Feature Cut: Takeovers

[Tom]

I've wanted to do a certain change for years now. Maybe this is the time:

Basically, a TO would work on two axis now - fear and loyalty. You can win the region either way. Brutality will increase fear, but lower loyalty while friendly acts will increase loyalty, but reduce fear. So trying both at the same time will be counter-productive, but a single or a few nobles going against the group will be drowned out.

What I would really love is for these two values to persist. Much like loyalty already persists, fear should as well.

This would allow realms to plan long-term - if you plan to take over a region by fear, you can ramp it up by going in an looting it a couple times during the war.

From the coding, it would be comparatively easy - we would add a 2nd column to the tables that already store loyalty.

[vonGenf]

I've wanted to do a certain change for years now. Maybe this is the time:

Basically, a TO would work on two axis now - fear and loyalty. You can win the region either way. Brutality will increase fear, but lower loyalty while friendly acts will increase loyalty, but reduce fear. So trying both at the same time will be counter-productive, but a single or a few nobles going against the group will be drowned out.

What I would really love is for these two values to persist. Much like loyalty already persists, fear should as well.

This would allow realms to plan long-term - if you plan to take over a region by fear, you can ramp it up by going in an looting it a couple times during the war.

From the coding, it would be comparatively easy - we would add a 2nd column to the tables that already store loyalty.

This gets bacl to the question I had before. I thought sympathy and loyalty were different values. I'll go on a limb and say that they should be if they're not!

http://forum.battlemaster.org/index.php/topic,1470.0.html

[Anaris]

This gets bacl to the question I had before. I thought sympathy and loyalty were different values. I'll go on a limb and say that they should be if they're not!

They are not, and it doesn't make much sense for them to be.

The value is simply how much the peasantry like Realm X.  When Realm X owns those peasants, it's called loyalty; otherwise, it's called sympathy.

[Tom]

_{Agreed with Anaris, and please don't hijack the thread.}

[JPierreD]

I very much like the idea, and the strategy possibilities it opens. Machiavelli would be quite pleased...

One question: would Fear and Loyalty be two separate values, which you could theoretically max at the same time? Such would make sense to me.

[Tom]

One question: would Fear and Loyalty be two separate values, which you could theoretically max at the same time? Such would make sense to me.

Yes, two seperate values. Since most actions that raise one will lower the other, however, maxing both is mostly a theoretical possibility. Minimizing both, however, will be more easy (they neither respect nor fear you).

[Velax]

Wouldn't it be easier to coopt current mechanic rather than creating a new hostile button?

I was thinking along the line of

-If there is looting - the TO works as a BTO
-If there is civil work - the TO works as a FTO
-if no one does anything - the TO works as a HTO
-If people contradict each other, the TO doesn't work and you're wasting your time.

So...exactly the same as now, but with even more possibilities for the takeover to fail and still nothing for nobles to do in hostile takeovers? Let's not.

I like Tom's idea, but would like multiple ways to affect fear and loyalty during a takeover, just for the variety. So it's not just, "Loot to increase fear, civil work to increase loyalty". Perhaps to increase loyalty a noble could spend 4 hours speaking to a local alderman, while to increase fear a noble could have that alderman strung up in the village square. To increase loyalty a noble might spend 6 hours hunting down a group of bandits that has been plaguing a village (it would just be a button click, with success determined by unit size and training), while to increase fear a unit could spend 8 hours patrolling the streets at night, enforcing a curfew. And so on.

[JPierreD]

Thinking about it, would it not be better to have the values be named Fear and Love/Sympathy, with a third value that would result from both, called Loyalty?

That is because loyalty comes from many sources, not only from love/sympathy, but also from fear. It would make no sense in some situations that people get less loyal when you prove them you can hurt them if you want to. But you can have loyalty with fear only, with love only, with both, but never with none of them.

[Draco Tanos]

Valid point.  With the USSR for instance, many were loyal to the government out of fear of their families and/or themselves being executed.  Especially under Uncle Joe.

[Tom]

Valid point.  With the USSR for instance, many were loyal to the government out of fear of their families and/or themselves being executed.  Especially under Uncle Joe.

Err... that is fear, not loyalty. This is exactly what the value "fear" should represent. Yes, we could rename "loyalty" to "love". But really, let's not re-write the entire game. I thought by having two different values named "fear" and "loyalty" it would be obvious that they're not the same thing.

[Revan]

I don't get why we're talking about Love here, especially for our period. When the English were being rebellious against William the Conqueror he just went up North and absolutely savaged the place. Twenty years later it was still in smithereens according to Domesday Book. But that didn't matter, because no longer was anyone challenging Norman rule. I doubt our Wills was losing any sleep over peasant hatred for that. All that mattered to him was their ultimate loyalty.

[JPierreD]

I brought Love into the equation because Machiavelli talked about it in The Prince, on the question of the benefits of being a loved or feared ruler. Chapter 17 according to the Wikipedia (I read the book some time ago, don't remember the exact words).

[Tom]

That's exactly where I take the idea. Basically, you can rule by being feared or by being loved.

[Zakilevo]

This will be very interesting. But I doubt many realms will try to rule with fear.

[Tom]

This will be very interesting. But I doubt many realms will try to rule with fear.

I think most will. The idea is that it is a lot easier to do it via fear, but it requires constant upkeep (you have to go around occasionally reminding people why they rightfully fear you). And as it is troublesome to switch one for the other, many people will conquer via fear and then get stuck with it.