Pirates doing Diplomacy?

[luddite]

Wow they are... ridiculous.

SO first of all, they admit in that message that Tortuga is too far away from their borders for them to reasonably settle it. They also admit that they don't event want the city- they just want it destroyed! They have NOTHING to gain from this war, they're destroying both of our team's chances for nothing. And I have no idea what they mean by "conform to the general pattern of movement clockwise" either. I must have missed the rule about how we can only settle clockwise :P.

My advice is to send a reply offering to cede them all land outside the BFC of tortuga, but absolutely refuse to let them raze Tortuga. They're the ones who started this war, not us.

Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice!

[Viqsi]

I think the objective really is the ivory and that's their biggest issue.

There *is* a definite general movement clockwise, judging by our maps as presently revealed - I think M3 is being truthful on that score. I opted to stitch together every current map screenshot I could find and thereby put together an idea of "intended theoretical areas of influence" not too far back. The result is here:

Troll, as you will note, has gotten very close to Gillette. Gillette, in turn, seems to be heading in Menagerie's direction. The ostensible reason for the TEAM-Troll war is TEAM heading towards Troll. We're the only ones not doing that, because we made an agreement with TEAM (which has helped get us the screenshots that make that map possible, by the way, if there be such a thing as "loyalty" among pirates :D ).

Unfortunately, Tortuga's gold is both our and their best chance at that resource. Our other border gold is way too close to TEAM (unless they press really far south), and while we don't know where M3's is, the likely spot is the fogged mountain range adjacent to the Gillette roads. Frankly, *any* gold settlement in this map is going to be a border aggression, apparently.

Therefore, if it's the ivory they're principally concerned about and they want to move on Gillette instead of us (i.e. agreement to a long NAP), I figure we can ostensibly let them have it if we're allowed to have the gold. Implementation suggestions here (spoilered b/c there's a dotmap, and just in case folks want to keelhaul me for even suggesting the idea ):

As seen, I was thinking we resettle the tile E of the mountain SE of Tortuga, as that gets us our cows back and retains corn. They would be obliged to settle around the freshwater lake, and I think we could concede the northwest if we get the interior. We have ivory in our backlines so it doesn't exactly cost us that resource to let them have it (and they don't necessarily need to know that). We stay that close because, frankly, the agreement is dependent on razing one of our cities - or alternatively, they can gift us a settler or something in exchange for our "conceding" ivory to the Khmer.

If the gold is another unshakable key part of their objective, tho, then IMO the animal fuckers can go fuck themselves.

[luddite]

Yeah I'd be willing to give them ivory, especially if we pair it with a long NAP (long enough that war elephants aren't a threat).

[Viqsi]

Yeah I'd be willing to give them ivory, especially if we pair it with a long NAP (long enough that war elephants aren't a threat).

I suspect lurkers look at that and think, "wait, long NAP with a civ led by Lord Parkin? We've seen this movie already!"

The questions I don't have an answer for but wish I did are:
* how much we trust M3 to actually stick to such an agreement (I suspect they'd be reliable to the absolute precise letter of any agreement and spirit be damned), and
* since that also commits us to pushing to the interior and in TEAM's direction, what fallout we could expect from that. Is TEAM still agitating about a border agreement?

[luddite]

Yeah I'd be willing to give them ivory, especially if we pair it with a long NAP (long enough that war elephants aren't a threat).

I suspect lurkers look at that and think, "wait, long NAP with a civ led by Lord Parkin? We've seen this movie already!"

Heh... well this is a pretty different situation from PB4. Also, I'm not sure if LP is still involved with them- I thought he was on hiatus from civ?

The questions I don't have an answer for but wish I did are:
* how much we trust M3 to actually stick to such an agreement (I suspect they'd be reliable to the absolute precise letter of any agreement and spirit be damned),

That's usually the case for most players.

and
* since that also commits us to pushing to the interior and in TEAM's direction, what fallout we could expect from that. Is TEAM still agitating about a border agreement?

We've already done them a huge favor by pink-dotting M3 and expanding away from them. I really doubt they'll be hostile to us, at least not for a long time. But we should really try and get a border agreement set up with them so they don't out-expand us.

[thestick]

Hang on, War Elephants dominate Classical/Medieval, especially without any War Elephants of our own to counter them. I don't think we should hand the Ivory over to them.

On the other hand, Tortuga's been more trouble than it's worth... I hope that changes. Current, early opinion is to just keep going and hope for the best.

[luddite]

Hang on, War Elephants dominate Classical/Medieval, especially without any War Elephants of our own to counter them. I don't think we should hand the Ivory over to them.

On the other hand, Tortuga's been more trouble than it's worth... I hope that changes. Current, early opinion is to just keep going and hope for the best.

Well for what it's worth, macemen and cats defend against war elephants pretty easily. Even axemen and cats will do in a pinch. The main reason war elephants get banned so often is that they make offensive wars

We just can't give up Tortuga now. We'd lose 1/3 of our economy! Giving up Tortuga would be essentially surrendering this game.

Regardless of what we say to them, I think we should respond quickly and try to end this war as soon as possible, because it's killing our economy right now. I suggest saying firmly that we won't give up Tortuga, but we'll agree to promise not to settle any cities that are directly south or west of Tortuga (so we'd keep roughly to the lines that Viqsi drew, although we might have to give up the land in the west too). We can offer to trade them ivory for something suitable, but if they press on it just give it to them, and get a long NAP of at least 75 turns.

[Viqsi]

I only suggested it earlier, but on further reflection, I think giving up Tortuga is feasible only if they gift us the replacement settler. EDIT: Preferably BEFORE the city goes down! That might be more agreeable to them dependent on their position.

That is, assuming one CAN gift settlers and they stay settlers.

[luddite]

I only suggested it earlier, but on further reflection, I think giving up Tortuga is feasible only if they gift us the replacement settler. EDIT: Preferably BEFORE the city goes down! That might be more agreeable to them dependent on their position.

That is, assuming one CAN gift settlers and they stay settlers.

Yeah you can gift settlers. That woudl suck but it's better than nothing.

[luddite]

did they attack?