The "diplomat trick": why does it exist?

[TheMeInTeam]

Exploiting and cheating are not literally the same, but they're hardly far apart either. 'Playing within the defined rules of the game' is a completely meaningless phrase if you're just going to define it as 'the game lets you do this', because guess what? The game lets you open the console and type cash too.

Not if you use ironman, which allegedly blocks cheating (at least some cheating).

But on the flipside, using the exploit definition is necessarily arbitrary. "Ally France and use it to win wars" is a tried-and-tired SP strategy that relies on something a human-controlled France wouldn't do. Exploit? Free money? The utility is greater than the supposed send/recall exploit. The rules let you do it. How do you define send/recall as an "exploit" within your constraints, but not this? You can't, it's necessarily arbitrary.

Boosting relations on arrival is something that could have not existed at all (just give relations at month end), which actually carries a semi-intuitive implication that it was placed in the game for a reason at some point, especially in the light of the AI getting an extra diplomat exactly because it can't handle them as well.

All this said, it's the defining of actions as exploits + pinning them as similar to cheating that bothers me, not the removal of the tedious mechanic. It sounds way too much like a sour-grapes MP player who lost because his opponent did something unexpected that he doesn't like, so wants it banned.

 

[Wizzington]

Not if you use ironman, which allegedly blocks cheating (at least some cheating).

But on the flipside, using the exploit definition is necessarily arbitrary. "Ally France and use it to win wars" is a tried-and-tired SP strategy that relies on something a human-controlled France wouldn't do. Exploit? Free money? The utility is greater than the supposed send/recall exploit. The rules let you do it. How do you define send/recall as an "exploit" within your constraints, but not this? You can't, it's necessarily arbitrary.

Boosting relations on arrival is something that could have not existed at all (just give relations at month end), which actually carries a semi-intuitive implication that it was placed in the game for a reason at some point, especially in the light of the AI getting an extra diplomat exactly because it can't handle them as well.

All this said, it's the defining of actions as exploits + pinning them as similar to cheating that bothers me, not the removal of the tedious mechanic. It sounds way too much like a sour-grapes MP player who lost because his opponent did something unexpected that he doesn't like, so wants it banned.

This is a meaningless tone argument. Our design philosophy is that we consider exploits to be undesirable, has always been that we consider them undesirable. They're usually not terribly high priority but over time they get fixed. What does calling them cheating or not matter in the slightest?

 

[LordQ]

where do you count 4? I count 1, the Sun God or Sunset Invasion achievements won't be won or lost based on a small bonus on colonizing, the new Iroquois one is also uneffected by it, only No Trail of Tears is likely the only one that could use this big time, although it could probably get other strats, like the Luck the Irish strat that involves fleeing to the new world, Perhaps African Power could benefit from it and a Re-reconquista strat that involves fleeing to America

On the Edge of Madness requires playing as the Aztecs, a nation that would profit from send resend trick for colonists. But in my post I ruled it out since a dedicated Edge of Madness run probably wouldn't go long enough to see use of colonists. So that leaves 3 as you say, which goes to 4 with the Iroquois achievement. Though I'm not sure a dedicated The Six Nations game would see much colonisation either.

 

[lyz]

Resending diplomat won't give instant opinion boost if you already have >0 from improve relations

We can still send a diplomat to cash in for the monthly relations, recall them, send a gift (or some other action), then send the diplomat back for relations by the time the end of the month rolls around. Can you just switch this to a daily relations gain so I don't have to worry if I am playing the game correctly

 

[Witto]

God damn it...

 

[Cymsdale]

What does calling them cheating or not matter in the slightest?

Because if you ever make use of a gameplay mechanic that is later called an exploit, then you are a CHEATER and you must live with that fact FOREVER!

FOREVERRRRRR!

Only those with the most purest of hearts know how to properly play the game.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

This is a meaningless tone argument. Our design philosophy is that we consider exploits to be undesirable, has always been that we consider them undesirable. They're usually not terribly high priority but over time they get fixed. What does calling them cheating or not matter in the slightest?

What matters is

1. We have a mechanic that has some presence in the current design, with limits to its utility and even the ability to invest into it.
2. Then after-the-fact that action is defined as an exploit.
3. As measured against dozens of other options that are apparently still WAD, the suddenly-an-exploit mechanic provides less utility.

The problem is that it's a concerning "philosophy", because by-definition you can simply say that literally any in-game action that is strong (or even if it isn't) is an exploit and remove it. In setting the threshold this way, the term loses useful meaning, and no this isn't just a tone issue. Removing ships from primitives for example was a painful move, and one that carried exactly zero utility other than denying human players in SP access to one means of surviving.

Removing foreign core recruitment is another practical example; was that ever competitively viable? Nope, I never observed anyone doing that long-term in MP and winning. Foreign core recruitment was something that had historical basis (Ottomans or others using Tartar troops, England using locals in India, etc) and had interesting applications for western, Ottoman, and nomad groups with others having less but still some utility (for example when the pip spread was unfavorable for Chinese and such a nation bordered India). Yet you went so far as to define a strategy that would realistically fall under the term "cherry tapping" as "exploit" instead and removed a game option players found enjoyable and was previously stated to be WAD...to what benefit exactly?

The "design philosophy" that anything that you kind-of don't like gets removed and post-defined as an exploit hurts. I'm not just arguing semantics; your application of this term has had tangible negative impacts on the gameplay experience...or are you going to try to tell us that natives having ships made them too strong in competitive MP or in AI hands? Isn't fun in your design philosophy somewhere, along with some consistent basis to apply your changes? Right now, it seems the basis is "we don't like the thought of this mechanic used that way", but I don't want it to seem that way. This game is pretty fun but the track record of removing options and defining them as exploit IS concerning, even if in this case it's a mechanic I won't miss in the slightest.

 

[Beagá]

If there is no law that forbids something it´s ok to do it, even if most people would consider it wrong?

If you don´t want ever to have to adapt because BS was removed, simple: don´t use the BS. Just like the easiest way to not ever having a lie discovered is... to not lie.

Shocking, I know

 

[blackchoas]

What matters is

1. We have a mechanic that has some presence in the current design, with limits to its utility and even the ability to invest into it.
2. Then after-the-fact that action is defined as an exploit.
3. As measured against dozens of other options that are apparently still WAD, the suddenly-an-exploit mechanic provides less utility.

The problem is that it's a concerning "philosophy", because by-definition you can simply say that literally any in-game action that is strong (or even if it isn't) is an exploit and remove it. In setting the threshold this way, the term loses useful meaning, and no this isn't just a tone issue. Removing ships from primitives for example was a painful move, and one that carried exactly zero utility other than denying human players in SP access to one means of surviving.

Removing foreign core recruitment is another practical example; was that ever competitively viable? Nope, I never observed anyone doing that long-term in MP and winning. Foreign core recruitment was something that had historical basis (Ottomans or others using Tartar troops, England using locals in India, etc) and had interesting applications for western, Ottoman, and nomad groups with others having less but still some utility (for example when the pip spread was unfavorable for Chinese and such a nation bordered India). Yet you went so far as to define a strategy that would realistically fall under the term "cherry tapping" as "exploit" instead and removed a game option players found enjoyable and was previously stated to be WAD...to what benefit exactly?

The "design philosophy" that anything that you kind-of don't like gets removed and post-defined as an exploit hurts. I'm not just arguing semantics; your application of this term has had tangible negative impacts on the gameplay experience...or are you going to try to tell us that natives having ships made them too strong in competitive MP or in AI hands? Isn't fun in your design philosophy somewhere, along with some consistent basis to apply your changes? Right now, it seems the basis is "we don't like the thought of this mechanic used that way", but I don't want it to seem that way. This game is pretty fun but the track record of removing options and defining them as exploit IS concerning, even if in this case it's a mechanic I won't miss in the slightest.

I think an exploit is defined by designer intent, I assume they did not plan to have recalling and resending diplomats be an optimal strat for diplomacy, I doubt they realized it existed until somone else found it, when you use something not WAD or not working as intended, to intentionally gain an advantage you otherwise wouldn't have been able to that is using an exploit. If you wanna min max the game then I suggest you use every known exploit, people do this in literally every game, but that doesn't somehow mean that the devs shouldn't attempt to correct exploits when they can

I also don't know what your talking about in terms of defining thinkings as exploits after they are removed, I never heard of natives having ships as an exploit. As for the foreign cores things, I don't know if that design was intended or not but they got rid of it because they didn't like the way it was used, as it was literally only used by Hordes to ignore there long term military tech issues and that was it. If they argument is that they shouldn't change things because some people like the old system, I would suggest finding a game where they don't patch it

 

[TheMeInTeam]

I think an exploit is defined by designer intent, I assume they did not plan to have recalling and resending diplomats be an optimal strat for diplomacy, I doubt they realized it existed until somone else found it, when you use something not WAD or not working as intended, to intentionally gain an advantage you otherwise wouldn't have been able to that is using an exploit. If you wanna min max the game then I suggest you use every known exploit, people do this in literally every game, but that doesn't somehow mean that the devs shouldn't attempt to correct exploits when they can

I also don't know what your talking about in terms of defining thinkings as exploits after they are removed, I never heard of natives having ships as an exploit. As for the foreign cores things, I don't know if that design was intended or not but they got rid of it because they didn't like the way it was used, as it was literally only used by Hordes to ignore there long term military tech issues and that was it. If they argument is that they shouldn't change things because some people like the old system, I would suggest finding a game where they don't patch it

It wasn't only used by hordes, as I used it as multiple other tech groups, particularly (early game) western and nations that border hordes early (recruiting horde units was strictly superior until tech 5 and you have better cavalry available even longer). So no, not "literally only hordes", at all. Second, cherry tapping =/= exploit. Why are devs deliberately removing cherry tapping strategies?

Exploit is defined as "stuff that we changed" right now, because there's no apparently consistent basis for what gets determined as one versus what does not. You never heard of native ships as an exploit...but they still removed it after people used it to get strong positions in the new world early-ish and only after that. There is no logically consistent argument for that change which is why no argument at all was ever given. However, the most probable conclusion is that it was considered "exploitative" for Aztec to stack 20-25 heavies and sink European fleets. Wiz himself said it isn't the realism angle, so presumably it fell under "balance change" or "exploit"...I guess?

 

[blackchoas]

It wasn't only used by hordes, as I used it as multiple other tech groups, particularly (early game) western and nations that border hordes early (recruiting horde units was strictly superior until tech 5 and you have better cavalry available even longer). So no, not "literally only hordes", at all. Second, cherry tapping =/= exploit. Why are devs deliberately removing cherry tapping strategies?

Exploit is defined as "stuff that we changed" right now, because there's no apparently consistent basis for what gets determined as one versus what does not. You never heard of native ships as an exploit...but they still removed it after people used it to get strong positions in the new world early-ish and only after that. There is no logically consistent argument for that change which is why no argument at all was ever given. However, the most probable conclusion is that it was considered "exploitative" for Aztec to stack 20-25 heavies and sink European fleets. Wiz himself said it isn't the realism angle, so presumably it fell under "balance change" or "exploit"...I guess?

What is cherry tapping?

I love how you consider anything they changed or got rid to have been an exploit, its really silly, just because they got rid of it or didn't like what it was doing in the game doesnt make it an exploit. I also love the balance change or exploit line, its literally just ignorant of how balancing games works. I don't know if your a league of legends player but thats kinda like saying that Riot nerfed the champion Irelia therefore everyone who used to play Irelia was exploiting the game. Its saying that they put a feature into the game, they were not able to predict 100% of the interactions of this feature, they disliked what this feature ultimately did to the game, they got rid of or changed said feature, said feature was therefore an exploit.

Also I suppose I didn't know all the uses of the foreign core recruitment although you make a great case for its removal, its sounds like you could use it to completely ignore the negative military sides of your tech group in certain situations

 

[Wizzington]

It wasn't only used by hordes, as I used it as multiple other tech groups, particularly (early game) western and nations that border hordes early (recruiting horde units was strictly superior until tech 5 and you have better cavalry available even longer). So no, not "literally only hordes", at all. Second, cherry tapping =/= exploit. Why are devs deliberately removing cherry tapping strategies?

Exploit is defined as "stuff that we changed" right now, because there's no apparently consistent basis for what gets determined as one versus what does not. You never heard of native ships as an exploit...but they still removed it after people used it to get strong positions in the new world early-ish and only after that. There is no logically consistent argument for that change which is why no argument at all was ever given. However, the most probable conclusion is that it was considered "exploitative" for Aztec to stack 20-25 heavies and sink European fleets. Wiz himself said it isn't the realism angle, so presumably it fell under "balance change" or "exploit"...I guess?

Exploit is defined by by me and Johan defining it as an exploit. We have the ability to do that because we make the game design and can make the call on what is and isn't WAD.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

What is cherry tapping?

I love how you consider anything they changed or got rid to have been an exploit, its really silly, just because they got rid of it or didn't like what it was doing in the game doesnt make it an exploit. I also love the balance change or exploit line, its literally just ignorant of how balancing games works. I don't know if your a league of legends player but thats kinda like saying that Riot nerfed the champion Irelia therefore everyone who used to play Irelia was exploiting the game. Its saying that they put a feature into the game, they were not able to predict 100% of the interactions of this feature, they disliked what this feature ultimately did to the game, they got rid of or changed said feature, said feature was therefore an exploit.

Also I suppose I didn't know all the uses of the foreign core recruitment although you make a great case for its removal, its sounds like you could use it to completely ignore the negative military sides of your tech group in certain situations

You seem confused. Wiz is calling these things exploits. I am saying that is an arbitrary statement. Your league of legends analogy should be directed at Wiz, not me. I'm asserting the term (and removing things while calling them exploits as the basis) is necessarily arbitrary.

Also I suppose I didn't know all the uses of the foreign core recruitment although you make a great case for its removal, its sounds like you could use it to completely ignore the negative military sides of your tech group in certain situations

Yes, you are making it painfully clear that you don't understand the tradeoffs of foreign core recruitment. The notion that being able to recruit off-tech group units in certain contexts is akin to "completely ignoring the negative military sides" is laughable. Foreign cores gave limited choice, no mercenaries, and were only useful if the unit you could recruit happened to be better (and the target had to have it available). They did nothing for your ideas, tech penalty, and once cannons came available could only give you one unit type (the weakest in pips). To use them as a horde meant forgoing mercenaries (which due to NI you don't pay to reinforce), centralizing unit production on the border, and consistently fighting nations up-to-date in mil tech while you yourself had a 75% penalty. This was supposed to be an exploit? Wiz called it that, but how does having gimped idea progression and only one of your enemy's units stack up to being western again?

Cherry tapping you can look up on TvTropes or somewhere else. It's essentially playing suboptimally on purpose for fun, generally in a lulzy/humiliating fashion to your opponent. An example would be using the joke weapons in FF IV to beat the last boss or going into a competitive counterstrike match below your level and getting MVP with a pistol.

Exploit is defined by by me and Johan defining it as an exploit. We have the ability to do that because we make the game design and can make the call on what is and isn't WAD.

Actually Wiz, the dictionary defines the meaning of words. Words have meanings, and your usage of exploit has roughly as much meaning as me defining a slide tackle as "telephoning" someone.

What you have the ability to do, and I agree it's meaningless to seek to stop you, is to change your game how you please. I can ask that you put some consideration for consistent logical basis behind your design, but you're absolutely correct that neither I nor anybody else can make you do it. Nobody HAS to do anything.

It doesn't change the reality that, as you're implementing things in the game, your definition of "exploit" applies to everything in the game and is thus meaningless as a term. If you're acknowledging you're making baseless changes because you like them, that's that. I believe that's an unfortunate route for the game to go, but as you say it's not my call to make.

 

[blackchoas]

You seem confused. Wiz is calling these things exploits. I am saying that is an arbitrary statement. Your league of legends analogy should be directed at Wiz, not me. I'm asserting the term (and removing things while calling them exploits as the basis) is necessarily arbitrary.



Yes, you are making it painfully clear that you don't understand the tradeoffs of foreign core recruitment. The notion that being able to recruit off-tech group units in certain contexts is akin to "completely ignoring the negative military sides" is laughable. Foreign cores gave limited choice, no mercenaries, and were only useful if the unit you could recruit happened to be better (and the target had to have it available). They did nothing for your ideas, tech penalty, and once cannons came available could only give you one unit type (the weakest in pips). To use them as a horde meant forgoing mercenaries (which due to NI you don't pay to reinforce), centralizing unit production on the border, and consistently fighting nations up-to-date in mil tech while you yourself had a 75% penalty. This was supposed to be an exploit? Wiz called it that, but how does having gimped idea progression and only one of your enemy's units stack up to being western again?

Cherry tapping you can look up on TvTropes or somewhere else. It's essentially playing suboptimally on purpose for fun, generally in a lulzy/humiliating fashion to your opponent. An example would be using the joke weapons in FF IV to beat the last boss or going into a competitive counterstrike match below your level and getting MVP with a pistol.

I love the way you cut out the term "in certain situations" from my quote and then explain what those certain situations are.

No Wiz is calling exploits, exploits. you are arbitrarily calling everything they ever changed or removed exploits. And since an exploit is taking advantage of something that is not WAD and Wiz gets to say what is WAD and what isn't WAD he can call whatever he wants an exploit anyway, unless you are secretly on the design team I don't think you know what they intended and what they didnt

and how are the taking away cherry tapping? Doesn't seem like they are doing anything to harm it to me,

 

[yerm]

Calling it a change or an exploit or a bug or anything else is not really anything other than forum fodder.

Is there going to be any kind of change or increase to relations improving to compensate for the net loss of relations this change creates?

Does this change/fix/nerf/whatever apply to anything other than improving relations?

Will the AI still have its free diplomat?

 

[ahyangyi]

This is an exploit, though it was slightly obscured by the fact it was left untouched so long, and the existence of various related modifiers, and that this looks like a deliberate design.

I won't expect they touch relation improvement speed or free diplomat just because of this fix though. This exploit simply shouldn't exist and be used in the first place.

 

[Zqrfmb]

Did you also patch out the similar phenomenon to this that occurs with sending and recalling a coloninst?

 

[TheMeInTeam]

I love the way you cut out the term "in certain situations" from my quote and then explain what those certain situations are.

No Wiz is calling exploits, exploits. you are arbitrarily calling everything they ever changed or removed exploits. And since an exploit is taking advantage of something that is not WAD and Wiz gets to say what is WAD and what isn't WAD he can call whatever he wants an exploit anyway, unless you are secretly on the design team I don't think you know what they intended and what they didnt

and how are the taking away cherry tapping? Doesn't seem like they are doing anything to harm it to me,

No, I am not "arbitrarily" calling those things exploits. Wiz *explicitly* stated the foreign core recruitment as an exploit (despite that it was cherry tapping), so using it as an example is the exact opposite of arbitrary.

The native ship nerf was...something. Take your pick, it's not justified by anything but a selective interpretation of history, which is something Wiz stated he wouldn't take seriously so presumably his motivation for that change is not to avoid taking himself seriously. I instead chose to give a relative benefit of the doubt and guess that it fell under "exploit" because the premise of it being a "balance" change is laughable. It's just a guess though, because the reason for that change was never stated after all.

Regardless, Wiz seems to be claiming that he + Johan can define words in the English language then apply them as they see fit, so I guess anything can be an exploit. That gets back to my original point though: if you define "anything we don't like" as exploit, then there is no meaningful distinction of the term and it carries no meaning other than "things we don't like". Using it in that context is confusing, however, because the English language defines it differently.

Perhaps this is just a tooltip error after all.

 

[blackchoas]

No, I am not "arbitrarily" calling those things exploits. Wiz *explicitly* stated the foreign core recruitment as an exploit (despite that it was cherry tapping), so using it as an example is the exact opposite of arbitrary.

The native ship nerf was...something. Take your pick, it's not justified by anything but a selective interpretation of history, which is something Wiz stated he wouldn't take seriously so presumably his motivation for that change is not to avoid taking himself seriously. I instead chose to give a relative benefit of the doubt and guess that it fell under "exploit" because the premise of it being a "balance" change is laughable. It's just a guess though, because the reason for that change was never stated after all.

Regardless, Wiz seems to be claiming that he + Johan can define words in the English language then apply them as they see fit, so I guess anything can be an exploit. That gets back to my original point though: if you define "anything we don't like" as exploit, then there is no meaningful distinction of the term and it carries no meaning other than "things we don't like". Using it in that context is confusing, however, because the English language defines it differently.

Perhaps this is just a tooltip error after all.

ex·ploit
verb
ikˈsploit/

1. 1.
   make full use of and derive benefit from (a resource).
   "500 companies sprang up to exploit this new technology"
   synonyms: utilize, harness, use, make use of, turn/put to good use, make the most of, capitalize on, benefit from;
   informalcash in on
   "we should exploit this new technology"
2. noun

ˈekˌsploit/

1. 1.
   a bold or daring feat.
   "the most heroic and secretive exploits of the war"
   synonyms: feat, deed, act, adventure, stunt, escapade; More
   
   
2. 2.
   a software tool designed to take advantage of a flaw in a computer system, typically for malicious purposes such as installing malware.
   "if someone you don't know tweets you a link, it's either spam, an exploit, or probably both"

This is the definition of exploit google gives me, none of these 3 really suit the way we're using the word. I already defined an exploit better for our context, which is the use of something not WAD in order to gain an advantage, which Wiz seemed to agree with, then he didn't claim to define exploit as anything he wanted but claimed what was and was not WAD was at his and Johans discretion which would basically give him the power to define what is and isn't an exploit. Unless you can come up with a better definition for exploit I dont think you have an argument here,

also foreign core recruitment was not just a cherry topping (now that I know what it mean I think its suppose to be topping not tapping) it was a legit strat for hordes and many considered it a serious nerf to hordes when it was taken out,

I think there are serious historical arguments against native ships based on history, although this is also because of the games limited ship models which most native american ships don't fall even close to

 

[net.split]

Isn't fun in your design philosophy somewhere, along with some consistent basis to apply your changes? Right now, it seems the basis is "we don't like the thought of this mechanic used that way", but I don't want it to seem that way. This game is pretty fun but the track record of removing options and defining them as exploit IS concerning, even if in this case it's a mechanic I won't miss in the slightest.

This is what a game designer does. I'm not entirely sure how you want them to act differently.

Every mechanic is designed with intent behind it -- intent of use, intent of interaction with other mechanics, intent of resulting gameplay. The more complex a game, the more likely it is for individual mechanic designs to have unintended consequences, unforeseen results, and accidental promotion of certain types of gameplay.

A good designer is consistent with modifications in exactly one way: continuing to develop toward the game's vision. That vision can of course be modified from time to time (as the designer desires new experiences, accomplishes a vision as well as can be expected, or comes across new ideas and inspiration). For this reason it's usually not a good idea for a designer to communicate the overall vision until after the fact; it can set expectations that aren't realized because the vision itself changes with time.

Regardless, the main sticking point you seem to have with a lot of these changes is that they happen not to match your personal vision for the game (this particular one excluded). There's nothing wrong with this, but you tend to defeat yourself when you try to position your argument to be the one of logic and consistency versus the designers' being arbitrary and not well thought-out.

Arguing the merits of individual changes and features is perfectly fine; frankly, when you stick to this, I tend to agree with you more often than not. But when you start spending those extra paragraphs bringing up unrelated changes and trying to build some overall case about the designers' apparent incompetence, that's when you lose me - and much more importantly, Paradox staff who might otherwise be inclined to take note of your analysis. This is neither a political race nor a formal debate event, and it is absurd to treat every discussion as such.

There is logic behind every (intended) change that makes its way into the game. You or I or anyone else may not like a change, and we are pretty much guaranteed to type up a few hundred words each stating exactly why we don't. But that doesn't mean there was no logic behind the decision. Paradox is not obligated to share that logic with us. Frankly doing so is probably untenable. I know when I'm designing games I can spend hours mulling over the pros and cons of individual mechanics; discussing internally, at length, minute details about how something should work. Trying to take all of that and communicate it to a wide audience is hopeless; you'll never get it all across, and if you spend too much time trying you'll miss out on doing other things, like more useful communications or getting work done or having any other sort of life.