Salutations!
In my recent playthroughs i have noticed an aspect of pollution, that may need rebalancing, and i have not seen mentioned often. This is the impact of pollution on Diplomacy.

When you are the "Top Polluter" (per turn, or total) in game, the AI will dislike you for it. This is is by itself a good impact, but the balancing is off. I noticed recently that you can easily trigger multiple AIs to break off their alliances and cancel all diplomatic relations, simply by industrializing early. The AI does not appear to take into account how great your pollution is, nor how much others pollute.

So i had all my relations sour in a few turns just because i was the first Empire to build a railway. I think the diplomatic reaction to this should be more complex! Some ideas on how to improve the Gameplay in this regard would be:

- Only give the Pollution-Modifier on relations, after a certain amount of Pollution (total or per turn) has been achieved

- Make the Relations-Modifier less severe

- Make the Relations-Modifier scale, in regards to the amount of pollution

- Lock some Relations-Modifiers behind tech; e.g. there could be a contemporary Era Civic, or Tech giving you a Grievance on Top-Polluters

These would be simple fixes, while a Pollution-Based Expansion/Update could even implement things like Climate-Accords, which limit the allowed amount of pollution per Empire (granting Grievances on Violations). Or there could be Civics which grant you Grievances against Polluters but limit your own ability to pollute.

I'd be happy to hear other players sharing their experiences with the Pollution-Modifier on Relations. Or maybe a short reactions by Moderators on the current (hidden) numbers behind the Relations Math.

(Related Reddit Thread: https://www.reddit.com/r/HumankindTheGame/comments/s7rjbk/the_impact_of_pollution_on_diplomacy)