Lewwyn's Diplo School

[Krill]

"That being said, if you do fuck with us we will drag you along with us to the depths of hell. (Dave quoted)"

I think they don't really have the moral high ground to complain about aggressiveness.

[Catwalk]

I'm not talking about morals, I'm talking about results. Already their message is making us suspicious of them, I think responding in kind would make them suspicious of us in return. I think we should stick with our point and tone down the language.

[Krill]

There is a difference between suspicious and pragmatic.

[ironstar]

I wonder if sommerswerd will be doing diplo for team razor

[spacetyrantxenu]

I hope not. He may try to endlessly hold up the game awaiting a more precise meaning of the word "jihad".

[Krill]

Oh.

Oh.

I have an idea.

Why don't we just write nonsense diplomacy, like the Jabberwocky is nonsense verse poetry? Let's see the bastard deal with that!

[Gold Ergo Sum]

I sort of agree with Krill. I might send them something like this.

Hey Pirates,

The land looks lush everywhere. We are open to cooperation on any and all levels, including screenshot trades and more. However, it's pretty obvious in your message that you don't know whether you want to cooperate or not. If we didn't make it clear in our first message we have zero interest in flowery language, bullshit hedging or basically anything Parkin would put in a diplo message. If that's cool with you guys, we can get along great and have a productive friendship. If you'd rather engage in verbal masturbation, we can add you to the "Go Fuck Yourselves" list with the others. Your call.

Regards,
TEAM

No quote box cause I'm on a phone and lazy.

Send it. Might as well do it today. I like it.

[Catwalk]

I'm voting against it, but if Lewwyn and Gaspar are in agreement we can proceed.

[Gaspar]

Guess that means you make the call, Lewwyn.

[Catwalk]

While waiting for Lewwyn, here's my suggestion for revisions:

Hey Pirates,

The land looks lush everywhere. We are open to cooperation on any and all levels, including screenshot trades and more. However, [strike]it's pretty obvious in your message[/strike] your message gives the impression that you don't know whether you want to cooperate or not. If we didn't make it clear in our first message, we have zero interest in flowery language, bullshit hedging or basically anything Parkin would put in a diplo message. If that's cool with you guys, we can get along great and have a productive friendship. [strike]If you'd rather engage in verbal masturbation, we can add you to the "Go Fuck Yourselves" list with the others.[/strike] Your call.

Regards,
TEAM

Not terribly different, and I don't think I really changed the content any. I've changed the first part to allow them to save face rather than calling them out. The last skipped part reads more to me as an insult than simply stating our opinion, and I don't think it's needed to get our point across. The points about what we expect in order to have productive relations should suffice IMO, and the GFY doesn't help any. Their message said that they'd hold a grudge if we fuck with them (meaning worker steals, aggressive settling or opportunistic city strikes I'm guessing) whereas ours says "If you don't talk how we want you to, you can go fuck yourselves". I agree with the general message, I just think it comes across too strongly.