Diplomacy Master Thread- Helping Your Opponents Beat Themselves

[scooter]

Well here we go. Beta from WPC sent me a message, first notifying me to communicate directly with him over the next few turns (not a problem). He also attached an 800 word document detailing their idea for upcoming war strategy. Here it is in all its glory:

Proposed Strategy for Upcoming War

Greetings, Scooter and the rest of the gang at Realms Beyond. Beta here. As Proviisori has mentioned, this is a proposed strategy regarding the assault on the German Team (hereafter referred to as the Incas).

The first question is whether we attack as one large force, or two separate ones from our respective civs. From a logistics and ease of co-ordination, the latter makes more sense. If we assume two separate attacking forces, then we have 3 options.

1) We both attack at the same time.

2) You attack before us.

3) We attack before you.

Option one has benefit of forcing them to decide how to defend, but also allows them to plan for that defense. In other words, there are no surprises after the initial attack.

Options 2 and 3 have the benefit of perhaps pulling defenders to one side of the Incan lands, which should help the second team that attacks, and may in fact cripple them sooner and end the war much quicker. The downside is the team that attacks first may take the brunt of the casualties.

I like the delayed second attack – ie option 2 or 3. However, if you attack first, it will probably be no surprise at all to the Inca when we jump in. So, as much as it pains me to say it, I think the best option is that we declare war and attack, and at a pre-determined number of turns later, Realms Beyond (RB) would attack. That seems to have the best chance of catching the Incas off-guard, especially given your recent resource trade with them and your cordial relations to-date.

If we used this option, we would probably go in with two forces. One smaller force westward from Great Plains and Huron River, but a main attack force which would move NW from Great Plains and use the forest and hill tiles to move on Wittenbirge. That has the added advantage of being fairly far north, and as mentioned above, may seriously weaken their southern defences. Thank you for your recent map showing the stack of Incan units. This convinces me even more of the soundness of this strategy to pull their military out of a ‘central’ defensive position.

However, if we adopt this strategy, we need to agree in advance on 1) how soon after we attack that you declare war, and 2) the split of Incan lands after to the war. It is quite possible that we, WPC, will get bogged down in a slug-fest with the majority of the Incan army around Wittenbirge, and then you could ‘waltz’ over their southern cities. Which is fine by us, as it may ultimately shorten the war, as long as we agree on the split.

So, on the first point, we think 3 turns would be a good period to draw the Incan forces northward. Two might even be enough as they will probably react to our approach. So, we would declare war on turn 149, 150, or 151, and you declare two turns after we do.

On the second point, I propose the following. RB gets the southern half of the Incan civ, including the cities of:

1. Wolfrathausen

2. Worms

3. Wassenburg

4. Weilderstadt

5. Wanzelhein

6. Webringen (capitol)



WPC would get the northern half, including the cities of:



1. Westheim

2. Wesselburn

3. Warendorf

4. Wien

5. Wittenbirge

6. Wilhelmshaven

That seems like a fair split. Equal number of cities; ours have slightly more population (from what I can tell); but we are also getting a lot desert and tundra; and you get the capitol. The remaining question is the city of Wismar. If it goes to you, it is fairly close to Wilhemshaven, and if it goes to us, it creates a bit of an uneven border. The best idea may be to raze it and then you can build on the south shore of the lake, say two tiles south of where the city is now.

I would also propose that we evenly split the number of captured workers, if there are any. And finally, that any gold from the capture of a city slated for the other team be turned over to that team. Alternatively, we could agree to a 50/50 split of all captured treasuries.

An unknown variable may be the involvement of other teams. Apolyton comes to mind. Our northern portion of the Incan lands is fairly isolated, but the southern section, as you know, borders Apolyton. If they decide to attack as well, it could upset the ‘fairness’ of the proposed split of land.

I don’t think we need to discuss operational planning; we can each take care of our own. And we will need to stay in close communication during the war to share status, intelligence and ideas.

I look forward to your thoughts on the proposed strategy, and we at WPC look forward to marching beside you, figuratively speaking of course.



Regards, Beta of WPC

We're going to have to talk them into going with "We both declare on T150 and what happens goes"

[pindicator]

Delaying our attack doesn't seem fruitful, doubly so if they're insisting on a 50/50split. The Inca forces are already up north, what are 3t going to accomplish except delays?

Although i do like them throwing themselves on the grenade, but i think we need to come up with an alternative. If their best defender is an axe then what's wrong with us attacking first to split their stack? (Clarifying: us attacking first may encourage the Germans to split their one stack into two so they can keep a force near WPC)

[kjn]

Yeah, simultaneous war declaration should be the thing to go for, and that we both play in the same slice of the turn.

From a pure strategic surprise perspective, we should be the team that declares war first, and they to do so T152 or T153. That would draw the bulk of the German army south, and allow WPC to capture Wilhelmshaven much more easily. This is especially true with the poor road network south of Wismar.

I think we should advise them that they shouldn't go for that long flanking movement. The Germans has the advantage of interior lines, and you don't want to spend a lot of time moving around in enemy territory if you can help it. I also doubt they have enough force to both do a strong attack into German lands, and defend against a counter-attack against Huron River. Their current plan just screams defeat in detail to me, and having their northern stack catapulted to pieces.

We should tell them that we have good relations with Apolyton currently, and that we have contingency plans depending on how Apolyton reacts.

I think we also should make clear that our overriding priority is to end the war as quickly as possible. Every extra turn at war is one more turn of war weariness and other unhappiness, as well as unit supply costs, and brings the end of our various NAPs closer. Ie, our goal is to capture the German cities as quickly as we can, to knock them out as fast as possible.

Also, we should tell them that we will send over a liaison chariot. I think we should invite them to send over a liasion unit as well.

[scooter]

From a pure strategic surprise perspective, we should be the team that declares war first, and they to do so T152 or T153. That would draw the bulk of the German army south, and allow WPC to capture Wilhelmshaven much more easily. This is especially true with the poor road network south of Wismar.

Wait, why would we want this at all? I don't think we want to take on extra casualties just to help out WPC.

[Shoot the Moon]

From a pure strategic surprise perspective, we should be the team that declares war first, and they to do so T152 or T153. That would draw the bulk of the German army south, and allow WPC to capture Wilhelmshaven much more easily. This is especially true with the poor road network south of Wismar.

Wait, why would we want this at all? I don't think we want to take on extra casualties just to help out WPC.

Yeah, them declaring first is clearly better for us. The issue is that the 50-50 split isn't.

[Sullla]

Wow. They're even more out of touch with reality than I expected. Are we sure Aidun's not hiding on that team somewhere? That message was a worthy Templar exchange (there are quite a few ex-Templars on the WPC roster). Anyway, let's provide some visual aid to this email:

Here's the planned attack route from WPC. I agree with kjn's opinion of this move: it's a terrible tactical advance. WPC spends 3 turns slowly creeping around in strategically useless tundra in order to capture... a small fishing village? Even if they succeed in this mission, they'll inflict very little damage to the Germans, with their army poorly positioned to go after any real targets. It's a dumb plan of attack.

But I would argue the exact opposite conclusion about this dumb attack: a foolish attack from WPC is great news for us! We should absolutely encourage them to send their army off into the wilderness and achieve nothing of note, while we happily capture everything of strategic value. Look at it this way: both WPC and the Germans have a giant stack of axes and catapults. At some point, they are going to clash against one another, and it's going to be extremely bloody on both sides. There's no avoiding that, both sides will take heavy casualties since they have exactly the same level of technology. We want to encourage this as much as possible.

From a pure strategic surprise perspective, we should be the team that declares war first, and they to do so T152 or T153. That would draw the bulk of the German army south, and allow WPC to capture Wilhelmshaven much more easily. This is especially true with the poor road network south of Wismar.

Why in the world would we attack first, and draw German forces away from their border with WPC? To allow another team to capture cities instead of us doing so? That would be silly. Remember, we don't ultimately care about WPC at all. I don't intend to do squat to help them capture German cities, which they will very like fail to do once again in spectacular fashion. They are simply a diversion to allow us to take cities faster and easier. Anything that they achieve is a bonus. If they draw 25% of the German military up to the arctic while we fight the other 75%, and we end up taking everything useful in the process, that's an awesome result for us.

As for their plan to divide up the German lands:

This is what they proposed, and I've drawn in a likely post-war border if things were to shake out this way. (I'm assuming we would get Wismar, even though they seem to think they might have a chance at that city themselves.) It's actually a very fair division of cities between our teams, and if all things were equal between us, I'd be happy to sign off on this.

Of course things are not equal at all; we're sitting atop the scoreboard with the largest and most technologically advanced army in the game, while they are sitting just barely above last place with a thoroughly antiquated force. WPC has zero chance to achieve anything without our team doing the heavy lifting, and they appear to be completely unaware of this. The diplomatic thing to say is what we've intended all along, "We both declare on T150 and what happens goes" as scooter put it. That's the polite way of saying "no goddamn way" that they're getting an even split when the war contributions won't be even close to even.

Here's what I expect to happen: we both attack on Turn 150. We capture the German cities on the border without much trouble and advance on Worms/Webringen. WPC mucks around in the tundra for a few turns, launches an ill-advised attack, gets their stack cleaned up, and doesn't do much of anything. We methodically capture the German cities and gift them 2 or 3 cities at the end of the war for their "help", if that. Basically, we let events play out on the ground and reveal just how terribly weak the bargaining position of WPC truly is. They do not appear to be aware of that at the moment.

I do not envy scooter here. Umm, have fun talking with these guys.

[Ellimist]

Don't the game rules forbid us from gifting cities? Why don't we use that as a prop in our reply.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=463122

We can't transfer ownership of any cities, and we want to be fair to our buddy WPC, so we both have to attack at the same time. We'll both attack together and meet in the middle.

Whichever team (WPC) captures fewer cities can have every captured worker if they want them. I don't think we're likely to capture very many or possibly any workers anyway.

[scooter]

From a pure strategic surprise perspective, we should be the team that declares war first, and they to do so T152 or T153. That would draw the bulk of the German army south, and allow WPC to capture Wilhelmshaven much more easily. This is especially true with the poor road network south of Wismar.

Wait, why would we want this at all? I don't think we want to take on extra casualties just to help out WPC.

Yeah, them declaring first is clearly better for us. The issue is that the 50-50 split isn't.

That's not what kjn suggested. He suggested we declare first to soften up the Incans so that WPC can capture cities more easily. I think that's almost as crazy as WPC asking for a 50/50 split.

edit: some crossposting going on

[novice]

I think what kjn meant to say was that us attacking first would make sense if we were playing not only with our own best interests in mind but also with WPC's best interests in mind. As a team, sort of.

Anyway, if WPC insist on a staggered attack, would we mind if they declared on t148? Of course we have to politely turn down their suggested land split either way.

[Shoot the Moon]

From a pure strategic surprise perspective, we should be the team that declares war first, and they to do so T152 or T153. That would draw the bulk of the German army south, and allow WPC to capture Wilhelmshaven much more easily. This is especially true with the poor road network south of Wismar.

Wait, why would we want this at all? I don't think we want to take on extra casualties just to help out WPC.

Yeah, them declaring first is clearly better for us. The issue is that the 50-50 split isn't.

That's not what kjn suggested. He suggested we declare first to soften up the Incans so that WPC can capture cities more easily. I think that's almost as crazy as WPC asking for a 50/50 split.

edit: some crossposting going on

Yeah, I know that's what he suggested. Which is why I said them declaring first is clearly better for us than us declaring first, while the 50-50 split isn't good for us. (In essence: we agree, although apparently weren't able to communicate that very well )