Diplomacy Master Thread- Helping Your Opponents Beat Themselves

[Old Harry]

I don't care about any future demo games, but if WPC complain to other teams might it make it harder for us to put together another dogpile in the future of this game? If not then my vote is to let them down as gently as possible...

Something along the lines of "We're trying to finish them ASAP to kill the units attacking you"?

[Bigger]

We can have those tundra cities captured in 2 turns. WPC would take probably 7-8 turns. Not an option.

Anyway, if I were WPC and I said "we're getting nothing from this war!" and RB said "uh you could settle some crappy tundra spots if you want!" I'd probably not be happy with that. I don't see how that helps anything.

agree with Scooter. it's all about speed. also, When we declined the hard land split we were gambling on being able to take our part by force... if we had lost that bet would we expect Wpc to donate cities to our cause?

yes, honestly, I suspect they would donate cities to our cause in that instance. although its ridiculous to imagine us in that situation

lets not make WPC out to be bad guys. they suck, that doesnt make them villains. Im all for taking all the cities we can, but we can turn down the hyperbole a bit.

[Mardoc]

I don't see anyone changing their mind. Us bonethrowers were outvoted, even if you don't give Scooter and Sullla bonus votes for the time they've put in. Can we move on to another topic?

If Scooter wants to try damage control with WPC, let him, but I don't rate the chances of that high enough to be worth the whole team's input.

Some things that might be more productive:

• Alternate things we can offer UniversCiv. Maybe an explanation on how we intend to stop the very confident anti-RB coalition
  
• A plan to stop the very confident anti-RB coalition .
  
• A discussion of whether cats or dogs are the superior pet
  

[Cyneheard]

Cats, were I not allergic to them.

#backontopic

[kjn]

Cats are superior units, because they retain their in-game usefulness far longer.

[scooter]

So Yossarian poked me on chat to say hey. We segued into diplo. Generally pretty productive again, I'm growing more optimistic that they might sign this T200 extension. I'll bold a few highlights.

scooter
What's your team think about the NAP idea btw?

YossarianLives
tbh, we're still somewhat divided
The proposal you made was a good one though. A lot of our team is ready to sign
But we do everything very diplomatically, and decisions take a little while to make
We're taking our time on this one, since we have it
Not diplomatically, democratically

scooter
Yeah no problem, I understand. Glad to hear people at least feel generally favorably about it

YossarianLives
Yeah, we're closer than I thought we would ever get before you had proposed anything.

scooter
I know our teams have both clashed with each other once or twice, but the reality is we communicate fairly well and both of our teams are pretty practical, so that helps a lot

YossarianLives
Were you able to replay your turn? Did the second reload have any impact on your battles?

scooter
"we communicate fairly well" - I mean both of our teams

YossarianLives
Yeah, I really like the dialogue we've had since we've been chatting

scooter
we haven't replayed it yet. Probably tonight or tomorrow, not sure. little hesitant to hurry too much and play since that ended poorly last time! haha
not too worried about the rerolling of battles. our luck was moderately above-average the first time so we may lose an extra unit or two, but it was our mistake to begin with so I cant complain

YossarianLives
Yeah, I don't think luck has much to do with the outcome of your battles at this point
What are you leaving for WPC? I thought they were going to get some of the German lands

scooter
yeah it wasn't going to hurt us on a significant level, it's mop-up time right now

YossarianLives
Right now we're predicting you might just continue right through WPC after you finish the Germans off.

scooter
that's sort of in progress on sorting that out. they kind of did things very different from our recommendations early on, and that really hurt them.
it's just awkward when one is attacking with knights, maces, and elephants and the other is attacking with dog soldiers

YossarianLives
lol!!!

scooter
hah, nah probably not

YossarianLives
Well that's good (from our perspective)
We were thinking that the way you worded the NAP, if you started a war with them right before T175, then we couldn't do anything while you just kept gobbling up more land

scooter
would it make you guys more willing to agree on the NAP if we promised not to attack them?
oh
no, sorry on the confusion there
the idea was as soon as the agreement was signed, that clause would be in effect
so theoretically if you guys sign it tomorrow and we declare on WPC next week, you would get your "out" clause
and vice versa of course

YossarianLives
Another question about the NAP
Do you have the same concerns about us that we have about you? That with a standard NAP we could DOW another weak team and take more land without you being able to stop us? Or was there another reason you made the clause reciprical?

scooter
Kind of, yeah. If we sign a NAP with you suddenly get peace with CivFr, you have a sizable army and a northern neighbor with basically no army
*with you, and you suddenly

YossarianLives
Well we need to catch up to you somehow! We had to share the Zulu lands with CivFr, but it looks like you're now getting all the German lands to yourselves

scooter
I can understand that, yeah. Would you be more interested in the deal if we dropped that portion of the clause for your team?

YossarianLives
Is that something you would be willing to do?

scooter
I'd have to check with the team and talk about it. I hadn't considered that it might be a sticking point. In my opinion I'd be willing to, but there are a lot of other opinions of course

YossarianLives
Yeah, I definitely know how that goes!

scooter
I'll check with them and get back to you for sure

YossarianLives
That would be great. One less concern for some of our members.

scooter
for sure, and yeah, do pass on to your team that the "out clause" would be active immediately, not wait until T175
you know, I'll send you an official email after we discuss all that with official wording so it's clear
let's me clean up the language a bit so nothing is overly ambiguous
Also I can't remember if we discussed this, but if we did this, we'd like to close "NAP loopholes"

YossarianLives
Like the pillaging thing?

scooter
and also extend our EP arrangements where we both target EPs elsewhere
yeah pillaging, helping enemies with strategic resources/gold, etc
we really only closed about half of them last time, and it seems prudent to just clean it all up so we're both clear

YossarianLives
You'll re-write it with the appropriate language for all that, then?

scooter
yeah I can do that
as soon as we figure out what we want to do with your half of the out clause, I'll send that to you
that work?

YossarianLives
Perfect, we'll be looking out for that, then

scooter
great!

Summary:

1) They feel generally favorably about it, but the support is not unanimous. They definitely have no concrete plans to attack us on T175 at the moment. That could change if things go sideways here, just noting that as of this minute, we aren't looking at a 3v1... yet.

2) So, they don't really like that the "Out Clause" works both ways. They feel they need to get more land to keep pace with us, and maybe they'll target UCiv to get it. I think we should absolutely drop their half of it and make it a one-way clause. To them, they'll see that as a deal that slightly favors them. To us, it's irrelevant because we will not be in a position to declare a new war prior to T200. We'll either be defending our west and/or pushing badly needed infrastructure. The reality is half my reason for including this as a 2-way clause was so that we could drop it as a "concession" to make the deal if necessary. So I highly recommend we do this. Any opinions?

3) He seems fine with closing loopholes and making the language official. I'll draft something up today along those lines. Extending our EP deal (no spending EPs on each other since we both have graphs, no missions, etc) is also a big deal.


Thoughts? I think this is more productive to discuss right now than the WPC issue.

[scooter]

And no, they REALLY don't need to know that we have a NAP with WPC that runs through T200.

[Sullla]

That is excellent work scooter. I've been seriously impressed at how well you've done with CFC. I don't think letting CFC declare war on another team during the NAP (which would surely be UniversCiv, given the geography of the region) matters much to us at all. That would drive UniversCiv straight into an alliance with us, and UniversCiv is strong enough not to be easy pickings.

But the main thing is just to get another 25 turns of peace with CFC. Without pressure from CFC on the other side, Apolyton and CivPlayers have no chance to deal real damage to our team. At best, they can get a border city or something while we're teching to rifles, and that's it. I would definitely keep pushing for this deal, because I think it virtually seals us as the winner of the game if they sign it.

[Ruff_Hi]

YossarianLives is CFC, isn't he?

If this NAP out clause is one-way, then who is their likely target?



It isn't CivFr so it is either UniversCiv or WPC. From the above, they don't have much land connection with WPC ... so UniversCiv it is. Aren't we trying to pull them into a much closer relationship with us? If we sign this NAP with CFC, then I think we can kiss goodbye to any such relationship with UniversCiv.

PS: It looks like this map should be updated again ... maybe next turn.

[Ruff_Hi]

I don't think letting CFC declare war on ... UniverseCiv ... [that would] drive [them] ... straight into an alliance with us, and UniversCiv is strong enough not to be easy pickings.

If we sign this NAP with CFC, then I think we can kiss goodbye to any such relationship with UniversCiv.

Interesting how Sullla and I look at this development differently. I was thinking they would be pissed at us in that we couldn't help them. Sullla is obviously thinking they would be just pissed at CFC.

I'm assuming that we can reach out to other select Civs and let them know that we have signed a NAP extension with CFC. That should put UniverCiv on alert ... shouldn't it?