DollarSign
Unwanted
- Joined
- Jan 18, 2015
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- 102
Having blazed through the Civilization series, GalCiv 2, some of the Heroes, all of the wonderful Age of Wonders, and even a bit of Endless Space/Legend, I've finally managed to identify the number one mechanic that is missing from virtually every strategy game out there, except, in a very small part, Age of Wonders 2. I propose that turn-based strategies provide the task of managing not only the empire's cities, armies and resources, but also its leadership.
The leadership is organized along a multi-tiered hierarchical model and is divided in two parts - political leaders and military leaders. They are represented by in-game units whose condition has a profound effect on the success or failure of your empire.
First off, there's the Leader unit. This can be a king, queen, president, emperor, supreme priest or other, depending on your empire's type of government. The leader is most effective when it resides in the empire's capital city, but it can be moved to a secondary location when needed. The leader unit provides bonuses to the empire's entire production/happiness/influence depending on how you customize its abilities, and can be leveled-up with the passage of time. If the capital city is assaulted with the Leader still in it, you may choose to sacrifice part of your forces in order to allow the Leader unit to escape.
If the Leader is killed, the empire suffers penalties until a successor can be named (the manner of succession is once again dependent on whether it's a monarchy, democracy, theocracy, technocracy, or something in-between). If the empire researches a new type of government, it enters a transitional period that may or may not result in civil war, depending on the leader unit's traits/abilities and how you deal with the situation. A universally-beloved leader with ten points in Tenaciousness may declare the change of government illegal and result in half your empire breaking away in rebellion, forcing you to reconquer or diplomatically reconcile the differences.
Additionally, every city has a Governor unit which acts as a local leader, and has a loyalty meter which depends on proximity to the empire's sphere of influence, citizen happiness, leader's traits/abilities, and so on. If the loyalty meter goes into negatives, the city may break away and become either self-governing or join another empire. Your type of government determines how much power the local governors have - despotism makes their loyalty meter almost negligible but deals penalties to city production/happiness, federalism grants them vast bonuses but increases the likelihood of their dissatisfaction in case of poor management. You can depose a governor before they break away.
The same way, your military forces are commanded by Generals. Each General unit may have a number of units assigned to them, it doesn't have to be present in a stack in order for it to count as being under that General's command, in this case the stack will be led by a Lieutenant unit. You can have multiple General units, with multiple Lieutenants assigned to each, and just like Governors, these may choose to defect, depending on the situation. Maxed-out Loyalty gives high bonuses to attack/defense/healing. You can also negotiate with armies/cities that defected from other empires and win their loyalty with cash/diplomacy/technology/etc. If an army's General unit is killed in battle, that army becomes leaderless and suffers penalties until a new General is appointed. Generals and Lieutenant units are selected from regular units that level-up through combat experience, alternatively, they can be trained at an Academy at a high cost and delivered to their army manually.
Finally, each Leader/Governor/General unit has a Reputation meter. Political leaders gain Reputation through high production/happiness/influence, military leaders through defeating enemies/conquering cities. Leaders with Hero or Legendary status provide tremendous bonuses but are less likely to step down willingly if you want to fire them. Lieutenants don't have their own Reputation meter. Legendary Generals/Governors may decide to appoint themselves leader of a new civilization, Hero units are more likely to join existing civilizations or remain neutral/roaming.
The civilization's form of government has two parameters: Type and Centralization. Type (Monarchy, Empire, Theocracy, Republic, Democracy, Technocracy) determines how much power the Leader has and the manner of its succession (election, hereditary, appointed by council, etc). Centralization (Despotism, Unitary, Federation, Confederation, Commonwealth) determines how much power city Governors have, the more decentralized it is the more micro-management is left up to the AI.
Gameplay example 1:
Terran Dominion achieved a great victory against the Eldar Empire, destroying their capital and conquering their remaining planets. However, the military victory came at the cost of starvation and reduced manufacturing throughout the empire. In hopes of quickly improving the civilization's economy, Legendary King Elessar institutes a government reform and Terran Dominion becomes a Federal Technocracy. Against all odds, the cyberized nano-AI selects former King Elessar as the best choice of leader, and he becomes President, sustaining his Leadership bonuses and preventing a potential civil war between the Technocracy and Elessar's supporters (highest approval ratings in the north-western quadrant).
However, Eldar governors of recently-conquered elven systems ( north-eastern quadrant) use their Federal powers to break away from the Dominion, causing a rebellion that lasts three turns. Additionally, mass starvation in the south-western quadrant leads to high disapproval rating, causing its governors to start a rebellion that lasts five turns. The bulk of military units deployed in the south-western quadrant remain loyal to Elessar, and under General Tiberius' command they easily reconquer rebelling systems and depose their treacherous Governors (a Tribunal system allows Elessar the choice between pardoning the Governors, exiling or executing). As this is going on, rebelling Eldar systems complete their rebellion and form a Restored Elven Tyranny, promising more devastating battles ahead.
Gameplay example 2:
Beastman Alliance is a loose Commonwealth of five tribes, each with their separate Leader. After the Orcs are attacked by the dark forces of Pandemonium, other four Leaders refuse to give military aid and watch as the Orcs are quickly destroyed. Trolls attempt a peace treaty with Pandemonium, which is promptly refused and makes them the next candidate for destruction. As this is going on, a Minotaur Hero General called Zangash instigates a rebellion, and after sacking the remaining three capital cities, becomes a Despotic Leader of the Beastman Civilization. This grants bonuses to military production and makes all cities directly controllable by the player, allowing the Beastmen to raise a powerful army quickly enough to stop the Demonic invasion.
P.S. Note that the Leader unit is not the player's avatar in-game, but rather a separate entity which may disagree with the player's choices and become permanently hostile to the player-controlled civilization. The player is not represented in-game directly, and is rather an abstract "hand of fate" which decides events from outside the universe's scope.
The leadership is organized along a multi-tiered hierarchical model and is divided in two parts - political leaders and military leaders. They are represented by in-game units whose condition has a profound effect on the success or failure of your empire.
First off, there's the Leader unit. This can be a king, queen, president, emperor, supreme priest or other, depending on your empire's type of government. The leader is most effective when it resides in the empire's capital city, but it can be moved to a secondary location when needed. The leader unit provides bonuses to the empire's entire production/happiness/influence depending on how you customize its abilities, and can be leveled-up with the passage of time. If the capital city is assaulted with the Leader still in it, you may choose to sacrifice part of your forces in order to allow the Leader unit to escape.
If the Leader is killed, the empire suffers penalties until a successor can be named (the manner of succession is once again dependent on whether it's a monarchy, democracy, theocracy, technocracy, or something in-between). If the empire researches a new type of government, it enters a transitional period that may or may not result in civil war, depending on the leader unit's traits/abilities and how you deal with the situation. A universally-beloved leader with ten points in Tenaciousness may declare the change of government illegal and result in half your empire breaking away in rebellion, forcing you to reconquer or diplomatically reconcile the differences.
Additionally, every city has a Governor unit which acts as a local leader, and has a loyalty meter which depends on proximity to the empire's sphere of influence, citizen happiness, leader's traits/abilities, and so on. If the loyalty meter goes into negatives, the city may break away and become either self-governing or join another empire. Your type of government determines how much power the local governors have - despotism makes their loyalty meter almost negligible but deals penalties to city production/happiness, federalism grants them vast bonuses but increases the likelihood of their dissatisfaction in case of poor management. You can depose a governor before they break away.
The same way, your military forces are commanded by Generals. Each General unit may have a number of units assigned to them, it doesn't have to be present in a stack in order for it to count as being under that General's command, in this case the stack will be led by a Lieutenant unit. You can have multiple General units, with multiple Lieutenants assigned to each, and just like Governors, these may choose to defect, depending on the situation. Maxed-out Loyalty gives high bonuses to attack/defense/healing. You can also negotiate with armies/cities that defected from other empires and win their loyalty with cash/diplomacy/technology/etc. If an army's General unit is killed in battle, that army becomes leaderless and suffers penalties until a new General is appointed. Generals and Lieutenant units are selected from regular units that level-up through combat experience, alternatively, they can be trained at an Academy at a high cost and delivered to their army manually.
Finally, each Leader/Governor/General unit has a Reputation meter. Political leaders gain Reputation through high production/happiness/influence, military leaders through defeating enemies/conquering cities. Leaders with Hero or Legendary status provide tremendous bonuses but are less likely to step down willingly if you want to fire them. Lieutenants don't have their own Reputation meter. Legendary Generals/Governors may decide to appoint themselves leader of a new civilization, Hero units are more likely to join existing civilizations or remain neutral/roaming.
The civilization's form of government has two parameters: Type and Centralization. Type (Monarchy, Empire, Theocracy, Republic, Democracy, Technocracy) determines how much power the Leader has and the manner of its succession (election, hereditary, appointed by council, etc). Centralization (Despotism, Unitary, Federation, Confederation, Commonwealth) determines how much power city Governors have, the more decentralized it is the more micro-management is left up to the AI.
Gameplay example 1:
Terran Dominion achieved a great victory against the Eldar Empire, destroying their capital and conquering their remaining planets. However, the military victory came at the cost of starvation and reduced manufacturing throughout the empire. In hopes of quickly improving the civilization's economy, Legendary King Elessar institutes a government reform and Terran Dominion becomes a Federal Technocracy. Against all odds, the cyberized nano-AI selects former King Elessar as the best choice of leader, and he becomes President, sustaining his Leadership bonuses and preventing a potential civil war between the Technocracy and Elessar's supporters (highest approval ratings in the north-western quadrant).
However, Eldar governors of recently-conquered elven systems ( north-eastern quadrant) use their Federal powers to break away from the Dominion, causing a rebellion that lasts three turns. Additionally, mass starvation in the south-western quadrant leads to high disapproval rating, causing its governors to start a rebellion that lasts five turns. The bulk of military units deployed in the south-western quadrant remain loyal to Elessar, and under General Tiberius' command they easily reconquer rebelling systems and depose their treacherous Governors (a Tribunal system allows Elessar the choice between pardoning the Governors, exiling or executing). As this is going on, rebelling Eldar systems complete their rebellion and form a Restored Elven Tyranny, promising more devastating battles ahead.
Gameplay example 2:
Beastman Alliance is a loose Commonwealth of five tribes, each with their separate Leader. After the Orcs are attacked by the dark forces of Pandemonium, other four Leaders refuse to give military aid and watch as the Orcs are quickly destroyed. Trolls attempt a peace treaty with Pandemonium, which is promptly refused and makes them the next candidate for destruction. As this is going on, a Minotaur Hero General called Zangash instigates a rebellion, and after sacking the remaining three capital cities, becomes a Despotic Leader of the Beastman Civilization. This grants bonuses to military production and makes all cities directly controllable by the player, allowing the Beastmen to raise a powerful army quickly enough to stop the Demonic invasion.
P.S. Note that the Leader unit is not the player's avatar in-game, but rather a separate entity which may disagree with the player's choices and become permanently hostile to the player-controlled civilization. The player is not represented in-game directly, and is rather an abstract "hand of fate" which decides events from outside the universe's scope.
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