Ranamar and Lewwyn, ministers for Bismarck of Mali

[SevenSpirits]

BD is still in avoid growth the latest save, below happy cap even. Hope you changed that. We want it to always be max size.

[Ranamar]

Incidentally, in response to Yuris's last message, we closed down negotiations on stone. For one thing, once we get Masonry, I'm all for getting the Pyramids. It's 1 turn for Masonry even at a reduced tech rate, and a couple turns for stone, so we should get going on that soon, especially once our wonder queue starts emptying, which I think it is.

Besides, Seven was getting suspicious about what they might want stone for if they can't get the Hanging Gardens anymore. We don't want them to get a leg up on those pyramids, after all... and I can't believe they'd just go for Moai.

It's interesting to note that Yuris is trying to cast suspicion away from MNG towards GES, too.

[Ranamar]

I was expecting angry... but this is still impressive:

RL7,

I'm sure you can anticipate what this message is about. Upon opening
the latest save, we see that you have founded a city on the rice tile
in our continent. We have no choice but to view this as a hostile
action, based on two points:

1) That location is on our side of the land bridge. This is
undeniably on our 'continent' and thus in our sphere of influence.
2) We specifically mentioned this in our stone negotition, which I
will quote "I'm sure you will agree that the landbridge is a natural
border between us, and with the good relations we had so far, I
wouldn't think you have an intention to cross the landbridge and steal
our land."

The city in and of itself wouldn't have been an irrecoverable problem.
We would have given you 1E or 2E or even 1S. This site, however,
ruins our eastern dotmap, and thus represents a multiple city offense.
In light of this, we are forced to invoke the 10-turn cancellation
clause in our NAP. The NAP will run up to and including T73, becoming
void on T74.

There was no potential for miscommunication. You have knowingly
settled a site in our land, without warning. Given your intent and
the damage it has caused us, we must ask what reparations you're
willing to offer us. We will be unlikely to accept any terms that do
not involve a razing and replanting of that city.

We desire to be reasonable, however, and we recognize that your strong
play has allowed you to expand to that site. We do not expect you to
replant without being compensated, so we will offer you the 20t of
ivory we had previosuly discussed. Until this incident, we enjoyed
open relations with you, and ideally will be able to find a peaceful
solution.

Board of Directors of Radioland

Thoughts on how to reply? I can already imagine Lewwyn's "You were too slow. Suckers."

[NobleHelium]

You could always bad cop Lewwyn.

[Lewwyn]

You could always bad cop Lewwyn.

I'm in~!

[Ranamar]

You could always bad cop Lewwyn.

I'm pretty sure he's been volunteering ever since I saw the negotiation item just as we were dropping a city where they were going to ask us not to. Seven closing out the discussion was the only thing that saved us from me sending an apologetic note saying that we couldn't accept that term.

I'm also amused to note, once I looked at the map again, just how thoroughly we blocked off the end of the island. I forgot that the 1-away rule was diagonal, too, as opposed to being merely "not in someone's BFC."

Anyway, played the turn. Research set to Hunting, which comes in in 4 turns... at 0% research. (GLib ) Next turn, we can set things to full and blow away everything through Archery. I'm thinking overflow to Masonry, actually, seeing if we can get that out of the way too: 5 turns until BD is out of bonused wonders to build.

power graph:


We're approximately neck-and-neck for hammers.

Oh, and I screwed up slightly by not leaving the galley next to the road which I used to put the chariot on it: next turn, I want to move it back there so we can transfer a worker on and then we can send the whole thing in to get the chariot in the city and the worker to chop the forest next to it. (I want as little available cover for the other side as possible.)

[Lewwyn]

BTW can we send Yuris an email saying "Come at me bro"?

[SevenSpirits]

Couple things since I have some spare moments again.

* I don't see why we didn't get hunting last turn and archery the next. (As opposed to delaying them to save more gold.) In general I'd just set research to breakeven at this point in the game. The rounding is no longer a simple matter of binary research given our libraries and scientists, and it's insignificant enough we shouldn't worry about it. (Or, did we avoid hunting to finish the warrior? I guess that's reasonable...)

* I hope we're going to give BD its food back from MT/Osgiliath... It's not growing right now, and needs to!

* Now that we can afford to whip again with the higher happy cap, the governors will be solid again. I'd set most cities to governor with emphasize commerce (the coin) on. Then swap around tiles (single click on it from the city that doesn't have it) if needed to make sure our best tiles are being worked.

* We have lots of cottages, which is great, but there are still two river grasslands (forested, near edoras) that lack them. Let's get those going ASAP.

* We have had 40ep (just 3 short of graphs!) on MNG for ages. Can we finish that now?

* If we run out of wonders to build in the capital we can still start Mausoleum and get a fantastic gold payout for it. Just can't finish it.

* I don't think this aggressive plant vs yuris is a very good idea right now. (Too early.) We are still nowhere near metal casting, so he could hurt us a lot with a trireme. I'd definitely look into making a deal with them. For example:

- We allow them to raze the city.
- They give us $50 when either one of us reaches currency.
- They give us their Mausoleum building rights.
- They give us Ivory for 35t and we have a NAP during that time.
- We maintain OB during that time too and close borders with MNG.
- We each promise not to settle each other's blobs or bridges during that time.

(And this could be negotiated down a little bit.)
What do you guys think?

[SevenSpirits]

Sent this:

Hm, our team's plans seem to have changed a bit from what I was aware of when I left. I don't think this admittedly aggressive plant was our best move, though I do think we can hold it and best you in war if you attack. Skirmishers are pretty darn effective and will be for a while yet.

I've posted in our thread trying to convince Lewwyn and Ranamar that making a deal for the site could be a good course of action for us. Hopefully I am persuasive enough and we can start negotiation as soon as possible. Every turn that the city costs maintenance and grows is a step away from the possibility of a mutually beneficial deal.

Of course, keeping our city seems like a good course of action too. As you may have noticed, we have less than half the riverside tile count of the other blobs, the worst access to the middle, the second-worst luxury distribution and no real compensation for those things. So we're trying to grab any advantages we can before the full power of everyone else's land starts kicking in and leaves us in the dust.

I like your guys' diplo style, you seem like people who can be reasoned with. Hopefully we don't have to be enemies.

Seven

[SevenSpirits]

Also, we apparently own cities called Timbuktu and Djenne.