How do you improve Diplomats

**upthehammers** · 08-27-2007, 17:18

For starters, which city you recruit your diplomat in plays a crucial role. Here you are more focused on avoiding traits then picking up certain ones. The main negative trait, and most common from what I have seen, is Dogmatic Beliefs (IIRC). This comes from having a certain level of church in that city. Maybe begins at Abbey, but def with Cathedral. The real problem with this trait is that it becomes worse with time. Dogmatic Beliefs is only -1 but eventually becomes Would-Be-Inquisitor, a -3. So avoid that.

To counter this, cities with advanced civic improvements in the city hall line increase the chance of having positive traits added at recruitment. However, I have found that the negative religious traits have appeared a lot more than the positive civic based ones.

A bit of luck comes into play as the new diplomat could have no natural skill or could have up to +2 with traits such as Natural Mediator. That is simply chance but usually new diplomats have some kind of base trait that adds skill.

As for training them, getting them the first two levels of experience (Promising Diplomat/Good Diplomat IIRC) is fairly easy. Within two or three successful negotiations, they have usually reached this point. This can be done by sending them out to do the basic trade rights/alliance/map info exchange, almost always a guarantee at the beginning of the game. Keep using that same diplomat and pretty soon he will reach that third level (forget what it is called) and have +3 experience. The flipside to this is that any negative aka rejected negotiation has the chance of adding the negative versions of these traits, like Poor Diplomat (-1). Again, a string of these and the negative points start adding up. Pay attention to the balance indicator at the bottom (demanding, generous, etc.) and help get good results to build experience.

At this point, the diplomat is probably far from home and will start picking up a few extra traits. The key is to get that first one because like the religious trait, this expands with time. Bilingual is fairly common (+1) and will eventually become Multi-Lingual (+2) and Translator (+3). The key to this is keep him moving all around the map. Also, certain ancillaries will start appearing for the same reason. Foreign Dignitary is the most common (+1). I can’t recall the others off the top of my head but they come from travel and time. Not much you can do but hope.

Another tact is bribing. If you have a little extra cash, seek out small stacks (1-3 units) of rebels or factions you can suffer to have relations worsen with. Note: Don’t try this until you have reached around 4/5 experience. I’ve never seen this work without a decent diplomat and you don’t want to risk picking up negative traits due to failed negotiations. Make sure the stack is not a family member, unless the loyalty is extremely low and/or they have a trait that makes them extremely easy to bribe. Even then, I avoid doing this because then he becomes a member of my family and a liability. The point of all this is two-fold. First, successful bribes increase your diplomats ability to do just that. The trait line (Switches/Changes/Breaks IIRC) loyalties increases 10/20/30% chance of successful bribe. IMO, it’s really good to have at least one diplomat that is good at this to either get you out of a tight spot or intervene in a foreign situation and influence the outcome to your benefit. (Think bribing off a Milanese Army that is going to attack Venice when Venice is your ally, etc. No open war but you still stopped their army and their borders from expanding.) As for your diplomat, successful bribes can lead to gaining the Discreet (+1) and then Secretive (+2) trait. I’ve never seen the (+3) trait but I suspect it exists as the corresponding Bribe traits got up to three levels.

That should get you a 10+ experience diplomat in time. I usually get to 7 no problem and 10 about half the time. On a side note, I had long thought that diplomats should be able to achieve Master Diplomat (+5) just like spies (Master Spy) etc and other agents. I was never able to until recently and it was only through constantly opening negotiations, as trivial as they were. I honestly would have my diplomat speaking to someone every turn, even just to exchange or sell map info. So getting to +4 level (Excellent Diplomat maybe?) is fairly easy. However, that last level seems almost impossible to reach consistently. CA seems to have balanced this out however by all the other ways to gain skill.

Hope that helped. Diplomacy isn’t this games strongest part, but still good. However, I have found with a one or two powerful diplomats in key regions (Iberia, N. Italy, Constantinople) you can really influence the world at large and shift the power balance as you need it.

**_Tristan_** · 08-27-2007, 17:39

For my part I use to send a diplomat to each and every faction on the map and rotate them as much as possible (one chasing the other) and negotiating map info or offering to give a region every turn (which I rarely do because the AI refuses almost every time)

Playing the Long Road mod, that means around 20 diplomats on the filed at any given time and 20 negotiations every turn... All of my diplomats have around +5 and more...

**Bob the Insane** · 08-27-2007, 19:31

Here is a slightly off topic quesiton...

If I have a high rated diplomat is it better to use him against captains (who have not rating as such) or against faction members or other diplomats?

**upthehammers** · 08-27-2007, 20:04

Depends what you want to accomplish. In terms of getting your diplomat a higher rating, captains offer a better chance of success but you need to do more of those in order to get to the next experience level. Family members are usually much harder but if you do get it then you take a huge step towards the next level, if not getting the trait increase right then.

Turning other diplomats is a matter of how good yours is compared to theirs. Everything applies like when trying to bribe a family member but instead of loyalty you are going against skill level. (Influence)

That’s all for just increasing your diplomat’s influence rating. If you are doing this cause you need troops or a good general etc, then go for captains or family members w/ low loyalty or traits that make them really easy to bribe. Remember, this will worsen your standings with that faction.

**Guru** · 08-27-2007, 20:36

Politics... Diplomacy, it's a dirty game. Succesful bribes will make your reputation take a hit. The Russians didn't want to sell Helsinki so I bribed the settlement. My reputation went from mixed to dubious. Of course, I didnt want to be dubious. Well, I loaded a previous save and took the place by force. My reputation didnt seem to take a dive and soon I was reliable... People trust you if you attack them but they do not trust you if you pay them.

- Guru