What is your ideal planetary diplomacy system?

I have always been interested in rebuilding the way our planet/citizen AI/diplomacy system works. I have a few ideas of my own but I want to get some general discussion going. The more ideas the bettter!

My question is:

On your ideal LotJ, what would planetary control/diplomacy gameplay look like? I’m talking big picture here. Forget everything you know about spamming propaganda, using the same leadplanet tax rates everywhere, and vague ‘rebel’ values. If you had a text-based dream that had the perfect planetary control system, what would it be like?

On ooc, we had a little discussion about this. feel free to read everyones ideas so far.

(OOC) *Fishy: Diplo needs to be about more than frustratingly time consuming bullshit
(IMM) Walldo: That’s the great thing about redoing planets, is that diplomacy basically builds itself
(OOC) *Fishy: Because right now all diplo is, is a timewasting mechanism. Really
(IMM) Walldo: I know
(OOC) *Fishy: Other than broadcast, which should be a fucking command or something
(OOC) *Slyth: diplomacy needs the ability to see funds(gained from running cargo?) and use those funds strictly for the planet, like defenses and stuff.
(OOC) *Fishy: Support should actually be a measure of support, rather than a planet capture progress bar
(OOC) *Slyth: also, would be nice if planets actually died when not taken care of by the diplomat. like citizens would get sick, and diseases would start spreading.
(OOC) *Fishy: Separate out military security/capture of the planet from actual popular support.
(OOC) *Fishy: No, the last thing we need is more dumb micromanagement bullshit for diplos to do.
(RPC) Gyndi: it would give diplos something to do
(IMM) Walldo: Planets have an ‘affiliation’ rank between major clans and what you think of as ‘pop support’ is renamed ‘control’
(OOC) *Fishy: “Your citizens WILL DIE if you don’t go to the planet every 24 hours” is something to do. Something HORRIBLE to do.
(OOC) *Fishy: Exactly, walldo
(OOC) *Slyth: they have shit all. they set a planet once and then leave it for months.
(RPC) Gyndi: maybe not something that crazy, fishy, but like… add a skill call speech or something every few days you go around to do it so that control stays high or something
(RPC) Gyndi: so citizens don’t feel ‘detached’ or something
(OOC) *Slyth: and I am not saying 24 hours, that is unrealistic. I am saying if a government lets it sit for like 2 weeks, and doesn’t even go to it, it should start to have problems.
(OOC) *Fishy: You’ve clearly never been a diplomat for multiple planets in a major clan that had a lot of people fucking with it
(IMM) Walldo: I’m not sure that it would actually be that hard to give planets a clan affiliation system
(IMM) Walldo: Dantooine supports the empire 51% csa 48% neutral government 1% or something
(OOC) *Slyth: captured a few and set them for the rebellion one timeline. I am just saying look at it now. no war, no planets being bothered, diplomats do shit all.
(IMM) Walldo: okay thread posted
(RPC) Gyndi: It’s hard to have war with two neutral governments 😛
(IMM) Walldo: Yeah making diplomacy mains important during peace time should be a big part of it
(IMM) Walldo: http://www.legendsofthejedi.com/forums/topic/what-is-your-ideal-planetary-diplomacy-system/
(IMM) Walldo: hmm still have to be logged in to read stuff?
(OOC) *Slyth: that is what I am saying walldo. if they have to help their planet every 2 weeks, what’s the big deal, eh?
(RPC) Gyndi: yeah
(RPC) Gyndi: and the pages are wonky
(OOC) *Fishy: Have military control and actual support be separate.
(OOC) *Fishy: Have very strong or very weak support affect the military control
(RPC) Gyndi: have a fear stat for each affiliation
(IMM) Walldo: it’d be like 2 separate stats, and one influences the other
(OOC) *Fishy: Popular support should be a slower-moving thing, affected by things like taxes and police rating and crime
(IMM) Walldo: Like the more support you have the more effective your skills to take control are
(OOC) *Fishy: And control should be affected by blockades and bombardments and new diplo skills
(OOC) *Fishy: Have things like propaganda do a short-lasting but big hit/benefit to popular support
(IMM) Walldo: Work over support to make your hardhitting control skills more effective
(IMM) Walldo: or something in english
(OOC) *Slyth: Or, propoganda and stuff raises the percentages walldo was talking about… so if you start with 48, 51, and 1, you can get something like 35, 55, and 10 using propoganda.
(OOC) *Fishy: Make control over planets economically incentivised for major clans. Not so much to replace more active moneymaking methods, but at least make it a sane system that you can actually get measurable results from
(IMM) Walldo: Definitely
(IMM) Walldo: Like how?
(IMM) Walldo: Is While My Guitar Gently Weeps the best beatles song?
(OOC) *Slyth: this way, a company can raise their status with a planet, and lets say if they do, the planet gives them a deal on items/resources?
(IMM) Walldo: It would be cool if minor clan base location impacted things
(IMM) Walldo: Like if you had an engineering clan based on your planet you get a bonus
(IMM) Walldo: who even knows, there are so many ways you could go with it
(RPC) Gyndi: make it so the resources are dynamic and fluxuate more so that people have trouble botting cargo running.
(OOC) *Fishy: Yeah, there should be more variability in planetary economies and more tools for clanleaders and clan diplos to measure and alter it
(IMM) Walldo: You could just make each planet have its own unique features like Ord Mantell is 10% resistant to control attack, whatever
(IMM) Walldo: Cargo running is almost a whole other thing but intimately involved
(OOC) *Fishy: And maybe have certain planets have hardcoded resources and then clans can add more on top of that?
(OOC) *Slyth: Engineering clans on a planet give a +10 industry bonus, making prices 10% higher for items?
(OOC) *Slyth: other than those in the clan of course.
(RPC) Gyndi: that would make them lower
(OOC) *Slyth: lets say an engineering clan adds planetary defenses, based on what size they are? like shields are major large manufacturing, and turrets are large manufacturing? Advanced weaponry and armor for citizens at medium engineering, and small engineering giv
(OOC) *Slyth: gives citizens better armor only?
(OOC) *Slyth: citizens = military.

I like the pie chart approach to popular support
. Certain events could trigger explosions in demand for certain resources and as the population doesn’t get them they get progressively more angry. The opposing faction could either choke off the planet itself through blockade or choke (or even better, control) the common trade routes for that resource. You could build certain player actions that would cause prices to spike in the same way e.g. the destruction of a food processing plant would send food prices sky high and if your opponents control the food exporting planets they could very easily starve your planets out.
There could also be a dynamic resource list; some things e.g. food and water are always moving around but there are certain fads e.g. pet rocks that will be real popular at certain points in time but if you’re the one to get tsstuck with them when the fad runs out you’re screwed because nobody’s buying them anymore at any price.

Diplomacy certainly needs to be more interactive than it is now and concepts like leadplanet and planetary AI need major overhauls as they are horribly incomplete and don’t want to work properly most of the time. People who are set as leaders of planets need to have a purpose for staying at the planet they are leading instead of just visiting every so often.

I made a big deal about all of this a looong time ago, drew up an elaborate economy system that required reworking of diplomacy and stuff. I don’t remember any of it anymore.

What if we had leaders of the planets decide where credits made from the planet go to. like the taxes go to a seperate account(planetary account) and then the leader of the planet can use those credits to buy into certain developments on the planet.(like maybe a building being put up for a mall, a new store being opened up to the public with new items, or a new area on a planet for phomes.)

They could also use the credits for planetary defenses, like shields and stuff, but only if they have lead the planet for x amount of days.

Also, why not have an outskirt town build in an area, and then in the same area file, and it with no vendors/people. when the planet is taken care of, the town opens up with vendors. when it is doing bad, the town is a ghost town(I know this would take time to do for the builders, but it’s just an idea.)

I think we need to focus on the barebones of a new system first. I think there are three key components to making this system work: Diplomacy, Economy, and Warfare.

Diplomacy really needs a booster shot. There’s not much to do but call criminals and wait for the pop support to drop. Once a better economy system is in place you could code support for trade embargoes, etc. At the most basic level, rework rebel points.

The MUD’s economy right now hinges on freight and quests. We need money-sinks for players and for every clan. Governments need to be able to make a sustainable amount of money off of planets if the planets are controlled and maintained properly. This is already possible to a degree but there’s a lot more that can be done.

Warfare, I say bring back pturrets and pshields with some modifications. Pturrets should be able to take out capships (and only capships) in blockade range, pshields should work more or less how they used to. This’ll give clans a reason to really put someone on the ground first and it should help prevent the situations where one side wins because they had an active fleet and the other side didn’t.

I think the first thing that needs to be tackled is a stable economy for the MUD. After that you can work on the diplomacy aspects, because you’re giving diplomacy mains a wider range of options in how they can affect planets.

I like the idea Walldo spoke of with having an engi clan on your planet giving you a bonus, but maybe it can be altered a big for other clans too. Perhaps a smuggling clan can make backroom deals to increase support, Engi gets discounts, Service increases profit, and so on.

Or, another idea for the crime clan, they can like, seed into a planet and influence the support in some way.. give other governments a reason to buy their services or some such.

-Edit: Probably going to make this another post in the brainstormatormatearium