Too easy to friend/ally

[leandrombraz]

There was a time when internal routes were the OP routes.

Look, I get what the strategy is for diplo victory. I'm telling you it is bad design. You and your allies all vote against you in order for you to become world leader? What sense does that make? I honestly don't see how anyone can defend this design.

I'm not defending it. You argued that "the math on favors makes spending 100% of it on diplo victory still not enough to win against every other nation voting against you", so I'm explaining how it works because you shouldn't be trying to outvote the AI on the diplo vote. The favor you get from Alliances is important if you're trying to win normal resolutions, which is what you should be doing, that's the point I was making.

Now I'll defend it . Civ AI try to both play a role, like a character, and simulate a player. In the congress, as it works now, The AI is focused on the player simulation aspect. A player might do an Alliance with you, which is beneficial for both, but they won't vote for you to win the game, why would they? Voting against yourself is just a way to bypass this AI's player like behavior, which is a player behavior on itself. You can roleplay it as you pretending to be a humble leader with an "I don't want power" atitude. Works for me.

The current diplo victory is far from perfect but is way, way better than it was when Gathering Storm launched. I enjoy trying to predict what the AI will vote for and how much favors I need to invest in a specific resolution. Firaxis should definitely revisit how the diplo vote works since it's clearly being problematic for a lot of players (it's common to see people struggling with the vote), but it works well enough if you see it as a catch up mechanic that is there to stop you, not to give you the victory. I would also like to see the relationship you have with the AI matter in the congress but lets face it, it's something that isn't easy to implement in a satisfying way. If your Allies just start voting for you, then the vote will go from unwinnable to too easy, giving even more gas to the diplomatic steamroll that the victory is now. I can't think of a way to implement it that won't turn the diplo victory into something that is too easy to cheesy, just get everyone to be your friends and voilà, everyone votes for you because you're awesome. It wouldn't solve the problem, just change to another problem. If we can't have the AI both playing a role and simulating a player in the congress, I prefer to have it simulating a player, this way the AI offer some resistance.

 

[Archon_Wing]

So from reading the front page, I learn that diplomacy is too hard, and it's also too easy.

It really comes down to how much you war. But if you don't war, you're putting yourself at a disadvantage anyways, so I guess it evens out?

I guess there needs to be other features to diplomacy such as people demanding you stop trading with another civ, or more agendas that pop up later on.

 

[_hero_]

Now I'll defend it . Civ AI try to both play a role, like a character, and simulate a player. In the congress, as it works now, The AI is focused on the player simulation aspect. A player might do an Alliance with you, which is beneficial for both, but they won't vote for you to win the game, why would they? Voting against yourself is just a way to bypass this AI's player like behavior, which is a player behavior on itself. You can roleplay it as you pretending to be a humble leader with an "I don't want power" atitude. Works for me.

The current diplo victory is far from perfect but is way, way better than it was when Gathering Storm launched. I enjoy trying to predict what the AI will vote for and how much favors I need to invest in a specific resolution. Firaxis should definitely revisit how the diplo vote works since it's clearly being problematic for a lot of players (it's common to see people struggling with the vote), but it works well enough if you see it as a catch up mechanic that is there to stop you, not to give you the victory. I would also like to see the relationship you have with the AI matter in the congress but lets face it, it's something that isn't easy to implement in a satisfying way. If your Allies just start voting for you, then the vote will go from unwinnable to too easy, giving even more gas to the diplomatic steamroll that the victory is now. I can't think of a way to implement it that won't turn the diplo victory into something that is too easy to cheesy, just get everyone to be your friends and voilà, everyone votes for you because you're awesome. It wouldn't solve the problem, just change to another problem. If we can't have the AI both playing a role and simulating a player in the congress, I prefer to have it simulating a player, this way the AI offer some resistance.

Why should they? Because the essence of a diplomatic victory is "you have proven yourself worthy of leading the other nations of the world." If every single nation in the world votes that "you are not worthy to be the world leader" and then you become world leader anyways, that simply makes no sense. If anything, diplomatic victory would make far more sense without a diplomatic leader vote at all. Then it would become more of a long-term trial wherein you're trying to prove your worth by helping other nations in need and supporting popular views in the world congress. They could also implement a loss of diplo points for excessive grievances and no CB wars.

I will agree that it is better than it was at launch, but I just think that the current design is too convoluted and it isn't numbers tweaks that will help with that.

Also, getting other nations to for you is how diplo victories worked in all past civ games that I can remember, so it's not as though making it work that way is unviable.

 

[Lily_Lancer]

Hint: stop playing on emperor then... The initial impressions modifier can go much lower on deity such that you are guaranteed to be disliked if all you do is send them a delegation.

Aha, how can you be able to send delegation when you first meet a Civ! I guess in the vanilla game they may accept if only at the turn you meet, however on GS even from the first turn they'll start rejecting your delegation.

 

[kb27787]

Aha, how can you be able to send delegation when you first meet a Civ! I guess in the vanilla game they may accept if only at the turn you meet, however on GS even from the first turn they'll start rejecting your delegation.

If you meet them on your turn, (i.e. your unit moves into sight of them) they will always accept. However, if you meet them on their turn (they move their units into yours or gaining sight through suzereinty of a CS that has sight of you) then by the time your turn comes they won't accept.

That said, my point was that on deity the first impressions modifier go down even to -8 such that even if you send them a delegation for +3 they will still dislike you if you do not have other positive modifiers. The OP had been simply complaining that AIs are too easy to befriend.

 

[Lily_Lancer]

If you meet them on your turn, (i.e. your unit moves into sight of them) they will always accept. However, if you meet them on their turn (they move their units into yours or gaining sight through suzereinty of a CS that has sight of you) then by the time your turn comes they won't accept.

That said, my point was that on deity the first impressions modifier go down even to -8 such that even if you send them a delegation for +3 they will still dislike you if you do not have other positive modifiers. The OP had been simply complaining that AIs are too easy to befriend.

But that in fact doesn't affect my gameplays at all. I ban trading with AI since I found them valuing things incorrectly and leads to trade bugs. For example, they may think 1 GPT worth 15 gold on online speed, however the GPT still lasts for 30 turns. Then if trading being allowed you'll be making giant profits.

 

[MrRadar]

For example, they may think 1 GPT worth 15 gold on online speed, however the GPT still lasts for 30 turns. Then if trading being allowed you'll be making giant profits.

But it sounds about right, doesn't it? You can take/give a loan and have/give 15 gold now for a price of 1 gpt over time.

It was before that AI valuing of lump sums scaled to the game speed, but not the deal duration. It used to create situations where on speeds slower than standard (Epic, Marathon) it was always much more profitable to take lump sum deal - you used to get more and now in comparison to gpt deals, which was absurd. And lump sum deals on faster speeds were over-penalized, so a gpt deal was always better.

But now it seems corrected, you don't get more in a lump sum than in gpt on slow speeds, and on faster speeds lump sums went up. About half the amount but now for gpt on online seems plausible to me. They left deal duration 30 turns on any game speed (which is omg how frustrating), but at least they corrected the lump sum valuation accordingly.

 

[leandrombraz]

Why should they? Because the essence of a diplomatic victory is "you have proven yourself worthy of leading the other nations of the world." If every single nation in the world votes that "you are not worthy to be the world leader" and then you become world leader anyways, that simply makes no sense. If anything, diplomatic victory would make far more sense without a diplomatic leader vote at all. Then it would become more of a long-term trial wherein you're trying to prove your worth by helping other nations in need and supporting popular views in the world congress. They could also implement a loss of diplo points for excessive grievances and no CB wars.

I will agree that it is better than it was at launch, but I just think that the current design is too convoluted and it isn't numbers tweaks that will help with that.

Also, getting other nations to for you is how diplo victories worked in all past civ games that I can remember, so it's not as though making it work that way is unviable.

The truth is that the congress doesn't make any sense if you try to do a realistic read on it or even try to give it context. It's an extremely gamified system. I mean, what are favors, anyway? Does it mean other sovereignty states own me favors and will support me in the congress? So each City-State that is giving me favors is indirectly supporting me in the congress each time I vote, and so are my Allies, I'm getting favors from them and they are getting favors from me, so I'm also supporting them, even when they vote against me and I vote against them. Buying votes with what is essentially a currency doesn't make a lot of sense. Same for the diplo vote, what are we voting for, anyway? IIRC the game doesn't give context, it's just a vote to win points and achieve a diplo victory. What does this points represent? Good deeds? Building the Statue of Liberty probably ended world hunger, because I got 4 points for it. Am I being chosen to be a world leader? The victory video just set you as someone who did the right thing and committed to a shared peace that will be the foundation of the world of tomorrow. You're never really elected to anything, chose to be some kind of leader, nothing. You get 20 points for a variety of tasks and you win. What a diplomatic victory means in Civ VI is extremely open to interpretation because it doesn't really mean anything, there's no essence, no sense, you just win the game because you won the game.

I agree that it would make far more sense without a diplo vote. Removing the vote and replacing it with anything would be a good move from Firaxis. That vote only make sense if you see it as a game mechanic and nothing more.

 

[steveg700]

There was a time when internal routes were the OP routes.

Look, I get what the strategy is for diplo victory. I'm telling you it is bad design. You and your allies all vote against you in order for you to become world leader? What sense does that make? I honestly don't see how anyone can defend this design.

Yes, it's terrible design, and hopefully when people say "hey, I'm good with where diplomacy is right now", they're not talking about anything having to do with the way the World Congress works.

 

[tetley]

Hey, let's be reasonable now. Just because I backstabbed the Sumerians and took all their cities but one, pillaged and took everything they had in a peace deal just last turn, then they accepted my Declaration of Friendship and are friends now with 581 grievances against me...that doesn't mean making friends is too easy.

Nothing to see here. Our troops are merely passing by. Don't forget to tell all your relatives you love them.

 

[leandrombraz]

Something that I think would improve diplomacy, is if the AI cared more about the relationship you have with others, and I don't mean an increase on the "you're allied/friend with our enemy" penalty. Even friendly, the AI should have a bias towards denying friendship with leaders who are friend/ally of someone they denounced or are at war with. So lets say everyone denounced China and I decide to be friend with China. If I try to declare friendship with any other leader, they're likely to deny it because China is a pariah to them, so I became a pariah myself when I aligned with China, even if the atitude towards me still friendly. I would need to wait X turns after my friendship with China ended to start getting my friendship requests accepted again. If the denounce of a specific leader against China ends and they don't get denounced again by said leader, my friendship request will also be accepted again with that leader after X turns. In the same way, if I had denounced China, it would be more likely to get a friendship with everyone because I denounced the same leader they did. Having an ally in common also would improve my chances to get a friendship with someone.

This would:

• Increase the importance of relationships, specifically denouncements and friendships/alliances. Players would need to choose their allies/friends wisely to assure that they won't make the wrong friendship. If I want to be friend with Greece, I better pay attention on who they denounce and who they declared friendship with. We currently get penalties depending on who we ally with but it isn't meaningful enough to matter and it won't stop you from being friend/ally with two leaders that hate each other, only theoretically make it harder but in practice the penalty barely matters;
• Help divide the world into groups of allies/friends. Leaders would be more likely to have common firends/ally and common enemies, creating a diplomatic situation that make sense;
• Make friendships harder to get but it wouldn't affect further your chance to get friendly leaders. I been avoiding friendships lately since they give me nothing aside from avoiding war and securing relationships, and a friendship will prevent me from participating in emergencies against that leader. Diplomacy is way more interesting that way since most relationships stay volatile, passive of change.

Alliances work well since you're limited to 5, so you can't just ally the whole world. Your allies should have a bias to renew friendship with you that is stronger than the relationship with other leaders bias, so alliances don't become hard to keep. The change I'm proposing is meant to affect meanly friendships. Once you secure your 5 allies, you're likely to keep them if you don't get too much grievances, but it would be harder to secure a friendship to ally with them, then it would be harder to get and keep friends outside your alliances.

This is my current game:

I really enjoy how there's a variety of relationships. I have my allies, my protectorate war and leaders that are friendly, neutral and unfriendly. All this can change at any moment. I had my fights with Japan (Osaka and Takamatsu are Hungarian cities, anyone who says otherwise is part of the FAKE NEWS MEDIA), then he hated me, now he likes me, later he might hate me again. If I secure friendship, he would just become a passive neighbor that I can't interact with outside of trade. Diplomacy is more interesting without friendships.