Diplomacy

**Kitsunegari** · February 19, 2012, 06:51 PM

I've played two campaigns briefly on H/VH and have noticed, that my proposals are always considered "balanced" and afterwards the AI "just accepts" them and gives my diplomat an earful xD, this is just for basic things like trade rights. Is this normal?
ETA: Now i'm trying a campaign as the Romans and my offer of trade rights to the Armenians and the Turks showed up as "generous" and "balanced" but both were rejected?

**Robert Guiscard** · February 20, 2012, 12:19 PM

Diplomacy relies mostly on your reputation. If it is mixed, then you will meet mixed results with diplomacy, usually only able to acquire trade rights or such. If you release prisoners, not sack towns, and not declare war on your neighbors, your reputation will go up and factions will be more likely to make deals with you.
Also, as the Romans, you have poor relations starting out with the Turks, Armenians, and the KoJ, I wouldn't bother with them. You can secure an alliance with Georgia no problem and trade rights with just about anyone except the three I mentioned, as long as you keep you reputation up.
Hope this helps

**Kitsunegari** · February 20, 2012, 02:32 PM

Wow it's that different from vanilla? Anyway i'll try Georgia next thanks!

**Iguanaonastick** · February 20, 2012, 05:05 PM

Yep, it takes some getting used to. Basically in this mod your reputation is a valuable commodity, much more valuable than the gold you get from sacking cities.

In my first game as the Romans I played like I did in vanilla: looting to fund my early expansion. The result was that everybody despised me and I got attacked by the Georgians twice and then by the Ayyubids and Seljuks at the same time. (This was back when the Seljuks were the "blue death" and tended to rule the middle of the map. Endless stacks combined with endless assassins meant... well, let's just say I was glad to meet my victory conditions for a short campaign so I could call the game over.)

In my later games I made sure to watch my reputation and usually succeed in creating a system of very solid alliances. Even the Armenians and Crusaders eventually come around. This way I can maintain buffer-states on (almost) all my frontiers which in turn means I only have to fight wars on my terms. A defensive war is much easier if you just use a few troops to support an ally and make sure they don't get overwhelmed. (Useful trick: if a faction declares war on you but not on your ally, move your stacks right next to nearby allied towns or armies. If the enemy attacks you, your ally will join in and now be at war with your enemy. Attacking an enemy stack standing next to an ally also works.)

I find that the diplomacy in Broken Crescent is a lot more fun to play than that in the average total war mod.

**Kitsunegari** · February 20, 2012, 05:50 PM

The Armenians just asked for 1500 in exchange for trade rights xD

**wudang_clown** · February 21, 2012, 03:49 AM

Originally Posted by Kitsunegari

The Armenians just asked for 1500 in exchange for trade rights xD

So?

In the long run trade with other factions gives you a lot of money. Don't be surprised then that you have to pay some sum to get trade rights.

**Kitsunegari** · February 21, 2012, 03:10 PM

Agreed, I'm cheap by nature, and got used to being able to drive hard deals in vanilla RTW and M2TW lol.

**Iguanaonastick** · February 21, 2012, 06:08 AM

It was a long-standing tradition in the Eastern Roman empire to give "gifts" to their neighbours to ensure peace and good relations. The emperors found paying gold to ferment rebellion or buy off raiders was a lot safer and more reliable than sending armies. But they also gave gifts on general principle. Any ambassador or delegation went home with a nice bag of gold or trinkets or ornamental weapons and armour.

Back in antiquity the Romans tended to be more arrogant and forceful in their dealings with other nations, but the medieval empire was a very different beast. They didn't see this as demeaning at all; on the contrary, gift-giving was a kingly thing to do and a demonstration of power and wealth, and the barbarians' greed for such things only lessened them in Roman eyes.

Which is to say: it's a good idea to occasionally pay off the AI both in gameplay-terms and from a roleplaying perspective.

**Ichon** · February 22, 2012, 02:43 PM

Yeah this is one of my favorite parts of BC after playing for awhile. So far not many mods seem to have gone this route but I like there being a tough choice whether sacking is really worth it just to get a couple buildings started 2 turns earlier. This is helped alot by by the buildings as many mods even if you don't sack you can raze buildings for 1,000s but that is less likely in BC.

**k/t** · February 22, 2012, 02:55 PM

"This is helped alot by by the buildings as many mods even if you don't sack you can raze buildings for 1,000s but that is less likely in BC."

What do you mean?

**nein** · February 22, 2012, 07:30 PM

depends on who you play as, some nations are programmed to like you and will gladly accept an alliance and trade rights... e.g. armenia and the koj. Some will hate you from the start, e.g. ere and seljuks of rum... and many more are neutral. Sacking makes any faction, even one that is programmed to like you, refuse trade rights or an alliance... you would need to give cash or a region in return. Alliances in BC are valuable because the AI cannot break them. Sometimes you can be a massive

and still obtain trade rights freely, usually with distant factions

**Ichon** · February 24, 2012, 12:56 PM

Originally Posted by k/t

"This is helped alot by by the buildings as many mods even if you don't sack you can raze buildings for 1,000s but that is less likely in BC."

What do you mean?

There aren't as many different cultural buildings that some mods offer where the building can do nothing for your faction so razing has absolutely no penalties. Nor alot of useless buildings such as SS has that provide such a small bonus that sacking them is worth it.