RBPB4 [SPOILERS] - De Gaulle of the Egyptians

[Lord Parkin]

Luddite seems to be acting a bit oddly at the moment. I logged in this turn to notice a Settler of his where he definitely should not be - in the land he just recently agreed not to settle. There's no possible way he could have misinterpreted or misclicked that far; this was clearly deliberate. In addition, he has a small Chariot stack and a supermedic Scout a few tiles from our border.

Our agreement (only signed a week ago) couldn't have been clearer.

me: Ok, so to summarise, we've got:
- NAP to T210 (1500 AD)
- You won't settle any further cities towards me beyond the canal city
- I won't settle over the coast towards you, except perhaps south of the peaks on the unconnected land
Luddite: yep, that sounds good

So, Luddite agrees to a NAP extension and border agreement, while all along planning not to uphold his end of the agreement by aggressively settling the territory he just agreed was mine (if not outright warring). That's pretty low, right there.

He's a bit daft if he thinks this is a good time to play aggressive and/or go to war with me anyway. I can list at least five reasons why it's a stupid idea:

5. He would be breaking his word on a settling agreement and 60-turn NAP extension he just agreed to only a week ago. That would be taking "low blow" to a whole new level, and would greatly tarnish his reputation.

4. He still has a tonne of awesome sites still yet to settle over in his land. It makes no logical sense for him to aggressively steal relatively crap sites he already agreed were mine. (Seriously dude, why not settle the better sites first and get your economy back on track?)

3. He just finished an unsuccessful war with Mackoti and is at the stage where he needs to garrison his units for military police and recover his economy. Simply put, he cannot afford to start up another fight right now, let alone a fight against me.

2. He has Vultures and Chariots. We're a couple of turns from Macemen and Crossbowmen. Not exactly a good time to pick a fight with your larger neighbour.

1. The grand-daddy of reasons: he literally cannot fight us for more than a few turns at a time right now, regardless of anything else. Why? Because we are the AP residents with a massive majority of votes, and he has a Christian city. Any war he starts we can force a stop to at our leisure, using the subsequent 10-turn peace to build up a much larger army with our far superior production and tech, and squash him like a bug on the rebound. (Incidentally, the same thing with the AP applies to Rego and Moogle, and anyone else who Christianity spreads to. I'm keeping it quiet though, so don't go informing/reminding anyone that I'm practically invulnerable to attack while my AP majority holds. Seriously, keep it lurker-only: no mentioning of it to the others or I'll be very annoyed. )

[Lord Parkin]

I did get a brief email from Luddite saying he was too busy to do a full chat right now, but wasn't intending on declaring war. That's something, at least. He didn't mention anything about what he plans to do with the Settler though. I told him not to move it forward any further for the moment or we'd have issues. Guess we'll see what happens.

[Ellimist]

1. The grand-daddy of reasons: he literally cannot fight us for more than a few turns at a time right now, regardless of anything else. Why? Because we are the AP residents with a massive majority of votes, and he has a Christian city. Any war he starts we can force a stop to at our leisure, using the subsequent 10-turn peace to build up a much larger army with our far superior production and tech, and squash him like a bug on the rebound. (Incidentally, the same thing with the AP applies to Rego and Moogle, and anyone else who Christianity spreads to. I'm keeping it quiet though, so don't go informing/reminding anyone that I'm practically invulnerable to attack while my AP majority holds. Seriously, keep it lurker-only: no mentioning of it to the others or I'll be very annoyed. )

Wow, very nice. That's pretty broken.

[Lord Parkin]

Wow, very nice. That's pretty broken.

Actually it's probably not quite as powerful as I'm making it out to be. Proposals only come up every 10 turns, so if you time it right you could get in 9 turns of war and do a fair amount of damage before I could shut it off. However, it's still a nice little ace card to have in my pocket.

[Gold Ergo Sum]

Actually it's probably not quite as powerful as I'm making it out to be. Proposals only come up every 10 turns, so if you time it right you could get in 9 turns of war and do a fair amount of damage before I could shut it off. However, it's still a nice little ace card to have in my pocket.

I actually meant to bring up the AP when discussing rules before the game, but I guess we forgot about it. Most of the AP rulings are totally broken and have no place in competitive MP games.

Unless there is a mechanic to forcibly remove religion from a city (a good thought for the RB-mod, but probably difficult to code and balance), the AP presents all kinds of headaches in a large scale MP game.

Too late now.

[Lord Parkin]

Actually most of the AP resolutions are completely useless in the multiplayer environment. Trying to force a trade embargo or a war declaration doesn't work - even if it succeeds, people can immediately reneg the deals.

The forced peace isn't even particularly useful unless you're in the right situation. At best it only gives you 10 turns of peace after a few turns of war, and then back to war again. A smart attacker can fairly easily get around it using dagger/sniping tactics (no use making peace when you've lost cities you could otherwise claim back).

Anyway, as you say it's in the game rules, and part of the reason I built the wonder was for the semi-security it offered when leveraged correctly. I would be rather annoyed if making use of the AP was somehow ruled out after I built it just because I mentioned it in my spoiler thread. I may not even have the opportunity to make use of it... we'll see.

Incidentally, you can rest assured that I have no interest in the crappy AP cheese victory. So you won't be seeing that from me.

[Lord Parkin]

Unless there is a mechanic to forcibly remove religion from a city (a good thought for the RB-mod, but probably difficult to code and balance)

Actually such a mechanic already exists, for instance in the "Legends of Revolution" mod. They named the units "Inquisitors", and they act by removing all religions except the state religion in the city they're used in. Works perfectly, not at all bugged as far as I know.

[Gold Ergo Sum]

I would be rather annoyed if making use of the AP was somehow ruled out after I built it just because I mentioned it in my spoiler thread.

I have no intentions to do so. I've had to make a few judgment calls within the rules as written so far this game, but there is no basis to nerf the AP.

[Thoth]

Actually such a mechanic already exists, for instance in the "Legends of Revolution" mod. They named the units "Inquisitors", and they act by removing all religions except the state religion in the city they're used in. Works perfectly, not at all bugged as far as I know.

That mechanic (removing non-state religions) also appears in FFH II. AFAIK, it works just fine.

[Lord Parkin]

Well, just had a long chat with a very slimy Luddite. Essentially, he double moved this turn to found a city NE of the canal city (just W of Puma). Not that I could have prevented him founding, but the double move was no doubt solely intended out of spite to "get in before I could stop him". (Actually, on second thoughts - I had a WC that could have killed the Settler, but I wouldn't have broken our NAP like that. I might have considered it if I'd heard his response first though.)

The city location is crap, but it's not the location that bothers me - it's the principle. Throughout the entire conversation, Luddite projected the view that he had done no wrong in his eyes - that, in his view, it's okay for him to breach an agreement and take a slice of our pie because we're ahead of him at the moment.

That view speaks volumes to me, and severely affects my opinion of him as a player. I don't think he quite realises just how much this calm, casual and uncaring breach of agreement is going to hurt him down the track. Before, I thought he was a close and reliable ally. Right now I hardly trust him at all, and wouldn't put it past him to break our NAP in the near future. (Arguably he already did so by planting that city via a double move after repeated reminders that he would be breaching our agreement.)

The irony is that if he'd actually talked to me earlier, I probably would have consented to him founding that city. But the fact is that he signed the explicit agreement not to settle that land. I didn't make him do that, he did it on his own and was fine with it at the time. Apparently after his war with Mackoti ended, he decided he wasn't happy with what he'd agreed to. I probably still would have been open to a rediscussion of the matter even after we'd signed our agreement. But instead, he kept silent, sneaked a settled across without mentioning it until I saw it, then founded anyway. That does not speak much for his character or trustworthiness. I guess I can thank him for tipping me off to his true nature before another more serious agreement gets "accidentally broken" later.

Anyway, here's the chat. I'll be interested to hear where the lurkers weigh in on this one. Perhaps there will be some sympathy for Luddite as the "little guy" in this situation... I've seen before in other games that folks who are not frontrunners are somehow "redeemed" from all actions, no matter how slimy on the surface. Perhaps some see it from a different perspective. In my eyes at least, this guy has seriously questioned my trust for him, which may heavily influence the course of events to come in the game.

Luddite: well anyway... i guess we should talk about the civ gamei hope you're not too mad about this, but i founded a city on the border this turn
me: yeah, sorry, I don't want to take up too much of your time
2:38 AM which border?
Luddite: on the border with you, in my east
it's on the northern coast
me: um... I'm really not too pleased with that. We did have a pretty explicit agreement regarding the choke point.
Luddite: i gave you all the cities that we talked about though
2:39 AM this just lets me work the coast
me: I think you ignored (or misread) the key summary, then
2:40 AM Ok, so to summarise, we've got:
- NAP to T210 (1500 AD)
- You won't settle any further cities towards me beyond the canal city
- I won't settle over the coast towards you, except perhaps south of the peaks on the unconnected land
[Luddite: yep, that sounds good]
that's directly from our Skype conversation
Luddite: hmm
me: You explicitly agreed not to settle any further beyond the choke point
Luddite: i guess i was kinda distracted by my war with mackoti when i said that
me: I'm not trying to be a bastard, but I kind of expected you to keep your word :P
Luddite: i really didn't think you would care if i settled a city that would just give me coast there
2:41 AM uyou really shouldn't get mad at me... i've given you ALL the land in between us, and thanks to me you're number 2 in cities without having to lift a finger
2:42 AM me: If it's the site I'm thinking of, then it steals a Sheep from me. And yes, I wanted to found that city.
Luddite: it's not gonna steal sheep, i won't have enough culture for that
2:43 AM me: Look, it's the double standard that gets to me. We make an agreement, then you expect me to honour it by not founding cities on your side, but you deliberately found a city in a place you surely knew would be troublesome even though (1) you agreed not to, and (2) you have plenty of far better spots open.
2:44 AM You can't have it both ways, I guess that's what I'm saying. I had a Settler all loaded up on that Galley down south of your territory, ready to found a city just before we had our convo. After our convo, I unloaded him back on my side and founded elsewhere.
2:45 AM Luddite: well... i should point out then that you would have violated our initial agreement if you had settled down there
me: right, which was why I was checking
2:46 AM I checked to make sure if it'd be okay or not. On the other hand, you just DID very deliberately violate our agreement.
You can't say "I thought you'd be ok with it", because I just sent you a bunch of emails before you founded telling you not to :P
So even misreading the Skype convo doesn't really cut it
Luddite: ok fine... you SHOULD be ok with it becuase i've given you so much already
2:47 AM me: The way I see it, you thought "oh well, he can't do anything about it right now, I'll just violate it anyway"
Luddite: i've given up so many good city sites between us, and focused everything west
2:48 AM me: The thing is, if you'd discussed it with me earlier I likely would have been okay with it. However, you AGREED to give me that site when you agreed to our last arrangement. If you weren't happy with giving me that site, you should have brought it up then, or not signed the agreement. You can't fault me for that.
Luddite: apparently if i hadn't agreed you would have sent settlers across my borders to break the first agreement lol
2:49 AM me: No, I wouldn't
And I didn't
Luddite: you just said you had a settler on a galley ready to go lol
2:50 AM me: Yes, but that Galley also had the option to go for the southern island, which you were ok with
Luddite: to settle in between two of my cities, in land i fought a war to get
me: And I never would have settled without your permission
2:51 AM There's a very clear distinction between considering an option and bringing it up for discussion, vs agreeing to something, having it made clear to you that you are about to breach that agreement, then sneakily going ahead with it anyway
Luddite: alright look, i'm sorry i did it without talking to you first
like i said, i've been way too busy for doing long chats this week
me: You double-moved to take that spot too, incidentally
2:52 AM Luddite: not trying to double move, just finishing my turns while i have time, and it wouldn't matter anyway since you don't have a settler there
in the long run this really shouldn't change much
me: right, but the intention of the double move was to just spite me by founding it before I could do anything
2:53 AM Luddite: i really didn't plan it that way
you can appeal to GES if you think i really broke the rules
me: It changes my perception of you when you don't honour an agreement even after it's made explicitly clear to you. Why are you settling such a crap location anyway, when there are so many other better ones that would put your economy back on track faster?
2:54 AM Luddite: more collosus coast, more economy
it's a site that helps me a lot more than it would help you
me: that's bull, frankly. You can get coast from a bunch of other sites without breaching an agreement
That's bull too, since I could share tiles if I had that spot
Luddite: i'm... settling other sites too
2:55 AM me: Right, so why the need to breach our agreement and make me so mad over such a crap spot for you? It doesn't make logical sense.
Also, I note that Chariot stack just moved into that new city. You're not exactly convincing me of non-aggressive intentions.
2:56 AM Luddite: the chariots well.. i'm just a little gunshy after dealing with mackoti
me: In fact, arguably an aggressive city plant like that after it was made clear to you that that wasn't ok was a breach of our NAP.
Luddite: if you want to break the NAP and attack me then i guess that's your call
i really don't think this justifies it at all
2:57 AM me: Maybe, but how am I supposed to believe you on the NAP when you just broke half of our agreement?
Luddite: well, you'll notice how my power graph hasn't increased at all in the last turns?
in fact i even deleted some units
me: It's still very high
2:59 AM Not that I'm concerned for my own safety - you can't win a war against me anyway right now, when I have War Chariots and am right next to Maces - but a war between us would drag both of our economies down and hand things over to plako.
Luddite: sure, i agree
3:00 AM me: I don't understand why you seem to be acting so aggressively towards me, as Plako's still the far larger threat. Sure, while he's at war his score temporarily drops down, but with his immense land he'll bounce back and then some once it's over.
Luddite: i really don't think i'm acting that agressive towards you, i'm just trying to rebuild my economy after getting way behind
3:02 AM me: Yes, but your actions speak louder than words. If this site was so important to you you could have pulled me aside and argued your case for getting that city well in advance. You didn't though, you kept it quiet and out of sight - I wouldn't even have seen the Settler last turn if not for sheer chance. That screams "acting in bad faith" to me.
Luddite: ok, sorry, i apologize if i did it in an unfair way
me: Especially since you founded it even after knowing that it was in breach of our agreement and would make me extremely unhappy
3:03 AM Any other cities you're intending on breaching our agreement to found?
Luddite: all my other cities will be west of there, i promise
especailly since you've already filled up every possible city site to the east
3:04 AM me: Ok, I'll hold you to that
3:06 AM I'm still not happy about this city you just founded though. I'd be willing to go as far as reimbursing you a Settler if you gifted it over, even though it was clearly founded in breach of our agreement. That's one option..
Luddite: sorry, but a city is really worth a lot more than a settler at this point
3:08 AM me: Right, but given that you're heavily in the wrong here, I thought you might be willing to consider righting things. A settler has slightly less value than a founded city (until it founds), but it seems unreasonable for you to expect more compensation than that for breaking an agreement in the first place.
3:09 AM Luddite: sorry, but i think you're far enough ahead that you can afford one sub-par city location
3:10 AM me: So basically, it's a case of "You're currently ahead of me, which makes it perfectly okay in my eyes to breach an agreement I made with you to get a piece of your pie. Don't you dare try doing the reverse though."
3:11 AM Forgive me if I see that as being somewhat dishonourable and slimy.
Luddite: um;; i hope that's not the impression you're getting
3:12 AM but, no i'm not going to give you one of my cities just to make you feel better
me: Personally, I prefer to keep all my agreements to the letter, even if I'm behind. I've had plenty of games where I haven't ended up winning, but I didn't resort to breaking deals to try.
3:13 AM One of your cities, planted on land you agreed was mine, in breach of an agreement you had with me, even after you were made well aware of said agreement. Sure.
3:14 AM The fact that you view a righting of the situation as you trying to make me "feel better" speaks volumes to me
3:15 AM I think we're not talking on the same level here. Your mindset is "first in, first served, f*** the agreement". Mine is "we had a deal, you broke that deal, what can we do to fix things here".
3:16 AM At least that's my impression
3:17 AM Luddite: no my mindset is "wow i gave that guy a REALLY sweet deal... i should at least try to get whatever i can from it, like the water between us"
me: You cannot blame me for you agreeing to a deal you later decided you didn't like.
3:18 AM The blame lies entirely with you in this situation
If you weren't happy with the deal, TALK to me and explain an alternative
Luddite: it's won't even give me land east of my city anyway, so i think it obeys the letter of the agreement
me: Don't go with this sneaky BS
3:19 AM Nope. "You won't settle any further cities towards me beyond the canal city". You can't misinterpret it like that.
3:20 AM Put yourself in my position for a moment. Say I founded a city on that SE peninsula below you across from my land. Would you be pissed? Would you consider that "fair"? Would you consider that a NAP breach?
Luddite: interesting you bring that up, since apparently you were preparing to do that...
3:21 AM me: rolls eyes for the last time, I had considered it as an option ONLY if you were agreeable. You were not, so it was immediately discarded from my mind as an option. You are deliberately mixing up the "before" and "after" the agreement, and I won't have any of it.
3:23 AM On the other hand, you had clearly considered this city as an option. On the other hand, you didn't discard it as an option after agreeing not to settle that land and being made aware again of that agreement. You are the one who acted deceitfully and broke the agreement here.
Luddite: look we're obviously not going to completely agree on this, and i'm gonna have to go soon
i really don't think you should feel hard done by, by me
i'm not gonna give you that city, but i hope we can work together in the future
me: It's not the site, it's the principle. That you were willing to breach the agreement like this and feel so uncaring about it really makes me reconsider our relationship in the game.
3:24 AM I thought we were very close friends, willing to talk through anything, but now I'm not so sure.
3:26 AM I won't keep you around for much longer. I'll just state again that I think it was a real slimeball move to do what you did, especially considering you probably could have done it without the fuss by just talking to me in advance.
3:27 AM Again, it was the way in which you went about what you did, much more than the actual event of settling the city that was important.
Luddite: ok, sorry
i'll try to do better about communicating in the future, i'm just really pressed for time right now
3:29 AM me: I'll be interested to see how the lurkers see it. On the one hand you were completely in the wrong here, for making an agreement and then directly breaching that agreement. On the other hand, from reading past games it seems the sentiment of some lurkers is that it's ok for the "little guy" to do whatever slimy moves he pleases and still have a shining reputation. Guess we'll see.
No worries, I've got to get to bed anyway
3:30 AM Stayed up far too late
Luddite: haha ok
goodnight man
me: Night

So... comments?