The Finer Points of Diplomacy
or how I learned to love the Natives
A work in Progress (official patch, recently updated).
Is there more to diplomacy than declaring war, opening borders and snagging up Pocahontas?
- Absolutely! Bribe the "Indians" into complacency, call for help when under siege by an angry tribe, exploit the other nation's greed for land to turn the natives against them or let your soldiers fight and die by their side! Diplomacy can lead to hilarious results.
A. Arrival
The first settlement is a freebie, place it with no regard to the natives, the more land you are welcomed to, the less you'll have to pay for it later. This has no repercussions. Also by producing liberty bells early you will be offered a close by village.
You may want to look up who you are dealing with on your first encounter. Different tribes have different special abilities, like unit promotions, reduced training times, great wealth etc. This is well documented in the Civilopedia. They also have hidden abilities, like the willingness to declare war and different degrees of xenophobia.
B. for Time Bomb
You know that gradually the natives will feel, that "-1 to 10 your way of life is threatening to ours" until they actually explode with anger and declare war. There is a -X counter ticking ever so slowly. The first negative count you get if your city in close proximity to a tribal village grows to 4. The range of your threat(3) is probably determined by how far your borders will extend once you reach a rebel sentiment of 100%. Maybe the natives' angst is a product of distance and city size. How this exactly works is anyone's guess.
Sometimes establishing a mission in a settlement will instantly increase their understanding of your culture and lower the negative number by 2 if "pleased" or by 1 if "cautious".. You can proceed doing so until they aren't threatened any more. Petty criminals are just as great at appeasing a war chief as the rest, though Jesuits will increase conversion by a little. Honestly, the Jesuit bonus of 50% is much lower than the "Impressionable" tribe or the french Leader bonus - with 100% respectively . Training Jesuit Priests in your school/college is an expensive option, but not really worth the trouble.
Missions are a diplomatic means to remove anxiety of your culture not really a good way to recruit gatherers for your economy.
C. Commerce
Trading with the natives has no immediate diplomatic consequences, but other cultures take note and will sometimes ask you to cease trading with their enemy.
If you gift them the item they desire (or guns/horses/tools). They will acknowledge that with up to "+4 our trade relations have been fair and forthright", depending on how badly they need manufactured goods, you can get up to +4. This bonus however decays with time and sooner rather than later they forget completely. Sometimes the villagers will no longer reveal what they desire.
D. Declaration of War
To get natives to declare war they need to be in favorable/neutral mood towards you, in a bad or neutral mood towards your rivals and you also need to pay a certain reasonable amount of gold. Leaders appear to behave very differently, for a fistful of gold Oconostota, Cunhambebe, Agueybana (and Montezuma?) are willing to scalp your European rivals first time you cross paths (even if you attack their "friends", while Logan never seems to offer the option to fight for you, all the while quietly sharpening his tomahawk behind your back.
A Defensive Pact inhibits the ability to make others declare war and thus is rather undesirable for a war monger. You can also instead of trading the first 50 guns with which you arrive, trade them for a war declaration, within the first 20 turns... Then you rivals get wiped out and you get a +4 fair trade relations bonus. The natives will soon bury the hatchet, but will gladly go to war again provided you pay again.
E. Espionage
Knowing the names of a faction's settlements helps, then you can tell the war chief where to attack as well as follow his troop movements and success. However the AI is pretty good at self preservation and won't attack fortified cities, but rather wait for an opening or presumably just raid the city.
F. Founding Fathers
Pocahontas and others will give you a "+4 past events have brought our people together" it might be permanent, i never played long enough to see the number's decay. After the DoI, the choice of Native Rights gives another +5, with a total +9 the natives are "friendly" and willing to declare war for free even on the King of your Motherland. Unfortunately these bonuses combined feel like Peter Minuit and Pedro Alvares Cabral, extremely blunt and overpowered. Pretty much making previous efforts of improving relations obsolete. However with only one of these bonuses diplomatic efforts can still be rewarding.
G. Mutual Military StrugGle
If you see a native faction declare war, or made them declare war. You can also declare. In the time you will get a +1 bonus every couple of turns. "+1 our mutual military Struggle brings our people closer together". I got it up to 5 once, but it will also decay over time, though seemingly much slower than bonuses from gifted goods.
Better yet you get your native allies to declare war first, in this case you may be soon asked to join the war and get an additional "+1 you agreed to come to our aid in war time".
H. Hernan Cortes and the rest
Free Stockades in cities as well as other defenses make it very difficult for natives to attack. If you keep a soldier in town you are very safe from "Indians" behind fortifications and so are your rivals. If you just keep guns a random worker will grab and defend, but the city will be raided and goods stolen.
Because native villages have no fortifications, they quickly fall victim to your native allies, especially since your allies carry quality muskets. However i only was able to get a tribe declare war on another tribe, when I was attacked firsts.
I. Interface
The olive Branch shows all leaders, while the paper scroll/foreign adviser shows faction standings towards you or when you click one towards one another. Both very useful.
J. Just do It
Diplomatic options become available and need to be actively initialized/negotiated (and payed for) as your standing with a faction increases. Finally a Defensive Pact will involve natives into your Revolution. Even though they won't exactly win in for you. Don't accept their settlements as your borders grow, to keep them in game.
The standing increases are mostly of temporary nature with either mutual war effort, gifts of desired goods, mission establishment or founding father bonuses.
60 years (on normal) of peace and diplomatic relations will get a bonus of "+1 years of peace have brought our people together", living under a defensive pact will also show an ever increasing bonus "+1 our defensive pact prooves that we are close friends".
K. Keep or raise conquered settlements?
If you choose to occupy a rival's city you will sometimes inadvertently anger the natives even when they are fighting the same enemy, since you indirectly have stolen their land. Sometimes all you can do is bombard the fortifications and wait for their braves to come and burn it down.
L. Last of the Mahicans
If you play on standard maps you may not find a single village with trappers, cotton or sugar planters. If you attack a tribe chances are high that the last remaining brave will found a new village. This village will have a new option to train a specialist, possibly the profession that you looked for.
M. Meta-game
The purpose of natives is to provide a boundary to all out economical expansion, be it 1 worker cities area occupation or quick population growth. The economist player has to put aside gold for muskets or cannons or consider diplomatic options.
At the same time an early militaristic strategy against natives pays a price when it looses access to nearby specialist training, while going to war early against European peers gives them a way to retaliate.
Other games like the total war series also have these neutral party institutions to even out early advantages, and keep opposing forces balanced. Luckily with the different tribes and varied functions of native villages, it doesn't feel as cheap and rubber-band-like.
I'll be happy to add more detailed info for the particular positive bonuses, when I know better. There is a bit of depth to Diplomacy system. Feel free to correct any misconceptions. Share your thoughts.
or how I learned to love the Natives
A work in Progress (official patch, recently updated).
Is there more to diplomacy than declaring war, opening borders and snagging up Pocahontas?
- Absolutely! Bribe the "Indians" into complacency, call for help when under siege by an angry tribe, exploit the other nation's greed for land to turn the natives against them or let your soldiers fight and die by their side! Diplomacy can lead to hilarious results.
A. Arrival
The first settlement is a freebie, place it with no regard to the natives, the more land you are welcomed to, the less you'll have to pay for it later. This has no repercussions. Also by producing liberty bells early you will be offered a close by village.
You may want to look up who you are dealing with on your first encounter. Different tribes have different special abilities, like unit promotions, reduced training times, great wealth etc. This is well documented in the Civilopedia. They also have hidden abilities, like the willingness to declare war and different degrees of xenophobia.
B. for Time Bomb
You know that gradually the natives will feel, that "-1 to 10 your way of life is threatening to ours" until they actually explode with anger and declare war. There is a -X counter ticking ever so slowly. The first negative count you get if your city in close proximity to a tribal village grows to 4. The range of your threat(3) is probably determined by how far your borders will extend once you reach a rebel sentiment of 100%. Maybe the natives' angst is a product of distance and city size. How this exactly works is anyone's guess.
Sometimes establishing a mission in a settlement will instantly increase their understanding of your culture and lower the negative number by 2 if "pleased" or by 1 if "cautious".. You can proceed doing so until they aren't threatened any more. Petty criminals are just as great at appeasing a war chief as the rest, though Jesuits will increase conversion by a little. Honestly, the Jesuit bonus of 50% is much lower than the "Impressionable" tribe or the french Leader bonus - with 100% respectively . Training Jesuit Priests in your school/college is an expensive option, but not really worth the trouble.
Missions are a diplomatic means to remove anxiety of your culture not really a good way to recruit gatherers for your economy.
C. Commerce
Trading with the natives has no immediate diplomatic consequences, but other cultures take note and will sometimes ask you to cease trading with their enemy.
If you gift them the item they desire (or guns/horses/tools). They will acknowledge that with up to "+4 our trade relations have been fair and forthright", depending on how badly they need manufactured goods, you can get up to +4. This bonus however decays with time and sooner rather than later they forget completely. Sometimes the villagers will no longer reveal what they desire.
D. Declaration of War
To get natives to declare war they need to be in favorable/neutral mood towards you, in a bad or neutral mood towards your rivals and you also need to pay a certain reasonable amount of gold. Leaders appear to behave very differently, for a fistful of gold Oconostota, Cunhambebe, Agueybana (and Montezuma?) are willing to scalp your European rivals first time you cross paths (even if you attack their "friends", while Logan never seems to offer the option to fight for you, all the while quietly sharpening his tomahawk behind your back.
A Defensive Pact inhibits the ability to make others declare war and thus is rather undesirable for a war monger. You can also instead of trading the first 50 guns with which you arrive, trade them for a war declaration, within the first 20 turns... Then you rivals get wiped out and you get a +4 fair trade relations bonus. The natives will soon bury the hatchet, but will gladly go to war again provided you pay again.
E. Espionage
Knowing the names of a faction's settlements helps, then you can tell the war chief where to attack as well as follow his troop movements and success. However the AI is pretty good at self preservation and won't attack fortified cities, but rather wait for an opening or presumably just raid the city.
F. Founding Fathers
Pocahontas and others will give you a "+4 past events have brought our people together" it might be permanent, i never played long enough to see the number's decay. After the DoI, the choice of Native Rights gives another +5, with a total +9 the natives are "friendly" and willing to declare war for free even on the King of your Motherland. Unfortunately these bonuses combined feel like Peter Minuit and Pedro Alvares Cabral, extremely blunt and overpowered. Pretty much making previous efforts of improving relations obsolete. However with only one of these bonuses diplomatic efforts can still be rewarding.
G. Mutual Military StrugGle
If you see a native faction declare war, or made them declare war. You can also declare. In the time you will get a +1 bonus every couple of turns. "+1 our mutual military Struggle brings our people closer together". I got it up to 5 once, but it will also decay over time, though seemingly much slower than bonuses from gifted goods.
Better yet you get your native allies to declare war first, in this case you may be soon asked to join the war and get an additional "+1 you agreed to come to our aid in war time".
H. Hernan Cortes and the rest
Free Stockades in cities as well as other defenses make it very difficult for natives to attack. If you keep a soldier in town you are very safe from "Indians" behind fortifications and so are your rivals. If you just keep guns a random worker will grab and defend, but the city will be raided and goods stolen.
Because native villages have no fortifications, they quickly fall victim to your native allies, especially since your allies carry quality muskets. However i only was able to get a tribe declare war on another tribe, when I was attacked firsts.
I. Interface
The olive Branch shows all leaders, while the paper scroll/foreign adviser shows faction standings towards you or when you click one towards one another. Both very useful.
J. Just do It
Diplomatic options become available and need to be actively initialized/negotiated (and payed for) as your standing with a faction increases. Finally a Defensive Pact will involve natives into your Revolution. Even though they won't exactly win in for you. Don't accept their settlements as your borders grow, to keep them in game.
The standing increases are mostly of temporary nature with either mutual war effort, gifts of desired goods, mission establishment or founding father bonuses.
60 years (on normal) of peace and diplomatic relations will get a bonus of "+1 years of peace have brought our people together", living under a defensive pact will also show an ever increasing bonus "+1 our defensive pact prooves that we are close friends".
K. Keep or raise conquered settlements?
If you choose to occupy a rival's city you will sometimes inadvertently anger the natives even when they are fighting the same enemy, since you indirectly have stolen their land. Sometimes all you can do is bombard the fortifications and wait for their braves to come and burn it down.
L. Last of the Mahicans
If you play on standard maps you may not find a single village with trappers, cotton or sugar planters. If you attack a tribe chances are high that the last remaining brave will found a new village. This village will have a new option to train a specialist, possibly the profession that you looked for.
M. Meta-game
The purpose of natives is to provide a boundary to all out economical expansion, be it 1 worker cities area occupation or quick population growth. The economist player has to put aside gold for muskets or cannons or consider diplomatic options.
At the same time an early militaristic strategy against natives pays a price when it looses access to nearby specialist training, while going to war early against European peers gives them a way to retaliate.
Other games like the total war series also have these neutral party institutions to even out early advantages, and keep opposing forces balanced. Luckily with the different tribes and varied functions of native villages, it doesn't feel as cheap and rubber-band-like.
I'll be happy to add more detailed info for the particular positive bonuses, when I know better. There is a bit of depth to Diplomacy system. Feel free to correct any misconceptions. Share your thoughts.
