Thoughts on Diplomacy

[rory_20_uk]

First off, apologies if this has been dealt with in the past.

Alterations that I thought would be helpful:

1. Increase Diplomant movement
2. Diplomats (and spies / assassins) can move between ports without using warships
3. Family members are capable of parley with cities and armies
4. Permanent access to the diplomatic screen with allies - they have a diplomat present in your capital

Diplomats IMO should be there for long distance diplomacy and sorting out more complicated agreements. Two nations that are right next to each other should be able to communicate, and I feel that this would / could give rise to further depth to the diplomatic side to the game.

For example, if a city was under siege, bieng able to request that the city capitulates with the promise that no massacare would take place. If the promise is broken, the faction would be viewed as untrustworthy.

There could be further options such as paying off the army, or out and out bribing it. I feel that not having these options merely as a diplomat is not there is unfortunate.

Family members could have more options than captains, and in general I feel that this would allow a far more fluid dimplomatic situation. Currently I find that it's easier to exterminate a foe or remain at war than go to all the trouble of getting a diplomat over the vast distance to make peace.

[Silver Rusher]

One thing that I would give anything for would be a diplomatic option that would enable you to coordinate battles with your allies. This would basically be to ensure the presence of large battles of alliances on the campaign map, which happened occasionally in MTW and almost never in RTW.

It would work simply. You would ask for one of your armies to be assisted in battle, at which point the allies would send an army to follow your one. When a battle is engaged, the army following the other one would automatically march towards the battle and join in. You would then be given control of your army, and the allies control of theirs.

[Fate]

One thing that I would give anything for would be a diplomatic option that would enable you to coordinate battles with your allies. This would basically be to ensure the presence of large battles of alliances on the campaign map, which happened occasionally in MTW and almost never in RTW.

It would work simply. You would ask for one of your armies to be assisted in battle, at which point the allies would send an army to follow your one. When a battle is engaged, the army following the other one would automatically march towards the battle and join in. You would then be given control of your army, and the allies control of theirs.

I've been really hoping for something like this, and it really would make the game much better, much mroe enjoyable and tactical. ie. have an allied army chase an enemy army, whilst yours waits to ambush their path?!

[rory_20_uk]

Diplomats IMO would be for long range diplomacy and also bribing enemy formations. The rest of their jobs are divided up between the faction's family and "innate" abilities of factions.

I don't use any agents much due to the cost as well as the hastle.

[lancelot]

The only thing I want out of diplomacy in MTW2 is the idiot factor removed...

MTW1 had a knack of accepting peace deals from superpower byzantium only for 1 province poland (or whoever) breaking treaty by suicidaly attacking byzantium the very next turn!

Waste of time and completely idiotic, plus no penalties for being a backstabbing little girl!

[Tiberius maximus]

my only thoughts are that if im trying to negotitate the surrender of england as example and i am vastely superior than i cant see how the could refuse
like in RTW i could surround a faction and have four full stacks positioned around their only city and they wouldnt surrender which means i want limits to how much diplomacy the ai can refuse exspecialy in hopeless situations

[Sun of Chersonesos]

good idea, however that goes a little deep into diplomacy, they would need to carefully program the artificial intelligence very carefully to guarantee that one will be capable of coordinating such a prepared attack with an AI user. for example, you could coordinate this coerced attack with the AI and then the AI not sending a fragment of an army whatsoever, i.e the situation would be similar going on a date in a restaurant and not turning up.

[econ21]

for example, you could coordinate this coerced attack with the AI and then the AI not sending a fragment of an army whatsoever, i.e the situation would be similar going on a date in a restaurant and not turning up.

I remember in MTW sometimes doing the opposite - fighting a battle with an ally and then deliberating standing back so that he took all the casualties, leaving me with the larger force and the province. Yes, despicable, I know.

The really fun thing was that a few turns after I did this, it inevitably turned out the ally would turn on me. It was as if CA had programmed the AI to recognise this disloyal behaviour and get offended.

Or maybe the AI was just psychotic, who knows?

[Tamur]

Interesting ideas. I really like the thought of shaking up diplomacy from a gameplay perspective. All the ways mentioned make good sense, especially a permanent diplomat in the capital for allied factions. That is just so obvious I'm surprised I haven't heard the idea before, great idea.

Additionally, it would be straightforward (except for AI use of such an option) to give a timeline requirement to the AI as part of the negotiation process... i.e. "get off my land by autumn of 1290" or "Attack Byzantium in the spring of 1350" or some such.

Even payment-based agreements could benefit from a timeline. This would allow for some fairly complex agreements like "Attack Byzantium in the spring of 1350, and we will pay you regular tribute of 1000 per turn for 10 turns starting in autumn of 1350" with the implied threat that if the attack was not carried out by deadline then no money would be going anywhere.

Not a chance this will happen anytime soon, but it's nice to dream

[rory_20_uk]

As far as I am aware, there appears to be no need to be a "good" ally. Methods that requet joint actions (with global implications for refusing / sending one unit of pesants) would make a point to having allies.

Concerning the "letting my mate take all the casualties and me the province" I'd sometimes even fire arrows and siege equipment into the melee - who cares who gets killed? They're not my troops!

Concerning balancing, a basic system would be that the AI rates the force you sent. If it's pathetic - epecially if the battle is lost - the AI isn't pleased.

Many ideas such as this IMO don't require perfect fine tuning for the AI. The modders will do a far better job. But of course they can't implement a feature that isn't there.

Civ 4 allows almost infinite moddability. It is a shame MTW2 is unlikely to be designed the same way.

[Denizar]

I think there is a lot that can be done to improve this area of the game. The agents are usually used for one or two purposes and not much. I had many ideas but some that come to my mind at the moment are:

The surrender of cities. Historically this is a very usual outcome of war. A city that is besieged should be able to surrender itself without your orders. The chances of a surrender should depend on the enemies strength, or cruelty maybe. For example alexander the great had to defeat one army at halicarnassus lets say, and later executed all who resisted his rule and who created unrest, this made his influence on the people grow, making other cities in Anatolia surrender to him without a fight. This would definately increase the quality of the game.

Spies garrisoned in cities only let you know about a certain number of things. However, I always thought that having a permanent spy in the enemy capital for instance should give you other information, about the economy of that faction or their family tree things like that...

I will write more later, but not to be able to things how they actually happened in history really bugs me. Eg. When I was playing he Alexander:Total War game, I spent a lot of time sieging all the cities in Anatolia one by one, then Middle east ... What actually happened was once Alexander defeated Darius, most of the Persian people did not resist him. They surrendered without a fight. Or at least when Alexander's army approached them.