Problem with diplomacy in the late game...

[meerkatology]

I just played a roman campaign to imperium 7+ on VH

It seems that the late game is still too easy. Despite the diplomatic penalties of later imperiums, every other faction is still scared to death of me, I'm also filthy rich by this point maintain 14 elite stacks of fully upgraded units'; with 2mil+ in bank anyone that wants to fight me can be bought off easily.

All the other factions just wants to become my client state or nonaggression pact for money. no one will go to war with me and if anyone does, they are crushed easily. Empire order is still very easily to maintain with the right techs and buildings.

When you are big and powerful other factions should gang up against you, but everyone is just SO scared of me
I've also not had a civil war at turn 240+ as i've been keeping my influence low.

[fenrir0054]

This type of thing is really just a problem with almost every grand strategy game ever made, not just Total War and certainly not just this mod. It sounds like you're well into the steamroll phase and this is the point most people start a new campaign or stop playing for a while.

[stevehoos]

I wish that somehow a script could be made that once you achieve imperium level 7 or so, the AI would really begin to gang up on you; as well one could receive massive diplomatic penalties for over expansion.

Once you get a "great empire" most strategy gamers begin anew as stated above.

[Mirozero]

Best thing for lategame is making yourself some rules. Limited armies, less usage of agents, no fullstack armies and so on.

[meerkatology]

i wish there were scripted stuff besides civil its a shame that once you get to the cool units and upgrades, u really dont get to use them.

scripted invasion from huns+steppe barbarians after turn 240? scripted alliance of the rest of the map to gang up on u after imperium 8?
feel like all those things could be done

[Mirozero]

i wish there were scripted stuff besides civil its a shame that once you get to the cool units and upgrades, u really dont get to use them.

scripted invasion from huns+steppe barbarians after turn 240? scripted alliance of the rest of the map to gang up on u after imperium 8?
feel like all those things could be done

You could just declare war to everyone, then they may gang up on you

I get the point you guys talking about, but just try to improve it yourself with some rules of your own.

[TheSavage]

Historically, large empires decline not because of external foes but because of internal instability. This is a factor in many of the Paradox games, but it sadly missing from TW series.

The corruption mechanism is a decent one to model this. But others can be added:
1a) Global public order and/or culture penalties at higher Imperium levels
1b) Better yet, random (but increasing) public order events as the game does on. (The original RTW discontent model did a much better job modeling this.)
2a) Localized (to region/province) unrest/rebellions, either scripted or by events causing rapidly decreasing P/O. These might be handled by measures to counter public order decline, military presence (patrol region), or (in the case of outright rebellion) the need to re-take the city. The rebellions would not be the scale of the "Civil War", but would result in cities/provinces or generals revolting. These revolts would primarily occur where significant non-primary culture was present
2b) Also, a provincial decree (sorry, forget the actual name for what I am calling "decree") called "grant autonomy" might be used to counter these events, but it would result in reduced tax and recruitment slots.
3) The client/protectorate aspect of the game should be much more fluid. (It would be great if it were possible to annex vassals, either when certain conditions or met or through special events.) Unrest among the populace of a certain culture or region could force the release of a vassal.
4) Death of faction leader should be a dangerous time period with heightened chance of power struggle or revolt.

Many of these things would probably require extensive scripting, and I am not sure if they are even possible. But I think the best way to prevent the player from expanding to easily once they reach a critical mass is simply to make empires more difficult to hold together as they increase in size.

[Le_Swede]

IMO, events would be a great way of creating challenge within a Total War game's late phase. This would also represent in a good fashion the different internal instabilities that arrives from having a large empire.

I personally don't know exactly what kind of events you can make in Rome 2 so this might not be really feasible.

However It would be nice to see events based on decadence. For instance when your income reaches a certain amount for x amounts of turns you get an event in which some Cato-stand in is agitating against the decadence of the younger generations. The dilemma's choices could then be something like: 1. Ban all public displays of wealth which lessen the construction costs of buildings but gives a high public order penalty. 2. Distance yourself from "Cato" which gives some public order but loses you alot of support in the senate. 3. Do nothing (which then can lead to some follow up dilemma perhaps).

The idea is basically that in the late phase you start focusing inwards due to a variety of events which handled badly can lead to rebellions, loss of income, and/or civil war.

[Zonac]

Hmm that is strange.. in the previous version of DeI (0.96 or so) when I had my last imperium 7+ empires I remember that once I hit imperium level 7 that all factions started to gang up on me.! . and all that happend within 10 turns or so (But it was a coop so our total empire was a bit bigger^^) Even though I had alliances with them and min 200+ relations

But didn't have enough time to check it in 1.0x though..^^

[Don_Diego]

I got to imperium 7 on IA campaign as Octavian, not only does the world seriously hate me, I am having trouble from within empire big time. Threat of civil war and several slave/ re-emerging factions rebelling. I had to stop playing for a bit as things are starting to really go down hill! If anything for me it has been too hard with a large empire for it to work well...

[meerkatology]

I got to imperium 7 on IA campaign as Octavian, not only does the world seriously hate me, I am having trouble from within empire big time. Threat of civil war and several slave/ re-emerging factions rebelling. I had to stop playing for a bit as things are starting to really go down hill! If anything for me it has been too hard with a large empire for it to work well...

i just started IA can't comment on it yet. I played a grand campaign rome. as long as i kept my influence low and made plenty of PO tech/buildings, all my provinces were happy and there was no civil war. the thing with external factions is that well they suck, no matter how many of them gang up on me, at that point my legions were sporting 50 attack 120 defense 100+ armor/morale from all the tech/upgrades, it would literally take 2 AI stacks vs 1 to even pose a remote challenge. and at that point u have 14 stacks running, there is simply no way for external factions to pose a threat regardless of how many of them gang up on you tbh

[Vardano]

Yes, we're in a need of genius solution of this "issue". Once you have no money problem to keep, let's say, 8 stacks, this game is finished for you, actually for AI I should say. Sad thing is that you don't want to start a new campaigns after streamrolling phase in current one, but stoping to playing for a while, cuz obviously all the cool aspects gonna be overshawded by your knowledge of what gonna happen in next campaigns and nothing is more discouraging than this for a gamer. Around 0.85 patch I did two legendary campaigns with Ptolemaoi and Seleucid and quit both of them when AI could not stop me at all at some point and I did not play this game till 1.0

[Maegfaer]

Random events for internal instability is good, but if you have millions in your treasury any rebellion can be tackled. There should be financial penalties for having a huge treasury I think, some sort of depression/inflation/corruption system.

Also, perhaps global Morale penalties at high Imperium levels could keep combat somewhat more challenging in the late game?

[Ritterlichvon86]

I share the sentiment that the late game gets too easy. Higher diplomatic penalties and higher corruption, especially after hitting level 6, is something I believe we can get happy with. Lessening the technology tax rate and empire maintenance modifiers slightly may also help to it. Tax edicts could also get reduced to 10% or 12.5% - I constantly see myself using these, primarily, and sometimes sell slaves when there are too many. How about you guys?