The question coming to my mind is what do we want more:
a) getting as much out of this war as we can
b) getting our investment in this war back and create an ally which will function as a buffer zone for "the inevitable dogpile".
What would a dogpile look like?
Would "they" just ignore WPC and go straight for us? - thats what I'd do, you can kill WPC once you got rid of RB without a problem.
In this case I'd go with the race for Berlin.
If we think there is a chance to avoid a dogpile diplomatically, and a happy WPC ally would go a long way towards this, then we should be magnanimous.
If I read correctly pretty much everyone is assuming we will definitely get dogpiled, so making a friend of WPC will just prevent them joining in, and they are and won't be in a position to hurt us given their position in this game.
I'm for taking what we can, we are locked into a NAP with them until T200, by then they will be even further apart from any competitive position, especially if they get little out of this war.
Or to be blunt:
Fuck WPC and take what we can.
Be friendly, take a cue from Seven's draft, but be sure we can actually take what we want without breaking what we said.
"Gentlemen. You can't fight in here. This is the War Room!"
- Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
"Right, as the world goes, is only in question between equals in power, while the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must."
“I have never understood why it is "greed" to want to keep the money you have earned but not greed to want to take somebody else's money.”
"Right, as the world goes, is only in question between equals in power, while the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must."
“I have never understood why it is "greed" to want to keep the money you have earned but not greed to want to take somebody else's money.”
We're OK with that division in principle, with the caveat that it can only happen if everyone earns their part through combat. It wouldn't be fair to have an exact equal split despite unequal contributions to the war effort. And most importantly, city gifting isn't allowed in this game, every single gain must be paid in blood.
Wars are a pain in the ass and therefore we will be making every effort to defeat the germans asap. But we can promise a few things if you do the same for us:
1) We won't race you for the cities in your half of the land split. If your army is marching towards a city, we will not try to snatch it up from beneath you.
2) We will prioritize capture of cities in our half over cities in your half.
3) After the war, we will consider seriously any complaints you have about fairness, and be willing to provide fair compensation in the form of gold, units, and/or resources.
Tia,
RB
My twist on the diplo message.
Things that need addressing:
What is the land split? Where do we draw the border.
What happens to the cities in the "border" of the land split? Plus, you have to remember that we want a border where we and WPC won't be culture clashing too hard.
What happens if conquer absolutely everything and WPC are still stuck at Warendorf and Wilhelmshire?
Their counterargument that they will be fighting the bulk of the German forces.
Should we dissuade them from doing that stupid march north through the tundra?
What do they do when they inevitably fuck up.
Sulla's map:
Wein, Wittenberge, Warendorf and Wilhelmshire form one tight blob (they're all 3-tiles apart), and hence it's going to be hard splitting them apart. I guess we can work west to east from Wein to Wittenberge, but after that the last two cities are squarely in WPC's sphere of influence.
I hate point #4 in Seven's draft. If we even consider sending them gold, units etc, then we are fucking idiots IMO.
Completed: SG2-Wonders or Else!; SG3-Monarch Can't Hold Me; WW3-Surviving Wolf; PBEM3-Replacement for Timmy of Khmer; PBEM11-Screwed Up Huayna Capac of Zulu; PBEM19-GES, Roland & Friends (Mansa of Egypt); SG4-Immortality Scares Me
(May 23rd, 2013, 22:27)Gold Ergo Sum Wrote: I hate point #4 in Seven's draft. If we even consider sending them gold, units etc, then we are fucking idiots IMO.
I would say there are two approaches we can take with WPC. One is to totally write them off, the other is to try to keep them as friends. I'm aiming for the second.
Suppose we end up fighting much fewer German units than WPC, because of the preexisting German troop distribution. Why not give them a few drafted macemen after the war? They are pretty cheap for us. Or suppose we capture some cities that WPC really wanted. If those cities have extra resources we don't need, we can certainly afford to send 1-2 of them WPC's way. Or suppose we both have stacks next to a city that WPC feels is theirs, but WPC can't take it on their own. WPC would want us to hurt the defenders so they can clean up and capture the city, but we won't do that. We'll capture the city ourselves and maybe offer WPC some of the capture gold. So all of these are things that IMO we should be willing to do, to a moderate extent, if the situation warrants it.
With that established, the goal of bringing it up in the draft is to gently but forcibly close the discussion on city rights, by offering up an alternate method of compensation - one that involves MUCH lower-value items, can be deferred to after the war when we have a better negotiating position, and bows to our whims. The lower-value-items point is key: cities have a value that's so high that it's hard to understand compared to other things, like gold, resource gifts, and units. Our primary goal in this war is capture as much land and as many cities as possible, and I think we prefer not to compromise that goal in order to placate WPC. But giving them a few gifts that are worth more to them then they cost us (duplicate resources, drafted maces) is a great way to pay for their friendship, if we can make it work.
0. Player Requests: The player's requests take precedence, even if they contradict the following guidelines.
1. Balance: The map must be balanced, both in regards to land quality and availability and in regards to special civilization features. A map may be wonderfully unique and surprising, but, if it is unbalanced, the game will suffer and the player's enjoyment will not be as high as it could be.
2. Identity and Enjoyment: The map should be interesting to play at all levels, from city placement and management to the border-created interactions between civilizations, and should include varied terrain. Flavor should enhance the inherent pleasure resulting from the underlying tile arrangements. The map should not be exceedingly lush, but it is better to err on the lush side than on the poor side when placing terrain.
3. Feel (Avoiding Gimmicks): The map should not be overwhelmed or dominated by the mapmaker's flavor. Embellishment of the map through the use of special improvements, barbarian units, and abnormal terrain can enhance the identity and enjoyment of the map, but should take a backseat to the more normal aspects of the map. The game should usually not revolve around the flavor, but merely be accented by it.
4. Realism: Where possible, the terrain of the map should be realistic. Jungles on desert tiles, or even next to desert tiles, should therefore have a very specific reason for existing. Rivers should run downhill or across level ground into bodies of water. Irrigated terrain should have a higher grassland to plains ratio than dry terrain. Mountain chains should cast rain shadows. Islands, mountains, and peninsulas should follow logical plate tectonics.
Overall I think Seven's layout is the best suggestion so far, but man #4 feels not quite right to me. I totally get the idea of wanting to keep them as a friend. I do value that, but I would value it a lot more if they weren't almost entirely irrelevant in terms of competitiveness. I'm on the fence here.
