The problem with this is that a Diplomatic victory simply becomes an Economic victory again, as it was in Civ 5 (if I remember correctly). I almost feel like the franchise has hurt itself with this move towards different victory types. Don't get me wrong, I was in favour of it years ago, but now I have changed my mind.
This might be an unpopular opinion but there should only be one Victory type; Score. Scoring stops when a Civ achieves Domination or the Space Race. What madness is this that I speak of, you may ask? Let me explain.
I don't mean Domination in a pure military sense, but a blend of all approaches. Civs can still have their strong suite (military, culture, religion, science) on which they would focus, but victory can only be achieved by subjugating all other Civs through a combination of military, cultural, religious or economic control. Economic control could be a great opportunity to make Corporations a feature again.
It doesn't have to just be economic. AI should only be open to the bribe if they like you for fulfilling certain things (agenda or otherwise, power quota or otherwise), or they could commission you to perform a task to get the vote (ala the mini quests in Civ IV). There are many ways to go about ensuring the bribe isn't purely about throwing money at a problem (which arguably the aid emergency in-game currently is).
Maybe an option to declare victory if you are far enough ahead and the game can either reward you with a victory or perhaps punish you in some way if you are not, but you declare yourself victor.
Or just go the grand strategy route and not bother with a victory condition. Just a game with lots of of individualized goals and missions until ultimately an endgame condition is triggered.
The biggest lol is people have devised a tactic where they vote to take away points from themselves, knowing it will succeed. You gain a point, so your net loss is not as bad.
I agree the current system makes it - as far as I'm concerned - impossible to win DV. I got a DV right after it was introduced, but since the changed mechanics, every time I have tried to do it, I've been subject to massive dogpiles like this as well, and even though I had many times the favor output of the AI, there was no way I could win the total vote.
You can spring back by conserving points and grinding for the next session . the 3 points can be mitigated by agreeing to downvote yourself and voting correctly on other cards.
It of course needs more work though. Less grinding and make intelligent decisions more of a payoff. Also there needs to be some function on coursing allies to vote for you. To give alliances some payoff and meaning. A long-term investment sort of thing.
I always find the best away for a diplo win is to conquer other civs out of existance which shouldn't be the case
For those going on about score victories you already have this as an option please stop trying to make things worse for others
You can spring back by conserving points and grinding for the next session . the 3 points can be mitigated by agreeing to downvote yourself and voting correctly on other cards.
Yeah, I would by this argument if voting came more frequent in late game, as in Civ5. But with 30 turns between sessions, going from 16 points to 13 (or even 14) points means you'll probably have to go on at least 60 turns or more before you can win. Sorry, but late game is already a drag like it is, so that's going to be a pass for me.
If voting was less erratic, if there was actually a way to weigh your options when doing the votes, then it could work ok. The current system is really arbitrary, randomly giving DV points from voting with the winning proposition, which may be throwing in as little as your one free vote, and/or you may be voting for something that actually benefits you, and then get rewarded additionally with DV points. If instead you got DV points from pledging your votes to someone else's suggestions and wishes, like how in Civ5 you could actually buy and sell votes though diplomacy, then I could see some sense in it. But current system just feels like a pain.
I agree the current system makes it - as far as I'm concerned - impossible to win DV. I got a DV right after it was introduced, but since the changed mechanics, every time I have tried to do it, I've been subject to massive dogpiles like this as well, and even though I had many times the favor output of the AI, there was no way I could win the total vote.
It's not impossible, it's just by far the hardest victory condition. The amount of resources you have to dump into winning aid competitions for example is hilarious just to win 1 measly diplomatic victory point and could instead be used to buy an entire army capable of conquering the world. Definitely needs a rethink in the next patch.
As I said in the OP, the sum total amount of favor it cost all of the civ's to dogpile was fairly paltry. I don't see where conserving favor accomplishes any difference.
Alliances give you diplomatic favor. Although, I will admit that it's a bit odd that you (or someone in your alliance) can use that diplomatic favor to vote against you (or you -> them).
I think a way of dealing with this would be to have some way where two or more civs can essentially become one. Basically, if one civ wins, the other wins as well. Civ4 had this and it worked relatively well. In Civ6, it'd require a level 3 alliance to establish or join the _________ Union and all members must unanimously agree. Each civ would still take its turn like normal but any action against someone in the union would be impossible. As mentioned before, when anyone in the union wins, the entire union wins. You can leave the union whenever you want but it incurs grievances, diplomatic penalties, a GPT penalty, and the War of Retrubution causus belli is enabled immediately after anyone in the union (or your now isolated partner) denounces you. These penalties fade fairly quickly with time (10-20 turns).
Because a union would require a level 3 alliance with at least one member, it would basically have to be planned from the earlier parts of the game. Its benefits would be powerful, but it would be very difficult or even impossible depending on how you treated people earlier in the game. This basically means it could actually pay to be nice to your neighbors in the beginning of the game so that you can "conquer" someone later in the game without ever attacking them, which is the entire idea of using soft power aggressively.
As a victory condition supposedly based in diplomacy, it starts to feel rather meaningless when its just about accruing some currency that is not strongly tied to player behavior beyond setting up alliances and send envoys to city-states. Grievances don't impact favor, so you can be an unrepentant warmonger and still compete as a diplomat. Indeed, as others have pointed out, you can quite feasibly exterminate your way to a diplomatic victory, eliminating anyone who might dispute your claim. Being the target of a military emergency doesn't even cost DV points, right?
Maybe the way this vote should work is that if you vote for yourself or an ally and the ally wins the two points, you gain one point. Similarly, if you vote against your ally and the ally loses, you lose a point.
Or alternatively, you could be compensated with some of the diplomatic favor used by allies to vote against you.
I think that's a great idea. I think the legacy mechanic of separate victory types could be rolled into the Score. There could still be separate stop points for the game (Time, Domination, Space Race) that would also contribute to your score (like everything else), but wouldn't necessarily guarantee a win. A tiny but tech advanced nation completing the Space Race might lose to a large nation with massive points from economic activity or previous wars that was able to hold on to a thin scoring advantage.
That system also allows for mechanics like Religion, where every civilization in larger games is not guaranteed a religion (and therefore is locked out of that victory condition). If it's all settled by Score, a player can dominate with religion but still lose to another player using other mechanics to get points. I think a unified victory point system would allow for more flexibility in design and play.
I was thinking that winning the Space Race would act as a tie-breaker if the remaining Civs cannot subjugate each other. You get a 10% boost to your current score. So it would not be a goal for a tiny Civ. That tiny Civ's only goal is survival, i.e. not to be subjugated. Non-subjugated Civs at End of Play receive say a 25% score boost (limited to within 90% of winner overall score). You still get Score even if subjugated, but no boost.
The reason I am coming up with the odd-sounding rules above is for a proper Ironman League to work. You cannot Steam, no reload or quit but with reason to finish the game regardless of whether you are overall winner. The goal is get the best possible average Score you can over a series of games given a certain starting position.
Agreed Staal, if you're going to make a competitive League, you'll want to adjust scoring accordingly. My thoughts are centered around the regular Civilization Experience - someone buys the game and plays against AI players. I think it's time the legacy Victory conditions are replaced by a single Score based condition, with the old Victory Conditions contributing relatively larger bonuses to Score than other things you can do.
I've run into a couple in earlier patches by accident, more or less, because I managed to win a vote I thought I wouldn't. I've got diplo with Phoenicia, Hungary, Rome, and Norway of all civs.
I tried so hard to do it in my Kristina game but I kept losing Diplo Victory votes. I had to settle for culture via rockbands because it became a race between me converting Kongo's culture and Kongo's spaceship. Closest (and dare I say, one of my favorite) game I've had.
With the new system of congress awarding points with each session along the game, I keep winning DV accidentally. I do however put a, lot of votes on getting points to avoid the - 3 to pass. I usually have all the CS once I reach cold war. My strat is to let the AI have all the CS from medieval/renaissance, I bank envoys, only spending a few to get yields,until I got cold war. And then I grasp them all using double envoys. When I played peacefully, I usually have zero grievance against me, and they have a lot,so I'm bathing in favors.
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