Diplo with Gillette

[Lord Parkin]

Reply from Gillette:

Menagerie,

Thanks for the message, and thanks for you willingness to talk through the deals. We've discussed your proposal with our team, but there is an issue we'd like to raise. Your proposal is mostly reasonable for the land between us, but the land towards the center is something that we'd like to avoid getting cut out of. Here's the issue, our understanding is that your border suggestion is like this:

https://dl.dropbox.com/u/5826112/RBDemo1...ssion2.JPG

I definitely understand your thinking on this, but the major issue is it totally cuts us out from the center of the map. If you look closely, you'll see just a shade of red culture to our northeast. Your suggestion would cut us off from that land strip where the cow/copper/silk/wheat is at. That would box us in pretty badly, so we're trying to avoid that . You guys would literally be direct neighbors with Trolls, and I hope you can understand how we would think that's a tough split for us. I would actually view that copper to be more in our sphere of influence, but more crucial to us is not getting shut out of the middle of the map. As you also have seen with your scout, we're pretty hemmed in down south by the water, so we're just trying not to get boxed in. Given that your capital is much further west than ours, a diagonal line is more logical than a horizontal line if you're wanting to use lines.

Would you guys be OK with sending us a screenshot of your surroundings too so we can understand the land split a little better? You can of course block out anything you'd like. We decided to go ahead and send this shot without guarantee of getting one in return as a sign of good faith in getting a deal done, so I hope you see we do want an agreement and we're not just haggling for the sake of it.

Also, the Trolls team met Pirates and told us that they're at war with you guys. Is everything ok? What's up with that? Hope you don't mind asking, but it seems that means every team in the game is at war with somebody right now, which was probably not something I would have predicted.

Thanks,
Gillette

[Mortius]

Proposed answear:

Gillette,

I understand your point, but let me explain our position:

1. The area you pointed to is vital for us, because without it our core would be very vulnerable to an attack from that side, and we just can't afford that. We planned to put a border city E of Cow, not because it's especially good city (because it isn't) but just for needed defense purposes. We are sorry that Trolls planted a city on your backyard blocking your designed way to the middle, but we can't be a victim of this situation.

2. Please take into account that we moved our capital 2N of the position designed by the mapmaker, and you moved yours NW too. This single fact means that your territory is bigger than ours from the start. If we would draw a border between the designed starting points, the border would be further to the south, and the Gold area would be in dispute. We didn't want to let this fact spoils our relation, so in the name of friendship we didn't raise claims to that Gold, and any of the tiles closer to our starting point.

3. The same situation happened when you planted your second city on the border taking some our tiles. In the name of friendship we decided we won't be fussy about such details. We think that it would be fair, to return that favor now. Even if some of the tiles of the proposed border are closer to your capital now, (two grasslands E of Copper) they are of no great value, and it would be a fair exchange for two our grasslands taken by Blades of Glory, not to even mention about a bunch of tiles closer to our starting point.

We hope we come to an agreement on the border, and in such situation we would be happy to send you a detailed map of your fogged western territory.

PS: As to Pirates, I would call it a small misunderstanding on the borders. They decided that a fait accompli method is a better way than a simple talk. It costs them one unit and a bunch of worker turns, but we hope we can reach an agreement in the near future.

PS2: The map of the proposed border is in the attachment.

Menagerie Trois

As always please make any comments and check the message for any spelling mistakes, and other errors.

[HitAnyKey]

I'll re-read it again in a little bit, but at first glance it looks pretty good. The one thing I would suggest is find some way to either blot out or cut out of the image where it shows the Horses. No reason to show them where our Horses are located. Especially if they don't have AH yet, which we have no way of knowing.

[Mortius]

The one thing I would suggest is find some way to either blot out or cut out of the image where it shows the Horses. No reason to show them where our Horses are located. Especially if they don't have AH yet, which we have no way of knowing.

IMO it's not necessary:
1. It isn't our primary source of Horses. We have it just north of Animal Farm.
2. Gillettes knew AH already. Their capital has pastured Pigs.
3. The Horses would strenghten our claims to such a southern border. We can argue, that the best spot for the important Horse city would be on the plain hill, SE, S of Horses.

[Mortius]

The message was sent.

[Lord Parkin]

From Gillette (1/2):

UGH. Sorry, we wrote up a draft and everything, and I thought I sent it before the forums went down. Turns out we didn't, and that draft is lost. Sorry about that . I'll try to get the response re-created and sent ASAP.

[Lord Parkin]

From Gillette (2/2):

(again really sorry for the delay. thankfully the forums are back up so here's the message we were ready to send right before it went down)

Menagerie,

We've been discussing a lot on how to respond to your message. To be frank with you, we just can't accept being boxed in like that. We don't want conflict at all, but we aren't comfortable signing away access to the middle of the map. From what we can tell, everyone is generally settling clockwise right now, and I think that's a part of the map design. For the land directly between us, we're of course happy to divide it up evenly, but a horizontal line just doesn't work because we are noticeably further east than you. I know you said the Trolls settling pattern shouldn't matter to you, but I think it matters just as much as the fact that you moved your settler - either both matter or neither matter.

We're open to a solution in which we concede two extra rows west of the mountain range (that's 8 tiles including a Wheat), but that would have to come with us gaining full access to land that is more under our control. That would be a more natural split really since you are further west.

Again, we're not at all interested in war, and surely you aren't either due to your war with Pirates. We are still of course interested in a rolling NAP with a 20T cancellation clause. To us, that seems like the best mechanism for preventing unfair settlings rather than a strict border agreement.

By the way - if you ever want to chat about it, let me know. Feel free to add scooter (realmsbeyondscooter@gmail.com) to your chat window if you think that would be easier.

Thanks,
Gillette

[HitAnyKey]

I'm going to try my hand at trying to draw another line that goes at least a little bit along with what they are requesting while also giving us at least as much as we would need to feel save. If they are willing to give up that area SW of the mountains which includes the Horse/Stone/Fish/Whale, then we might be able to allow them to have that strip of land to the NE of the mountains that has the Cow/Copper/Wheat/Silk.
I originally thought when they stated conceding 8 additional tiles that they meant beyond what we had drawn as our initial line, but after looking at their screenshot closer, I realized they had drawn their line west of the mountains one row north of where we drew our line.

I'm thinking of making part of the agreement being that if we allot that area to them, they can't settle it as their very next city. That would put their first two additional cities right on our border. What I'm going to try to come up with is a way to state that if we come to a new agreement with them having that path to the center of the map, that they need to settle their next city somewhere to the south of their capital....and then they can go settle that spot later. Main reason for this, would be so that they don't have too much culture near us so soon.

I'll see what I can come up with during my lunch hour today.

Actually, I'm going to send them a quick message right now asking them to send us a screenshot first that shows what border line they are trying to negotiate for. I need to see how far to the west they have explored, since I don't want to show them too many of those resources if they haven't already seen them by exploring. Though I think one of the screenshots Mortius already gave them might have done so. I'll go look at the actual emails again while I compose the quick message to them asking for a visual drawing of their line.

[HitAnyKey]

Here is my proposed message. Nothing really key within it (since it's really just to ask them for an image), so I don't think this message needs much discussion. But I'll wait a couple hours before I send it. I'd like to get an image from them as quickly as possible. I would rather use their image for drawing lines, since we have more visibility than them and I don't want to show them more than we need to:

-----------------------------
Trying to help spread out the duties a bit more so this is a new voice speaking, but still the same team.
I’ve spent some time reviewing the past messages and screenshots in greater detail so we can find a way to come to a good agreement. The first thing I’ve noticed is that the western line that you drew in your map is different than the line that we had detailed in the prior message and then shown in one of our images. You had your line drawn across the top of that last mountain in the range, but our line was originally described as being at the bottom of that peak (as can be seen in the image sent to you on Oct 4th). So it is unclear to us which additional tiles you are offering on the western side of the mountains for us to adjust the eastern side of the mountains such that you get that northeastern path into the center of the map.
Can you send us a new image with your proposed line so that I can review it and discuss with the rest of the team? That center land strip has been an important view for us, but if we can come to a good enough agreement on that western coastline we can see what deal can be made.

Menagerie Trois
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[HitAnyKey]

Message sent. Now to await them to send us an image.