[suggestion] Diplomatic capital as a useful resource.

from Elemental Forums

Back in the beta I remember someone posting about diplomatic capital having no real value. It can be accumulated it can be traded and that's it... Of cause it is a useful tool, but I think we can improve on this.

There's an old game called Master of Orion. To be honest my knowledge of it is meager at best, but I do remember them having so called "orion senate".

This is what got me thinking - what if use diplomatic capital as an actual measure of influence? Atm this is more of an imaginary influence a player can't really use it for anything other than trading and without a real value why would another player want it over his resources?

A simplified example:

"A" asks "B" for 500 gold in exchange for his 500 influence.

"B" agrees.

Later "B" wants to sign a treaty with "A". He proposes a treaty and offers some influence. "A" refuses, saying that he'll only take gold.

"B" is now screwed because he is left with influence which he can't use.

So next time "B" is proposed a trade he will want something with real value in return.

 

Every currency must have some sort of insurance to it.

What I propose is to build a sort of world senate - an institute that passes rules and restrictions over its members by taking votes. Diplomatic influence then can be used to affect those votes.

It may have some bonuses like inter-something trading rules which let's say increases gold income for every member as a passive bonus. Or restrictions which lets say forbids it's members to advance past certain adventure level or to use certain spells. It may also force diplomatic decisions like forcing it's members to declare war on a certain country or on contrary forcing it's members to cease hostile activities.

I'm probably being to vague, but there's to many ways to implement it to be able to give any specific idea.

I'm just trying to point out that there's a promising direction for a later diplomatic expansion.

6,962 views 6 replies
Reply #1 from Elemental Forums Top

Is this a joke and I'm just thick skulled?

Have you ever played Gal Civ 2? I think stardock has a pretty good grasp on the concept since they included a "orion senate" in their game. It doesn't really fit the lore but they can think of something like a council of mages.

Reply #2 from Elemental Forums Top

I think the Diplo Capital needs to be worth a lot more than gold/gildar in game. Diplomatic influence, in real life, can move nations to war, or peace, or move mountains. It needs to be harder to gain and be worth a Lot more in trading.

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Reply #3 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Raven, reply 2
Diplomatic influence, in real life, can move nations to war, or peace, or move mountains.
End of Raven's quote
And here I was thinking that all that was because of women.O_o

Reply #4 from Elemental Forums Top

Another possibility is like the one in MoM.

 

Sometimes, heroes will offer their services, units will want to join, a seller will offer a random magical item or resource, maybe even quest maps or an arranged marriage for your son.

The higher your diplomatic points are, the better and more frequent these random rewards get.

 

You can even trade the points themselves in the said events to get the feel of an actual resource.

Reply #5 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting random_target, reply 4
Sometimes, heroes will offer their services, units will want to join, a seller will offer a random magical item or resource, maybe even quest maps or an arranged marriage for your son.

The higher your diplomatic points are, the better and more frequent these random rewards get.

 

You can even trade the points themselves in the said events to get the feel of an actual resource.
End of random_target's quote

 

That is actually great idea. That gives value to saving them, as well as the capacity to use them. I also agree with Raven X that they need to be worth more. As it stands, other AI are pretty much universally recalcitrant, and refuse to do so much as say "thank you" to you until you can will them out of existence, at which point they are falling over themselves to please you.

 

I've never actually HAD diplomatic capital at a time when I needed to use it for anything.

Reply #6 from Elemental Forums Top

The random events I suggested can also somehow be influenced by the charisma of the leader, maybe by paying less political points for the reward or something like that.

 

Whatever method of an actual use for diplomatic capital, I think it's obvious SOMETHING should be done. Otherwise, it will be a big useless area when the multiplayer games start.