Diplomacy

Diplomacy is managed through the diplomacy window which can be opened using the button at the top right of the screen. The relationship between any two factions is described by three factors: hostility, intimidation, and diplomatic status. The default state of relations between most factions in the Ancient World is hostile. Minor border raiding is a continuous fact of life. When a faction cannot defend a border, either because it does not have the troops or they are needed elsewhere, it may request a truce with a neighbouring faction. During a truce, neither faction will attack or invade their neighbour.

Diplomatic relations are cancelled either by a declaration of war via the diplomacy window, by moving units into enemy territory and violating a truce, or by refusing to meet a diplomatic demand for more money. In the first two cases this will increase hostility, making any future attempts at diplomacy more difficult. This affects not only the two factions directly involved but other factions will also hear of the treachery and be less likely to enter into diplomatic relations with the offending faction.

Diplomacy is defined in terms of hostility, intimidation and diplomatic status, it can also be influenced by events. In Hegemony, diplomacy is controlled through the diplomacy window, which allows you to monitor the relations between factions as well as initiate or break diplomatic agreements.

Diplomatic Status
Diplomacy thus is very simple, there are 2 situations in which you will find yourself to be at, one at a time of course: War is the default stance among factions. At any time anyone is "allowed" to attack anyone. Any attack towards a faction, increases the hostility between you two. When you enter Truce, a white dove will appear on every asset on the faction you are in Truce with. This means you cannot attack them, without declaring war first.

A truce is a diplomatic state where two factions have agreed not to attack each other’s units or buildings. Cancelling truces permanently increases hostilities between the factions, making future diplomatic agreements more costly.

The cost of a truce depends on the intimidation and hostility between the two factions. Greater hostility increases the cost of diplomacy as does negative intimidation (they’re not scared of you). Positive intimidation (they are scared of you) will decrease the cost of diplomacy and, if intimidation exceeds hostility, you can demand money from them in return for the truce. If intimidation is less than hostility than you will have to pay the other faction for a truce. However, if intimidation exceeds hostility then the other faction will offer you money for a truce.

The final cost of diplomacy is also determined by the total income of the paying faction, so as your empire grows you will be required to pay more to maintain your relationship with hostile factions.

The Eagle King DLC introduces a further state of diplomacy: Having a Supply Truce with another faction allows the player to supply his troops on the other faction's territory and access it's territory, cities, camps etc. freely Note: in earlier iterations of the Hegemony series this was called an "alliance".

Hostility
Hostility is a measure of the inherent distrust and hatred that exists between any two factions in the game. It is used both to determine the availability and cost of various diplomatic agreements as well as the size of garrison required to keep a captured city from rebelling.

Hostility increases or decreases depending on your actions. When you attack enemy assets hostility increases, but when you leave the faction alone it gradually decreases. Also, giving them back any requisitions, decreases the hostility as well. However, hostility increases over time when a faction is paying you tribute.

Its value is between -100 and 100. If hostility is 100, then the enemy feels hatred towards you. If hostility is -100, then they are open to diplomatic agreements.

Hostility affects 2 things:
 * Morale of captured enemy cities: The more hatred a faction feels towards you, the more difficult is to keep their captured cities morale up and running. Which means you might need more units, or hostages to keep the morale in check.
 * Gold "burden" on diplomatic agreements: When you want to enter in a Truce state with the faction, you will need to pay gold. The more hostility there is between you two, the more gold you need to pay.

Factions start neutral with the player, but keep in mind, that difficulty setting control the target number of hostile neighbours. That means on hard difficulty you will quickly be surrounded by hostile factions.

Intimidation
Intimidation is a measure of how much one faction is influenced by the other’s size and military strength. Intimidation is used to reduce the cost of various diplomatic agreements. Indimidation works pretty much the same as hostility, but it's determined by other factors. Which means, when you expand and create a large empire, other factions begin to feel intimidated towards you, they fear you. In other words, the value changes as the game progresses mostly.

Intimidation is represented as a number from -100 to +100: If indimidation is 100, then they fear you greatly and will reduce the gold expenses for Truce, Alliance and Requisitions. If indimidation is -100, they show no fear, so any diplomatic relations will cost more.

Values less than zero indicate the other faction believes themselves to be stronger and so they are not intimidated by you. Intimidation values less than zero will increase the cost of truces and alliances. On the other hand, values greater than zero indicate the other faction thinks you are stronger and this reduces the cost of diplomatic agreements. If a faction’s intimidation exceeds their hostility, you can demand money from that faction in return for a truce or alliance.

The intimidation value is calculated using the relative sizes of each faction’s military as well as any imminent threats to each faction’s cities. This means that moving a large force into position around an enemy’s city can greatly increase their intimidation and therefore reduce the cost of proposing a diplomatic agreement. The affect a military manoeuvre has on intimidation is based on the size and importance of the city as well as how close it is to being captured. For instance, if it has plenty of food to withstand a siege it will be significantly less intimidated.

However, even if you might have a very large empire there can be factions with -100 indimidation, which means they don't fear you at all. If you start defeating their armies and capturing their cities, they will start to feel scared, thus increasing the Indimidation value.

Note: Intimidation values can increase quickly based on military manoeuvres but will decrease very slowly allowing you to move a significant force against the enemy to negotiate a favourable agreement and then remove that force so it can be used elsewhere.

Note: The threat of capturing an enemy city is more influential than a continued occupation. This means that you’ll get the best terms for a diplomatic agreement if you weaken a city to the point you could take it easily but before you actually capture it.

Requisition
Note: Requisition can be used to peacefully take away vital resources from a AI faction or city and speculate that the City Rebels to Player event will trigger, which lets the player peacefully annex a foreign city.

Events & Objectives

 * diplomacy events/objectives to declare war, request truces, renegotiate truces
 * conquest events/objectives where factions ask for help attacking other factions
 * warning message when you're attacking neutral targets