RBP3 - [SPOILERS] - Team DIM (Mehmed of HRE)

[Ilios]

Are they trying to take Rome out or harass them? I'm willing to contribute troops to harrass or help them out, but not a full invasion force.

As we don't have the troops for an invasion force, I think we can rule out that option...
Portugal hasn't really put any pressure on us, so I'm thinking they will try and take out Rome alone. We can send a couple of chariots as reserve force should Portugal require assistance. In any case, we won't be able to whip DIM effectively till around T72. Even, the chariot we're getting from Ottomans around T75, still leaves us pretty weak on defense. I'd like to chop out a couple of Horse Archers before building a Barracks to be on the safe side.

Interesting E-mail frolm Portugal:

Hi guys,

We would like to discuss the possibility of having France replaced with Babylon. This might come across as a little backstabby, but then the way I see it is you have to be friends before you can backstab and we've had a grand total of 34 words from France. Yes I'm keeping count and ranking your friendliness by your word count . They also continued to ignore our directions to meet Ottomans even though they didn't have pottery so they can't be getting much in the way of commerce (says the 4 city broke civ ). I know we can't be alone in not wanting France in the CAN as they were originally vetoed. I think Babylon are especially keen not be left struggling in the CANTs and they could be one of the few Alphabet researchers left out there. Babylon could possibly make a strike against France with our permisssion and our pledge not to come to French aid or we could just leave France out of the next round fairly peacefully. A downside is that France were in a better location strategically and this would put Babylon between Mali and Byzantium, but they do have a fairly powerful defensive UU (although it isn't much use against skirmishers or the ubiquitous HA). They already have the important financial techs so it doesn't need to be obvious that they have joined with us until the next round of trading although it could be obvious sooner depending on what ETA they gave others for Alphabet.

As the Ottomans have finally chased down the French warrior this turn for contact could they cancel their pottery gift until we discuss this unless they think this idea is too Machiavellian and far fetched. We feel that the French were signed on a little too hastily before getting to know them and their style of play, but we are happy to have our minds changed if other people have had better relations with them and can see a way that the French could develop into a powerful, trustworthy ally.

Mukha
CBE