Envoys < Emissaries?

[The Fuzzician]

I have been enjoying this masterpiece of a mod for some hundreds of hours, but one thing that has stood out for me is the odd relationship between Emissary, and the upgrade, Envoy.

Emissary costs 80 hammers (base), and offers 40 base influence, while taking up 1 paper resource.
Envoy costs 200 hammers (base), and offers 50 base influence, but takes up THREE paper.

I find that after researching Civil Service, my diplomatic ability actually decreases, since I now can build only 1/3rd of the diplomatic units as before. This upgrade is also forced - I would continue to build Emissaries if i could, at least until i had a larger supply of paper.

This is true, to an extent, with the other diplomatic units, as they cost much more paper and hammers, while only providing a minor increase in influence, but the difference is most glaring between emissary and envoy.

Thoughts?

 

[Deadstarre]

so with 160 hammers and 2 paper you can make 2 emissary reaping 80 influence, or with 200 hammers and 3 paper you can get 50 influence- yeah, it is unquestionably a downgrade moving to envoys, I noticed this awhile ago as well.

i also think all of them give too much influence period, the influence bloat too quickly gets to absurd numbers

 

[DarkZero]

Its for sure on purpose, the reason being that in the time envoys emissary are available you are full of must have buildings and units left to build, while wen the further diplomatic units are available you have some breathing room between techs and buildings.

Building an emissary or two to get an allied city state is an strategic decision that cost you something in return from those hammers, meanwhile the other diplo units are often just built/bought for a quick alliance to a nearby state or a strategic alliance for a future war, lets not forget that further diplo units also move much faster.

 

[Funak]

They're not supposed to be 'upgrades' they're supposed to be a gradual increase in cost with a slightly higher punching-power to compensate

 

[Gokudo01]

I have been enjoying this masterpiece of a mod for some hundreds of hours, but one thing that has stood out for me is the odd relationship between Emissary, and the upgrade, Envoy.

Emissary costs 80 hammers (base), and offers 40 base influence, while taking up 1 paper resource.
Envoy costs 200 hammers (base), and offers 50 base influence, but takes up THREE paper.

I find that after researching Civil Service, my diplomatic ability actually decreases, since I now can build only 1/3rd of the diplomatic units as before. This upgrade is also forced - I would continue to build Emissaries if i could, at least until i had a larger supply of paper.

This is true, to an extent, with the other diplomatic units, as they cost much more paper and hammers, while only providing a minor increase in influence, but the difference is most glaring between emissary and envoy.

Thoughts?

so the moral being : don't rush civil service if you plan to ally cs around medieval. get the paper with education and delay the tech if needed ^^

 

[kawyua]

Yep, there is enough influence from emissaries that I find it rather pointless to go statecraft. When I'm playing my favorite civ, the Huns, I often try to delay civil service and military expand hard.

The difficulty of getting enough influence to ally city states is significantly lessened when you have military pressure that I find statecraft just overkill. emissaries are just so cost efficient and the ai can't compete with the player abusing them. A 2:1 efficiency difference is a big deal. I don't think Funak's statement completely resolves the problem here.

I really think that diplomatic units should have some sort of scaling decrease for how much a civ is expanded. A %decrease per city owned modifier on influence from diplo units would help sooo much for taller civs to compete fairly for city states. Right now its affected too much by the zero sum game that is military expansion

 

[Deadstarre]

I often try to delay civil service

Bingo. Whatever it's 'supposed' to be, the practical reality here is that you will effectively *double* your diplo influence potential by avoiding civil service. It is counter-intuitive to say the least to avoid a technology so you can continue to leverage the unrivaled efficiency of emissaries.


*double* = 80 hammers for 40 influence = 0.5 influence per hammer vs 200 hammers for 50 influence = 0.25 influence per hammer. it's an even worse ratio when you factor in chancery promotions (more units = more influence from promotions) and all that for using less paper to boot. You can't even make an envoy if you have exactly 2 papers, but you could still pump out 2 emissary if you didn't get civil service.

 

[The Fuzzician]

Yea, this was my main point. Emissaries just seem to be far more efficient at this task, than Envoys. Seeing as the influence gained from the agents is a flat 40,50,60,70 , how do we balance around this? Or should the upgraded units have additional abilities?

 

[LukaSlovenia29]

I too agree that the CS influencing needs another balancing look. Certain buildable diplomatic units are too strong, certain too weak, great diplomats aren't as (cost) effective (once embassies are no longer buildable) compared to diplomatic units and there should be at least a few quests that at least on average offer a more significant influence benefit (perhaps either increase the number or transform the quest reward to % increase in your influence or % decrease for AI's influence - not sure how hard it would be to code this).

And yes, I too delay civil service as long as I can (IIRC, you can discover rifling without discovering civil service) when I'm interested in CS influence game, as emissaries are just so strong cost-benefit-wise.

 

[Hreat]

I too avoided researching Civil Service as long as possible, now I just think emissaries shouldn't obsolete at Civil Service. I view it as the same situation that caused the change where UUs have their obsolescence delayed - you shouldn't be punished with less effective units after researching a tech that should be an upgrade.

 

[CrazyG]

Its really not a gradual increase in cost though. Envoys are dramatically worse than emissaries. 5 emissaries give 200 influence for 400 hammers and only take 5 paper. When you factor influence upgrades (which are per unit) they become even stronger. 400 hammers of envoys only gives 100 influence and takes more paper. They are less than half as effective

I've guessed it was intentional, but I still don't know if its desireable. Unless I want to commit to have very little diplomacy for a while you have to avoid this tech, which pushes me towards the bottom half of the tech tree for renaissance every game

 

[phantomaxl1207]

Well the easy solution I'm seeing is to move Envoys and Chanceries to the same tech.

 

[CrazyG]

Well the easy solution I'm seeing is to move Envoys and Chanceries to the same tech.

I think we need to decrease the cost of enovys in addition. Currently you would research education and have no immediate way to build an envoy, you would need to wait for chanceries to finish and likely be capped at just one unit at a time for a while

 

[Giza]

Maybe there should be other sources of paper before Chanceries. Right now, only the Scrivener's Office (national wonder) and Roman Forum (world wonder) give one paper each. School of Philosophy and/or Great Library could give an extra paper, for example (this would concentrate all sources of paper in Writing, but I can't really find other buildings related to paper or diplomacy in the ancient/classical era).

This allows more options for players prioritizing diplomacy. It also allows for a smoother transition to Envoys.

In that case, I agree with moving Envoys at the same tech as Chanceries.

 

[matlajs]

writing guilds may give paper ? they are cultural buildings, but it would not hurt.

 

[ShadedSkies]

Envoys are 50% faster, which is nice when you are trying to grab city states on a different continent. The extra influence helps with full Statecraft, which gives Emissaries 60 influence and Envoys 75. Other than that they're a downgrade, especially since you have so many other ways to secure alliances around that time, such as the world congress and spies.

I actually like it this way, because on Deity the AI is absolutely ruthless with spamming Envoys and every city state sits at +1,000 influence before the atomic era. A boost to diplomatic units would benefit the AI far more than it would the player.

 

[wobuffet]

Possible solutions:

• Add +1 Paper to the Palace, make each Emissary cost 2 Paper, and increase the Emissary's hammer cost.
• Give a free Envoy or two upon discovering Civil Service to alleviate the perverse "avoid Civil Service if going diplomatic" problem.
• Tie the Chancery's effectiveness to Civil Service somehow: e.g., (1) the Chancery doesn't give any Paper at all until Civil Service is discovered, or (2) Civil Service unlocks "+33% to diplo unit production" on Chanceries, and increase all diplo unit hammer costs to compensate.

 

[tu_79]

Doesn't Civil Service open a diplomatic wonder too? One of those that just give some votes. If so, delaying Civil Service may be an option for those that just want to ripe yields from CS, but not if you want to control the world congress.

 

[ShadedSkies]

Not anymore, it is now the progress finisher which reduces gold buying costs.

 

[Moi Magnus]

For reference, the current values (without cost reduction of buffs) are :

Emmisary 100 (or 230 ), 1 paper, 40 , 2 (Writing, First half of classical era)
Envoy 250 (or 460 ), 3 paper, 50 , 3 (Civil Service, Second half of medieval era)
Diplomat 500 (or 760 ), 5 paper, 60 , 4 (Industrialisation, Second half of industrial era)
Ambassador 800 (or 1060 ), 7 paper, 70 , 5 (Atomic theory, First half of atomic era)

I think the main problem is the 1 paper -> 3 paper.

First suggestion :
Emmisary : 1 paper
Envoy : 2 paper
Diplomat : 4 paper
Ambassador : 7 or 8 paper

Second suggestion :
Emmisary : 2 paper
Envoy : 3 paper
Diplomat : 5 paper
Ambassador : 7 paper