[GS] World Congress and Diplomacy Anticipation Thread

[acluewithout]

What do we know? Anyone excited?

Diplomatic Favour sounds very cool.

World Congress... yeah. Well. It looks better than in Civ 5 and 4. Resolutions look better, although there still seems to be unbreakable sanctions which is not great (e.g. There's a resolution that seems to create a hard no on creating district buildings rather just making it harder, and I think we know banning luxuries is back?).

I'm a little sorry more resolutions aren't like the immigration one, where resolutions all have a plus and minus. I think that's a more interesting choice.

I fine with the WC just triggering in the Medieval Era. But I hope you can eventually still build the Apolostic Palace and UN Building at some point, and that these somehow interact with the World Congress.

And did the Devs say Grevieances will be linked to Loyalty? That's got some potential to make loyalty more dynamic...

And does folding emergencies into WC mean no more gold rewards for emergencies? i.e. You only get Diplomatic Favour as a reward, and the aggressor gets nothing? That would be a huge, huge improvement!

 

[Caprikel]

A Diplomatic currency is a pretty cool idea, especially since they said in the stream that it would come from many different sources.
I think I recall Government plazas as also being a source of Diplomatic favors, which makes it so the Gov. Plaza is the Diplomatic favor district essentially.

 

[BackseatTyrant]

In the latest livestream they mentioned that strategic resources now have a cap for how much a civilization can hold at one time, and that that cap could be increased by constructing certain buildings. It would be cool if there would come up a resolution that would restrict how big each civ may make that cap

 

[Stringer1313]

Is anyone else troubled by the fact that any one can vote on any number of possible resolutions, due to the drop down list? The votes are all scattered. There's no cohesion or sense of tension around whether the civs will vote for or against some specific proposal; instead everyone can vote on any one of 20 different possibilities. It feels off.

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

Is anyone else troubled by the fact that any one can vote on any number of possible resolutions, due to the drop down list? The votes are all scattered. There's no cohesion or sense of tension around whether the civs will vote for or against some specific proposal; instead everyone can vote on any one of 20 different possibilities. It feels off.

It seems weird, but I'm willing to withhold criticism until the livestreamers get ahold of it and really show it to us, not the marketing team.

 

[acluewithout]

It seems weird, but I'm willing to withhold criticism until the livestreamers get ahold of it and really show it to us, not the marketing team.

FXS definitely deserve the benefit of the doubt on the WC given they seem to have held it over from RnF to get it right. So far, bar a few niggles, it does look very good.

 

[DogeEnricoDandolo]

Is anyone else troubled by the fact that any one can vote on any number of possible resolutions, due to the drop down list? The votes are all scattered. There's no cohesion or sense of tension around whether the civs will vote for or against some specific proposal; instead everyone can vote on any one of 20 different possibilities. It feels off.

This also is one of the issues I have with the WC, since we do not really know what the tiebreaker is in case there is one, and we don't have a "host" like civ 5 to break the ties either. Also, the resolutions are randomized and I hate it.

 

[bbbt]

It seems sort of designed for maximum variation this time around - almost like semi-random events/challenges you can influence rather than workings of a world congress.

I'd prefer something more iterarive - like first you are voting to nominate particular resolutions then every one votes on them.

 

[sonicmyst]

It also seems like resolutions does not expire. Whatever the outcome of the votes, it will stick until the end of time unless there will be another resolution that lifts or cancels the previous agreement. This I am still unsure if I am going to like it.

 

[Pistol90]

For me biggest downside (If i have figured out) is not being able to actually propose resolution but they appear automaticly ...

 

[kb27787]

I would be happy enough with something similar to BNW's system...

 

[acluewithout]

It also seems like resolutions does not expire. Whatever the outcome of the votes, it will stick until the end of time unless there will be another resolution that lifts or cancels the previous agreement. This I am still unsure if I am going to like it.

I think the descriptions say each resolution lasts until the next WC session.

 

[Infixo]

For me biggest downside (If i have figured out) is not being able to actually propose resolution but they appear automaticly ...

Did they actually say that in one of streams? I mean, is that confirmed?

 

[NegativeZero]

In the latest livestream they mentioned that strategic resources now have a cap for how much a civilization can hold at one time, and that that cap could be increased by constructing certain buildings. It would be cool if there would come up a resolution that would restrict how big each civ may make that cap

If you could pass the resolution barring encampment buildings being built, what you desire to accomplish will happen.

Did they actually say that in one of streams? I mean, is that confirmed?

From the last live stream, they randomly come from a pool of era specific resolutions. Civs can't propose what will come up for vote as far as we know.

 

[Infixo]

From the last live stream, they randomly come from a pool of era specific resolutions. Civs can't propose what will come up for vote as far as we know.

This is a huge shortcoming of the WC feature then. Imho, it contradicts the core idea of the WC as a place where you can control things on a global scale.
I really can’t believe that anyone would consider that a good idea (hey, UN, what would you say if nations were to vote on random proposals?), so it seems like a result of simplification during design and implementation. Meaning: somebody said, hey guys we hate AI, so let’s make random proposals, that way we don’t have to code anything. Because modifiers are already in the game (and resolutions are clearly implemented as modifiers) and the only thing needed to make it work, is a scoring system. The game already has several scoring subsystems, so making another one is pretty easy.
That is so very disappointing.

 

[NegativeZero]

Being unable to propose what could be voted on does weaken the WC quite a bit.

However it does depend on how large the pool of proposals is for each era. If the WC meets ~2 time per era with a pool of 6-8 resolutions, the chances are actually quite good you'll get the one your looking for.

I'll also note that each resolution has 2 parts which make them more flexible then resolutions from prior civ games.

I'm going to give the Dev team the benefit of the doubt on this one as we don't have much specific info about what is possible with the new diplomatic system.

 

[acluewithout]

@Infixo I get the frustration. Maybe even share it a bit. But it's hardly a huge shortcoming.

I imagine it's random to help make the game easier to balance - i.e. stop the human player borking the whole system. The random elements doesn't mean the WC isn't strategic or tactical. It's just that the strategic element is deciding whether to accrue diplomatic Favour when you can't guarantee precisely what resolutions you can manipulate, and the tactical element will be much more about being opportunistic.

The only thing that really bothers me is that the WC will always be in the Medieval Era. I don't mind its so early. More, I'd prefer if it had some sort of trigger, just so that it was a bit more random when it kicked off.

 

[Starwars]

I'm pretty torn on how it seems to work. I do think the randomness will possibly be a good thing in the long run gameplay-wise because, as others have said, it may at least serve to change it up a bit instead of finding an always optimal route. But on the other hand... it just *feels* extremely weird to have something like the World Congress be randomized like that. Like, it's always a struggle to create game systems that are fun and works well gameplay-wise and at the same time feels logical and somewhat tied into its real world equivalent and I don't think this hits the spot for me. Same with the Governor system and how everyone gets the same ones, it just feels... really weird even though it can be fun gameplay-wise.

Other than that, I also think I'd prefer it come into play an era later or so. But maybe it will be a good fit for the Medieval, kinda depends on how the game will play out with everything added/changed in GS as well.

 

[acluewithout]

I actually really like that it comes in the Medieval Era. I think the randomness will also allow for more flavour and more different resolutions. It looks like special resolutions will also be triggered by events on the map, so that sort of gives you control as well (or at least let's you anticipate some resolutions). Honestly, I think it'll be good.

But a bit like Governors though, my guess is it'll be a solid system but just missing some flavour in places.

God. I really hope they have a third expansion and rework Governors and the Government Plaza. Mechanically they're basically fine, but they are dreadfully boring.

You know what's really tedious about Governors...? The fact you can't avoid having them. You have to earn Governor Titles, and then you basically have to spend them (you can sort of hold onto them like envoys - but there's no upside). Honestly, Diplomatic Favour, Envoys, Governor Titiles, Spy Capacity - you could very easily just compact these down to just one or two currencies.

FXS really need to do a third expansion where they largely just boil down a few existing core mechanics rather than just piling on more stuff.

 

[Infixo]

However it does depend on how large the pool of proposals is for each era. If the WC meets ~2 time per era with a pool of 6-8 resolutions, the chances are actually quite good you'll get the one your looking for.
I'll also note that each resolution has 2 parts which make them more flexible then resolutions from prior civ games.

Did you forget about "variances" in resolutions? Somebody already pointed out that if a resolution has 5-10 variants that you can vote on separately then the outcome will be totally unpredictable with votes spread thin. Couple that with the fact that resolutions are random and you end up voting for a pool of 50-100 random modifiers.

@Infixo
I imagine it's random to help make the game easier to balance - i.e. stop the human player borking the whole system.

This is exactly what I said - why bother with AI? It is easier to restrict the entire system, preventing humans from "borking" it.
And, btw, as long as gold allows for buying votes, it will be exploited anyway. AI makes all the stupid trades possible - why would it be any different with votes?