Spartan Diplomacy

[arginine]

Every turn of trade we lose with the PKs is 10 raw energy lost. If I was sure we could get trade with the PKs once we could get contact, I would push strongly for it. Seeing as how things with Zak went, we can't count on that.

[Mead]

The benefit of waiting until after we get te turn is that we stand a chance of getting for less or free from a source other than the Spartans.

The benefit of getting now from the Spartans now is that they don't know if we might get the commlink from someone else in the meantime.

It's kind of like a poker game. Neither us, nor the Spartans know what card we will dealt next turn. If we get the commlink from someone else next turn then they just lost whatever we were prepared to pay now.

They don't know what the next card will be, nor do we.

I could just respond, now, saying that 40 is too much and see how far they'll go down.

Any thoughts?


Mead

[Chaunk]

40 is too much, but not much too much. 20 is very cheap for example.

I say, offer 30 in 2150 (Turn after demo right?). We should make a counter offer rather than waiting for them. This offer is also conditional on them giving us the commlink, and us not aquiring it in the mean time from another source.

Don't offer the 2ec reduction. Go for a percentage decrease. In time, should our treaty last longer, both our trade incomes will increase (I think ours will with adaptive econ) and 2ec will become meaningless. 40% remains 40% (or 33%, a third perhaps).

[Mead]

Latest Post in the Embassy

I posted this in the embassy:

Lt Col Googlie

We are pleased tht you wish to continue the treaty.

We understand the concerns that you have and regret any inconvience our observer may have caused your travels.

Nonetheless, we are disappointed by Mr. Moneypenny's removal from the ship. There was some apprehension over whether he had to 'walk the plank.'

Please note, as noted in our discussions earlier, a portion of the the money sent to Sparta was for Mr. Moneypenny's passage. As fair and equitable measure of the loss of value of the cartographic data, we seek to reduce the amount 'Morgan Bonus' sent to Sparta by one third. We do not wish to present this to you a 'fait accompli'. As always, we seek open and free discussions with you.

In summary, with the removal of Mr. Moneypenny we plan on reducing the 'Morgan Bonus' profit sharing by one third. That is we plan as follows:

If the Morgan Bonus is 10 (Morgan earns 10 more from commerce with Sparta than Sparta earns from commerce with Morgan) then half of the 'Morgan Bonus' is 5. We would then forward 2/3 of this half to Sparta - which is 3ecs rather than the 5ecs.

Please let me know your thoughts and comments.

Mead
CDO, Morgan Corp.

PS

Although we did appreciate the the cartographic information provided by the observer, what we may miss more is the colorful and entertaining commentary from the Captain of the ship. We were planning on making the screenshots and Captain's Logs into a historical screenshow. The work and thought that went into the Logs were of very good quality.

Although I was tempted to correct they typos, I didn't want to have an 'edit' stamp on the post.


Mead

[Mead]

Latest From the Embassy

Googlie just posted this in the embassy.

I don't have time right now to try to figure it out.

Please let me know what you all think it means.

I'll log back on in about eight hours.

Mead

Dear Mr. Mead:

While we recognize that there is a loss to the Ciorporation (cessassion of cartographical information sharing), we had believed that the consideration that Sparta had been receiving to pay for Mr Moneypenny's passage had been Morgan's applying of the profit-sharing formula to gross differential, and not inefficiency-adjusted differential. Thus we had expected that the adjustment from 2149 onwards would have been to 1/2 of the dfferential net of inefficiency penalties.

However, here is a suggestion that might bridge the gap:

We will reduce the price to the Corporation for the Peacekeepers' commlink to 30 ec's (from our asking price of 40), in return for which the Corporation will continue to share 1/2 of the income differential, but adjusted to allow you to deduct the cost of inefficiency (which we estimate, at this time, to be 1 ec). In a static universe, over the next five years, this would balance out to the same as your proposal.

However, as we expand, and as we see more paired bases between our factions, we would like to see our profit share being 1/2 of the increased income, not 1/3rd

(The same effect would be achieved in leaving the commlink price at 40 ec's, accepting your 1/3rd proposal, but freezing its application to the ten currently paired bases, and sharing at the 50% level for all additional bases. Given the shorter timeframe we are asking for the payment for the commlink, this would actually be more beneficial to the Spartan Federation, but we are prepared to accept the earlier alternative (bold italics) in the interests of solidarity. Plus, it's an easier formula!!)

Lieutenant-Colonel Googlie

(Edited for typos, and for greater clarity)







Commanding Officer, Spartan Engineering Corps; Commanding Officer, Spartan Special Forces

Message edited by: Googlie on 11/26/2004 05:45:08[Server Time/GMT -8 Pacific Time]

[Chaunk]

I call BS. 2 reasons. 1. AFAIK, IIRC (Other disclaimers may apply) Commerce income is not affected by inefficiency. 2. Theres no mention of this in the trade agreement at all. If they wanted to get out of part of the deal, then pointing to the five year expiry date would be the correct way, not this, which is tripe.

But if they want to talk in those terms... Perhaps something along the lines of "We wish our inefficiencies were running as low as you'd think. However, we are laden with beurocracy from various sources, and our ec loses to inefficiency run closer to fully a half of our bonus commerce, currently 6 ec. to be exact. Were we to factor that into our profit share, you'd be losing 3 e.c. per turn, not the mere 2 we are suggesting. Note that our inefficiency is only likely to worsen as time goes on."

But frankly, that's a load of crap. I have to say, I'm frankly pissed at them changing the deal unilaterally, with no warning, or anything else. Screw 'em I say. No money passing hands during treaty negotiations at the very least, and don't budge from a minimum of 2 ec reduction to the yearly amount.

[Mead]

Embassy Post

I posted this in the embassy:

Lt Col Googlie

I'm not sure I understand.

I think you mean that:

Now Sparta would like one third of the 'Morgan Bonus.'

After 5 years Sparta would like one half of the 'Morgan Bonus.'

For purposes of trying to understand this assume:

In commerce we earn 18 in commerce from Sparta an Sparta earns 12 from commerce with Morgan. In this case there are 6 Morgan Bonus ECs.

For the first 5 years Sparta would get 2 ECs (one third of the bonus), for the next 5 years Sparta would get 3 ECs (one half of the bonus).

This would mean a ten year deal.

Do I understand you correctly?

I'm not too sure how the inefficiencies work although I think that all the cash we send to you is ineffiency free. I think this means that if we send you 3 ECs you get to use all 3 ECs (none of that gets lost to inefficeny).

I know that in order to run free market we have to allocate a lot to psych which consumes a lot of energy.

I'm not sure how it all works together though.


On a separate note. The price update you gave for the PK commlink is a lot closer to what I would be allowed to accept. Thankyou. I think (but I'm not sure) I could get approval for 25 ECs. It would really help if I could get it for 23 ECs.


Please let me know if I understand you correctly and whether I could get the commlink for 23 ECs (if it was for less than 23 we might even be able to pay a lot more of it more quickly rather than over a span of years).


Mead
CDO, Morgan Corp.

Once, if, we get the PEG won't the raw energy from commerce help us more than it helps them?

In that case would a 1/3 then 1/2 split would work out okay for us?


Mead

[Mead]

Googlie's Response

Dear Mr. Mead:

Proposed Treaty Extension and transmittal of Peacekeepers' commlink

To clarify:

The last five years:

As Treatied factions, we have ten bases that are paired with ten Morgan bases, and they each generate 1 energy credit for Morgan and 0 for Sparta

You have been sending 1/2 of this (5 ec's) per year to us, and had (we believe - correct me if I am wrong) justified it internally as a combination of Sparta sharing in your faction bonus (enhanced revenues thru Treaties and Pacts) and the "fee" for having Mr Moneypenny aboard the SCC Hunter in exchange for which we share with you in our "faction bonus" - a faster track to Doc: Flex and no drone problems with military units away from home - by way of sharing in the exploration data from the SCC Hunter.

We never saw that as a trade off (revenue from Morgan to us in exchange for mapping information from Sparta to you), as, frankly, there is no monetary benefit to Sparta to having a Treaty with the Morgan faction, whereas there is no income to Morgan (from Sparta's paired bases) without a treaty with Sparta.

We saw, therefore, the 50% revenue sharing as being payment to Sparta for entering into a Treaty with Morgan, and not as a result of our sharing exploartion data with Morgan.

(If you recall the initial discussions, we asked for an additional payment, per year, for hosting Mr. Moneypenny and sharing exploration data, but agreed to waive this after your representative pointed out that the 10 ec's income for the paired bases wouild not necessarily result in Morgan actually receiving 10 ec's, depending on your Social Engineering settings (ie, there might be inefficiencies resulting in, say only 8 or 9 ec's per year accruing to Morgan) but that you would still share in 50% of the gross revenue accruing as a result of the Treaty.

The next five years:

We have said that we are unwilling to continue with the information-sharing component of the deal, as we feel that it inhibits where we send the SCC Hunter.

You have responded that you would therefore propose reducing the revenue-sharing component from 1/2 to 1/3rd, and separately have asked what Sparta might require in order to transmit the Peacekeepers' commlink to Morgan.

Our suggestion, originally, was 40 ec's for the Commlink (as a standalone deal). Separately, we proposed that if the reduction from 1/2 to 1/3rd applied only to the currently ten paired bases (thus dropping our revenue sharing from 5 ec's to 3 ec's per year, as you pointed out) we wouild like future paired bases' revenues to be shared on a 50:50 basis.

For ease of calculation, we proposed a variant - maintain the revenue-sharing for all bases at 50%, - ie you get 10 ec's per year from the Treaty with Sparta, and Sparta gets nothing, so Morgan sends Sparta revenue-sharing payments of 5 ec's per year - (but use the net revenue Morgan received, adjusted for inefficiency loss - i.e. of you are running at, say -12% economy as a result of your SE settings, you would only enjoy 88% of those 10 ec's, equalling 9, when rounded) and we would drop our asking price for the Commlink to 30 ec's (this would have the same effect over a five year period, as the 2 restored ec's per year for 5 years equate to the 10 ec's lower price for the commlink)

Reducing the Commlink price to 25 ec;s - let alone to 23 - imbalances that equation. (But that, oc course, is based on our intial valuation of the Commlink's worth at 40 ec's).

But in an endeavour to be good neighbours and Treaty parters, we would accept that deal, if bundled with the revenue-sharing continuance at 50% of realized gross Morgan revenue differential. (to re-iterate: currrently Morgan receives 10 ec's as a result of the Treaty, and Sparta receives zilch, so 5 ec's per year would be transmitted. If Sparta grew to 15 bases, and Morgan has 15 paired bases, then the Morgan revenue differential would be 15 ec's per year, and we would expect alternating yearly transfers of 7 and 8 ec's)

And this could be for a ten year term if Morgan so wishes (although we would equally be comfortable with a five year continuance of our treaty.

So to summarize our proposal:

* Morgam sends Sparta 25 ec's (preferably over 1 or 2 years, but no longer than 4)
* Morgan continues to transfer 1/2 of the revenue differential Morgan receives as a result of the Treaty with Sparta
* Sparta sends the Peacekeeper Commlink to Morgan
* The arrangement is reviewed again in 2159

Does this sound like a plan?

Lieutenant-Colonel Googlie



Commanding Officer, Spartan Engineering Corps; Commanding Officer, Spartan Special Forces

Mead

[jtsisyoda]

Tell them we "plead dumb" and ask to keep it simpler-- our counteroffer could be 40% instead of 33%. Maybe 30 ec's over 2 years for the commlink, as a modest concession.

[Mead]

Posted in Embassy

Lt Col Googlie

I'm thinking about your offer and I think I understand it, but what about this to keep it easy for me.

We adjust the payments to 40% of the revenue differential. Assuming we kept the same ten paired bases then Sparta would get 4 ECs per turn rather than 5 ECs per year.

Sparta sends PK commlink.

We increase the payment for the PK commlink to 30 EC and pay it over the next two years (15 EC per year).

We revisit treaty terms after ten years from now.

I think it works out the same as your proposal but it's easier for me to work with.


Mead
CDO, Morgan Corp.

[jtsisyoda]

From Googlie:

To: Morgan Corporation

We accept your counter proposal, but we wouild like to see the commlink price - of 30 ec's - paid this year and next (ie in 2149 and 2150, straddling the year in which the Corporation receives the commlink, rather than that year and the one following)

So the 2149 payment from Morgan Corporation to the Spartan Federation would be 19 ec's pre-accepted (15 for 1/2 the commlink cost plus 4 for the commerce income sharing), and Sparta will, in 2149, send the commlink to Morgan pre-accepted. In 2150, when the Corporation has received the commlink from the Federation, the balance of the 15 ec's will be payable (plus 2150 revenue sharing of 4 ec's)

Lieutenant-Colonel Googlie (Acting Diplomacy Officer)

And my reply:

Sounds good. Including the 8 ec tech payment, it'll be 27 ec's this turn. Please send the commlink pre-accepted on your next turn.

[Chaunk]

Sounds like a good deal. Adaptive econ is a commerce tech too, so we may get an increase in our commerce income from next turn. That won't affect all bases if it occurs, so I'll do some checking to see exactly which base discovers the tech and hence, how much income we actually got.

[jtsisyoda]

From Googlie:

Dear Mr. Mead:

We are currently researching Intellectual Integrity, as we have alluded to in prior communications, However, given that somehow we have managed to become the technology leaders on Chiron, our research rate is, perforce, pathetic.

The Corporation will imminently finish its research into Adaptive Ecomomics.

Might the Corporation be willing to work with the Federaion towards both our factions acquiring Intellectual Integrity? This would likely require the Corporation to commence researching Social Psych after completing Adaptive Economics, and our sending to the Corporation the 2 technologies of Social Psych and Doctrine: Loyalty, whereupon you could change to Intellectual Integrity and pass to us upon completion.

This would then - for us - complete the research that we have deemed to be on our critical path (opening the way for us to complete the Citizens' Defense Force which you recall from our Ethical Calculus deal was a crucial component in our strategy development) and clear the way for a more detailed joint approach to researching Synthetic Fossil Fuels and Doctrine: Air Power to be followed by Neural Grafting and Mind Machine Interface.

Is there interest on the part of the Corporation?

Lieutenant-Colonel Googlie

His use of the word "imminent" makes me wonder if they've infiltrated us.

This will help get them (and presumably us) a tech toward DAP. However, we'd have to spend research on Int Int. So, do we want Int Int? CDF (off limits), High Morale (not critical), and better Police (which we can't use).

[arginine]

I.I. with Adapt Eco. would allow us to research P.E. . P.E. would allow us to pass the global trade pact, doubling commerce and build the A.V. We have only 1 trade partner now. We couldn't pass the trade pact now without significant support. With ICS we won't need a higher population. The deal will let us start researching D: AP sooner, but we really don't need that.

I was hoping the long time it would take the Spartans to research I.I. would give us time to research clean.

If the Spartans really want I.I, there are some things they can do for us. (Give us the humans contact, techs and assitance with the University and the PKs to a lesser extent.)

As for infiltration, we did go for doc: mob then doc: flex right after each other. That would tell the Spartans roughly our research rate. The use of the word 'imminently' is odd. We have had a probe team in the known bases since their warship came by. I don't think we ever did see it. They could have probed us over land quietly or with probefoil before we had a defense team in RFR. They could have probe units en route hiding in the fungus (much like we do right now).

I would settle for a 40% - 45% 'redistribution' in order to set a precident in order to give less to other humans in trades. I figure we are going to have to give the other humans a significant amount of the revenues, but hopefully less than half. I would settle around 35-40% as a standard for trading with humans. We could give the Spartans a special deal of 45%... Maybe make 50% a standard for pact members.

[arginine]

Now that I think about it, I'd be game for it if part of a larger manuever.

Namely, we shift to police state (to support formers), we get trade routes with other factions (including the humans) and the Spartans assist us with somewhat. We also get backing in running for Planetary Governor and the Spartans help us in getting the Planetary Trade Pact passed. If done in conjunction with that I.I. would be useful to us. That is along the lines of what would happen with a Spartan-Morgan alliance.

On our current course those techs are just not worth much to us, especially when compared to clean. As part of the evil scheme, doc loyalty and I.I (to get P.E.) would be VERY worthwhile.