Diplomacy in AWD

[Lucky1]

First off, I would preface this thread with the comment that I think AWD is VERY good as a broad-based strategic / historical WWII game.

However, I do believe that there is room for improvement on the diplomacy side of things. Although perhaps a function of my own skills as a player, I almost never attempt to "influence" countries diplomatically. Where "diplomacy" plays a role, is generally the side-effect from attacking a neighbouring country. For example, it is almost impossible to have Hungary / Romania / Bulgaria join the Axis without attacking Yugoslavia or Russia.


My questions and/or suggestions:

1) Why is there a limit of one "diplomatic" move per turn?
2) Why are countries "locked-in" to a particular orbit once they swing to one side or another (i.e., it is not possible to attempt to influence them any longer)?
3) Why are given countries equally resistant to Axis or Allied pressures?

Although I confess to not have given this a huge amount of thought (the purpose of this thread is to enjoin others to discuss improvements), I might suggest the following framework:

a) Allow players to expend as many diplomatic points per turn as they desire / can offord. I would suggest lowering the actual cost of diplomatic efforts as well as the probabilities for success. Neutral country allegiances could either move incrementally up and down (with perhaps a max movement per turn) each turn, or be reconciled at the end of three month cycle (of course, they would react normally to declarations of war etc.,).

b) Allow players attempt to "influence" countries already in notionally in the "other" camp. This might be done at an increased cost and/or penalty depending on how tightly aligned the neutral country is. Similarly, attempts to bring favourably inclined countries tighter into one's orbit might cheaper / and or obtain benefits depending on how aligned the country is. Of course, once a DOW occurrs, a country would be no longer subject to influence.

c) Allow countries to have differential responses to diplomatic pressures, depending on their historical alignment. For example, some countries were simply more inclined to fall in with the WA than with the Axis or Russia or Japan.

d) For every "X (to be determined)" number of diplomatic attempts on a given country, a militia (or other unit) might be added to it's forces. Again, depending on the country, this might be scaleable. This would reflect the positive industrial effects of being agressively courted by a world power (think of all the client states or neutral states in the cold war that were given arms / funds etc., by the US or the Soviet Union).

Any other ideas / suggestions / critiques? I would love to hear them!

Cheers,

Sean

[WanderingHead]

I think that AWD is very much intended to be and designed to be a game about WWII. There is some flexibility in when there are DOWs and diplomatic conditions, but not a whole heck of a lot of flexibility because it is intended to play WWII in basically the same time frame with basically the same players.

Given that as a design objective, I'm happy enough with the way diplomacy is implemented and I don't feel it needs more sophistication. It is sophisticated enough to disincentivise politically questionable moves (like Germany attacking Spain) while allowing the flexibility to largely do what you want if you're willing to pay the price.

More sophisticated diplomacy could be cool, but really it would be a different game.

Bottom line, I'm quite happy with it as it is.

[GKar]

ORIGINAL: WanderingHead

Bottom line, I'm quite happy with it as it is.

Yep, same for me. [:)]

[flintlock]

While more freedom with diplomacy would open additional possibilities gameplay wise, I appreciate the way the current design says roughly within the realm of what happened during WWII.

[freetalk]

I have a game where Romania is Axis and has been for several turns,
but Hungary has not joined. Looks wierd - a neutral country
in the middle of all the grey.

[rjh1971]

Have you invaded Yugoslavia and attacked the Soviets?

If you have done so, I still think there is a very little possiblity for Hungary not joining the Axis. That's due too bad luck, probably in the next game she will join.

Bulgaria more often doesn't join the Axis, trying to force her to join the Axis may require to invade Greece.

[freetalk]

yes have taken yugoslavia many turns back and Russian invasion is 2 years old.
Not taken greece but still cannot understand Hungary.

[Joel Billings]

It's just die rolls going against you. There's enough randomness that this can happen.

[WanderingHead]

ORIGINAL: freetalk
yes have taken yugoslavia many turns back and Russian invasion is 2 years old.
Not taken greece but still cannot understand Hungary.

The thing is, once you've attacked every territory adjacent to a neutral there is no way left to try to get them to join you.

I hadn't really thought about it, but this is kind of strange.

It does suggest a reasonable modification to the political rules for "sphere of influence":

1) if a nation is adjacent to a power on one side (Axis or Allies) and cannot trace via neutrals or opposing transports to any region controlled by the opposing side, then make a political roll (against volatity squared, or maybe even cubed for this one to make it slower). If the roll passes, the neutral nation shifts one direction towards the adjacent power.

This would tend to eliminate that very strange "surrounded by gray" effect. It would eventually, and justifiably, put TLC on the German side sometime after the WA abandon the continent, and even sometimes make Switzerland go German.

I think it fixes some oddities and would be fairly realistic.

It's kind of like a generic coup event rule, encouraging each side (Allies most notably) to maintain a link with all neutrals, even [or especially] those leaning against.

[freetalk]

I accept Joel's conclusion that the dice have gone against things.

But if anyone wants to see a save of the game
(showing Hungary as a little island in a sea of grey)
let me have your email and I'll send it.
huntley_d@hotmail.com

[JanSorensen]

Its not all that unusual. While very unlikely I have had this happen as well. At one point in testing there was a chance that Romania would not join Germany - that really hurt Barbarossa though.

[Petiloup]

ORIGINAL: freetalk

This would tend to eliminate that very strange "surrounded by gray" effect. It would eventually, and justifiably, put TLC on the German side sometime after the WA abandon the continent, and even sometimes make Switzerland go German.

Not sure Switzerland would have joined Germany at any time but I agree that the political game is too much about following what happened during WW2 than opening new possibilities. World at War had more a taste of a "what if" game than A World Divided on my sense but the way AWD is played is far better. Maybe do a patch where you can tick "Historical Political Event" or not would give the opportunity of the players to play the game as they see fit (which by the way is making more clients happy so selling more games potentially).

Then if we choose not to follow history give some possibility to influence more the neutrals.

On my side I still find strange to get Portugal siding with the Axis most of the time (because of the colonies in Africa) when I play against the AI but never did manage to get Spain on the Axis side [&:]

[christian brown]

On my side I still find strange to get Portugal siding with the Axis most of the time (because of the colonies in Africa) when I play against the AI but never did manage to get Spain on the Axis side

Lol!  Just keep playing buddy, you'll be seeing it (Spain) soon.  BtW, Portugal going Axis!!!!!!!!  I have not seen that one happen......are the Allies just attacking neutrals right and left in your games or what?

[WanderingHead]

ORIGINAL: Polonthi

ORIGINAL: freetalk (actually WH)
This would tend to eliminate that very strange "surrounded by gray" effect. It would eventually, and justifiably, put TLC on the German side sometime after the WA abandon the continent, and even sometimes make Switzerland go German.

Not sure Switzerland would have joined Germany at any time

That's my quote, not freetalk's.

I don't think it seems complete out of the realm of possibility, not if they are completely surrounded by German powers. Not that in the rules I proposed _any_ path to an Allied power, directly or through neutrals, would eliminate the die roll. So if WA had transports to Spain, through Vichy France to Switzerland then Switzerland would never go over by this rule.

Also, the rule would only move a neutral towards the adjacent power one step at a time. So it would take 3 steps to move Switzerland all the way into the Axis camp.

Given all that, I would make the rule as follows:

* at the beginning of the season, if a neutral can trace to one side (Axis/Alies) via other neutrals and transports but not to the other side, then roll a die(100) against volatility squared for the neutral. If passed, it moves one step towards the side it can trace to, including possibly joining that alliance.

* check this for each neutral one at a time, but stop checking for further neutrals once the check passes for one neutral (like the neutrals joining WA mechanism).

If you think about it, this is a generic rule that allows a power to exert a sphere of influence, and would actually even remove the necessity of the "neutrals join the WA after the USA DOWs rule", since it would automatically cover it.

Comparing against volatity squared, there is a 1% chance for Switzerland to bump towards the Axis every turn. It needs to bump 3 steps to the Axis. In 20 turns, assuming the WA never connects via Spain/Vichy or captures N Italy, that is a probability of an Axis Switzerland of approximately

(1 - (1-0.01)^20) / 3 = ~ 6%

Doesn't seem so bad, since the WA would nullify the roll most of the time anyway. It would probably be more like 1-2%.

[Petiloup]

ORIGINAL: christian brown

On my side I still find strange to get Portugal siding with the Axis most of the time (because of the colonies in Africa) when I play against the AI but never did manage to get Spain on the Axis side

Lol!  Just keep playing buddy, you'll be seeing it (Spain) soon.  BtW, Portugal going Axis!!!!!!!!  I have not seen that one happen......are the Allies just attacking neutrals right and left in your games or what?

Not really but this is mainly against the AI when you can via Ethiopia conquer most of Africa with the AI doing nothing much about it. As Portugal got 2 colonies there then there are plenty of chances that by succesfully invading that adjacent countries you tip Portugal to Axis. Now you just need to do a trade agreement with Portugal before of course.