Apply Diplomacy Proximity Logic to City States

[Voremonger]

Recently the diplomacy logic of the AI has been changed to more heavily factor in proximity:
Being nice to a neighbor is much more impactful than being nice to someone at the other end of the map.

I think the same logic regarding proximity should be applied to City States.
More specifically, I think being close to a City State should give you an advantage when it comes to how your military power is evaluated and how much influence you gain with diplomatic Units and Quests.
This would make control over City States more of a local conflict rather than a global one ("sphere of influence").

The reason why I'm proposing this is because I think it would make conflicts with your neighbors more interesting.

Also, I think it would make City State Diplomacy more even across difficulty levels.
On Immortal and Deity I think it is very hard to keep even one or two City States loyal against the AI because they can pump out so many diplomatic Units.
I oftentimes find that the AI contesting my allied City States are not even that close to it.
Because it's so expensive (in terms of production) to keep City States loyal I almost always just kill nearby City States to avoid the risk of them flipping on me.

In addition to that on higher difficulty levels you currently almost never get to demand tribute from City States because some AI on the other end of the map has more Units than you.
I think that this is a poor judgement of which player is an actual threat to the City State since even a weak player can kill a City State if they are close.

Implications of my proposed changes:
If proximity is factored into City State diplomacy it would make tall Diplomatic Victories more difficult.
(I don't know how good or bad this strategy is at the moment).

 

[civplayer33]

In addition to that on higher difficulty levels you currently almost never get to demand tribute from City States because some AI on the other end of the map has more Units than you.
I think that this is a poor judgement of which player is an actual threat to the City State since even a weak player can kill a City State if they are close.

That seems to me like a misunderstanding or gross exaggeration...you can find the function that calculates the Tribute metric here (ignore the comments in the code, they are mostly outdated); note how military rank is capped at 75 (half the base resistance) and that cap is decreased by 5 for every Era.
By far the biggest impact on the result of the function, apart from blocking factors and reluctance due to previous tributing, is achieved by the local force differential between you and the City State, which is rather easy to influence: just move more of your units close to it (increases the denominator) or declare war on the CS and kill his units (decreases the numerator)...it's basically ( your_local_combined_unit_power / (his_combined_unit_power + his_City_Strength) ) * 100

I do find the idea of applying a distance factor to quest rewards interesting, though, but, as you point out yourself, it would be a buff to wide strategies, since they would be closer to more CSs and thus should be compensated somehow, especially since wide already has an easier time in the diplomatic game, but I have no good ideas about that.

 

[crdvis16]

You kind of already get advantages for being near a CS when it comes to quests and allying them in general.

A handful of quests are easier if you're close:

"Build a road to them"
"Kill barb camps"
"Suppress their revolt"
"Convert them to your religion"
"Establish a trade route"

I assume there are others I'm missing. On top of that, the closer a CS is the quicker and safer it is to send diplomats.

I don't really agree that there need to be further bonuses from being nearby.

 

[Voremonger]

That seems to me like a misunderstanding or gross exaggeration...you can find the function that calculates the Tribute metric here (ignore the comments in the code, they are mostly outdated); note how military rank is capped at 75 (half the base resistance) and that cap is decreased by 5 for every Era.
By far the biggest impact on the result of the function, apart from blocking factors and reluctance due to previous tributing, is achieved by the local force differential between you and the City State, which is rather easy to influence: just move more of your units close to it (increases the denominator) or declare war on the CS and kill his units (decreases the numerator)...it's basically ( your_local_combined_unit_power / (his_combined_unit_power + his_City_Strength) ) * 100

It seems I was indeed misinformed regarding tribute demands.
Was this changed at some point during the last few months?
If I remember correctly it became easier for me to bully a City State after clearing a Barbarian Encampment a few months back.
Because of things like this I was assuming that Military near City State is based on global military strength.

 

[civplayer33]

It seems I was indeed misinformed regarding tribute demands.
Was this changed at some point during the last few months?
If I remember correctly it became easier for me to bully a City State after clearing a Barbarian Encampment a few months back.
Because of things like this I was assuming that Military near City State is based on global military strength.

Not sure if it was changed in the last months but your situation could be explained in any number of ways, like maybe some barbarians killed one or two CS units, which you may not have noticed, thus reducing the CS's relative power, or maybe your units received promotions from fighting the barbarians, which are actually counted toward their power, or the CS had an Ally or PoP before you killed the barbarians and then lost it or you upgraded a unit in the meantime or sent more or sent them closer, and that before not all were counted, etc. etc....