Hi again. Today I'd like to highlight some issues that I've met with peace treaties in during my runs (So far I've finished 3 games and a half before it crushed)

In another post I've already discussed the problem of vassalization, which is too easy to obtain, so I won't discuss this matter again.

I want to focus more on how you obtain war support and how you can loose it.

Let's make a practical example: 2 different wars that I fought against Green empire in 2 different games.

Both wars were fought in ancient/classical era, and the difficulty level was Civilization (6/7)

(Vlad) War I: war was declared on me. I've spent all the conflict difending my stronghold at the border, won 4 battles, but due to heavy lossess I've never sent my troops outside my territory.

Result: I've forced the enemy to become my vassal 

(Vlad) War II: I've declared war on Vlad. I've crushed his army in 1 battle, besieged his capital for 5 turns than launched a final victoriuous assault.

Result: I couldn't vassalize Vlad because my war support wasn't high enough.

Now it's clear that something is wrong here. Winning battles is much higher rewarded than occuping enemy cities (even cthe capital). I'm not saying that victories in battles shouldn't give you high score, but occuping the enemy capital should reward you 5/10 times more than a single won battle. Ask Hannibal.

In War I my support never went down because I was the defender and I kept winning battles (and that's ok). In War II I've lost war support during those 5 turns besieging the enemy capital, because I was the attacker and the enemy didn't have an army anymore that I could defeat, as if in 1453 the Byzantines were gaining war support because the Ottomans were loosing too much time placing their cannons.

Another issue: every time my enemy reaches 0 war support I'm forced by the game to force surrender. I cannot end my turn and get some extra war support with further conquest. That's anothe reason why War I was more rewarding than War II. When the enemy is defeated, it should be up to me whether to force surrender or keep on playing like the cat with the mouse.

Last thing: peace menu is a bit unclear. I admit that I'm not the sharpest person around, but it's confusing understanding which territories you're going to annex. It will be nice to select demanded territories directly from the map and not just from a menu, just like in another very famous game, you know, the one with 35 DLCs.

Supporting these war complains, current state of the war is not logical at all.

More support to these ideas.

-Fighting skirmishes gives way to much war support compared to actually taking territory

-You shouldn't be able to vassalize another by only fighting border wars

-The forced peace concept has to just be removed all together (maybe just make a negative impact on overall empire stability if a war goes on way too long)

I agree with those point.

I think that the force peace concept should apply if there is a revolution. So maby your sability goes down if the war takes too long (even if you are winning) and cause a revolution that changes the leadership and forces you too make peace.

Like when the germans overthrew the Kieser in the first world war to make peace that was detremental to germany even thought no foreign army had set foot on german soil during the war.

I also think that you should be able to use diplomacy to convince other nation to go to war with you.

Absolutely. I almost lost a war to Vlad while occupying his capital because it was a surprise (unjust) war and because of my ideological proximity to his empire. I was losing war support at the same rate he was because of this.

I also think there should be a way to fabricate greivances (maybe by spending influence) so you can set up a conquest war without too much penalties (although I'm not sure if that's already a special ability for militarist or expansionist cultures).

afarteta93 wrote:

Absolutely. I almost lost a war to Vlad while occupying his capital because it was a surprise (unjust) war and because of my ideological proximity to his empire. I was losing war support at the same rate he was because of this.

I also think there should be a way to fabricate greivances (maybe by spending influence) so you can set up a conquest war without too much penalties (although I'm not sure if that's already a special ability for militarist or expansionist cultures).

I also think you should be able to do "false flag" wars. Where the reason you declare war is not the same as the actual reason. This has happened historically (even in recent history), and happens quite often.

The provided reason for war is something that is justifiable to other countries and their own population, to make it sound like a "just" war. But the real benefits gained by the war are usually different.

In reality. I don't really care about getting gold or getting random territories that have "opressed" religious people. What I do care about is some strategically placed territories and strategic resources. Let me declare a war because of opressed people, but then when I win, let me take a territory with a strategic resource, because that was the actual reason for the war, and the reason I provided was just a justification.

+1 for not forcing peace immediately. Sometimes you just need one more turn to raid an outpost or occupy another territory. There could be some penalty if you delay finishing the war for too long.

War support should distinguish if you are waging a defensive war (other empire attacked and claims your territories) or an offensive war (you attacked and claim their territories). The attacker should loose war support if they don't put units in enemy territories. The defender should loose war support if there are enemy troops in their territories.

War support change for battles should be: 1) fixed +/- for winner/looser, 2) fixed malus for every unit lost based on their pop build costs (for both winner and looser). Wars which are costly on the own population should decrease war support faster.

To limit total war length there could be an additional "dooms clock" which decreases war support over time the longer the war goes on. E.g. -1 after 10 turns, -2 after 20 turns, etc.

Vassalage should only be an option if the empire is considerable weaker. Also if a vassal empire becomes strong again they should have the option (and also take it) to stop their vassalage.