[SPOILERS] Catherine of China

[Lewwyn]

sigh. Why don't they make proposal of their own, if they're not happy with ours?

lol, Aren't they asking you to violate negotiating 101, don't negotiate against yourself?

[antisocialmunky]

Something like this:

"Greetings from the East.

Thanks for being honest and forthright with us. Though all due respect, the BrB site in in our first ring, but either way we appreciate you negotiating and refraining from poaching it.

We understand that you are hemmed in and sadly our last proposal did not address that issue as well as we intended to. We didn't intend to cut you off from further expansion. After all, every single city except for the last one we settled was AWAY from you. We will let you expand around the mountains to the north. I don't know how much you have scouted north but its a very narrow and snaking path that opens up to areas probably claimed by Lord Parkin. You can have it if you want, its closer to you than to us. All we really request are two things:

- We need the 3 way port city to the north. Its closer to our capitol than yours and strategically necessary for our future naval defenses. Settle the minimal distance away from it. We only want the sea/lake tiles/resource and the canal function.
- Don't violate the BFC of BrB. We settled that city in good faith with the previous border agreement and we expect that you respect the old treaty with regards to this site.

You can have the spice site. Also, we'll extend the NAP if you feel it needed.

If this is disagreeable to you, then can you make a counter proposal? We are not really sure about how you envision a settling agreement and we feel this agreement is the best we can offer. We can provide pictures if needed.

Thanks,
ASM and Plako"

In summary: tell them you meant that we'll give them a path north so long as they give us that 3 way port and don't violate the existing BFC of brb. I suspect that the sticking point is the spice city because it seems unreasonable to squeeze them like that. I dunno, you could mention how they still have a fair amount of land to settle but I don't think that's really productive - kinda argumentative in fact.

[plako]

I don't like the idea of giving in so much without any kind of compensation. We could easily get all the spots we want in the north and they couldn't do anything about it. We can outproduce them and we've also longer term NAP with WK. I also don't want to give up spices. We don't have enough luxury resources to throw away ones that are only 6 tiles from our capital.

Furthermore I don't like the fact that they're also threatening us with military route. They really aren't in a position to threaten us. I think I'll take contact to Locke to see what they're up to. If they choose threats we might as well start negotiating behind their backs.

[antisocialmunky]

Yeah go with that, I was also irked by the military threat because I don't see them being able to do much. However, I don't think its worth the spices unless we ask them to trade us the spices.

[plako]

Messages with the Barbs.

Me:

Hi,

Quite a while passed since we last time shared messages. So I decided to send you one.

This time I'd like to open dialogue concerning the Vikings. Currently we're negotiating our border and so far we haven't found consensus. They also let me know that you would have blocked their way of expansion in the west. Could you tell how things there are from your perspective.

Best regards,
Plako

Them:

Yes it is good to hear from you. I sorry for not writing you before.

We are a little worried about Nakor attacking us. I'm sure you see he is building lots of axes recently. Power graph keeps going up. We have no interest in fighting cause map is really big and theres lots of room to expand peacefully. So we are a bit concerned. Nakor exaggerating or lying about blocking his expansion in west. We plant one city over there 5 tiles from capital. It is on one tile chokepoint but he never going to expand past that anyway. Nakor wants us to sign deal that gives him all land between our teams. We offer what we think was a generous split of land, he not seem interested. Like there is spot 6 tiles from our capital and 10 tiles from his that Nakor wants us to give him. He say you are blocking him in, he say we are blocking him in. I say he should build more settlers LOL.

So we are trying to resolve things peacefully with Nakor. But if he come after us, obviously we would want to be on good terms with your team. I think we stay in touch for the moment and see what happens.
Thanks,
Locke

Not yet sure who is telling the truth or what is going on, but I think we probably should allocate all our EP to Nakor/Gaspar to get their demographics.

[antisocialmunky]

Drama time it seems.

Yeah... that's kinda odd to ask for territory from both the neighbors while antagonizing them if that is the case. That doesn't make sense. They have a fair amount of space and demanding more so there's something else to their motivation. Maybe they think its a conspiracy against them or they are doing some kind of North Korea play.

I guess we could play hard ball if what the Barbs say is true. Basically tell them take it or boat to the other side of the mountains if they run out of space. Afterall, I'm only advocating ceding them land to have him develop it so we can take it back later.

[plako]

I still consider how to respond to Nakor. Meanwhile I sent this to the Barbs:

Hi Locke,

I see. So he is making demands both left and right. Maybe we should do a bit deeped co-operation and coordinate our actions towards them. What do you think?

As a 1st step maybe it would be good idea to sign a long term NAP e.g. until T100 or whatever you like? If you're available maybe also a small chat would be in order. When would you be available?

Best regards,
Plako

[plako]

Draft message to Nakor. I still consider how openly hostile we want to be so this could change radically. Opinions are very welcome.

What? I was considering to give you land that rightfully belongs to us and you threaten us with military expansion. If this is your attitude, we can quit negotiations immediately. We're not giving in to any threats. I also don't see any suggestion about what you really want. I'm not gonna offer you anything unless I see your counter offer first and I'm not gonna give the land that rightfully belongs to us unless I see some serious effort to make it worthwhile to us.

[antisocialmunky]

If you want to try and call their bluff:

I would spin it in a way to say that they are going back on their deal and that our offer allows them to get North which is what they wanted in the first place. If they don't want it, tell them to offer a counter proposal or build a boat.

If they want to play victim and ask for help from someone by posting our mean emails, we might as well make them work for it.

[plako]

We got Nakor's graphs and indeed he is the one that has gone over our power. That power should mean ~6-8 axes/spears/Chariots. He probably won't violate our NAP, but I'll put some turns to spear and axe to make them 1 pop whips on Brb before starting Granary. Assuming their primary target are the Barbs trying to keep low profile is better than direct hostility so I'll reconsider our message.

Afaik was founded in a position that leaves most of our future options available.