Opposition Influence

[dantethenephilim]

I've looked around the forum and i saw a thread, almost identical to my problem but could not find an answer to it, so here it is.

In my campaign, my influence is around 43% atm. Equites is 10, Patricii is 10 and Plebs have 37%. So, no matter what i do, influence of the Plebs won't go down. I tried everything I could, assassinations, various political actions, using only other generals leaving out Plebians but no action made it thourgh. Equites and Patricia influence going down constantly and Plebs rising.

In the thread I saw people mentioned the same problem, one party is gaining all the influence from all the actions while other two gets nothing(leaving ruling party out).

So, is this a bug? Is there a solid answer for this? I am waiting for your infos, suggestions and insights. Thank you.

[Tiny]

As stated in the thread that I brought up way back: no one really knows it seems. :S

What I did was went into the files to give myself the influence % necessary to start an Empire, then changed over. The influence stats immediately reverted for some reason, but changing to an Empire gave me some kind of buff to Party Influence that brought me into dominance.

I really don't know what to tell you though: I don't recommend what I did simply because it's complicated, and it requires poking around with values that may or may not screw your game up.

[kpagcha]

Welcome to broken vanilla politics.

[Alexander78]

If I understand you correctly, you are trying to increase the influence of your party by weakening other parties, such as the Plebs. I would not advise you to do this, and focus solely on increasing their influence without touching the rest. I think you know how to do it. A common mistake many players make is trying to weaken other parties to increase their influence. But the point is to gain influence without causing too aggressive reactions from other parties. The easiest way I use this marriage and adoption, can also act through their generals, tempering them in battle, try to capture as many settlements it generals belonging to your clan. Personally, I never paid much attention to which of the other three parties has more influence in the Senate. I'm always only interested in the influence of my party. If you want to raise the influence of your party in the Senate to reform the state system, then you have a lot of tools for this. The only thing you need to pay attention to is the balance of loyalty of other parties and changes in public order as your influence in the Senate increases. Skillfully applying various political actions you will achieve your goal and then just keep the rest of the party in the comfort zone. Anyway, that's how I always do it.

[Jake Armitage]

Main problem is there is no effect to give/remove political power to other parties (I have to check with assembly kit if there is an unused one for this, yet).
There is an event value only, still to understand how this works, since, for sure, there is an hardcoded script triggering it.

Every time main party gain influence it will take it from other parties, but it seems it takes more from who has less, that's probably the reason of.

Yesterday patch changed something about political influence. Give it a try.

[Alexander78]

Every time main party gain influence it will take it from other parties, but it seems it takes more from who has less, that's probably the reason of.

Yesterday patch changed something about political influence. Give it a try.

Hi Jake. As far as I've noticed, our worst relationship is usually with the party that has the most influence in the Senate. As a rule, this Plebs, which is always represented by a large number of senators from all three competing parties. Getting more power, we weaken other parties maybe it happens as you describe it. I have always solved this problem by promoting Plebs members only in extreme cases, when their loyalty fell too much towards me. I tried to promote and hire characters from other parties to balance influence. I hope the new patch will make this task easier. Cheers!

[Jake Armitage]

Exactly, to be honest I've never had great problems to balance influence.
Personally, I'll have more experience and knowledge about this when I'll be in an advenced stage of the political overhaul.
For now I have impressions only.
Always remember that DeI is a strategical game, so everyting should be weighted.


Please, for specific questions/reports/ideas, write into this thread: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...or-downloading
Thx

[dantethenephilim]

If I understand you correctly, you are trying to increase the influence of your party by weakening other parties, such as the Plebs. I would not advise you to do this, and focus solely on increasing their influence without touching the rest. I think you know how to do it. A common mistake many players make is trying to weaken other parties to increase their influence. But the point is to gain influence without causing too aggressive reactions from other parties. The easiest way I use this marriage and adoption, can also act through their generals, tempering them in battle, try to capture as many settlements it generals belonging to your clan. Personally, I never paid much attention to which of the other three parties has more influence in the Senate. I'm always only interested in the influence of my party. If you want to raise the influence of your party in the Senate to reform the state system, then you have a lot of tools for this. The only thing you need to pay attention to is the balance of loyalty of other parties and changes in public order as your influence in the Senate increases. Skillfully applying various political actions you will achieve your goal and then just keep the rest of the party in the comfort zone. Anyway, that's how I always do it.

It is not a matter of ruling party influence. I always hold my ground around 40%, because I like that the best.

I accidentally send the post sorry. Anyway, the thing that I am interested is that, I want to have a balanced senate, but other 2 parties goes under 10% influence and plebs almost have 40%, that sucks. They don't even deserve it, I always help other two parties militarily ant politically.

[Alexander78]

I accidentally send the post sorry. Anyway, the thing that I am interested is that, I want to have a balanced senate, but other 2 parties goes under 10% influence and plebs almost have 40%, that sucks. They don't even deserve it, I always help other two parties militarily ant politically.

I understood. I'm afraid you can't put Plebs on a short leash. Their influence will still be greater than the rest of the parties. Apparently the developers felt that this is historically correct. In turn I will ask a question: you tried to adopt and then to marry members of the your party with members of other parties not belonging to Plebs? In my case, it helped to reduce their influence in the Senate a bit. But on the other hand, this step will increase your influence and you are unlikely to stay within 40%.

[dantethenephilim]

I understood. I'm afraid you can't put Plebs on a short leash. Their influence will still be greater than the rest of the parties. Apparently the developers felt that this is historically correct. In turn I will ask a question: you tried to adopt and then to marry members of the your party with members of other parties not belonging to Plebs? In my case, it helped to reduce their influence in the Senate a bit. But on the other hand, this step will increase your influence and you are unlikely to stay within 40%.

Well, Plebs should be more crowded but 37%? Insane. I used adoption, marriage and assasination, or even persuasion of a Plebian to join me. But even if their influence goes down for like 1%, they increase their influence in 5 turns, drastically. Because of my attmepts, my influence is around 45% but Plebians are still the same, Equites and Patricii went down instead. Always those two. Dont know what to do, guess i'll try the new beta version.

Is beta version save game compatible? And I have an out of topic question. Am i able to edit my posts? I've sended accidental posts and i want to merge them but couldnt find an edit button.

[Jake Armitage]

beta version is compatible, could have some issues with pirates but don't think so

you can edit your post when at 25 posts (you have 10)

Could be there is something hardcoded so when a party has high power he'll continue to drain power from the other 2 parties.
I'm sure plebeians have not some privilege about this issue. For the game they are just number 3 of 3, nothing else.
If a party gains power is just casual whatever party it is.

[Ptolemaios Soter]

If your goal is to balance your influence, there’s a system that works very well with lots of tools. If your goal is to manage the influence between opposition parties, it’s broken - don’t try. Like Alexander says, I’m not concerned about which of opposition is strongest because it has no gameplay impact.

[kpagcha]

I'm sure plebeians have not some privilege about this issue. For the game they are just number 3 of 3, nothing else.

Well in my campaign it was also the Plebs getting overwhelming influence over the rest. Too much of a coincidence that it's always the Plebs for all of us don't you think?

[Jake Armitage]

Well, I can't be 100% sure, but this would means CA put some hardcoded preference to their third party (house papiria). And so to every third party for every other faction, since other parties should be identified by progressive numbers (so I've seen into CA scripts, have to test these functions yet).
This seems quite unlikely to me, in terms of both concepts and coding.

Also, I always play Rome without recruiting nor marry unneccessary chars (max 3+2+2+2 with only a couple married) and plebs are always the poorest in influence terms.
Influence balance remains mostly as for the beginning, slowly growing for main party but not affecting unequally the others. In all my campaigns Patricians tends to have more than the other two, 'cause they start with more influence and with a strong leader.

My advice, for now, is not to recruit people you don't need. Nor make a lot of children 'cause they are completely useless (and not historical, since ruling succession between father and son were very rare and begun with the medieval era).
You need a general and all chars are already busy? Ok, you recruit one, otherwise, don't.
It's not a collecting cards game, imo. It's a strategical one, where many things matter, and modding is the way to try limiting flaws.
We'll see what we are able to do about these power discrepances.

[dantethenephilim]

Well, I can't be 100% sure, but this would mean that CA put some hardcoded preference to their third party (house papiria). And so to every third party for every other faction, since other parties should be identified by progressive numbers (so I've seen into CA scripts, have to test these functions yet).
This seems quite unlikely to me, in terms of both concepts and coding.

Also, I always play Rome without recruiting nor marry unneccessary chars (max 3+2+2+2 with only a couple married) and plebs are always the poorest in influence terms.
Influence balance remains mostly as in the beginning, slowly gorwing for main party but not affecting unequally the others. Patricians tends to have more than the other two, in all my campaigns, 'cause they start with more influence and with a stron leader.

My advice, for now, is not to recruit people you don't need. Nor make a lot of children 'cause they are completely useless (and not historical, since ruling succession between father and son were very rare and begun with the medieval era).
You need a general and all chars are already busy? Ok, you recruit one, otherwise, don't.
It's not a collecting cards game, imo. It's a strategical one, where many things matter, and modding is the way to try limiting flaws.
We'll see what we are able to do about these power discrepances.

Well, things you say about the code forcing me to believe it is just a silly coincidence. And your save game sounds fine. But again, when I had this problem, at first I thought it was because something I do, I tried to solve it with mechanics. But after some point it felt like something is wrong about the mechanics. You know the feel, you feel something is off. So out of curiosity I searched in the forum and found a thread just about that. Many people having the same issue. So two possibilities:

1)Many total war players, are doing something wrong without knowing or realizing which empowers just the Plebieans(which is possible, yes we play a lot but there are always things we do not know), game is coded as it should be and it is all fine.

2)There is a minor issue about politics mechanics, maybe starts with a little trigger, causing Plebians the have half of the senate in like 5 years, draining equites and Patricia no matter what you do.

In two cases, we need to understand clearly, what is causing this, so far I am unable to do it but I will play games specifically understand this problem.

Also have a question about this issue. Is it possible that, if growing 3rd class citizens boosting the plebeian senators? Is there a mechanic like that?

[Jake Armitage]

No, absolutely not. Population system is not linked to power.
Neither could be in a good way afaik, since functions and effects for political power are really limited, sadly.

Sorry, I messed with the threads commands, wanted to edit and posted a new one

1)Many total war players, are doing something wrong without knowing or realizing which empowers just the Plebieans(which is possible, yes we play a lot but there are always things we do not know), game is coded as it should be and it is all fine.
Some events are random, could be that the hardcode is set to have more probability to spawn for poorest party. Then they get too much and they are unstoppable at this point. Just prevent it before, not after ,'cause you don't have the means to do this (for now, maybe something can be done).

2)There is a minor issue about politics mechanics, maybe starts with a little trigger, causing Plebians the have half of the senate in like 5 years, draining equites and Patricia no matter what you do.
Political mechanics are foggy, and I fear most parts will have to stay this way due to lack of possibilities to modify them. But something can be done to limit it, hopefully.

[kpagcha]

Well, I can't be 100% sure, but this would means CA put some hardcoded preference to their third party (house papiria). And so to every third party for every other faction, since other parties should be identified by progressive numbers (so I've seen into CA scripts, have to test these functions yet).

Actually, funnily enough, in my current campaign as Epirus it is also the THIRD party (Thesprotian Nobility iirc) getting the other chunk of the pie while the other two have 0 nobles.

[Jake Armitage]

Look, kpagcha, a lot of things could be, since they are hidden.
But if in every campaign you always have 2 parties with 0 senators it means that you don't mind about this issue.
Should the game let you play as you want and have a reasonable balance? yes it should.
Does it? No.
So, or you persists into having 2 parties at 0%, or you try to find a way to prevent it.
I have found it by not recruiting futile chars. I like both the gameplay style and the fact I can control political power.

[Augustus9260]

Unless this has been changed since I last played, it could be that you have your most influential generals in Plebeian-owned regions? I had a similar problem in my last campaign. If you look at the strategic map you can filter your owned-regions by party control. From what I understand even if a general is from your party, if he is in a Plebeian-owned region his influence will go to them each turn.

It may not be the main underlying cause of them having that much power but it could be compounding it.

I think I read about this effect a while ago on here somewhere. I haven't played since CA introduced Empire Divided though so this might not still be in place.

[Jake Armitage]

Really?
Would be nice to track down where you read it, it 's the first time I've heard about it.
Could be, who knows...
I'll keep in mind and check it.

Thanks for sharing.