Devs - suggestion for alliance wars / peace treaty problems
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Stardock Forums
Stardock Forums
Brad and crew,
There's been some talk of annoyance with trying to make peace with multiple members of an alliance and also of abusing weak allies who are forced into wars.
Basically the problem (and / or possible abuse) is this:
If you are at war with allied races and you want to make peace you must go to each in turn. While this may seem realistic it can problematic if you offer a great deal to one race and then the next race turns you down cold... leaving you still at war and with a heavy loss of resources. Worse still the alliance will force the race you amde peace with (and paid off) to go back to war with you on the next turn.
Inversely if you are at war with allied races and you are STRONGER than an opponent then you can force him to make peace with you only to have him drug back into the war on the next turn where you can once again bully him for more free goodies.
The first example above seems broken and the second a blatant cheese tactic.
Some people have suggested that a race that agrees to make peace should have his alliance severed with the other races still at war... a sign that he is not honoring his alliance. I'm not sure this is a good idea.
I don't even know if you guys are considering addressing this particular issue, but if you are may I humbly submit this suggestion - it may sound more like a "quick fix" then a solution to you, but hey it's worth considering.
If the game doesn't do this already, when a race is set to "at war" with the player because of an existing alliance (NOT because it declared war on the player) set a flag for that race like AllianceWar=true then whenever the player tries to sue for peace with that race if the AllianceWar flag is set the computer will refuse peace and respond with a canned answer such as:
"We would like to make peace with you Human, but our bond of honor with the %s will not allow it. Take your terms to them if you want to settle this war."
(you could use a standard default response string or come up with one for each alignment, race, etc.)
If the player makes peace with the original race that declared war the game would go through and clear all the AllianceWar flags and return the races from "At War" to thier original dispositions towards the player... with maybe even with a slight reduction in favor.
(in fact you could go a step further and use some formula to compare how many ships of each race were attacked or destroyed by the player since the flag was set to determine how far relations cool with that race.)
Like I say it's not the greatest solution ever, but it could stop players from "raping" weak enemies who are forced into wars by alliances AND it's a way to settle peace with all the members of an alliance at once...
heck you could even inflate the terms of settling for peace with the original "war starting" race based on the combined total military power of all the alliance members...
Good idea?, bad idea? or ugly idea?
There's been some talk of annoyance with trying to make peace with multiple members of an alliance and also of abusing weak allies who are forced into wars.
Basically the problem (and / or possible abuse) is this:
If you are at war with allied races and you want to make peace you must go to each in turn. While this may seem realistic it can problematic if you offer a great deal to one race and then the next race turns you down cold... leaving you still at war and with a heavy loss of resources. Worse still the alliance will force the race you amde peace with (and paid off) to go back to war with you on the next turn.
Inversely if you are at war with allied races and you are STRONGER than an opponent then you can force him to make peace with you only to have him drug back into the war on the next turn where you can once again bully him for more free goodies.
The first example above seems broken and the second a blatant cheese tactic.
Some people have suggested that a race that agrees to make peace should have his alliance severed with the other races still at war... a sign that he is not honoring his alliance. I'm not sure this is a good idea.
I don't even know if you guys are considering addressing this particular issue, but if you are may I humbly submit this suggestion - it may sound more like a "quick fix" then a solution to you, but hey it's worth considering.
If the game doesn't do this already, when a race is set to "at war" with the player because of an existing alliance (NOT because it declared war on the player) set a flag for that race like AllianceWar=true then whenever the player tries to sue for peace with that race if the AllianceWar flag is set the computer will refuse peace and respond with a canned answer such as:
"We would like to make peace with you Human, but our bond of honor with the %s will not allow it. Take your terms to them if you want to settle this war."
(you could use a standard default response string or come up with one for each alignment, race, etc.)
If the player makes peace with the original race that declared war the game would go through and clear all the AllianceWar flags and return the races from "At War" to thier original dispositions towards the player... with maybe even with a slight reduction in favor.
(in fact you could go a step further and use some formula to compare how many ships of each race were attacked or destroyed by the player since the flag was set to determine how far relations cool with that race.)
Like I say it's not the greatest solution ever, but it could stop players from "raping" weak enemies who are forced into wars by alliances AND it's a way to settle peace with all the members of an alliance at once...
heck you could even inflate the terms of settling for peace with the original "war starting" race based on the combined total military power of all the alliance members...
Good idea?, bad idea? or ugly idea?
