Pacifist War Overhaul for 1.5

[Repeats]

After recently playing a fanatic pacifist empire, I had some ideas on what would make this roleplay more enjoyable. Currently, there are two massive flaws with the pacifists for war:

1. Going to war is absolutely crippling to your economy. Going to war results in -30% happiness because (+15 turns into -15 from government). This is a major drawback, as war is nearly 50% of the game...
2. Ideally, you want enemies to declare war on you as a pacifist. However, this doesn't work as the AI will only declare war if they know they will win. So the defensive war policy is only benefiting the AI, not you. Insults or border friction don't seem to matter enough for the AIs to change behavior either.

Here are some of my suggestions for helping fix this:

1) New War Policy - Peacekeeping War

Make a new war policy called "Peacekeeping War", which allows you to declare war on aggressive empires. If an empire has declared an offensive war in the last 30 years, they are a potential target for a Peacekeeping War. Empires receive no happiness malus for partaking in a peacekeeping war, but the catch is that you can't cede or liberate territory. The only war goals allowed are sanctions against the enemy(s), in the hopes that they become crippled and stop aggressive expansion.

The whole galaxy must learn of our peaceful ways! By Force!

2) New Wargoal Sanctions

Considering we only have a few types of sanctions (ban AI, outlaw slavery, tributary, etc.), we would need to add several new sanctions to the pot to make this even Peacekeeping War remotely useful. The following are some ideas I had, so the numbers don't really mean much (just think of the idea):

1. Change war policy to defensive war only for 20 years (note: takes 10 years to change back afterwards)
   
2. Can't colonize or build frontier outposts for 20 years
   
3. Demilitarize : 40% less fleet capacity for 15 years (AI on hard/insane get 50/100% more anyway)
   
4. Resettle oppressed pops - slaves and/or low-caste members can to migrate to your empire for 20 years. These settlers get a Savior bonus (+20% happiness and -50% ethics divergence) for 20 years upon entering your empire (if treated nicely).
5. Create a new faction within the enemy empire associated with peacekeeper's ethics
   
6. Isolation : Cannot participate in alliances/trade deals with other empires for 20 years
   
7. Change government type to a random "peaceful" government for 10 years (note: takes 250 influence to change back)
   
8. Force research agreement for 20 years (benefiting you only)
   
9. Force migration treaty for 20 years (one or two-sided ; can be used offensively for dropping peaceful factions in enemy empires)
   
10. Borderless : Give -30% border range for 20 years

3) Supporting Enemy Factions

With the expanded factions system coming in 1.5, I hope there will be the option to support an oppressed faction in a bid for a civil war. Supporting an oppressed faction will severely degrade diplomatic relations between empires to the point of war. If a suppressed faction declares a civil war, you enter a defensive war against the empire.

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Personally, I believe that these three things would give pacifists a real power within the galaxy. Having a strong pacifist empire in the mix will make people think twice about being overly aggressive.

Let me know what you think. Thank you for reading!
Repeats

 

[Emraldis]

As much as I agree with the ideas in this post, I can't help but notice the irony of it all. In my opinion, pacifists should have a method by which they can play an entire game without declaring war on anyone, As well as methods to improve peaceful expansion and diplomacy. For pacifists, war should really be a last resort. With that said, I do like the whole "peacekeeping war" idea, as well as the sanctions.

 

[Aurtose]

A 'Depose Leader' sanction would be nice too (kill the current leader and let the victor elect a new one).

On that thought, there could be mileage in edicts or demands along the lines of 'Capture Scientists' (to steal enemy scientists or get debris/research agreement-like benefits) or 'Prisoners of War' (steal generals/admirals and/or gain slaves after military victories).

Either way, having more offensive political options would be nice, so that non-military or pacifist empires have ways of gaining allies and territory. I'd like to be able to support factions in other empires (being able to covertly donate resources, ships and influence to rebels would be fantastic).

 

[BlackUmbrellas]

Yeah, nah. Pacifists should play as, well, pacifists. I expect we'll be seeing things that make that easier pop up sooner rather than later, given Wiz specifically wants each Ethos to bring unique play styles and mechanics with it.

 

[Dalinski]

How about a unique tech that allows them to control and collect space creatures. Using them as fleets. And allow them to declare war on nations that are destroying wild life

 

[Sopbucket]

While numbers are still changing, it does seem like the happiness swings from being at war are going away, based off what we've seen in the streams. I think it's likely that that change is going to stick, or at least that happiness will be controlled through factions instead of being part of the ethos itself.

I think I like the way things are now - Pacifist governments need a good reason to go to war, and Fanatic Pacifists governments can't declare at all. I wouldn't mind if there was an ability to enforce peace on the side of an empire you have good relations with, and supporting oppressed factions sounds like a good idea too, I just don't think Fanatic Pacifists would ever be the ones to initiate violence. It's true that the game isn't really made for a pacifist playstyle right now, and I hope they eventually come up with ways to make it more viable and interesting.

 

[Elfwind]

They should be able to liberate planets to other people's empires who lost planets to the target empire.

 

[praftd]

Why are people playing pacifists expecting to declare war? That defeats their entire ethos.

 

[Derp]

Why are people playing pacifists expecting to declare war? That defeats their entire ethos.

because there's isn't much else to do other than blob

therefore, once you take all the colonizable worlds, all that's left is to take all the colonized worlds, and maybe fight the crisis if you don't get bored and quit before it shows up

of course if diplomacy and development were actually interesting this wouldn't really be a problem, but we're going to have to wait until at least Utopia (and probably later) for that to really start to gel

 

[dying0d]

Civil War + cede planet = you create a separatist faction that eventually attempts to join your empire flipping planets to you, but you're gonna have to take that happiness hit in the rear to secure those planets...

Well if it was an event chain that the parent empire selects to retain said planets by force... otherwise free planets!

Associated cost notwithstanding. Be it standard resources to represent military support, food as aid, or influence as a space un corollary since nothing like that is in the game, representing external government pressures on said parent empire.


I pretty much don't want pacifists to go to war, but agree diplomacy is shallow atm and don't allow the full arsenal for a pacifist to be fully fleshed out playstyle

 

[TempusxX]

if you want to be able to declare war then don't play a pacifist, because that is not what pacifist is all about. Pacifist are all about peace no declaring war, they can only fight wars when a war is declared against them. Pacifist are all about peace and avoiding war through diplomacy and having a fleet to deter opponents from attacking them - When I think of Pacifists I think of the United Federation of Planets in star trek - they are all about exploring, diplomacy to solve problems against them peacefully, but will fight a war if they have to, and are all about discovering new life (part of exploring) and scientific research on anomolies etc

 

[Repeats]

Well I understand that pacifists are the lame duck and people would want them to be completely docile. However, in a game that only lets you go to war, they is no place for them mechanically. Federations are a joke, as the AI is completely dumb and will likely screw you before they help you. There simply is no way for pacifists to gain territory without war, and yet everyone is like "they can't do that."

This basically leaves two options. Either you allow for pacifists to cripple evil empires as "non-violently" as possible, or the pacifist ethos should be removed from the game. My argument is for the first option, as I personally believe that sometimes you may have to kill a really bad guy for the greater good. Also, my suggestion is implementable within the current confines of the game without adding any new mechanics. This could serve as a band aid until some real pacifist-style tools are developed.

 

[GAGA Extrem]

because there's isn't much else to do other than blob[...]l

Well, I suppose the good news is that this might change somewhat with Utopia.


Apart from that:
As long as you play a non-fanatic pacifist, your ability to wage wars isn't really that much impaired. Sure, you have to diplo-vassalize + annex the liberated empires, but that is nothing stopping you getting a dominant position in the galaxy eventually.

As a fanatic pacifist - well, I'd argue they *really* should be against war. The fact that you lose your happiness in defensive wars (at least last time I played them) is quite annoying - but, again, that is known and may be tweaked in the future.