Ideas for Changes to the Diplo Style

[Inca (DoE)]

Further ideas:
1. Added costs to industrial/modern units. +1GPT for gunpowder, +2GPT for industrial, +3GPT for modern, +4GPT for the latest units. This makes the late game supermilitaries a bit costlier to maintain.
1B. Added costs just to the "offensive" arms. So, mobile and shock units cost +1GPT extra or are more expensive to make, while the defensive units are the same as vanilla. So, if a superpower wants to get aggressive, it costs them more to do so, while smaller civs can still build up good defensive armies with a smaller production base to keep themselves safer.
2. Rules on city gifting (no mature cities past a certain size in each era in the "heartland")
3. Publicly announced defensive pacts that must be adhered to. So if Germany and France declare they have a defensive pact in X circumstance, and Russia attacks France in that circumstance, Russia must also DoW on Germany before moving troops.

[Inca (DoE)]

I think #3 is necessary and extremely logical, #2 a bit limiting but perhaps quite reasonable (it's very unrealistic in the real world for anyone to gift a mature city to someone else for unit upgrades. It breaks the diplo spirit heavily, even if I've done it twice now in DoF , but I wouldn't ever do that in DoE or a similar format).

#1s are of course unlikely, but it's a good idea I like to implement in personal SP mods.

[The Priest]

Two different good ideas running here.

1. The civ swap idea. Brilliant at keeping the game fun for everyone. Nobody gets into a hopeless state. The normal suspects who race away have a new challenge of taking on weaker nations frequently. Alliances don't remain for too long because the players behind the civs change. (Look at Britain over the last few hundred years - fight the americans then later become close allies, ally with the germansto fight the french, a hundred years later its ally with teh french to fight the germans. The russians flip flopped from allies to enemies within a few years.) The only problem is lots of folks won't like the idea of losing their civ to another. I think it would be fun, but guess many won't. Worth doing if you ask me, though respect Ozzy's issues about the work involved in hosting.

2. Changes to make a standard diplo game run in a 'better' fashion. There was another thread about that a couple of weeks ago. Good ideas there as here. Main point here was to stop there being massively long lasting alliance blocks. If we focus on that, the main thing is to make alliances not work, or not work as well, therefore there will be less point in them. To do that we need no tech trading and no unit gifting. Without them the ability of a 'superpower' to interlock closely with 'clients' is greatly weakened, and its not like they are believeable anyway. As Inca says, no city gifting either or some strict limits. Not sure we want to make war harder though - in some ways we want nations to fight more smaller wars, more freqently, to get more churning.

[Inca (DoE)]

Limiting troop gifting (not eliminating) is a good idea. Although as an exporter, I don't like the limitations, I've found that I basically have had to make them voluntarily anyway for most nations.

[Russia (DoE)]

3. Publicly announced defensive pacts that must be adhered to. So if Germany and France declare they have a defensive pact in X circumstance, and Russia attacks France in that circumstance, Russia must also DoW on Germany before moving troops.

It is not needed at all. And illogical. The defensive pacts as a game mechanism should be removed as an option in MP. Those are good ONLY for SP and AIs which cant be made otherwise to keep their word on.

Both as-it-is-now and as you propose them to be, defensive pacts cant work. Take the example of Russo-Indian NAP and the Indian-Neandor DP (Defensive Pact, not double penetration )
India had agreed to non-aggression with Russia, but later India signs DP with Neandor. If the DP is as now in the game, India declares war to Russia, thus violating the NAP. If it is as you propose, Russia must declare war at Neandor too, thus breaking its word for NAP. Is Russia bind to never declare war at Neandor?

[Ottoman Empire (DoE)]

Generally speaking, I think we should avoid trying to add a bunch of rules and untested Mods to the game. In my experience, adding Mods always create unintended, unanticipated consequences. We can sit and argue that "this Mod would have ONLY this desired effect", but then 6 months into the game, we discover it doesen't work the way we planned, or someone discovers some clever way to use it to their advantage or some way around it, and then everyone is crying about "exploits" again.

No score Mod is fine. That's a great Mod that has been tested in tons of Pitboss and MP. I even liked the fast movement for ships tremendously (I always felt that ship movement was waaay too slow), but case in point, Inca hated the ship movement Mod.

And that's the point. We need to be very sparing on the Mods. As Ozzy said in the other thread, most of what determines outcomes has to do with relative skill of players. No amount of Modding or handicapping the game to protect weaker players is going to change that. The great players will always rise to the top, and the weaker players will always sink to the bottom. Overmodding the game just serves no purpose. If Rifles cost twice as much, then I will just demand twice as much for me to stop attacking, twice as much for resource trades, Great People, etc.

We need to think long and hard about ONE or two very SIMPLE changes that will have a positive impact. I think No Score mod along with some resource changes might be enough, in-and-of itself.

[Inca (DoE)]

Russia, I don't mind losing the in-game DPs. I mean that in the org thread people can state that they have signed a virtual DP, and if anyone DoWs one memeber they must DoW the other at the same time. This is far more realistic than the in-game stuff, and prevents the sorts of absurd tricks as have happened in DoE (not that I'm not a bit in awe at pulling that off twice, but they really aren't realistic). They can be limited as well, meaning there's only a DP for certain territories (like, Vikings will DP with Aztecs only in their Aztec territory), or that if anyone wants to attack someone on the same tiles as X Viking army, they must also DoW the Viks. This involves no game mechanisms, only that people abide by these pacts as though they were hard-coded.

For ship movement: I do like it a lot, but not 16 movement points. That's ridiculous for anyone that has a considerable shoreline to defend. I mod my SP game to 12MPs, although it's really like 10MPs or less for other modern units. 16 ends up being even more for some reason, so ships can go like 19 tiles sometimes. I don't quite understand why, but it's nearly impossible to defend myself with that. Like I said, I need 30 airplanes just to watch the oceans around me for a 1-turn warning, and even then it's easy for someone to slip through or whatever. It destroys naval tactics, and it takes out a rather interesting part of the game in doing so.

In fairness, I'm a fairly weak player I think and I've risen to the top based mostly on luck and some good diplomacy.

If rifles cost twice as much, you will have half as many and he will still have the same number of musketmen or maybe 2/3rds as many grenadiers. I doubt you could ask for just double the gold with such a drastically different amount of military leverage. But I agree that this heavy of a mod isn't likely to pass.

[Inca (DoE)]

Look, the stuff I think is absolutely necessary is this:

1. no score mod (seems we all agree and have implemented it already)

2. right of passage option (being tested in G&H at WPC)

3. toroidal maps (kills real-world based maps but hugely increases connections and diplomacy)

4. new org thread DP options and the elimination of in-game DPs

5. some rule that you can't do ridiculously unrealistic stuff like gifting mature cities, gifting half your nation's army to someone, etc.

5b. limits on total units gifted to anyone

I agree that there should be no further gameplay altering mods used other than shifting around UUs/UBs from standard BtS options for flavor. Perhaps some modest increase in ship speeds.

[OzzyKP]

And that's the point. We need to be very sparing on the Mods. As Ozzy said in the other thread, most of what determines outcomes has to do with relative skill of players. No amount of Modding or handicapping the game to protect weaker players is going to change that. The great players will always rise to the top, and the weaker players will always sink to the bottom. Overmodding the game just serves no purpose. If Rifles cost twice as much, then I will just demand twice as much for me to stop attacking, twice as much for resource trades, Great People, etc.

Exactly. The biggest factor is the skill of players, the great players rise to the top. Which is why they shouldn't stay there. Scramble the civs so the the great players take the bottom civs and vice versa. That WILL balance the game, disrupt game-long alliances, and make the game far more unpredictable and FUN.

[Russia (DoE)]

Russia, I don't mind losing the in-game DPs. I mean that in the org thread people can state that they have signed a virtual DP, and if anyone DoWs one memeber they must DoW the other at the same time.

This is simple - just gift the units to the appropriate city owner. This is not even realistic - England and Poland had defensive pact against Germany in 1943, but it took 2 weeks to England to actually declare war to Germany and their army just watched. (IIRC )

absurd tricks as have happened in DoE

It is not absurd - this is how it works in Civ4. Should we ask for a player to kill his own worker for example because an enemy Battleship passed nearby and he wants to to be able to destroy this worker, but he cant, as in Civ4 naval units cant attack land units? How realistic this is - a whole Battleship is helpless to destroy a single worker? Or should we ask the host to use World Builder to remove the railroads you want to destroy, but they happen to be in your own culture and thus you are not allowed by the game? We all play Civ4 and it is one and the same for all of us. And this is how she works. Someone said that those who cant come to ideas how to use innovative the game to their advantage, call this exploits or abusing the game mechanics. No, it is not. Double-moving is abusing of the way the game mechanics. Taking infinite technologies from the Oracle or the Liberalism is exploit and not realistic. Sinking a whole enemy fleet at harbor is none of those

For ship movement: I do like it a lot, but not 16 movement points.

We can limit those just like the lands units - no unit is allowed to move more than 10 tiles - no matter what.

[OzzyKP]

Taking infinite technologies from the Oracle or the Liberalism is exploit and not realistic.

Infinite?

[Russia (DoE)]

Yes, there is exploit, or loop - call it whatever you want.

[Ottoman Empire (DoE)]

Infinite?

Yep thats right, there is a bug that allows you to use the Oracle Free tech Bonus to just get all the techs. Now THAT's what I call and exploit.

This is simple - just gift the units to the appropriate city owner... It is not absurd - this is how it works in Civ4. Should we ask for a player to kill his own worker for example because an enemy Battleship passed nearby and he wants to to be able to destroy this worker, but he cant, as in Civ4 naval units cant attack land units? How realistic this is - a whole Battleship is helpless to destroy a single worker?

Yes exactly right. Just do a better job of learning the way the way the game works and you won't get suprised as easily. And LEARN from you mistakes! No way we should have been able to do that twice

there's only a DP for certain territories (like, Vikings will DP with Aztecs only in their Aztec territory), or that if anyone wants to attack someone on the same tiles as X Viking army, they must also DoW the Viks. This involves no game mechanisms, only that people abide by these pacts as though they were hard-coded.

You see, I don't agree with this. People must LEARN to play the game. If you didn't realize that the first DoW exhausts the DP, well... now you know. You LEARNED how to play, and you are a more skilled player now because of it. I seem to remember an older version of Civ that allowed you to target a specific nation, like "Germany makes Defensive pact with Vikings AGAINST Turkey. So if Russia attack Germany, the pact wouldnt activate, only if Turkey attacks, but that is not how it works in Civ 4. So that's another part of the problem, and it goes back to Ozzys comments about skill level. It's silly to try to make rules to account for people's lack of skill. All the rules in the world are not going to save them from being dominated. They just need to pick a Superpower to protect them and they will be fine.

Another wild option:

* Make RISK type of orders which are handed out every 100 turns, to each civ.
* We have a standard set of orders which get assigned via a double-blind system.
* You get points for completing your assignment. And that's how you win.

Examples could be:
1) Conquer a city from the highest ranking civ
2) Ally with the lowest ranking civ, and conquer a size 10 city for him.
3) Conquer a city on another continent.
4) Discover a tech which has a special bonus for the first one to reach it (GP, tech, religion).
5) Steal a tech from any of the top 5 players.
6) Raze a city.
7) Backstab an ally and conquer one of his cities.
8) Make peace with all players
9) Backstab one of the top 5 players and conquer two of his cities.
10) Attack your biggest neighbour and conquer two of his cities.
11) First ally with the lowest ranking player you have fought a war against. Then fight a war against one of your former allies.

Now THIS idea has alot of merit IMO! Maybe by tying this to the Diplo voting score we can even avoid the random civ switching thing. Who knows?

This is my variation on Calanthians Idea... We have a set of RISK-Factions style missions, each worth a set amount of points towards your diplomacy score. So theoretically, you could win in score without making a single story post. And we could make the ones we like to see happen the most be the most valuable. For instance, "Take a city from the score leader" could be a good one, or "Betray your alliance and capture one of their cities" could be really valuable. The point of the missions would be to give people a really good incentive to behave in a way that players ordinarily would not. And since the rewards and points would be totally in the Diplo score, there would be no need to create a bunch of new hadicapping rules to protect weak players, or Mods to protect weak players.

@ Inca- I think when you say the ships moved too fast "because I can't adequately defend my coast" I think you are missing the point. That's the idea. you arent supposed to be focused on defending your coast to protect you precious score. You are supposed to be focused on writing great diplo stories about what is going on in the game. Worrying about handicapping the game in a way that its easier to protect your coast shows focus on MP-style winning, not Diplo-style winning, dont you agree

[The Priest]

Exactly. The biggest factor is the skill of players, the great players rise to the top. Which is why they shouldn't stay there. Scramble the civs so the the great players take the bottom civs and vice versa. That WILL balance the game, disrupt game-long alliances, and make the game far more unpredictable and FUN.

(As nearly always) you are right Ozzy.

As others have said, we need to focus on as few changes as possible, but which actually achieve what we want. My experience is that it is easy to muddle around with almosts which don't really work. The experience through successive iterations of tech trading is a case in point in my mind. Remember voltans? vouchers? All sorts of ways to try to keep what people wanted (them doing well through tech trading) while limiting the bad effects. In the end we have come round to no tech trading and it works better. Similarly I would say the unit gifting. We all know it can have really bad effects. We have tried to control it - discussions of labelling the units to make clear they have been gifted etc. and I can really understand Inca saying we want 'only limited' but my guess is that the one way is to say 'none'. Is clear then. Small numbers of very clear rules, and then a spirit of ooc friendship does us well. Technically complicated rules tend to bring out the bad side of us all, as we try to weave around them.

The 'quests' game sounds fun to me; but then i am one of the wierd ones who thinks civ swapping would be fun. Maybe fun is the point. I kick enough ass in rl to not look for it here. Yes if i am playing i want to do well, and I get as tied up in it when you have been playing for nine months as the next man (though I did love my martyrdom operations against Egypt in DoD). Quests and civ swapping would all be about enjoying the playing - yes with some way of 'winning' i'm sure - but not really about that, if only because there would be lots of unfairness. (fair in as much as random who the unfairness happens to, but still unfair).

A great group of us from on here having a laugh playing quests or civ swapping sounds great, and a welcome change.

One other thing on the 'speed of sea movement' question. We just have to be a little careful on inbalances for landlocked states. We have had games which have emphasised 'the new world' which sounds fine, but has a disproportional impact on those states who are doing well mid-game (and so reach astronomy first) and those with ocean coastlines. It is easy by mistake to produce ten balanced start locations which seem fine, but mid game you realise four of them can really exploit 'sea favourable' set up conditions/rules while the others can't. Or to make sea conquest/settlement more powerful and not realise that this gives a massive help to whichever nations are already in the lead to get astronomy. Not a biggie, but the balance implications are worth thinking through.

[OzzyKP]

(As nearly always) you are right Ozzy.

Some of the greatest words in the English language.