Diplomacy Master Thread- Helping Your Opponents Beat Themselves

[scooter]

Okay can we migrate this non-diplo discussion elsewhere?

Also, something else came out of this misclick fiasco that I want us to discuss. Please, if you are in-game and another team is in-game, I ask that you not initiate official diplo. I don't mean to pile on kjn here, but I was also bothered that someone else was reaching out to WPC right in the middle of an extremely sensitive exchange with them. Even if the intent was totally innocuous, things are tenuous with WPC right now and I'd really prefer that every word is carefully considered. So please be careful about this. I'm already not thrilled about the fact that we had to push that message out the door the other night (and obviously a few of you are too), but time was sensitive and I believe it was the right call and message.

The only reason the Inca did what they did was because they were never going to get odds on our units, but they could get odds on WPC.

Urgh, this kind of comment is so frustrating. Come on, there was a reason we worked hard not to lie to the German team leading up to the war, and even sent them that courtesy note that a couple people thought was dumb. They were mad at WPC, but they were not mad at us. Therefore, they let us go and threw everything at WPC. How else can you explain what they're doing currently by INVADING WPC while letting us walk into their cities?! They're pissed at WPC for sabotaging their game for no gain whatsoever, but we always treated them very fairly, so they aren't mad at us. It's not our fault WPC pissed off the Incan team, and we did not. We handled our foreign relations way better than WPC did, and we are reaping the rewards of that right now, plain and simple.

---

Anyway, I'm going to send a very short note to WPC just alerting them we'll respond to them tomorrow, but we need to see what comes of this reload before we can answer them completely. I just don't want them to think we're ignoring them.

Also, I'm going to try to chat to UCiv tomorrow like planned. I'll float the novice Communism plan to them and see how he reacts. We can always follow it up with an email on specifics in terms of gold gifting. If they agree to it, we'll of course want other things tied in (some intel sharing, a promise to not use harmful spy missions, etc), but I want to see if they're open to the idea to begin with. Sound like a good plan?

[NobleHelium]

Sure.

[scooter]

Quick explanation sent to WPC:

Hey Beta: Just a note that I didn't forget about you today, but if you noticed over at CFC we have put in a reload request. Due to the nature of the problem (a bunch of our units on the front got sent in the wrong direction ), we needed to know if the reload would be granted before being able to reply to you. I'm hoping that will get resolved tomorrow, so you should be hearing from me then.

Thanks,
scooter - Team RB

[Nicolae Carpathia]

Urgh, this kind of comment is so frustrating. Come on, there was a reason we worked hard not to lie to the German team leading up to the war, and even sent them that courtesy note that a couple people thought was dumb. They were mad at WPC, but they were not mad at us. Therefore, they let us go and threw everything at WPC. How else can you explain what they're doing currently by INVADING WPC while letting us walk into their cities?! They're pissed at WPC for sabotaging their game for no gain whatsoever, but we always treated them very fairly, so they aren't mad at us. It's not our fault WPC pissed off the Incan team, and we did not. We handled our foreign relations way better than WPC did, and we are reaping the rewards of that right now, plain and simple.

I still think that's how we should sell it to the other teams. Everyone's probably annoyed about the Germans effectively gifting their cities towards #1, so if we push that angle they'll feel less annoyed about it. Not enough to not attack us, but better nonetheless.

[NobleHelium]

Nic, I hope you know that you haven't made any sense to anyone else for about twelve months at least.

[Azoth]

Also, I'm going to try to chat to UCiv tomorrow like planned. I'll float the novice Communism plan to them and see how he reacts. We can always follow it up with an email on specifics in terms of gold gifting. If they agree to it, we'll of course want other things tied in (some intel sharing, a promise to not use harmful spy missions, etc), but I want to see if they're open to the idea to begin with. Sound like a good plan?

I don't comment often but I thought I should on this point. I think the novice Communism plan is crazy.
UCiv are a team that, by their own admission, prefer to go it alone. They're worried about being left behind as other teams form alliances and they're wondering what we can offer. So what do we suggest? That they lend US gold up front, which we will use to race our enemies (who are ahead 5000 beakers, have a full slate of universities, and have never been at war) to Communism. Then, IF we land the Great Spy, we promise to gift it to UCiv and further suggest they infiltrate us, then send a boatload of spies halfway across the world to steal those techs whose research they funded. I can't see them going for it. It's such a complicated plan and requires a great deal of trust, which we simply haven't built up.
I'm getting a whiff of the same madness that proposed, when we first met CivPlayers, to raze some of their cities, then gift them Settlers, just to clean up the dotmap on our border.
UCiv might well conclude that we're delusional. Or am I alone in thinking this?

[NobleHelium]

Apolyton is not ahead 5000 beakers with respect to Communism. They are ahead Gunpowder and will be teching Rifling next while we make up Gunpowder. So we are effectively even in terms of starting point. And our max science beaker rate is surely ahead of theirs with our enormous empire.

But your point that we'd be asking them to give us gold up front is well taken.

[antisocialmunky]

I think what I'll call "Operation Double Agent" is a good Plan B but I think we need to have a more conventional Plan A.

I still think we should put forward a Apolyton partitioning since they gain 0 from Apolyton going after us but a crippled Apolyton would help them very much. In fact I kinda think that's what they are fishing for (we want to be neutral but no irrelevant). Just not sure what the mechanics for this is.

I suppose another idea is a loan from them to us and a EE against us without the Communism spy (we float the spy idea IF they don't like it). That's really favorable to them since they get their gold paid back and the techs. They know what a Switzerland is so we might as well take them up on being the Swiss.

[zakalwe]

I think the great spy plan makes a lot of sense. This would actually give them a tangible benefit from siding with us. They could build an EE and easily keep up with the tech leaders. If they don't trust us enough for something like that, it's their call. But we know that we can be trusted (right?) so I don't see why it would be crazy to suggest it.

[Nicolae Carpathia]

I think the UCiv fund-to-communism plan is completely absurd and they wouldn't even consider it. To them, single GSpy is not going to make up for the gold cost in order to fund our research, the opportunity cost of not having techs now in exchange for possibly later (after their spies have walked halfway across the world).

Ask them about it, and they stop taking our diplomacy seriously. Only propose reasonable things. Please fund me enough gold to tech through ~10000 beakers... and in exchange you get 3000 espionage points? Are you god damn kidding me?

And beaker rate at max science means nothing, the only relevant thing is commerce minus maintenance times science multiplier. And, by the way, we're lacking on those thanks to not having an academy nor oxford.