Altar Diplomacy / Video Games

• In Crusader Kings, political marriages are the only way to forge a non-aggression pact or formal alliance with another ruler. Independent rulers with whom you have a marriage pact with may come to your aid in war, and vassals with marriage ties to their liege cannot act against them no matter how much they hate them. Spouses with desirable traits also have a chance to pass them on to any children, requiring the player to balance sometimes conflicting priorities. (Polygamous Muslims have an advantage here, since they can marry four women and get alliances through all of their wives.) Depending on random events and Player Character focus this can also go in a couple of interesting directions, with you and your wife potentially falling in love for real, or you getting permanently branded as an adulterer for cheating on her despite the fact you hate each other's guts and only ever touched her to produce legitimate heirs.
• Dragon Age:
  • Dragon Age: Origins:
    • A possible resolution to the Ferelden succession crisis subplot is to have the party member Alistair, the Heroic Bastard son of King Maric, marry Queen Anora, the daughter of Maric's army commander Loghain mac Tir and widow of Alistair's half-brother King Cailan who died in battle early in the main plot. Fair warning, though: if a female Warden has been romancing Alistair as a female Player Character he'll break it off.^note However, taking the right dialogue option in his personal sidequest can let the Warden become The Mistress. Alternatively, a male human noble can marry Anora and become her Prince-Consort, while a female human noble who has romanced Alistair and played her cards right may marry Alistair instead, thus becoming the queen. (In the long run, this last option is likely a bad thing for national stability, as two Wardens together are all but infertile. In the short run, however, it's considered an extremely good thing because the people love them.) If either the Warden or Alistair executed Loghain, this option is taken off the table — national stability or not, Anora will not marry the man who killed her father.
    • Notes found in the Return to Ostagar DLC, supported by Word of God, indicate King Cailan was planning to divorce Anora in favor of a political marriage to the Empress of Orlais. This fed into Loghain mac Tir's Cavalry Betrayal of Cailan at Ostagar: in the Backstory Loghain and King Maric had fought for years to eject Orlais' occupation forces from Ferelden.
  • In Dragon Age II, a female Hawke who romances Sebastian on the rivalry path while supporting the Templars can encourage him to take back his throne as Prince of Starkhaven; by supporting the Templars she gets herself named Viscountess of Kirkwall, and he'll propose this as forging an alliance the likes of which the Free Marches can only imagine.
  • In Dragon Age: Inquisition, several war table operations involve forging or breaking such marriages or betrothals to achieve the player's desired ends.
• Elden Ring: In its effort to conquer the Lands Between, Queen Marika's Golden Order fought two wars against the neighboring kingdom of Liurnia and its queen, Rennala, under the generalship of Radagon, one of Marika's champions. In the end, Radagon "repented his territorial aggressions" and married Rennala, joining the two kingdoms peacefully. By all accounts the marriage was happy, and their three children ended up as highly-placed members of the Golden Order. Then Marika abruptly exiled her husband Godfrey and summoned Radagon to the capital to marry him instead; this broke things off with Rennala, devastating her. Liurnia remained a part of the Golden Order, given that their children still tied the realms together, but Rennala never remarried or even really recovered from Radagon leaving her. How he felt about all this is never stated, but you can find Rennala's wedding gift to him, which he had reforged into a symbol of devotion to Marika.
• Mass Effect:
  • Salarians, being amphibians who reproduce externally, don't have any real sex drive and with that no concept of such things as romantic love (except for the ones that hook up with asari). Reproduction rights are determined by negotiation to continue certain dynasties or alliances, for which family history is very important. A family that loses their history can become a non-entity in such negotiations, as evidenced if Shepard returns one family's history.
  • To illustrate how deeply ingrained this mode of thinking is, Shepard manages to broker a turian-krogan alliance in Mass Effect 3 and turian teammate Garrus jokingly says he hopes no one thinks of sealing the deal with a political marriage. Over in the med bay, you can find salarian scientist Mordin making the pitch to a very uninterested krogan female.
• It's mentioned in Warcraft III's backstory that Arthas Menethil (crown prince of Lordaeron) and Jaina Proudmoore (the daughter of Kul Tiras' admiral and high up in the Magocracy of Dalaran)'s relationship was seen with a favorable eye by all, as this would surely bring about good relations between all nations involved. However, they drifted apart due to their duties, even before Arthas became the Lich King.
• Final Fantasy:
  • Final Fantasy XII opens with the wedding of Princess Ashe of Dalmasca and Prince Rasler of Nabradia, who are married off to unify the Dalmasca-Nabradia alliance at a time when Archadia is invading them. While they love each other, the couple don't have much time together, because Rasler falls in battle, defending a Dalmascan outpost.
  • Final Fantasy XV begins with Player Character Noctis, the Crown Prince of Lucis, traveling to Altissa to marry Lady Lunafreya of Tenebrae. They're childhood friends and do have feelings for each other, but the match is primarily a political one as part of the peace treaty between Lucis and the Niflheim Empire.
• Guenevere starts with the title character preparing for her marriage to King Arthur, arranged to provide him with an army and her father with greater power and status. The marriage happens regardless, but it's up to the player whether it's a Perfectly Arranged Marriage.
• This can be potentially done in Fire Emblem Fates, if a Prince/Princess of Hoshido marries a Prince/Princess of Nohr, or vice versa, during the Golden Path. Even more if said Prince happens to be the Crown Prince, whether it's Ryoma (for Hoshido) or Xander (for Nohr). Ryoma himself lampshades it if he marries Xander's sister Camilla.
  • In Fire Emblem: Three Houses, Flayn (sister of Seteth, aide to the archbishop Rhea) can potentially marry Dimitri, the Crown Prince of Faeghus. It's stated that initially the people thought the marriage was politically motivated, but eventually it became clear that they had actually married for love.
• This shows up in Civilization 5 as a special ability for Austria. Once Austria has allied themselves with a city-state for five turns, they have the option of puppetting or fully annexing it as part of their empire for the required amount of gold, with the ability's name ("Diplomatic Marriage") indicating that this trope is in effect in-universe.
• Oracle of Askigaga: The princess of Hachisuka is set by her father to marry the prince of Askigaga to bring peace, but she doesn't like it, wanting to personally mow down the opposing army instead.
• Persona 5: Haru Okumura is engaged to Sugimura against her will for her own father's political ambitions. When she finds out that her father does not care about him being a creep and possibly leading to Marital Rape Licence, she outright says that she only agreed to a political marriage. This revelation leads to unlocking her true potential to Milady's power.