Diplomacy

[Norfleet]

Me, I start out with an implicit state of leery distrust. It can be downgraded by a backstabbing attempt into a state of open distrust, or upgraded through a history of reliability to reserved suspicion. I don't really think that trust really has a place in a game played to the death, though.

[SelfishGene]

Originally posted by Gandalf Parker:
.... The only ones I remember having a problem were the ones who wanted to go back and forth. They wanted the slate to be wiped clean between games. Hey Im real sorry about that but if Wikd allies with me and then majorly uses it to trash me, its alittle hard for me play the next game with Wikd and enter into an alliance on a clean slate. ...

This is actually where role playing can come in handy. If you still act as the same player as you did before there would certainly be a great deal of wariness and mistrust. But, if you change your persona through the tone and kind of your Messages, it helps ameliorate the sense of anxiety and lets you have a clean slate. This is actually one reason why i started role-playing pretty heavily in most of the games im in right now.

I've also found role playing is a giant help in forming relationships in game with ppl you don't know. Sort of an ice-breaker.

[Zapmeister]

Originally posted by Kel:
There is an advantage and a disadvantage to being cutthroat. I think that works out just fine, instead of trying to make everyone play the same way.

Kel, I think it's unfair to imply or state that I am trying to mold the playing community into playing the way I want. If you've been reading my Posts, you should be able see that IMHO it's the game-long alliance makers that are limiting the options of the sole victory players, not vice versa.

But the most important point, as I said before, is:

People's ability to play Dominions ceased to be as relevant as their diplomatic reputation and willingness to join an alliance.

Dominions is a distinctive and interesting game in its own right, but if joint victories are the norm, then its individuality is lost and it becomes just another strategy game where biggest bloc wins.

I don't think I'm being manipulative in trying to point that out.

[ July 01, 2004, 01:24: Message edited by: Zapmeister ]

[Pirateiam]

Me, I start out with an implicit state of leery distrust.

LMAO Oh Norfleet say it isn't so...you mistrusting??? I thought you were our community flower child! Peace and Love....
I just thought that statement was so obvious it was funy.

[Kel]

Originally posted by Zapmeister:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Kel:
There is an advantage and a disadvantage to being cutthroat. I think that works out just fine, instead of trying to make everyone play the same way.

Kel, I think it's unfair to imply or state that I am trying to mold the playing community into playing the way I want.

---

It honestly wasn't aimed at anyone in particular, please don't take it personally. There are two sides to the question with people on both sides, no doubt.

That said, I think it *is* fair to say that people who want other people to NOT be able to make joint victories are trying to get them to play the game according to their 'vision' of how it should be played. That is, while they may feel they are trying to give themselves more options, regardless, they are clearly trying to take away options from the people who want to ally.

Originally posted by Zapmeister:
If you've been reading my Posts, you should be able see that IMHO it's the game-long alliance makers that are limiting the options of the sole victory players, not vice versa.

I understand that is your position. I just don't agree with your conclusion. Let's take it to an extreme and say that every single person in the game makes a permanent alliance with one other person, except you. You will be at a disadvantage and it will be a serious challenge but you can still play the game, and win, playing the game the way you want. If you say that noone can make alliances, than you are denying them the chance to win the way they want to, completely and explicitly, whatever your feelings towards them. You are clearly limiting their options more than they are yours.

In summary, alliances have an implicit impact on your strategies while banning alliances explicitly limits those who want them.

Dominions is a distinctive and interesting game in its own right, but if joint victories are the norm, then its individuality is lost and it becomes just another strategy game where biggest bloc wins.

Dominions uniqueness does not boil down to it's diplomatic/political system. I enjoy the game, whether I form an alliance or not in that particular game. If your enjoyment of the game really all comes down to whether or not two people can permanently ally, you always have the option of making house rules for new games. That might actually prove to be a good way to avoid artificially limiting the games options as only people who want to play that way, will join that game.

Anonymous games are another way, though you learn in the first 30 minutes you ever spent on the net that anonymity brings out the worst in people

- Kel

PS, on second thought, anonmyity will let you act without consequence but I suppose it won't stop people from making alliances before the game, which is the more heinous aspect of alliances I think you are most opposed to.

[Cainehill]

What would be nice would be if there was joint / allied victories within the game, and then, by an option, you could disable this.

One problem I've seen, especially with VP games, is that alliances are ... illusionary. When one person gets the required number of Victory Points, game over - no mention of allies. This makes it harder to hew to honorable alliances, even if it is promised that "you'll share the world" by your partner.

Having them in the game would add a lot, imo. Then, people who wanted allied victories could play them out that way. And games wherein it was stated, via the game engine, that there was no allied victories, would exist as well for people who prefer to play that way, or merely desire a change of pace.

Perhaps the game could even enforce this : If the Last remaining players didn't take their turns, "A Pretender, having gathered her strength in the worlds beyond, has returned to claim her world." IE - one of the deceased players was declared victor. Maybe at random, maybe the one who had at one time been most advanced, or the Last to be extinguished.

Or the other pretenders were brought back at random, each with an equal percentage of the remaining nations provinces, thus setting the lands to war once more.

Thing is - some people really enjoy the allied play. Some people hate it. Myself, I don't like to enter into true, long term alliances in the game, but sometimes do. And when I do, I hate / loath / despise to break them.

I also keep track, on a long term basis, of who honored their treaties. Trooper, for instance, wiped me out in a Cradle map game. I didn't mind - we had a treaty which we hadn't thought to specify terms on, not an alliance. When the time came, we agreed on what would be a fair and honorable notice - 3 turns / months, I believe. Two months later, my Machaka was given notice, and I was ground into Vanheim's blood and dust.

But he behaved honorably - I remember that. I remember other players who were honorable, and I feel that's a reasonable part of the game. After all - each Pretender could be considered, a la M. Moorcock, an echo of the being behind the pretender. Pretenders all sprouting from some ... more grand divine energy.

If diplomacy, alliances, was built into the game, people could have it both ways, in different games. As is, too many people are less than happy. Ah well. Rome wasn't burned in a day.

[Sheap]

In my small gaming group we have thus far played without any diplomacy at all (this is not popular with all the players). However I feel that playing without diplomacy improves the game considerably for the following reasons.

1) Most importantly, diplomacy becomes *the single* most important factor in the game once initial expansion is over. It doesn't really matter how well you manage your empire, or how well your armies fight. It only matters who is allied with who. Effectively, diplomacy becomes the game and the entire game becomes micromanagement overhead.

In a group of people that know each other, I find that once everyone has met up and borders been established, I can pretty much predict the way the entire rest of the game will play out. When you play without diplomacy, you never know what the other players will do.

2) Diplomacy is a force multiplier and exaggerates the differences between strong (or lucky) players and weak players. Without diplomacy, everyone must defend all their borders and distrust all their neighbors. With diplomacy, empires that have treaties can pull forces off their borders to go fight other enemies. Strong empires which have more troops can better afford to defend all their borders but gain more from not having to do it. Similarly this allows harder pushes into research, and generally eliminates "drag" on an empire that can further expose any hidden balance issues.

3) Trading encourages specialization and specialization disrupts game balance. Allowing empires to focus on one particular thing gives them more of an opportunity to exploit any design flaws or imbalances that may be present. Usually games are designed and tested in single player mode where such things are hidden. Also, some races/empires/nations/whatever gain more from specialization than others do. (This isn't as much a problem with DOM2 as with some other games). An extension of this is people forging alliances before the game even starts, and designing their empire to suit.

4) Diplomacy causes hard feelings which can often spill over out of the game, or Last into future games.

5) Some people invariably know each other better than others and have an advantage forging alliances with each other (and have an advantage in predicting how the other person will play). Even if they don't go into the game with this intent, these people have a natural advantage which has nothing to do with how well they play or even how well they conduct diplomacy.

5a) Some people do not have the time, or are located in different time zones, and cannot chat in IRC all day or answer e-mails promptly. These people are disadvantaged.

Frankly, other than the nagging feeling that "I ought to be able to do this," I don't feel that diplomacy adds anything to the game whatsoever. It just creates problems.

[Zapmeister]

That was very well argued, Sheap, and you've influenced my thinking on this. Points 1, 4 and 5a are particularly well taken. Thanks for that.

[Norfleet]

Originally posted by Sheap:
In my small gaming group we have thus far played without any diplomacy at all (this is not popular with all the players). However I feel that playing without diplomacy improves the game considerably for the following reasons.

How do you go about ruling out diplomacy through posture, though? There are postures of force one can take which can very clearly indicate a lack of desire to attack: If the other player then reciprocates, what you have is essentially a de-facto peace. After all, it's just not feasible to attack everyone at once, and under the assumption that everyone is a potential enemy, you take what you can get.

In a group of people that know each other, I find that once everyone has met up and borders been established, I can pretty much predict the way the entire rest of the game will play out.

The above behavior is even more magnified when the players know each other. For instance, in our clan matches, there's little to no overt diplomacy. However, the fact that we know each other well, means that it is very easy for us to read postures, and players tend to keep to their tendencies on the grounds of an "implicit" reputation: A player who regularly attacks another player is viewed with suspicion by that player, whereas a player who regularly maintains a peaceful posture towards another player with consistency is thus regarded as "friendly".

2) Diplomacy is a force multiplier and exaggerates the differences between strong (or lucky) players and weak players. Without diplomacy, everyone must defend all their borders and distrust all their neighbors.

Diplomacy is also the counterbalance of weaker players against a stronger player: Even a stronger player may not wish to be drawn into a war on two fronts against two people at once, and may thus restrain his belligerence as a result. On the flipside, an alliance between two strong players more or less just brings the game to its inevitable conclusion that much faster.

With diplomacy, empires that have treaties can pull forces off their borders to go fight other enemies. Strong empires which have more troops can better afford to defend all their borders but gain more from not having to do it. Similarly this allows harder pushes into research, and generally eliminates "drag" on an empire that can further expose any hidden balance issues.

Assuming that players deal predominantly in good faith, and backstabbing is relatively rare due to the damage it inflicts upon one's reputation for future games, this still does not address the fundamental issue of implicit posturing: If a player begins to pull forces off the border, not enough so that the border is weakened to the point of indefensibility, and the other party, finding that he is in little danger of being attacked as a result, reciprocates, having better use for his troops than to station an overly large garrison at a neighbor who is clearly uninterested in conflict, may too elect to pull his forces elsewhere: Pretty soon you have a general reduction of force levels on the border, and the exact same effect implicitly.

Trading encourages specialization and specialization disrupts game balance. Allowing empires to focus on one particular thing gives them more of an opportunity to exploit any design flaws or imbalances that may be present.

You may have a point: This is clearly apparent in the fact that an explicitly declared team game players to an entirely different strategy - no longer is it optimal for both players to pursue advancement of their own nation in all fields, and instead specialization becomes optimal - one player may research and focus on forging, while the other harvests the resources, and remits these resources to the other player. However, if the idea that ultimately, there can only be one real winner, is retained, then there's a counterbalance to this tendency - if at the end, all players, regardless of any alliances, are required to either fight or concede to a single player, then this is moot.

4) Diplomacy causes hard feelings which can often spill over out of the game, or Last into future games.

Depending on how you define "hard feelings", this may or may not be a problem. If players hold personal grudges against other players for diplomacy performed in game, this is childish. If players maintain a certain level of wary distrust after a particularly sneaky backstab, this is only to be expected. Unavoidable implicit diplomacy can present the same effect: Even winning or losing a game in a particularly noteworthy manner can have this effect.

5) Some people invariably know each other better than others and have an advantage forging alliances with each other (and have an advantage in predicting how the other person will play). Even if they don't go into the game with this intent, these people have a natural advantage which has nothing to do with how well they play or even how well they conduct diplomacy.

Knowledge of another player's psychology is already a strong advantage in both making war against, and seeking peace with, that player: If anything, psychoanalysis is even more important when explicit diplomacy is forbidden, since then all that you have is the implicit posturing of the other player - failure to correctly read your opponent's posture results in being unpleasantly surprised, or wasting resources defending against an attack which will not come.

5a) Some people do not have the time, or are located in different time zones, and cannot chat in IRC all day or answer e-mails promptly. These people are disadvantaged.

This is a case for a ban on external diplomacy, certainly. Some games are played by the rule that diplomacy can only be conducted via in-game Messages, which puts everyone on an equal footing. There is, however, no guarantee that the player simply speaking to each other, does not already color relationships. Even if no attempt is made to actually diplomacize, merely talking about the game may be enough to influence one's course of action.

Frankly, other than the nagging feeling that "I ought to be able to do this," I don't feel that diplomacy adds anything to the game whatsoever. It just creates problems.

Ironically, the human desire to seek peace proves as much a problem in a game about war as the human tendency to fight is an obstacle to world peace.

[Wendigo]

Originally posted by Gandalf Parker:

In any case, I know that I personally would appreciate some totally anonymous games where I could play as Murgatroid instead of Gandalf Parker. I WOULD use the chance to play very differently.

Jeff Tang, where arth thou?

I did enjoy a lot those anonymous blitz games with no diplomacy that JT organized like a year ago. The map was kind of biased towards a certain strategy (Amphibious pretender, full economy pics & hyperexpansion), but having a close neighbour on each side & little control over what happened at the other side of the world did indeed keep the players on their toes...very intense.

No need to invest time in diplo was also refreshing for those of us time handicapped.