Once a Nation has at least one Level 10 Town, that Nation can take part in Diplomacy! The Diplomacy system is a unique, in-game mechanic that allows Nations to create political treaties between one another, and make a name for themselves on the world stage through Trade Agreements, Alliances, Vassalships, Wars, and more!

 

Getting Started

Upon reaching Level 10, a Town unlocks the Ambassador Citizen. The Ambassador is where all diplomatic treaties are crafted, reviewed, and received - so this Citizen will be your lifeline to Diplomacy. (It's important to note that if your Nation trades away its last Level 10 or higher Town, you won't be able to take part in Diplomacy until you once again control a Town with an Ambassador.)

To get started, simply speak with your Ambassador and go to the Manage Diplomatic Relations menu. From there, you'll be able to access the following:

• Write a Proposal - From here, you can write treaty proposals to send to other Nations. More detail on how this works below.
• View Proposals - From here, you can accept or reject incoming treaty proposals, as well as view your pending outgoing proposals.
• Nation Status - From here, you can check the status of your Nation's active treaties.
• Global Status - From here, you can check the status of all other Nation's active treaties.
• Diplomacy Info - From here, you can learn more about how Diplomacy works through the in-game help menu.

Writing a Proposal

Certain actions (such as going to War or leaving an Alliance) do not require both sides to consent to a Treaty. However, nearly all other diplomatic relations start with a Nation writing a Treaty Proposal to another Nation. The recipient of the Proposal can review the terms at their own Ambassador, and either accept or reject it. Once accepted, the terms of a Treaty go into effect immediately.

To begin crafting a Treaty Proposal, click the Write a Proposal button, then select the Nation you want to send it to. A single Proposal may only have a single recipient - however it can include as many terms as you'd like.

So what sorts of terms can be included in a Treaty?

• Offer/Request Payment - A simple one-time payment of Gems.
• Offer/Request Town - Transfer ownership of an entire Town from one Nation to another. BE CAREFUL WITH THIS ONE - once transferred, ownership, permissions and zones will immediately switch to the new Nation.
• Offer/Request Tribute - A daily recurring payment of Gems. Players choose both the daily amount and the number of days this occurs.
• Offer/Request Vassalship - Make your Nation a Vassal or Overlord to another Nation. More on Vassalships below.
• Create Armistice - Make a pact with another Nation in which neither side can declare War on the other for the duration of the Armistice.
• Establish Trade Rights - Trade Rights generate daily Gems for both sides of the Treaty, based on each Nation's activity. Trade Rights with inactive Nations will lose you Gems.
• Share Map Information - Two Nations sharing map information will be able to see each others' members on the Dynmap.
• Join/Create Alliance - Create an Alliance with another Nation. If the sender is already in an Alliance, this option will invite the recipient to join the existing Alliance.
• Declare War - As mentioned above, this option does not require an agreed-upon Treaty. Selecting this option will open a confirmation menu showing the Nations that will be involved on both sides of the War - confirming the War Declaration will close the Treaty menu and begin the War Prelude. More on Wars below.

Depending on your current Treaties with other Nations, some of these options will change. For example, if two Nations are at War with each other, the Declare War option will change to Declare Ceasefire.

And finally, don't forget to name your Treaty by selecting the icon at the top center of the Create Treaty Proposal menu. The recipient will of course be able to see this name. In the case of creating a new Alliance, the name used here will be the official name of the Alliance.

 

RESPONDING TO PROPOSALS

When your Nation receives a Treaty Proposal, all members will receive a Diplomacy Status Change notification in chat. View the incoming Proposal by speaking with your Ambassador, and going to the View Proposals button. If you have a pending Incoming or Outgoing Treaty Proposal, the icons in this menu will be glowing.

Clicking on a specific incoming Proposal will bring up a menu with the terms being proposed, and an option to either accept or reject the Treaty. Rejecting a Proposal will not send a notification to the sender - however you can negotiate terms by immediately sending back a Proposal of your own, which will notify the other Nation. Once the recipient is happy with the terms, clicking Accept will immediately put the Treaty into effect.

 

Nation Status

Once a Treaty has been agreed to, you can view the active effects of it by going to the Nation Status button. From here, you'll be able to view a summary of all active diplomatic relations that your Nation is involved in, as well as the remaining duration of each.

• Alliance - View all Nations in your current Alliance.
• Wars - If your Nation is at War, this is where you can check the Balance of Power bar for each of your current Wars.
• Vassalships - View your Nation's current Vassals or Overlord.
• Other Treaties - Any current treaty effects that don't fall into one of the above categories can be viewed here.

GLOBAL STATUS

The Global Diplomacy Status menu shows current major diplomatic relations between all Nations. You can see another Nation's Alliance members, or who they are at War with, as well as all Vassals and Overlords. All other diplomatic statuses are not shown in this menu, and thus are not visible to all players.

If a Nation is at War, you'll see either an [A] or [D] before the names of the Nations they are warring with. This shows which Nations were the aggressors (the ones who declared the war) and which ones are on the defending side. (This is purely informational - there is no tangible difference between the attacking and defending sides of a War.)

 

Vassalships

Many Nations likely fall into one of these two categories:

A) You are in a strong Nation, and you can (and want to) protect yourself and others, OR

B) You are in a smaller, more peaceful Nation, and you'd prefer to avoid War altogether.

If one of those applies to your Nation, then a Vassalship agreement is for you! Overlord-Vassal relationships last for a set amount of time (determined in the Treaty Proposal) and a certain set of changes happen when this relationship goes into effect:

For Overlords, things don't change too much. The only real change is the knowledge that you're now officially protecting another Nation - which means if your Vassal makes enemies, or had prior enemies, those enemies will likely be coming after you now! Beyond that, mechanically, nothing else changes for the Overlord.

For Vassals, things change a bit more. Vassals cannot make or receive diplomatic Proposals from/with other Nations. This means War can't be declared on you, and you can't declare War on others - nor can you capture Relics or take part in Sieges. However, if your Overlord is at War, your Nation members can be killed once per day in the wilds by your Overlord's enemies. Being a Vassal means temporarily giving up diplomatic power in exchange for protection, so choose carefully when becoming a Vassal!

 

Alliances

As mentioned above, Alliances are initially formed by a Treaty between two Nations, with the official name of the Alliance being derived from the Treaty name. Once an Alliance is created, those first two members can invite up to three additional Nations to join the Alliance for a maximum of 5 Nations per Alliance.

Being in an Alliance means your members have their own chat channel! Type /ch a to join Alliance Chat, which is only visible to the members currently in the Alliance. When a Nation leaves an Alliance (which does not require a Treaty Proposal) they lose access to this chat.

An Alliance's war status is tied together - meaning that if one Nation in the Alliance declares War (or has War declared on them), then all members of the Alliance join that War - so be careful who you ally with! Your fates are tied together on the world stage.

 

Wars

Declaring a War

Declaring War on someone is one of the few things in Diplomacy that does not require both sides to agree to a Treaty Proposal. As long as your Nation has at least one Level 10 Town, then anyone else on the world stage can declare War against you (unless you're a Vassal, or in an Armistice with the aggressor.)

Clicking the Declare War button in the Create Treaty Proposal menu will open a new menu showing the Nations you are about to drag into War. Remember - Alliances are tied together, so both the aggressor's allies and the defender's allies will be a part of the War effort.

Fighting a War

To win a War, your side must gain enough War Score to have tipped the Balance of Power bar in your favor (viewable in the Nation Status menu) by the end of the 7 day period. War Score points can be obtained in multiple different ways - all of which break down into 3 major categories:

The Military Route

The first way to fight a War is… well, fighting. As you can probably imagine, Sieging an enemy’s Town is a great way to gain War Score. Also, your Nation will slowly accrue points for controlling Relics (the more the merrier.)

It’s important to note that Siege vulnerability is still tied to Relics. Your Town won’t be siegable simply because your Nation is at war… you’ll still need to control a Relic for that. However, you won’t be able to fully escape fighting your enemies by simply not controlling a Relic: while at War, both sides’ Nation members can each be killed once per day in the wilds. And of course those kills will also add to your Nation’s War Score.

THE Political ROUTE

The next two routes involve utilizing the help of the 3 major NPC Nations of Atlas, so we'll start with a quick explanation on how they factor in:

War Quests
All 15 NPC Towns controlled by the 3 major factions (Purelakers, Vantians, and Shen-Cirilians) have a new NPC called the Quartermaster. Speaking to this NPC while your Nation is at War will allow you to take on War Quests in order to gain Diplomatic Favor with 1 of the 3 factions. Simply accruing Favor will contribute to your War Score - however utilizing that Favor with the NPC factions will net you even more points. But we’ll get to that…

The War Quests themselves are fairly simple, and don’t require forfeiting expensive materials to complete. There are a total of 120 War Quests, which are randomly given by the Quartermaster depending on which NPC Town you’re in. Some may require you to kill a local MythicMob, or deliver supplies to an ally, or bring materials to help build the town’s defenses - while others may ask you to go fight on the battlefield for that NPC Nation!

Diplomatic Favor
There are 3 types of Diplomatic Favor - Purelaker, Vantian, and Shen-Cirilian. Completing a War Quest will automatically award 1 Favor for the faction you’re questing for, and will bring up a GUI in which you can choose which War you want to contribute that Favor towards (if your Nation happens to be fighting multiple Wars simultaneously.)

So what is that Favor used for? I’m glad you asked! Because that brings us back to our second War path: the Political route. Accrue enough Favor with 1 of the 3 NPC factions, and you can spend that Favor to request that NPC Nation swear loyalty to you - meaning they will shut down that NPC Nation’s Towns to your enemies for the duration of the War! The NPCs in all 5 of that Nation’s NPC Towns will simply refuse to talk to your enemies - meaning no trade, no quests, and no fast travel. And of course, your enemies will no longer be able to complete War Quests for that faction for the duration of the War.

THE Economic ROUTE

The third method of competing in a War is good ol’ fashioned money. Regardless of the Diplomatic Favor you’ve gained with an NPC faction, you can offer a bribe to the Quartermaster. If your bribe is accepted, that NPC Town’s merchants will double buy prices and halve sell prices for your enemies’ Nation members, for the duration of the war. Not to mention, each successful bribe will add to your Nation’s War Score.

Keep in mind, your enemies can bribe NPC Towns to make your prices worse, even in towns that you’ve already bribed. However, spending Favor to cause an NPC Nation to shun your enemies prevents both sides of the War from continuing to bribe that Nation’s Quartermasters. So plan your war strategy carefully!

Ending a War

Wars can end in 1 of 2 ways:

1) The War lasts for 7 days, at the end of which the side with the Balance of Power bar in their favor is declared the winner, OR

2) A Ceasefire is declared (which requires both sides to agree.)

If a winner is declared, a Post-War Armistice is put into place between those two sides for 7 days. However, for each sequential War against the same Nation in which the same side wins, that Armistice increases in length by 14 days. There is no limit to how long this Post-War Armistice can grow to be - although both sides have the option to mutually end the Armistice early if they want to resume fighting. If a War is ended early by a Ceasefire declaration, then no Post-War Armistice is put into effect.