Diplomacy Master Thread- Helping Your Opponents Beat Themselves

[scooter]

Finally got a response from CFC:

Thank you for your advice in regards to the barbarians. As we discussed on GTalk, we moved a different route with our warrior than the one you suggested, but our warrior has left your borders behind now. Our goal was, as I told you, to move the quickest and most efficient path out of your lands so we can continue exploring northwards.

Our exploration has so far revealed far more land than water, so the area we are in seems to be dominated by land. We are uncertain about the size of the salt water body that I mentioned in our chat about the map, as we haven't explored the southern part of it yet. It may turn out to be a fjord-like body of water connected to an ocean, or it may just be a large inland saltwater sea.

In regards to your question about explicit terrain mirroring, we have not seen signs of that. However, the general terrain seems pretty similar, although distributed differently, so there is definitely a mild mirroring present (at least for our two teams starts) as you suggest. It is highly likely that we will see that the other teams have pretty similar starts, with some variations of course.

In our early explorations we discovered a mountainrange in our east that looks somewhat similar to the mountains that are southeast of your lands. Have you seen any more of these little mountainranges?


Caledorn, on behalf of Team CFC

[scooter]

Poked Caledorn and asked about the Lion, even though I realized by then it was definitely "our" lion. He specifically confirmed they have no units close to us except the one that just went by, and he also confirmed it's traveling through the jungle. He also briefly apologized that their last response took longer than usual and again said that it was because he was away, not because of the team deliberating. Also engaged in some brief minor smalltalk about turn pace and the German team that doesn't end turn, but he had to go. (I can paste exact log if anyone requests it)

I'll draft something official to them tomorrow.

[Gold Ergo Sum]

Perhaps we could make a joint request with CFC to the German team to speed it up? If it doesn't just come from us, it might work.

[kjn]

Perhaps we could make a joint request with CFC to the German team to speed it up? If it doesn't just come from us, it might work.

We probably shouldn't phrase it as "speed it up", though. I think the consensus and discussion culture there is quite strong, and we shouldn't expect them to change that. But asking them to finish the turn once they've made their decisions, that might work.

[Gold Ergo Sum]

We probably shouldn't phrase it as "speed it up", though. I think the consensus and discussion culture there is quite strong, and we shouldn't expect them to change that. But asking them to finish the turn once they've made their decisions, that might work.

If the turn timer was 24 hours, no doubt they would reach a consensus that quickly. Perhaps we should propose a 24 hour timer until the first war is declared or something. I don't know. It would be different if 4-5 teams took that long, but when only one is holding it up, that is pretty ridiculous.

[scooter]

Caledorn didn't seem too bothered by the pace when I chatted with him, so I'm hesitant to get too whiny about it. I didn't sense that his team is talking much about the slowness of their team, though it's possible he was just being nice.

[kjn]

One thing I realised when thinking about future diplo, and the way Scooter got the impression that Caledorn felt unsure about the rest of the CFC team, is that we should try to find out who does the CFC diplo with the other teams.

If it's Caledorn, then we can treat with CFC more or less as we would otherwise.

But if it's not Caledorn, then it's one big honking alarm bell, especially if we find out that they use the same person for diplo with several other teams.

How to best find this out from the other teams will be an exercise in diplomatic correspondence for Scooter, especially since I doubt we will be able to go ahead and ask any other team directly.

(Yes, I have a dark and twisted mind at times.)

[Cyneheard]

One thing I realised when thinking about future diplo, and the way Scooter got the impression that Caledorn felt unsure about the rest of the CFC team, is that we should try to find out who does the CFC diplo with the other teams.

If it's Caledorn, then we can treat with CFC more or less as we would otherwise.

But if it's not Caledorn, then it's one big honking alarm bell, especially if we find out that they use the same person for diplo with several other teams.

How to best find this out from the other teams will be an exercise in diplomatic correspondence for Scooter, especially since I doubt we will be able to go ahead and ask any other team directly.

(Yes, I have a dark and twisted mind at times.)

That's easy. Have a chat with one of the other teams, and ask "have you heard from Caledorn recently?" instead of "have you heard from CFC recently?"

Waiting for flaws in this plan to be pointed out in 3... 2... 1...

[kjn]

Not a flaw, it fits with my thinking on how to approach the problem. But the devil is as always in the details: timing, how to make it sound natural and friendly, et c. But I agree that a chat would be the best venue for this - I hadn't thought of that.

[Cyneheard]

I think the key is to have the chat talk about other teams, and then "slip" by referencing Caledorn instead of CFC.