So, I did it. Declared war on plako. I expect he and ASM will be.... pleased? with that
So I thought I'd at least write down my thoughts on this. At least I can get it on paper before this war starts. I do recognize that this is likely to hand LP the game (if he didn't have it in the bag already). So why do it?
Well, I've recognized that I / we / the Zulus have very little to no chance of winning this game, for quite some time. And so then what do we do?
Let me step back a little bit to talk about past relationships.
At the tail end of plako's war with WarriorKnight, I was VERY annoyed with the fact that plako essentially "bullied" his way into taking land that I felt I at least had a claim to it. Now, that was totally his right to do so. He had the big army, and so it's certainly a fair option to just try and grab as much land as you can get away with it. But it didn't earn them very many friends in Zululand.
Then in the mid-game, China went all "passive-aggressive" - spending tons of EPs on us, militarizing the border, which made us fairly nervous.
But let's talk about LP. We had pleasant out of game relations, but in-game, early on, it was just as frustrating. He wouldn't OB, didn't want to strike a deal with Christian missionaries, etc. You can check my thread for more examples of that.
So let's fast forward to the mid-game. China is going passive-aggressive on me. I have no active NAP with LP either. So here we are, still trying to dig ourselves out of the hole we put ourselves in with the GLH gambit, and our 2 immediate neighbors (who are #1 and #2 in score) are both neutral to hostile. I would be VERY surprised if there wasn't some good long discussion between the two of them about allying to attack ME.
In the end, the best deal on the table was a long NAP between ourselves and LP, till T250 I believe. I kept this on the down low, and I don't know if this is well known to either lurkers or other players.
We made talks about attacking plako later on, around T200 but nothing concrete.
Somewhere around there, plako wanted to extend our NAP. There were lots of discussions back and forth about that. I was under the impression that folks were trying to coordinate a dogpile on Lord Parkin, which I wasn't completely opposed to. Even then, I recognized that he was the "top dog" and bringing him back to the pack was in Zululand's best interests. I was trying to walk a very thin line here. So I signed a NAP to like T185 with plako, under the impression that a) I could sell that to LP that I couldn't attack plako due to that arrangement, and b) that would give plako and his coalition the chance to attack LP with my non-interference. Later I found out that everyone had NAPs with LP till T200 so that didn't happen.
Now we're here. LP asked me to declare on T199, with the hopes of going first on T200 to take control of the seas between the 3 of us.
Again, I realize that this is likely to make LP win, and it may even be that everyone concedes within the next few turns. If that happens, I'm okay with it. IMO, LP has played the best game and thus deserves to win. Also, he has treated us the best out of any of the other powers, so if I'm going to play "kingmaker" I'm okay with him being the beneficiary.
