Distribute spoils of war by war contribution - a CK2 adaption

[Seelensturm]

It is a common strategy to preserve your army when called into an ally's war because you can't expect to gain anything out of it. This means you accept the call to arms but do nothing but defend your own territory.
On the contrary human players exploit the happily committing AI allies in their own wars without rewarding the AI for the help.

To at least lessen this problem I suggest to adapt the war contribution system of CK2. If you are not familiar with it:
http://www.ckiiwiki.com/War_contribution
Prestige and gold spoils of war would be distributed between all war participants based on their war contribution. This might need a slight rework of individual war score in a way that battle war score does not solely apply for the war leader but is split based on number of men killed or similar.

 

[TheProCoder]

Yes yes yes please!

 

[Durnilhas]

There is a problem. Player use the great AI kindness, but some player are allied each other without equals power. Contribution are also depending on power... you can be a little country, send all your manpower, take loan and do nothing in the war but being crushed and sieged without dealing damage.
Currently the country who does damage take all presige, all army tradition. If many country are in the same battle they all gain same amount of prestige and army tradition. It's fair. It's not because you are small that sending 100% of your army should be punish by a lesser gain in comparison to your ally. Don't punish weaks.

But i agree there is a serious problem about player who use the AI by being passive so it's a good initiative to punish passive player ^^.

 

[londoner247]

Maybe it would be better to have a relationship malus for "accepted call to arms but then did nothing to help me"? This way you might get away with it once but not repeatedly.

Now for the complicated bit. The size of the malus could scale with your military strength, positioning and manpower. So, if GB has half of their troops in India and is called into a European war then they would not suffer the malus for not using the Indian troops but would if they didn't commit troops that were in Europe.

 

[jjake101]

But then how would I expand as an OPM if all my allies do the heavy lifting and then they get all the spoils?

Maybe it would be better to have a relationship malus for "accepted call to arms but then did nothing to help me"? This way you might get away with it once but not repeatedly.

I prefer this way of doing it. Maybe have something like a 60+ relationship hit and make it more likely thay'd break there alliance with you or not join one of your wars in the future.

 

[Durnilhas]

The diplomatic solution is really interesting londoner247 and jjake101. Yes we can't share gain depending on our participation since the participation depend on the strengh.

The problem with GB for exemple is the AI is not fully smart ^^. They are pretty dumb and don't use well their ressource is they are oversea. But why shouldn't it be punished if they don't use it?If a player send his troop oversea and doesn't participate because does't want does that mean he should have a malus?

 

[TheProCoder]

What about if it was divided equally among all participating nations who committed at least a certain portion of their strength?

 

[londoner247]

The diplomatic solution is really interesting londoner247 and jjake101. Yes we can't share gain depending on our participation since the participation depend on the strengh.

The problem with GB for exemple is the AI is not fully smart ^^. They are pretty dumb and don't use well their ressource is they are oversea. But why shouldn't it be punished if they don't use it?If a player send his troop oversea and doesn't participate because does't want does that mean he should have a malus?

Bearing in mind it takes a year to sail from India back to Europe, I think you have to look at the outcome of the war as well. So, if GB leaves half their troops in India and the war is lost then that should hurt relations. If they leave them there but they use their European troops and the war is won then they should get a boost to relations.

Just bear in mind that what we are discussing here is easy for our brains to understand. I'm not convinced it is easy for Paradox to write it down in code and so, unless Wiz is looking for a code writing challenge, I don't think you'll see a change like this.

 

[Seelensturm]

If many country are in the same battle they all gain same amount of prestige and army tradition. It's fair. It's not because you are small that sending 100% of your army should be punish by a lesser gain in comparison to your ally. Don't punish weaks.

This suggestion is only about the distribution of peace prestige and ducats and not about battle prestige and army tradition.

Maybe it would be better to have a relationship malus for "accepted call to arms but then did nothing to help me"? ... Now for the complicated bit. The size of the malus could scale with your military strength, positioning and manpower

As you say yourself: (too) complicated. I would still prefer something like a "peace conference" where you can actually demand something significant if you are not the war leader but contributed a lot to war. But again: likely too complicated. So I constrained myself to this minor suggestion of adapting an already existing system to soften the problem a bit.

But then how would I expand as an OPM if all my allies do the heavy lifting and then they get all the spoils?

This is only about the distribution of minor spoils (prestige and gold), the major spoils e.g. conquered provinces would still be distributed as the war leader negotiates in the peace treaty.

 

[Durnilhas]

But, what do you want to divide? The prestige gain in a battle? When you gain 0.24 do you split it in 6 because everyone use their army?
In the end of war the war leader have all prestige from peace deal. But spliting gold and prestige from peace deal is a little wary. you don't have so much prestige in the end

 

[londoner247]

The problem with taking the CKII mechanic is that it works in CKII where the game is all about gaining prestige and where prestige affects your ability to marry into powerful alliances.

That simply doesn't fit EUIV where prestige is capped and diplomacy is key to alliances. A major power will probably have high prestige anyway so has little to gain and much to lose by participating in his ally's war now. If a more nuanced diplomatic impact could be coded into the game then it would be a really useful enhancement which fits the EUIV world better than brining in a CKII mechanic that would have little bearing.

 

[Durnilhas]

I agree, a little malus like "you were passive" in the same way as "independant peace" could be cool ^^. You use the AI and the major country for a war but loose him after

 

[Wizzington]

Great idea!

 

[Suzaku]

Great idea!

Which idea was a good idea the last post or the op?

 

[Sheriff Godwin Law]

I think it's about to get harder to feed territory to vassals.

 

[Grand Pope Papa]

Yes this! I am tired of watching myself (and Arumba and Shenyr on youtube) just sitting there not helping. Make a relation penalty (-50) if you didnt fight at all in a war.

 

[Ilightmaster]

Yes this! I am tired of watching myself (and Arumba and Shenyr on youtube) just sitting there not helping. Make a relation penalty (-50) if you didnt fight at all in a war.

-50 seems a bit excessive but i like that.

 

[Grand Pope Papa]

-50 seems a bit excessive but i like that.

Well you declared war on a nation and than do nothing while your ally (usualy France, Poland, Castile or Austria in my games) does all the fighting, even sieging. They should be pissed.

 

[Ilightmaster]

Well you declared war on a nation and than do nothing while your ally (usualy France, Poland, Castile or Austria in my games) does all the fighting, even sieging. They should be pissed.

I said that because sometimes you just can't help an ally for example genoa which usually goes at war with crimea and you are dealing with a war in north HRE. This malus should just check if you are not at war with someone else. Whereas AI sometimes just don't call you in their wars so my remark could be ignored if it's well done.

 

[indika_tates]

I agree that is not an easy task to code it. It may be very difficult to check when a player is intentionally not helping an ally, or when the player just can't help, like the Genoese example of Crimean wars. But if devs find a way to punish this AI abuse it can be very interesting for the game. The standard OPM strategy of France & Austria AI abuse should end. AI allies should expect a war contribution after the war finishes. If as Ragusa you manage to ally Austria and crush Hungary with AI help, AI austria should be rewarded for the war contribution.

I think I read it on patch notes for the next beta. Great powers are not willing to ally OPM more. Because is not a thing only humans do. Tuscany or Papal States AI allied with AI France blobbing Italy is a classic nowadays.