Diplomacy is broken

[Noir]

Originally posted by Didz
The bottom line is that in STW it was possible to win the game using just agents...

A certain amount of warmaking was necessary in STW in that the player needed to expand his territories and defend them up to the point that he could earn enough in order to finance assassins/bribes.

Many saw the Geishas as "cheesy" or exploits - the same was true for the Shinoby armies that were roaming unguarded AI back-provinces.

In any case though agents did have a certain importance and power and so a role in the game. Didz's point gets across: these were strategic elements - you could base your campaign strategy (stay in and turtle and invest into a Geisha house in order to hit the enemies with assassins) - now they are a sort of a "toy" - you can't really win with them, nor you can base your play upon them.

Ultimately it comes down to domination as a game goal - its very restrictive - and provides for a linear gameplay. A better system would be a broader GA, where one could cash in territories OR money accumulated for game "points". Vassalages could work the same (cash them in fo points). Other obvious point-goals (relative to the medieval period) could be Crusading and spreading the religious word (islam, orthodoxy, catholicism) among others.

The campaign AI was playing better with GA mode in MTW, in the sense that he wasn't all out to get the player - he would consider the situation much more from his point of view. That meant diplomacy too - factions were really concerned with survival (being eradicated meant the points were zeroed and the counter started from the beginning in the event of a reappearance).

The reason i advocate strict homelands and logistics is exactly to "hit" the superempire syndrom that TW suffers IMO. Strict homelands mean that the more land you occupy you are not better off logistically (can produce armies faster) but worse (you have to make more armies with the same resources and so feel the strain). Logistics will further make that visible - they can be very simple ie any stack that is not in "home province" loses men at a certain rate (crusade style) - the further from home provices the higher the rate.

Territories may switch ethnic composition and religion slowly andwith the investment of time and money relative to the player's faction (if you conquer islamic factions and are one yourself would be faster to bring them to your cause). Medieval Auctoriso presented something similar in theearly days of its conception. EB has also done that with the 4 levels of management of newly conquered towns.

The "classic" TW concept is the "more the merier" as long as you can occupy more prvinces you've got little else to worry about - this kind of linear gameplay really kills strategic choices.

Many Thanks

Noir