Diplomacy Master Thread- Helping Your Opponents Beat Themselves

[Ellimist]

Also, Apolyton seems to have no military emphasis at all. Let's stop using any threatening language vs them and be super nice, then plan on hitting them at some point after the Germans.

[scooter]

Also, Apolyton seems to have no military emphasis at all. Let's stop using any threatening language vs them and be super nice, then plan on hitting them at some point after the Germans.

We cannot hit them without a CFC NAP. It's just not possible. This is why I've snapped at your posts before - you criticize my decisions, but your comments make me wonder if you're paying close enough attention. If we are ever in a position to not have a NAP with CFC, we'll need to commit a lot of military to their border because they are Rival Best in power by a long ways. It will be that way for the entirety of the time we have no NAP with them. We cannot do that and simultaneously invade a team who is pretty even with us in tech. That's insane.

This isn't even considering the fact that they can in theory soon start screwing with us w/ Espionage if we don't have an agreement in place.

[Sullla]

I view the big picture diplo situation the same way as scooter. There are 3 teams with a realistic chance to win the game: ourselves, CFC, and CivFr. There will almost certainly be a 2 vs 1 situation between those three. We want to do everything possible to be one of the "2" teams and not the "1" off by themselves. The current CFC vs CivFr war puts us in a strong bargaining position, much better than we could have hoped a few turns ago. And CFC seems to have pissed off CivFr with their war declaration / Great Merchant snafu. This is a great chance to act.

I would also prefer to ally with CivFr over CFC. I think that our partnership is much more natural, since we share no borders, and we could cooperate together against any combination of CFC, CivPlayers, or Apolyton. (Both our teams share borders against all three of them.) However, CivFr has shown no sign of responding to any of our messages. They have also been supplying ivory to the Germans for some time now during our war. Say what you will about CFC, but they haven't been propping up the Germans with resource trades. Much as we may dislike CFC, it would still be better to have a deal in place with them than be on the wrong end of a big dogpile alliance.

Here's what I would suggest. Let's wait another turn or two before making any big diplo pushes. We would be able to make a much stronger case if we can go to other teams and say "Hey, we just ran over the German capital and they're going to be dead in the near future. You guys might want to deal with us now, because T170/T175 is coming up soon and we've got a huge army with nothing else to do." This would also allow more time for the CFC/CivFr war to continue heating up as they squabble over the Spanish spoils. I would also like to make one more push with CivFr before we go back to CFC, since CivFr would make so much better of an alliance partner. We can push pretty hard, tell them that we're simply going to deal with CFC and give CFC a free hand to throw everything against them. If still nothing from CivFr, then yeah, CFC is better than no one. And I do think they will adhere to the letter of the law and not break any NAPs, people here seem way too paranoid about that.

The WPC message is fine, by the way.

[Zargon]

If ever there was a time to start acting a little more irrational and less pragmatic with respect to CFC, now is it.

Sure, CivFr doesn't do diplo with us. So what? We're effectively war allies that don't talk right now. CFC's CivFr border isn't safe. CFC can't possibly attack us unless they get a long NAP with CivFr, and if their diplo with CivFr is anything like ours, they won't get it. And if CFC can't attack us because of the CivFr threat, CP and Apolyton and WPC sure won't, and then we can sit back and choose our next move, rather than being forced to react to the dogpile threat. Banking next, for example, seems really tasty for a 50gpt bank in Mansa's Muse.

So I wouldn't take a NAP with CFC at this point unless we're getting something above and beyond the simple NAP. Either CFC is paying us in some fashion, or we have plans on the table to go conquer another neighbor that will be finalized with the signing of a CFC NAP.

This is why CFC has stopped pillaging. Not threats or nice language or a sudden sense of honor. They're already at war with the team tied for #2 after pissing them off over a merchant mission, and they've therefore re-evaluated the wisdom of additionally pissing off the #1 team on their other border too. We've got the upper hand, and I want to twist the screws.

[kjn]

The WPC draft looks fine to me. Sooner or later we will have to go into us capturing "their" cities, but that can wait until the big ancient unit battle.

I think we should hold off on the CFC front. Right now they're quite busy with CivFr, and my guess is that CivFr wants to push aggressively into the now free land. CFC also managed to piss them off with their GM-denying war. We also know that CivPlayers have very little trust for CFC. There might be a CFC-Apolyton understanding, but I doubt it.

So CFC has managed to piss off the #1 and the #3 power in the game? I see that as a good reason to wait and see. Once the German war is concluded we can do another round with CivFr, and tell them we've forgiven their ivory deliveries to the Germans.

That would also allow us to be the swing party in the fight between CivFr and CFC.

[antisocialmunky]

You can have 2 options, wait for CFC and CivFR to drag it out or you can apply pressure diplomatically on CFC to force their hand if they are willing to negotiate.

[fluffyflyingpig]

"Get NAPs with anyone else except CFC" made me laugh - as if we can just snap fingers and our neighbors would suddenly change their minds.

But that's the POINT. We have leverage now and need to try to capitalize! CivFr and CFC are tied up in a war, CFC has a ton of land from the Spanish. If we twiddle our thumbs, sure we do nothing. But the game state has changed!

This is a FFA. The 3v1 argument makes no sense to me when we have no border with CivFr. Why would CFC and CivFr start working together? There is no one they can jointly invade. The geography makes no sense AND they are in a war now and have traded 8 units and a city. At best they can agree to a NAP and work to independently eat the smaller teams.


As and aside, an actual dialog would be appreciated instead of snide comments.

[NobleHelium]

Here's the updated image...

[Yell0w]

Didn't we have a few French speaking players here. I'd advocate to try to talk to them in French. It's probably not the issue but on the chance it is I'd at least try it.
Have CivFr used multiple e-mail addresses for communication?

[scooter]

Sent the WPC draft.