So
I spent a long time considering what to do with certain elements of
political simulation. Since Paradox is really the only extant example I
draw my comparisons and contrasts there but I didn't base my ideas off
of theirs.
Consider
how EU4 handles what they call diplomatic annexation. There is a 10
year timer from establishing a vassal. You must pay bird mana and it
takes a few years to absorb the state. You get bonuses based on religion
and culture.
This
is extremely limiting and abstract, even aside from all vassals
behaving identically across the whole world with identical duties.
The
system I am currently planning on implementing works this way: There is
no such thing as a hardcoded vassal, protectorate, or colony. As part
of the diplomatic system there are many different terms one can put into
a treaty. Treaties can be performed in peace with all options in play
aside from a truce since there is no war. A war treaty is the same a
peace one excepting the truce, and a certain pressure to assent to terms
based on the current state of the war. Treaties contain various terms
regarding money sent back and forth, royal marriage, hostages,
fostering, land exchanges of many kinds, defense pacts, offense pacts
and so forth. A nation may exist as a series of states with various
agreements in place. You may use tiers based on a template treaty to
represent something like the members, electors, free cities, and emperor
of the HRE.
Directly
controlled land allows full sovereignty and control. You may perform
any province based action. This is land directly controlled by your
character. You may establish a bureaucracy of non noble offices to
administer your land. You will assign them goals and duties and access
to resources with which to act. Since such people don't have any
significant power they will not be represented in game by an actual
character and cannot perform actions characters can. You will pay a
general fee to these people to operate your stuff for you. So a large
bureaucracy is expensive but cannot initiate rebellions the same way
characters can. However bureaucrats are represented as a population as
you assign them. Based on racial traits and your experience with
institutional bureaucracy they can handle more duties. The default base
is 2. You'll actually assign duties to the population itself, not an
individual member since they are not characters. Other populations will
react poorly if a specific race, religion, nation of origin, and so
forth gets all the cushy posts.
Governors
or nobles will be full characters which can handle far more work than a
bureaucrat. But they can amass personal wealth and power and have
standing with all relevant populations, so they can secede or engage in
plots and do other crap. Nobles can act among themselves, moving lands
and such things around but they maintain populace opinion whereas a
governor who dies loses all standing and a new governor lacks any
standing upon appointment. Populations will have similar reactions if
all governors or nobles are of a given demographic. Governors are not a
hardcoded system, its simply a flavor way to differentiate between
hereditary and non-hereditary positions within my posts.
Why
am I talking about administrative stuff in a post about annexation and
cultural acceptance? Because that is how it is defined. You can levy
taxes and other obligations on populations any way you like. But this
affects their opinion of you personally and how they regard your state.
Instead of some stupid base tax calculation or a change culture button
or w/e, how your state treats people determines their feelings about the
state. Citizens will be willing to meet more obligations if they feel
more represented and accepted in a state. There is also an affect based
on how populations view each other. If your state is 70% main culture
and main culture hates your minorities they have a worse opinion of you
and the state. If you work to change their status they like you more and
if your actions cause the majority population to like them more they
are more loyal to the state.
Note
that nobles and governors have their own relations and acceptances.
Both them personally and the land they control work the same way as your
personal land. But its not as easy as just giving proportional
aristocratic, bureaucratic, and administrative positions to out. Because
previously privileged populations will dislike governors of other
groups if they have a poor opinion of that group. And they will dislike
you for appointing them. Populations are divided among religion, race,
caste, nation of origin, and also faction. Some populations will have
the faction for racial purity or the faction for nationalism or w/e.
Note
that its no use being a beacon of cultural acceptance if you cause your
main population to hate you and revolt. All characters have more than a
faction. Part of their consciousness data involves desires that can
relate to race, land, religion, political appointments and so forth. If
for whatever reason you appoint a minority to a position and a certain
noble wanted it he will be mad at both you and that guy who "stole" his
job. He may initiate plots or propaganda campaigns against you and/or
that person.
Yes,
there is propaganda. Its sort of like the espionage system. You spend
resources to promote ideas, appoint people from populations who agree,
and so forth. Your propaganda can slowly change the political beliefs of
your populace over time. Certain populations take more effect from
certain propaganda.
Also
note that if you assign a state religion or religions people of those
religions will like you more and people not of them will like you less.
Also the more you add the more diluted the bonuses are. Well the hate of
non-sanctioned religions grows as more others are accepted and theirs
aren't.
As
far as vassal states themselves, any land not directly controlled by
you or your governors is not really YOUR land per say. Nobles are
basically part of your state by treaty. The noble family and the
populace become more and more in favor of the treaty over time as it
persists, though the populace and the nobles have distinct feelings
about it. Thusly, if you create a new subordinate ruler and state, the
populace will retain their current feelings about you and have positive
feelings about the treaty. As will the noble. If you conquer a noble
and/or their land by force or build up support and progressively more
powerful treaties, support starts at 0 and builds up. To "integrate" a
vassal state you keep it in treaty for a long time, slowly add duties
that it must meet towards you, and slowly appoint its nobles or populace
to positions of power and authority within your lands and vassals'
lands. Integration is more about the chance of the treaty being broken
and the vassal or populace receding or rebelling. You must perform
actions and dedicate resources after the treaty is initially signed in
order to convince the ruler and/or populace that a stronger treaty will
benefit them.
Ways
outside of taxes and treaties and appointments and building relations
with the ruling classes to make a state want to be diplomatically more
integrated involve preventing them from being damaged by conflict,
spending from the national treasury to build up their state, assigning
more troops and so forth. Propaganda campaigns also slowly increase
their opinion of you over time.
You
get substantial bonuses to "integration" speed if you have a high
respect rating with the ruling classes and the populace. Respect
indicates peoples' opinion of you as a ruler. How you treat citizens and
nobles and so forth, whether you keep your word. Fear is how seriously
they take threats. Regular opinion/influence is the slow build up of
good feelings by being part of your state for a long time. Acceptance of
a leading religious figure of the proper kind also has benefits.
As
far as breaking your word, when you sign treaties you'll agree to
certain things, perhaps protection and tax limits and money to build or
rebuild infrastructure or provide positions and offices. When you break
such a treaty this lowers the respect value of interested parties based
on their closeness to you and the people you broke trust with.
Anyway
a major theme of my game that infuses all the mechanics is the idea of
direct action and gradual change rather than abstraction, timers, and
arbitrary button clicking.
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