Diplomacy is the process by which you manage relations with other factions. Much can be achieved through diplomacy that would otherwise be impossible. Factions can trade ancillaries, resources, territory and food, arrange marriages, form coalitions, lend and borrow money, threaten or declare war, annex other factions non-militarily, and much more.
Other Total War Three Kingdoms Guides:
- Total War Three Kingdoms: Guide to Factions
- Total War Three Kingdoms: Guide to Armies
- Total War Three Kingdoms: Guide to Siege
- Total War Three Kingdoms: Guide to Characters
- Total War Three Kingdoms: Guide to Administrators
- Total War Three Kingdoms: Guide to Relations
- Total War Three Kingdoms: Buildings Guide
- Total War Three Kingdoms: Food Guide
- Total War Three Kingdoms: Diplomacy Guide
- Total War Three Kingdoms: Commandery Guide
- Total War Three Kingdoms: Unit Abilities and Types
- Total War Three Kingdoms: Spies & Espionage Guide
- Total War Three Kingdoms: Public Order Guide
Negotiate Guide
Conducting a negotiation is the process of presenting another faction leader with a request or offer, scrutinising their reaction, and fine tuning the deal to find a mutually acceptable set of terms. To do this, simply select a warlord from the faction list in the diplomacy screen, click negotiate, select the category of offer you wish to make, then select the diplomatic option you wish to request. Any offers which are not possible are greyed out; you can mouse over greyed-out options to reveal the reasons why.
When you present a faction leader with an offer, it is placed in the offer box at the bottom of the screen, along with a number which indicates how much the other faction leader values your offer. The number may be a red, negative number (undesirable or costly to the other faction leader) or a green, positive number (desirable or beneficial to the faction leader). The art of diplomacy is finding mutually acceptable terms to get the deal signed if they don’t like it, or seeing how much more you can get out of the other guy if they do like it.
The desirability of any deal you propose is influenced by their diplomatic attitude towards you, your respect rating, and whether the deal you offer aligns with the faction leader’s strategy at the time.
If the number is negative, this doesn’t mean that the faction leader is ruling out the offer, but that you must add positive, desirable offers in order to cancel out the negative value, and sweeten the deal to a point where he’ll accept it. This may involve adding a cash payment, food, a valuable ancillary, a diplomatic treaty, or any combination of desirable offers in the diplomatic menu. When the negative number rises to zero, the faction leader will be willing to agree. It’s possible that a negative value is so large, indicating a deep unwillingness to deal, that the cost of balancing the number up to zero will be prohibitively expensive. Only by experimentation, through adding or altering offers, can you find terms acceptable for both parties – or conclude that the cost may be too great, and write it off altogether.
If you suggest an offer and the result is a positive number, the other faction leader finds it desirable. The higher the number goes above zero, the greater your bargaining power, as you may be able to pack in further requests, provided the number doesn’t go below zero. Experimenting with different offers might net you more than you had originally bargained for.
If you don’t wish to manually negotiate, you can click the ‘make this work’ button. This will reveal a baseline requirement from the other party in order to accept your offer. This can often be a useful point from which you can begin modifying your offer.