Diplomacy Master Thread- Helping Your Opponents Beat Themselves

[antisocialmunky]

Can we propose civplayers to help them against civfr? We could send some two-movers.

What do people think would be necessary in terms of troops to defend the CFC front?

We should also consider helping WPC if CFC attacks them. Is it worth discussing some kind of mutual defense pact? WPC should get a NAP with UCiv at least.

Kalin

The only way we could really support a war against CivFR is unit gift which would be difficult I think to get enough support within the team to do. It's going to a mess if we threaten CivPlayers, we'll spread ourselves too thin and lose out on 15 turns of consolidation and economic recovery so we can get rifles. I don't think CP could get Rifle in time for a T175 war can they? If not it would be suicidal for them to attack into our territory with the crippling SoZ effect.

[Mardoc]

The earliest we can initiate the cool down is t160, so that's why I used that number in our chat. I basically implied exactly that, but chose to try reasoning with them before going all-in on a threat. We could burn several of their cities in the 5T window before CFC could join, so it's a nice option we have.

That threat will be a lot more meaningful if the next five turns against the German team are awesome .

I suppose the logical alternative, if they don't believe, is to write off Civplayers, and instead look for someone to divide them with. 5 turns of terror followed by us being too busy to collect the spoils? If I were their neighbor, that's an attractive idea.

That's something that wouldn't necessarily even need a prior commitment - send someone a note that 'hey, about T172 you're going to have a vulnerable neighbor,' and trust self-interest to do the rest.

[pindicator]

Just to throw this out there, what if we actually do try to take out CivPlayers? Could we get them with knights while defending our narrow front with CFC by cats & muskets/rifles?

[scooter]

The earliest we can initiate the cool down is t160, so that's why I used that number in our chat. I basically implied exactly that, but chose to try reasoning with them before going all-in on a threat. We could burn several of their cities in the 5T window before CFC could join, so it's a nice option we have.

That threat will be a lot more meaningful if the next five turns against the German team are awesome .

I suppose the logical alternative, if they don't believe, is to write off Civplayers, and instead look for someone to divide them with. 5 turns of terror followed by us being too busy to collect the spoils? If I were their neighbor, that's an attractive idea.

That's something that wouldn't necessarily even need a prior commitment - send someone a note that 'hey, about T172 you're going to have a vulnerable neighbor,' and trust self-interest to do the rest.

I was thinking about this over lunch. I'm starting to believe this is a good avenue to take with both CivPlayers and CFC. CivPlayers especially - they have a real contender in CivFr to their west who CivPlayers should be every bit as afraid of as they are of us. I bet they would be interested.

Same with CFC. Once UCiv gets around to writing back to us, we should let them know CFC will be sending their army at us on T175, and if they want some easy land they should pounce.

As for CivPlayers - I don't think they're going to be persuaded by a better offer. CFC's offer is a strong one. We're going to have to switch from reasoning with them to outright threatening them I think. While also trying to find a war ally against them since it may not work. I also agree with Mardoc if we can point to the first 5 turns of the German war and say "hey look how much damage we did in just 5 turns." Fingers crossed on that one.

[scooter]

Another factor: we still don't know where Apolyton stands on all this. I still suspect they're friendly with CFC. We're currently waiting on a reply from them, but if I see them on chat later today I may take the opportunity to poke them and gauge where they're at. Part of me wants to wait until the German war declaration though.

[scooter]

Proposed draft to CivFr:

CivFr,

I know we haven't had a lot of contact with you guys, but we have a proposal for your team that I think you may be interested in. We are both neighbors with the CivPlayers team, and there's a big chance we end up at war with them around T170. It is not confirmed yet, but it is looking that way. They are focusing their attention very heavily on our team, and we expect the bulk of their army to be near us. They are not a major threat to us, but it would certainly make life easier if we had an ally in the conflict.

Is your team interested in joining a war against them and picking up some of the spoils? I believe you would face very little resistance. Let me know if you're interested, and we can talk a little more.

Thanks,
scooter - Team RB

IMO If we sent this and they accepted it, a CFC/CivPlayers 2v1 is dead in the waters before it even starts.

[scooter]

Draft to WPC:

Beta/Tatu,

Thanks for the quick reply, sounds like we're on the same page! Your time window sounds pretty good for chat availability, so I'll get back to you soon. Right now it's just wait and see because it's unclear when the turn will roll and when the German team will play their half of T150.

If you're interested in a gems/dyes swap, we'd be happy to give you gems now up front so you can get the happy boost immediately, and you can just send the dye whenever you get them hooked up. How does that sound to you?

Thanks,
scooter - Team RB

I don't plan to delay sending this one for very long.

[Sullla]

I would not send any email like that out to CivFr right now. We can sound out CivFr without committing ourselves to anything that audacious.

I also think you guys are drastically overestimating how much damage we could do to CivPlayers in a war. They are not technologically backwards at all, and we won't have much of an edge in a war against them. They can whip an impressive force in short order with their sacrificial altars. Plus, we don't even know how successful our war with the Germans will be at this point. I would dial down the level of aggression taking place in these posts; we need to try and minimize potential opponents, not threaten more teams. At least not until we have no other options, and we haven't reached that point yet.

As annoying as it is, CFC's strategy of mediocre playing and then convincing everybody to dogpile the leader seems like a solid approach in a full diplo game

I hate full diplo games. Good play gets punished, and mediocre play gets rewarded.

[pindicator]

Yeah, let's give CivPlayers a chance befote sending something like that to other teams.
Now if we haven't gone anywhere in 5-10 turns and know we're going to initiate the cooldown on t160 then things change

[antisocialmunky]

Well you aren't playing the game you are playing each other. Its like poker where you can play the odds, but if you are good, then you are playing the person.

Overall I agree with Sullla's points about minimizing risks. RB shouldn't go around kicking over every 2nd rate power in the world just because we can pull one over on the Germans.


Another more subtle option we could try would be to get a dialogue going with CivFR and maybe a trade going with CivFR timed with T160 so we can make CivPlayers worry about their western border if they invade us. Its a little thing, but little things add up and tend to snowball. Also you can show some more bravado about being prepared for CFC because they idiotically telegraphed their plan 10 turns ago. Sprinkle some stuff emphasizing how we are prepared for a CFC war and how silly they are because they basically told us their plan and how CFC's allies are basically leaking info about it all over and how Caledorn's ego is going to his head because he taunted us with LittleFinger quotes.