddies forever. I don't like that kind of gameplay where one way to play (peaceful) is significantly better than the other (aggressive).

 

[CppMaster]

How about if the proposed gold deal is the default, but a player still could change it, so he gets more gold, but less diplomacy bonus or the other way around? AI would still be able to refuse it, so there won't be any exploitation.

 

[azum4roll]

The diplomacy bonus is very minor and isn't really significant in influencing approach.

That's why I said veteran players would just decline the offer and initiate a trade with the maximum gain value instead of minimum gain plus diplomatic boost.

I don't understand this at all. The price would be the same no matter the initiator.

 

[Rekk]

While this sounds fair on paper, in practice it would simply reduce all trade value to player by a significant amount

Intended. Humans are getting way more gold from trades than AI because the AI is faulty.

and railroad everyone into buddies forever.

No. Fair trades do not make you "buddies" with the AI. The AI already does not agree to "aggressive" trades, and why should it?

 

[Stalker0]

That's why I said veteran players would just decline the offer and initiate a trade with the maximum gain value instead of minimum gain plus diplomatic boost.

So this change would alter the AI's trade valuation when dealing with players. The AI would still offer you the maximum deal its willing to accept, its just that has been lowered based on a new perception. So a vet player making a new deal would not get any extra advantage.

 

[nekokon]

Intended. Humans are getting way more gold from trades than AI because the AI is faulty.

No. Fair trades do not make you "buddies" with the AI. The AI already does not agree to "aggressive" trades, and why should it?

This kind of "fair trades" would give a bunch of diplomatic boost which human player doesn't necessarily want in exchange for better deal. Currently players have a choice, either going for maximum deal and nothing else or give AI a good deal and gain a diplomatic boost, this proposal would simply enforce the former choice onto players.

If the AI is faulty (in giving out way too much gpt) then it should be adjusted within its valuation calculation (applying a cap or diminishing value or something). Limiting player's choice just because the AI is faulty is bad design.

 

[ma_kuh]

The diplomacy bonus is very minor and isn't really significant in influencing approach.

This kind of "fair trades" would give a bunch of diplomatic boost which human player doesn't necessarily want in exchange for better deal.

It sounds like the diplo boost isn't that significant, so it's not really a choice. The AI doesn't get a choice either way, so I think this is a saner system, all things considered.

You can look at this as if the AI has been giving the player the best possible deals, and has generated a huge diplo boost with the player. They're just pulling back on how much they want to give you the diplo boost now. And if you don't like that they aren't paying you "enough"... I guess you can always try to make them.

 

[nekokon]

It's a raw nerf to trade deals if you have absolutely no intention of staying friendly. That's why I said it favor peaceful play (you trade some gpt for diplomatic boost) over aggressive play (you simply lose out gpt). Players have zero choice in the matter.
If you want to fix the huge gold influx from trade deal, fix the calculation, not player's choice. As long as we still have ridiculous deals, even when turning half of them into diplomatic boost it would eventually become a big swinging contribution.

 

[azum4roll]

Dupes of luxury are literally worthless. No amount of calculation change is going to change that, unless you want AI to give away dupes for free.

 

[CppMaster]

Dupes of luxury are literally worthless. No amount of calculation change is going to change that, unless you want AI to give away dupes for free.

They literally not worthless when they can be sold. Then they are worth roughly the amount of gold you get when you sell them.