Chris: Hiatus from new beta players for a bit (diplomacy), but keep signing up!

[Firemad]

Hi Chris,

I just want to share with you the Star Ruler 2 Diplomacy. It's a unique and fresh diplomacy system vs others games. I don't think it's the best but it's really an innovative idea vs others.

I think the best will be yours off course haha

Here a screenshot: http://media.moddb.com/images/games/1/35/34075/screenshot16.png

You need to play the game to understand it but it's like a mini card game.

I just wish that you implement something different then a traditionnal "civ diplomacy system" or a "graphic civ diplomacy system". I think the 4X genre need an innovative new system.
If you find a good one it will help you very good for selling your game because it's the #1 thing in 4X game that every games is lacking.

I don't have the beta so I really can't have any ideas based on your game but we are brainstorming right

Others innovative ideas:

-With allies, you can create a Federation to overcome others players. You can be 2, 10 or whatever but it will counter the effect of a very strong player or AI. You can have multiple Federation. Think maybe of the WW1 or WW2 when everyone was on one side or the others, it was temporary but necessary.

-Council, like the real life ONU. Only very few can have a veto.

-Random events. I'm thinking about CK2 from Paradox that you can have problem when you force to mary another person in another country that can change the diplomacy stuff. Or maybe in CIV4 when you have all the addon... the random events can do great stuff in your advantage or can be very bad... I have no ideas what the Random events can be because I don't have the beta yet.

-I don't know if some ressources are limited but you can have something like to ally with someone for only this type of ressource and share the income or the benefit with them. Like in real life when 3 corporates work together temporary to build a bridge and after that they are ennemy again.

-Disaster...like I said I never play your game but I will take the example of Sim City with a tornado. The neighbourhood can donate stuff to help you out because you helped them in the past for something very specific for them and now you need them to survive. If they refuse to help you out because you are dying other species or some of them will react negatively with them. If he declare war againt you to crush you out...well the species that didn't like it will declare war agaisnt them without any warning.

I hope you find something good here 

[Firemad]

Welp, first off, BETA ME ANYWAY, but here's my take on diplomatic stuffs.

1. People will always try to find a way to game 4X AI Diplomacy, it's really what it's there for. Maybe have a bit of unpredictably depending on the race in question.

2. AI's almost never handle territorial dealings strategically well, I'd definitely make it hard to gain any kind of ground via diplomacy unless you feel really comfortable with how your AI evaluates the land. (e.g. player grabs the land mainly so he has an invasion point of said AI, so he asks for a piece of land that the AI might consider garbage right near his territory).

3. If AI's can initiate diplomatic contact, limit how often they pop up at the global level (e.g. if Race #1 just contacted them, Race #2 shouldn't pester you on the next turn). You can have multiple leaders contact you on the same turn, and war declarations can still happen anytime and should still popup since they are important.

4. "The 4X Diplomacy Point System", seems almost every 4X with diplomacy has a way to show the player how many points their offer is worth and how much the AI's stuff is worth. Get rid of this. Make offers generalized and actually require negotiation. You should only have a general idea of what the AI's civ values (e.g. they have a shortage of food, you have lots, so it shows up as a shiny green dot as something potentially valuable).

When you make an offer to the AI, you shouldn't get them all angry unless the offer is outright ridiculous (e.g. give me your city and i'll give you 1 unit of food, even though you need 50 to survive this turn). The AI should evaluate the offer then counter-offer with something that is high for them, and you can risk lowering their offer and making them mad from there. As long as your counter offer isn't too much in your favor again the AI should evaluate and re-counteroffer if it's still not good, if your counter offer is the same or still really bad then they get mad.

5. AI's should become suspicious of large military buildups on their border (and be equally sensitive to doing this themselves). Even as allies an AI should expect SOME military presence on the borders, but if it starts getting abnormally large they should suspect an invasion (with the exception of allies close enough to have both mutual defense and mutual war targets).

6. Some other posts have been made to this effect, but I feel you need to be able to tell the AI's your general stances on some things. When the game starts you'll get to set your initial policies (Don't like people that border me, those with bigger military forces worry me, size difference bugs me) and also place tokens down where you feel you'll be expanding, so the AI's know to either stay away or to contest you immediately.

After the initial policy/territory setting, you can change them at will but to prevent rapid changing of policies and gaming the AI, when you change your stance it will take a few turns to take full effect, and during that time your old policies begin to decay as well.

7. AI Should remember wars and how well or bad they went as a factor in their wardecs. Also the player shouldn't be penalized on future diplomatic deals with an AI if the AI was the one that initiated war.

8. Diplomatic reputation should be a factor, the AI's should track if a player tends to honor or break any deals they make, but the player being known for honoring their deals should never be a major honeypot factor for the AI to prevent gaming the system. If the player is known to break deals though the upfront payment should drastically increase to compensate for any long term deal the player may make with an AI until this improves.

Well this is all I've got for now

+1 I second everything.

For you thought about 4... I can compare it with pokers game... nobody can see your card. Why in every 4X game we the human can predict in advance what the AI wants with points... AI can't predict in advance what I have in my mind... it's a broken system in every 4X game.

If I deal something with the AI what I want is to negociate with him. Every 4X game I never felt the need to negociate like in poker because everything is the same thing.

The only diplomacy system that I can't predict something is the Star Ruler 2 system...well maybe you can predict some but you really don't know what "cards" the AI have in the hands and the AI don't know too (well maybe in the backend but I feel he don't know about it).

The best diplomacy system ever created is the Chess game. Both sides can't know what the others will do the next move. Both side need to think 5 moves ahead just in case he choose another path...that's what I want to negociate.

Poker and Chess is the key

Anyways in real life right now with government and everything with Russia (they want to conquer Ukraine or part of it), Iran (nuclear weapon), Ukraine (want to save their ass), USA (propaganda) etc. well all president in the world play chess and poker at very high level and I think it's the core of a diplomacy system.

If you can't feel the poker/chess system...well you have a broken diplomacy system

[Firemad]

Another idea:

Why every 4X game we have always a 1 vs 1 diplomacy screen ?

Why I can't have a 2vs1 or 2vs2 diplomacy screen with my ally to help me or maybe my ally screw it in the diplomacy....

Why I can't make a threath with 3 ally vs 2 others in a diplomacy screen to add more fear...

In real life you have the G10 to negociate stuff. In real life you can have 4 government that temporary ally up in the diplomacy screen to end the nuclear with Iran that appear to be alone...

It's a simple innovative idea that every 4X game are missing.

Please trow out to the windows the 1 vs 1 diplomacy screen I'm sure you can make something very innovative and different vs others.

[Traveller]

The best diplomacy system ever created is the Chess game. Both sides can't know what the others will do the next move. Both side need to think 5 moves ahead just in case he choose another path...that's what I want to negociate.

Actually, if you're going to take inspiration from board games, you should look at Go instead. 

There are very well-studied sequences of moves that are understood to give fair compensation to both players; when you invade in a certain way, you might be offering your opponent his choice between giving you territory in exchange for influence, or giving you territory on the top of the board in exchange for his territory on the left.  Chess seems like it's more about tactically out-maneuvering your opponent, while Go is more strategic and (early game at least) focuses on making fair exchanges all over the board but combining them in a way that puts you ahead.

[Gwmngilfen]

Actually, if you're going to take inspiration from board games, you should look at Go instead. 
fair exchanges all over the board but combining them in a way that puts you ahead.

Hat-tip to you, sir! I thought of Go there as well. It's a great game for teaching you to know when a battle is worth fighting, or already a lost cause - a skill worth having in many other areas of life, diplomacy/politics included.

[NichG]

I don't know how much of this can translate into a computer format, but I've been running a tabletop RPG centered around nation-building on long timescales for the last couple months, and some mechanics in particular have made for interesting diplomatic opportunities.

One such mechanic is that each separate nation can get only a limited number of sources of a resource (we're calling it Culture) that can be invested in specific bonus abilities. These bonuses apply to every nation that has open borders with the ones providing the investment. Since each nation can only provide a limited amount, to get the really nice bonuses the players have to negotiate with each-other (and with NPCs) to invest their points of Culture cooperatively.

Another mechanic is something called 'Sway' which nations with a particular technology can exploit. Whenever a territory depends on infrastructure provided by this nation, the nation gets a point of Sway over that territory which can be activated in order to influence build decisions and things like that. Essentially, they can say things like 'I know you want to build a military base, but if you want to keep pumping oil through our territory we need you to build a power plant instead'. Sway can be dissipated forcefully, but that inflicts problems. One player has been using this mechanic to basically run NPC nations behind the scenes while not actually holding any land for himself that could be invaded.

Because resources in this game reset every session if they're not used, something the players themselves came up with was to create a centralized resource exchange where every signatory nation would put their surplus resources into a pool, and nations that want to build things they couldn't normally afford could take from the pool. This had a huge effect on the game, because the way I'd designed it was that nations would have to build up resource-production bit by bit so they could afford the next building (which meant that if you wanted advanced buildings, you had to expand into multiple territories). But because of the resource pool you could have smaller nations jump straight to more advanced structures (which, combined with things like the Culture mechanic, meant that the players subsidized the construction of luxury resorts and things like that in small nations in order to get them to contribute Culture points).

So again, I don't know how much of this could really translate to a computer game, but hopefully something in there helps.

[gnosis]

if you want to see the ramifications of global trade (both good, evil and disastrous) play victoria 2. it covers spheres of influence to pump you with raw materials, investments in other nations, immigration and emigration, and other economic, political and geo-strategic forces at work.

I like the idea of sway.

Global markets in games are good cause they both create and resolve events. You usually want autarchy or large stockpiles in strategic goods to function as a military and efficiency (competitivness) in each good you manufacture and trade. Most of the time you shouldn't sell raw resources unless you have to, instead you proccess them to get more value out of them (and lower unemployment in vicy 2).

[keith.lamothe]

if you want to see the ramifications of global trade (both good, evil and disastrous) play victoria 2. it covers spheres of influence to pump you with raw materials, investments in other nations, immigration and emigration, and other economic, political and geo-strategic forces at work.

It's a very interesting game, but when I couldn't please my citizens because I couldn't get fruit because apparently Belgium produces no fruit whatsoever AND all the exported fruit in the entire world was being bought by the UK (since it had the highest prestige, it got first pick) without me getting a chance to offer a higher price... well, I found the simulation somewhat wanting

And then there was the time when over half the entire adult male population of Brazil was in armed revolt against me, only to be slaughtered when they assault on my capitol province... and then a few months later it happened again... but maybe that was my fault. Taxes were only about 50%...

[gnosis]

if you want to see the ramifications of global trade (both good, evil and disastrous) play victoria 2. it covers spheres of influence to pump you with raw materials, investments in other nations, immigration and emigration, and other economic, political and geo-strategic forces at work.

It's a very interesting game, but when I couldn't please my citizens because I couldn't get fruit because apparently Belgium produces no fruit whatsoever AND all the exported fruit in the entire world was being bought by the UK (since it had the highest prestige, it got first pick) without me getting a chance to offer a higher price... well, I found the simulation somewhat wanting

And then there was the time when over half the entire adult male population of Brazil was in armed revolt against me, only to be slaughtered when they assault on my capitol province... and then a few months later it happened again... but maybe that was my fault. Taxes were only about 50%...

Granted, the mechanic of market access was simplified to first pick based on prestige. A more detailed system with market influence would be apropriate. But that would be another layer ontop of an already complicated game (I like complicated games).

You can't get fruit, but you can get other resources to calm things and prevent unrest. Covering all of the pops needs is very tricky (as it should be). It's not just about first pick, the pop must also have the money.

The way vicky treats population is exceptional: You need to cover all of their needs, otherwise you end up killing the "starved" rebels and nerfing your own state. So rebellions hurt you more than they do in EU4. Taking land is a double edged sword: It might be populated with alot of poor and angry pops that want your head and you might create more problems by annexing them.

I don't know if you played stock or modded, but they abandoned the game in a broken state after a while so playing with pop demand mod and  mod mods is a must and solves almost all problems.

I really couldn't care less for HOI 4, bring forth vicky 3...

[keith.lamothe]

I don't know if you played stock or modded, but they abandoned the game in a broken state after a while so playing with pop demand mod and  mod mods is a must and solves almost all problems.

The Belgium game was stock, the Brazil games were with a pop demand mod and some others. With Brazil I pursued other goals but ran into the same basic problem: couldn't make cavalry because I didn't have wine, couldn't make wine because I didn't have glass, couldn't make glass because I didn't have cement (factory upkeep, I think), and I couldn't buy wine, glass, or cement because the UK was buying it all.

Maybe that's the subtext of Vicky: the UK ruins everything

[gnosis]

I don't know if you played stock or modded, but they abandoned the game in a broken state after a while so playing with pop demand mod and  mod mods is a must and solves almost all problems.

The Belgium game was stock, the Brazil games were with a pop demand mod and some others. With Brazil I pursued other goals but ran into the same basic problem: couldn't make cavalry because I didn't have wine, couldn't make wine because I didn't have glass, couldn't make glass because I didn't have cement (factory upkeep, I think), and I couldn't buy wine, glass, or cement because the UK was buying it all.

Maybe that's the subtext of Vicky: the UK ruins everything

Well, not to drag about vicky 2, UK is the big end boss of the game: the queen's name is the title of the game after all. Brazil should be an easy game. But small nations are always hard, even harder than EU4.

[tombik]

I don't know if you played stock or modded, but they abandoned the game in a broken state after a while so playing with pop demand mod and  mod mods is a must and solves almost all problems.

The Belgium game was stock, the Brazil games were with a pop demand mod and some others. With Brazil I pursued other goals but ran into the same basic problem: couldn't make cavalry because I didn't have wine, couldn't make wine because I didn't have glass, couldn't make glass because I didn't have cement (factory upkeep, I think), and I couldn't buy wine, glass, or cement because the UK was buying it all.

Maybe that's the subtext of Vicky: the UK ruins everything

Well, not to drag about vicky 2, UK is the big end boss of the game: the queen's name is the title of the game after all. Brazil should be an easy game. But small nations are always hard, even harder than EU4.

Which mods are u recommending?

[gnosis]

I don't know if you played stock or modded, but they abandoned the game in a broken state after a while so playing with pop demand mod and  mod mods is a must and solves almost all problems.

The Belgium game was stock, the Brazil games were with a pop demand mod and some others. With Brazil I pursued other goals but ran into the same basic problem: couldn't make cavalry because I didn't have wine, couldn't make wine because I didn't have glass, couldn't make glass because I didn't have cement (factory upkeep, I think), and I couldn't buy wine, glass, or cement because the UK was buying it all.

Maybe that's the subtext of Vicky: the UK ruins everything

Well, not to drag about vicky 2, UK is the big end boss of the game: the queen's name is the title of the game after all. Brazil should be an easy game. But small nations are always hard, even harder than EU4.

Which mods are u recommending?

I played and enjoyed PDM with the mod mod divide by zero. Since naselus and the PDM team stopped working on PDM, Divide by zero kept the mod torch lit.

[crazyroosterman]

so due to chrises quietness I'm going to hopefully presume that diplomacy is coming along well. (and not that chris has been abducted by aliens or beaten up by angry communists)

[nas1m]

I think he mentioned that he would be travelling for a week. Looks like it was this one.
But I think Keith is hacking away as heck on the extensive work list that Chris left behind ...