Diplomacy Master Thread- Helping Your Opponents Beat Themselves

[kalin]

scooter, why do you think it's a problem at all to ask for an extension of the NAP with CFC right now? Sure it's early, but so what? I am just curious for your reasoning.

Kalin

[T-hawk]

Wait. Could we ask for something like 1-2gpt instead? That's still a steal of a trade for them, but at least we get some value out of it.

This is silly. No need to look like we're annoying haggling misers for the sake of 10 to 20 pennies.

[Fintourist]

Ok, let's talk CFC NAP extension.

What do you guys think of trying to get a NAP by telling them up front that we're considering helping WPC in their campaign to remove the German team?

Absolutely no! That must remain our little secret with WPC. Just imagine the possibility of CFC telling Germans about our plans. Giving away our plans would give CFC a powerful diplomatic weapon that they could definitely utilize in some way. What would we do if we knew CFC were about to attack WPC? We would certainly at least consider warning WPC and encourage military build-up.

I think we should reconsider this closer to the attack if there would be some kind of significant gains that would be enabled through revealing our plans.

[Sullla]

Yeah, I wish I had seen this. Negotiating for 3gpt is really silly; it does nothing to help us and it makes UniversCiv significantly less likely to accept the deal. The whole reason why we want to accept the deal is to make them more likely to side with us in any future dispute. Arguing for pennies on the dollar makes us look arrogant and out of touch. It's not a disaster or anything, but I'd almost suggest sending another message dropping that request and simply agreeing to their sheep for spices deal.

Definitely do not share plans of German attack with CFC. We have little to gain from putting that info out there and potentially a ton to lose. I actually thought that our NAP with CFC ran out much sooner than T130; with that information, we should probably drop the request for an extension. Just send a friendly message thanking them for the trade route connection.

EDIT: More generally, I think that you're doing a good job with diplomacy, and that speed can often be important in these messages. However, the UniversCiv email wasn't THAT critical, and you sent it 15 minutes after posting. I do think that a little more time for others to look at this one would have served us better. Anyway, it's water under the bridge now, so don't worry about it. Maybe we can chat with someone from UniversCiv and straighten things out.

[Gold Ergo Sum]

Why don't we just make the spice for sheep trade and tell them we get their first happy.

[scooter]

I was under the impression we wanted to rush this so we could get the trade routes to recalculate before the turn ran out. My mistake on rushing it, then.

I can send a quick note to them accepting their initial offer and retracting the gpt offer if you'd like? Also, if you can cancel them without touching OB, then our worrying is unnecessary anyways - we could just pop in and re-offer the sheep deal they offered us.

Any objections to doing those two things?

[scooter]

scooter, why do you think it's a problem at all to ask for an extension of the NAP with CFC right now? Sure it's early, but so what? I am just curious for your reasoning.

Kalin

To me, it makes it pretty transparent that we have another motive for wanting to extend it so early. They're going to speculate on why we want to extend it 30T (AKA 2 months) in advance. This is why I entertained the idea of explaining to them, though of course I won't do that since there's a seveeeeere lack of interest in the idea.

[kjn]

We already have trade routes - I think the simple action of even rejecting an OB deal forced the recalculation. We're at +95g right now and GNP 151, compared to +85g and 141 earlier in the turn.

We also get 27 in trade in the demos, compared to 8 earlier.

[novice]

Cool, do we have any domestic routes still or only international ones?

[kjn]

I think we have a few more slots for international routes, but I don't know how many. Might be as few as 3, or as many as 5. I didn't notice until I checked some screen shots taken earlier today, and APTmod doesn't expose that info (and is wonky right now).

Won't get back home until tomorrow, anyway, but nothing stops anyone else with the mod from logging in and checking the per-city trade income.