Diplomacy: Choice between becoming an enemy or client-state of Rome?

[Steel*Faith]

Unlike anything we've seen in previous TW games, more specifically the first Rome, I'm wondering if Rome II has deeper diplomatic choices and effects; more specifically the alternative choice to becoming a client state of a greater Empire. So I have a question for CA, and I hope we can get some answers to this in the coming months. Here's the ideas I been thinking of and wondering if we can expect to see this in-game.

The time comes in the campaign, and you are approached by Rome and they offer you to either serve them and retain some of your freedoms and gain the "benefits" of serving Rome, or you have the choice to oppose them and become enemies. So what will happen in these scenarios? If your kingdom isn't in a position (yet) to oppose Rome, and you decide to become a client state and serve Rome, how will this change your campaign experiences and gameplay? Will Rome demand regular tribute, perhaps even take territories from you, and make you raise troops to support them in their expansions or defense of their Empire? If you fail to offer them what they want, will Legions invade your land and take what you have by force?

For example: certain nations, such as Germanic Batavia became a client-state of Rome, but they did not give Rome tribute of resources or any kind of wealth, and Rome only demanded them to offer them troops to serve as specialized Auxiliaries for the Legion - notable service being in the conquest of Britain. So different nations had different relationships with Rome and offered different services to them.

Alternatively, are there any examples of nations who were true allies of Rome, and were treated with much respect and dignity through a long-standing relationship with them? Or are there only two choices of either serve Rome, or become their enemy?

So in my campaign as Lacedaemon (Sparta), if I choose to become a client-state of Rome, I'm curious if serving them will offer me much benefit, as well as stressful demands, while I'm struggling to control Greece. Hopefully relationships with Rome and other nations will have new complexity in the choices you make to either ally with them or oppose them - improved from what we saw in Rome I.

Thoughts and comments?

[Needs New Name]

I for one would love to see the diplomacy, particularly in the areas of vassals/alliances improved upon.

I think a lot of what the OP said sounds great, I think it would be even better if units or stacks could be attached to allies, so that if your ally demands that you help them in a war, it actually means something, and your lesser faction isn't merely operating independently of your more powerful ally.

It would add a lot to the campaigns and diplomacy, and even the battles, where your forces could, say, hold the left side of the battle line, with your allies on the other. It would be particularly realistic regarding the Romans, where auxilia would often form up on the flanks of the Roman legions. Imagine the despair at having your allies swept from the field, or the elation at having them save your struggling forces at the last minute! Also, it would open up a lot of depth, such as the type of treachery that Arminius carried out (what will your "allies" do if your cavalry abandons the field, or joins the enemy?)

It would really be very cool to have to do the sort of "balancing act" that many less powerful factions during Antiquity had to in terms of foreign relations/alliances. You might have to do certain things in order to keep your alliance or aid, which may have varying effects on your faction's economic and social stability.

And you know, it might turn out to be quite fun to have to deal with an overbearing but necessary alliance, or you might be content to serve as faithful and valuable allies to the greater faction and ride their coattails, to accompany them into battle and earn the rewards, or even pull an Arminius on them

[Historyaswas]

I love both of your ideas and hope they do them in the game that would be amazing being Rome and forging alliances and having them fight with you in battle!

[Steel*Faith]

And you know, it might turn out to be quite fun to have to deal with an overbearing but necessary alliance, or you might be content to serve as faithful and valuable allies to the greater faction and ride their coattails, to accompany them into battle and earn the rewards, or even pull an Arminius on them

I like your ideas as well. This kind of betrayal done by Arminius is an inspiration of a plot I'm planning on doing, but with greater emphasis on advancing on Rome afterwards. Although, unless we have some kind of feature that allows us to plan attacks with the AI, it might not work as we hope. So I'm hoping we have a feature that allows us to coordinate with other factions, and plan specific dates to attack an army, fort, or city.

Also, what if I'm playing Sparta and they're a vassal of Rome, and by being aligned with them, we are enemies of Germania. What if I want to conspire against Rome, and give the Germans tactical information, and also plan on striking together with them against a Roman army? A feature to contact an enemy general during the battle, or before the battle starts would be really interesting; that way if I'm working jointly with the Romans in a battle, I can decide if I want to secretly contact the opposing General and offer a secret alliance to unleash on the unsuspecting Romans once the battle starts. I think these kind of features would be even more fun in MP campaign!

In regards to coordinating attacks with the AI allies; hopefully we have a feature to inform them of where and when we plan to attack. So let's say I'm launching an amphibious assault landing into Sicily, my AI ally can come and offer protection with the fleet, aid in the assault themselves, or even attack an exposed part of Rome while they're busy with my forces in Sicily. Clearly this can get pretty in-depth, so I don't expect wonders from CA in this regard, but some kind of advanced communication and strategic diplomatic options would advance this series in a huge way.

[Dan113112]

Well, you've been able to become a protectorate/vassal of another faction in most TW games.

[jsully16]

Sounds pretty good. I've been playing RTW lately, and in a campaign with Macedon I wanted to work my way east and re-conquer Alexander's Empire. I wanted to create peace with the Brutii Romans, obviously failed to do so, and was stuck defending Greece from Rome every turn with a few armies while conquering east slowly.

I would pay tribute to Rome with gold or troops to be able to focus elsewhere in my campaign and not have to worry about Rome until I wanted to.

[SinerAthin]

One of the first things that springs to mind when talking about benefits when dealing with a superior faction would be technological advancement.

Being a client-state of Rome should for instance help your technological developement a great deal(unless you are already ahead of them).

And lucrative trade agreements could also be balanced by "required donations".

In fact, I could also expect Rome to even help you develope your economy/infrastructure, for if you got more money and goods, the Romans would in turn get more money and goods themselves. Maybe high-standing Romans could also be allowed to live in your regions and build their villas there, which would give you both money and influence.

[Needs New Name]

Lots of good ideas here

I think that more collaboration in battles could be achieved with a sort of "attachment" feature, where a number of allied troops would stick with your army (or you stick with theirs) automatically, and it wouldn't count toward your stack's unit limits. It would be a diplomatic option, asking them to help or offering help. Another plus is that since it wouldn't count towards your or the ally's stack, alliances would be much more powerful. I guess it might be represented by a different shade of color on your stack's flag, or perhaps with another tab that says "Allies" or something of that nature.

Of course, this is all speculation and wishful thinking, but a man can dream

Also OP, I think as far as the Romans treating allies with longstanding alliances with dignity, the relations with some of the Italic cities could be described that way I suppose; cities who remained faithful during times of peril and such might be granted Roman citizenship for their service. Also, maybe the relationship with Eumenes of Pergamon, who ceded his kingdom to the Roman Republic in his will. (Of course, such goodwill between nations isn't always out of the kindness of their hearts, but mutual interest... although that's a digression)

[Steel*Faith]

Being a client-state of Rome should for instance help your technological developement a great deal

In what ways could the Romans improve the technological development of a foreign people?

I think that more collaboration in battles could be achieved with a sort of "attachment" feature, where a number of allied troops would stick with your army (or you stick with theirs) automatically, and it wouldn't count toward your stack's unit limits. It would be a diplomatic option, asking them to help or offering help. Another plus is that since it wouldn't count towards your or the ally's stack, alliances would be much more powerful. I guess it might be represented by a different shade of color on your stack's flag, or perhaps with another tab that says "Allies" or something of that nature.

That's a nice feature that would work great I think. If you could attach your troops to an AI army, you would loose control of their movement on the map, but it would be good to have an option to use them during the battles the AI fights - the better you perform with them, the more prestige your nation gets for serving Rome in it's conquests. Plus, it gives you more opportunity for fun gameplay an action, and they could even create different scenarios for these type of engagements. Like, send your auxiliary force across a river, without being seen, and attack the enemy supply from the rear while the Legionary force attacks the majority of the army from the front - stuff like that.

To quote myself from the thread "Will facing large factions be scary?"

That being said, I want to AI to betray me only if it really was in their best interest to do so, but at the same time, I want the game to recognize healthy long lasting alliances, or even increased loyalty between certain nations. Think of a game like the Sims, where you need to reach a certain level before you gain something, or before someone becomes your friend; I want diplomacy to work - almost like a mini-game - where if you accomplish enough tasks and good gestures (helping a faction when they're in trouble, aiding one of their cities during a siege, giving them money when they're in debt etc), then that faction will reach a point where they are much more likely to stay loyal in an alliance with you, and do the same to help you when you need it. So maybe there could be something like a "Diplomatic Alliance" of multiple level - let's say 1-to-10 - and if you reach a level of 10, you can be pretty certain you and your ally have done enough for each other that when **** hits the fan, they're going to stick by you, because you stuck by them.

I think this part of what I was talking about was another point I wanted to bring up in this topic. How do you guys feel if diplomacy worked in this way, so you can forge a strong bond with other factions? To expand on this, I hope minor factions within your own culture will have bonuses to diplomatic relations, while those totally foreign and opposite of your own culture will be very difficult, but possible, to create a strong alliance - think Greeks trying to make an alliance with Germania - yikes.

Also OP, I think as far as the Romans treating allies with longstanding alliances with dignity, the relations with some of the Italic cities could be described that way I suppose; cities who remained faithful during times of peril and such might be granted Roman citizenship for their service.

I agree, that is along the lines with idea I was talking about above. I want there to be rewards from the AI allies (depending on the faction) for helping them and being loyal to them. Serving Rome should be like walking a tight rope with a chest full of treasure at the end of it; there's going to be a lot of fear and close calls before you reach the end of it, but if you do, you get rewarded for it.

Many times I ask for an alliance with an AI faction, their demands would be to take the majority of the gold I had, or even some of my territories - that's pretty damn insulting. So I'm talking about the AI acting with some reason, and not like they're Al Capone coming into my store and demanding protection money from me, so some bad guys don't come in and break my legs and burn my store down, that's not really diplomatic behavior, unless you're a Roman maybe?

I was thinking of how Rome treated their client states, such as in Britain, and it didn't seem all that different than how the Italian mafia operates where I live haha! So I guess CA won't need to change the AI all that much when it comes to Rome's behavior.

[SinerAthin]

In what ways could the Romans improve the technological development of a foreign people?

It would be relative to your current technological developement.

You'd get % boost on technology already developed by Rome, and you'd also gain a small passive for their own developement system.

Of course, you'd gain less if you were already developed far ahead of them.

[Needs New Name]

Well, I feel like the relations with client states/allies (and foreign factions in general) would be well represented if the way AI reacts to your demands is more logical. Even as the powerful faction in an alliance, you still might have to walk a fine line in order to not alienate your allies, while still trying to get from them what you want/need.

On that note, some factions might be rather easily cowed and comply with you, while others might voluntarily seek your friendship and comply, while others still might reject your faction and cultural influence completely. If the power struggles in fractious areas like Gaul or Greece are well represented, client states/allies will be very useful indeed, and add depth to the game, because by keeping a friendly faction in power you may extend your power in a region, or use a just pretext of defending your allies to expand more (which doesn't make all the other factions despise you). Furthermore, NOT defending an ally should hurt your reputation as well, you may be viewed as impotent or unreliable.

[Swiss Army Cheese]

A feature I would like would be to offer yourself up as a client kingdom, instead of waiting for the enemy to demand you be one.

[Sun Jetzu]

Unlike anything we've seen in previous TW games, more specifically the first Rome, I'm wondering if Rome II has deeper diplomatic choices and effects; more specifically the alternative choice to becoming a client state of a greater Empire. So I have a question for CA, and I hope we can get some answers to this in the coming months. Here's the ideas I been thinking of and wondering if we can expect to see this in-game.

The time comes in the campaign, and you are approached by Rome and they offer you to either serve them and retain some of your freedoms and gain the "benefits" of serving Rome, or you have the choice to oppose them and become enemies. So what will happen in these scenarios? If your kingdom isn't in a position (yet) to oppose Rome, and you decide to become a client state and serve Rome, how will this change your campaign experiences and gameplay? Will Rome demand regular tribute, perhaps even take territories from you, and make you raise troops to support them in their expansions or defense of their Empire? If you fail to offer them what they want, will Legions invade your land and take what you have by force?

For example: certain nations, such as Germanic Batavia became a client-state of Rome, but they did not give Rome tribute of resources or any kind of wealth, and Rome only demanded them to offer them troops to serve as specialized Auxiliaries for the Legion - notable service being in the conquest of Britain. So different nations had different relationships with Rome and offered different services to them.

Alternatively, are there any examples of nations who were true allies of Rome, and were treated with much respect and dignity through a long-standing relationship with them? Or are there only two choices of either serve Rome, or become their enemy?

So in my campaign as Lacedaemon (Sparta), if I choose to become a client-state of Rome, I'm curious if serving them will offer me much benefit, as well as stressful demands, while I'm struggling to control Greece. Hopefully relationships with Rome and other nations will have new complexity in the choices you make to either ally with them or oppose them - improved from what we saw in Rome I.

Thoughts and comments?

The Athenians needed help against the Spartans they asked the Persians for help. The Persians asked for a gift of earth and water. That ment they were part of the Persian empire. The Spartans attacked so fast that Athens couldn't ask the Persians for help so they defeated the Spartans on their own. They deem the contract with the Persians void and this lead to Marathon and Thermopylae.
That would be alot of drama in the game and it would be great

[Ichon]

One of the biggest demands Rome placed upon clients was control of their foreign diplomacy. No outside wars without Roman permission. In that case in game if you accept becoming Roman client you would have to wait for a period of civil war or unrest within Rome (or major war that will be ongoing for some time) to break client status. Or attempt to maneuver as a client with diplomacy getting Rome to declare war on your enemy from which you can profit by gaining territory (Numidia, Armenia, some of the Greek cities initially).

[The Teutonic]

I know it's a simple request, but I would an option of demanding/gifting troops to other factions (without the cost of upkeep). That way alliances and battles would actually mean something, instead of hoping for an ally to be in the region/area your attacking.

[Woodrow Skillson]

I know it's a simple request, but I would an option of demanding/gifting troops to other factions (without the cost of upkeep). That way alliances and battles would actually mean something, instead of hoping for an ally to be in the region/area your attacking.

Really the easiest way to make military alliances effective would be to give the palyer control of a stack of allied units. You can't pick what is in the stack or how it is reinforced, but at the very least you can direct it to be in the right place at the right time.

[MathiasOfAthens]

It would be amazing to have this choices in the game. I am uncertain as to whether CA will implement this but who knows.


I would like to see a simple client-state system. One which is voluntary entered into. And one where a tribe is conquered and instead of annexing the land outright the tribe becomes an ally, tributary and whatever other goodies. However, as long as you remain strong it will serve you and offer you troops to recruit. Plus in 10 years or 20 or whatever the land automatically becomes yours. If there is some sort of Infamy system you wouldnt gain any through this annex.

The voluntary client state system would be a simple ally who may or may not offer tribute but would offer troops to you. Notable cases throughout history of this type of alliance. Caesar received many auxillaries from allied gallic tribes in the gallic wars. Forexample when he conquered the Suissonnes he demanded they surrender and enter into an alliance with rome where they would only provide troops to Caesars army. Same as other gallic tribes.

[Steel*Faith]

You know what might work quite well for Rome II? A type of Pope/crusade feature from Medieval II, but tailored for this game. That way Rome can issue orders and demands to clients states, and give you deadlines for when to achieve those objectives. If you succeed, you gain favor with Rome, and if you fail you loose favor - loose enough favor and you get invaded. A game called Caesar III had something like this, where the Senate would give you objective to raise Cohorts, and then send them to join the Legion and support in various campaigns.

[Historyaswas]

You know what might work quite well for Rome II? A type of Pope/crusade feature from Medieval II, but tailored for this game. That way Rome can issue orders and demands to clients states, and give you deadlines for when to achieve those objectives. If you succeed, you gain favor with Rome, and if you fail you loose favor - loose enough favor and you get invaded. A game called Caesar III had something like this, where the Senate would give you objective to raise Cohorts, and then send them to join the Legion and support in various campaigns.

You Are A Genius You Are Now My God!!!

[LewisVee]

It would be cool if you give them soldiers and your men follow the moves of the legions and when it comes to a battle you are reinforcements and control your guys helping rome in a battle