Diplomacy games were one of the best things in AoE2 that I wish would make a comeback in age IV. However, in the interest of replayability and more complex intrigue, there’s a mechanic I think would spice things up: Personalities!
Imagine, before the game starts, you get 3 personality cards, randomly assigned, that condition your strategies - for instance, 1 trade personality, 1 diplomatic personality and 1 defeat condition. I find that in AoE2 diplomacy games, deep down you know everyone is lying, so having a mechanic that gives players different alliance and trade strategies means there are actual different “characters” that you can play. Blue coffee, for instance, is a legendary liar in AoE2 diplomacy, so people always know what to expect from him, but he could be assigned a very honest and peaceful personality, which makes for more replayablity in the game mode. This also creates a meta of trying to guess the other players’ hidden personalities.
Examples of trade personalities:
- Espionage: as long as you have an active trade route with a player, you see his resource count.
- Cash crop entrepreneur: 5% slower farming, 15% higher trade profit
- Vengeful merchants: gain 500 gold when declaring war on someone you trade with
- Trade knowledge: see every market and trade unit on the map
Diplomatic personalities:
- Shrewd diplomats: reveal 1 random personality card of everyone you ally with
- Proud warrior: all your units gain 15% extra HP for 2 minutes after declaring war to an enemy. Can only make peace if
- Cowardly knights: 10% cheaper fortifications. Must spend 500 gold to bribe your court in order to be able to declare war.
- Overlord: gain a gold trickle when allied with enemies with at least X less score. Lose a gold trickle when allied with someone who’s got more score than you.
- Pious: your units do -50% damage to villagers but +10% more to military units. Monks +10 HP.
- Constant suspicion: Gain a military debuff if holding an alliance for more than 20 minutes. Gain +x% faster military training speed for each enemy you currently have.
- Naïve: reveal your hidden personalities to all players, place a -12% economy debuff on players who defy all that is good by declaring war on someone as innocent as you.
- Backstabber: gain +15% attack damage for your units when declaring war on an enemy
- Righteous: your units gain a debuff if you break an alliance. If an ally breaks an alliance with you, you inflict 20% more damage on their units and your units gain 10% more movement speed for 8 minutes
- Slayer of sycophants: gain a 25% damage bonus vs players who tributed you resources in the last 2 minutes
Special defeat conditions:
- Bloodthirst: Lose if you don’t kill 10 enemy villagers by 20 minutes
- Treasurer: Lose if your gold count is below 500 for more than 5 minutes from the castle age onward
- Unpopular with the traders: lose the game if you don’t make 500/1000/2000 gold in trade profit by 20/30/40 minutes
- Conspiring clergy: Lose if you don’t convert 5/10 enemy units + 1 building by 25/40 minutes
- Fatally generous: As long as there is more than one other player left in the game, you lose if you don’t gift at least a total of 1000 resources every 30 minutes to another player, starting in the feudal age
- Greedy: lose if your allies don’t tribute you 500 gold every 25 minutes
- Friend of nature: lose the game if you don’t control at least 4 living herdable animals, starting from the feudal age
If you have a better idea of how this should be done, feel free to contribute!