Improved Relations: add penalty for hostile actions?

[kralex]

I'm quite new to EU4, and I don't know if this has been suggested before - if it has, please accept my apologies. Same thing applies if the idea is just plain dumb.

One thing that strikes me as odd on my first play-through is how super-effective Improved Relations is. Their bonus very easy to gain, and they last a very long time. What I find odd about it is that the bonus stays even if you properly upset the target nation - shouldn't actions speak louder than words? Imho you shouldn't be able to stay on a nation's friendly side in spite of upsetting them because you sweet-talked to them 20 years ago.

I think it would make sense that if you had any Improved Relations bonus, and you did an action that adds x points of Dislike to the target nation, your Improved Relations bonus were reduced by x as well. E.g., if you have 50 IR, and you press an issue over borders, you gain -30 Dislike, and additionally your IR is reduced by 30 to 20, meaning that their opinion of you would drop by a total of 60. This would make it harder to use IR to misuse your allies, and imho make the relations mechanics a little less easy to exploit.

Any opinions on this idea?

 

[Thrake]

It would make much sense indeed, I completely agree with you. However, keep in mind that the actual relationship is not really the main factor; it is their attitude that will determine how they act towards you and you might find nations hostile with 100 relationship - don't expect much good from those.

 

[kralex]

I've played quite a bit more since originally proposing this idea, and I'm still contemplating it. I think it would be interesting to try, as it would give greater impact to the decisions you make. You couldn't smooth over angrying your neighbours quite as easily. I guess it would also slow down a bit the rate at which you can diplo-annex vassals, which seems to have been a big goal in the 1.8 changes, as each annexation would set back your IR progress on other vassals.

Is there any way to mod the game to implement this idea? Or would it have to be implemented in the program executable code?