Sparta-Morgan Relations

[Maniac]

Originally posted by Googlie
It's pretty moot now anyway, as we won't have Doc Loyalty in 2147

Then perhaps we could propose another more modest leapfrog to the Morganites?

For example we give them Social Psych and Ecological Engineering. They then research Doctrine: Loyalty and Intellectual Integrity and they give it to us.
Additionally we promise not to build the Ascetic Virtues, while they promise not to build the Command Nexus (at least if they can research DocLoy before Yang builds the CN). The current restrictions on building the CDF (for Morgan) and PEG (for us) remain. Since we want IntInt, and the Morganites are AFAIK interested in AdapEcon and after that a b-line to Planetary Economics (with prerequisite IntInt) our research lines are alike, so cooperation would only be natural.

[Googlie]

In the meantime, Arginine has responded :

PM from Arginine to Googlie

Re: ACDG-3 Possible Morgan-Sparta Blockbuster deal

Very well, bear in mind I am limited in what I can say, especially after that 'note' I had posted then retracted.

I was hoping there would be a quiet period action for a few turns, after which another round of deal-making could occur. Namely, we are going for the PEG now. As a result Morgan Industries can offer nothing in tech and little in money for the near future.

There has been discussion about teaming up with the Spartans to go for Bio-engineering (the clean reactor)

A short term plan would have the Spartans research Neural Grafting, pass it on to Morgan Industries, at which point we would research bioengineering.

Compensation could be worked out in one of two ways:
1) We pay ~250 EC (provided the tech is researched immediately and no other faction on Planet has it of yet. In effect we'd be outsourcing some research.)
2) We give bioengineering later on in exchange for neural grafting.

Yes we care about the other techs, but Bioengineering comes first, and it's where the money's at.

I would prefer that NEITHER party would be able to trade the techs.

We are picky about the restrictions being placed on the trade of the tech to the AIs. Can't we throw in some cash to make some those trading requests on some techs go away? I resent Sparta being the only faction permitted to trade the jointly researched techs.

Note that the AIs can be probed and/or traded with.

To which I've replied:

Sent by PM from Googlie to Argenine

RE: ACDG-3 Possible Morgan-Sparta Blockbuster deal (3)

Well - I posted much the same in the Embassy as I had sent to you privately - at least it'll spur talks.

We'll be in a position to commence researching Neural Grafting in 2 years, but would rather try to get Doc Loyalty - and the Command Nexus before Yang builds it in 9 years - and Intellelctual Integrity (for the CDF)

Yang is beginning to frighten us. He is currently researching Gatling werapons, then it'll be Chaos weapons, and if he has the CN, he'll be churning out Hardened troops that are just a mindworm and a monolith away from being Commando. Until bioenhancement centers, we're the only realistic faction that has a chance to stand up to him, if we have the CN (We can't afford to build Command Centers in every base)

The Gaians are 1 turn away from Social Psych, and the Angels 3 away from Doc Flex. We've tried to suggest a modest leapfrog with the G's whereby if we give them Soc Psych this turn they'll change to Doc Loyalty and send it our way next turn, but they want an additional tech as well!!!

For it to work with the Angels, we'd need to give them Doc Flex (so that they could change) as well as Social Psych and Doc Mobility (so that Doc Loyalty would come up as a choice). Big price to pay.

So it leaves really just 2 options. Steal from Yang and risk vendetta, or research it ourselves. But the latter ties up our meager research efforts for the next 22 years (for Doc Loyalty and Intellectual Integrity)

Wouldn't it make more sense for us to use that 22 years to research Neural Grafting and then Bio-Engineering in exchange for your researching Doc Loyalty and Int Int (which you need for the Ascetic Virtues anyway), with the techs being passed to each other when requested?

Anyway - just thoughts. Should I post some of these in the Embassy as well?

[Googlie]

Morgan is biting (want to swing with us to D:AP)

And if we can get the Angels on board ................

[Maniac]

It might be possible the Angels will refuse our proposed leapfrog.

To test whether we have a possible Plan C to acquire DocLoy soon, should we ask the Morganites the following?

"The Junta would be interested to know when possible leapfrogging could start between us. For this reason, would be allowed to ask when you will research your next tech? Also, would you then be free for leapfrogging, or do you still have to research Adaptive Economics ?"

[Googlie]

Only change I'd make, to avoid ambuigity, is from"research your next tech" to "complete the research on your current tech"

(if it's not 100% clear to me, then if they wanted to obfuscate, they could interpret it in a couple of different ways)

[Googlie]

I see Mead has responded:

[sizw=1]Posted in the Embassy by Mead of Morgan Industries[/size]
Lt Col Maniac

It's been a couple of days since I've been on-line.

Let me check with the Corp. to see if we've got an efficient plan of researching the tech yet.

Because the turn is coming up in the next day or so, our folks on our end should start coming on-line tomorrow.

Mead
CDO, Morgan Corp.

[Maniac]

His follow-up post:

Lt Col Maniac

Unfortunately, we still have to research Adaptive Economics.

Please let us know what are you currently researching and what you suggest we research? Please also let us know what is the beeline that you are thinking of us jointly executing?


Mead
CDO, Morgan Corp.

PS

Please note that if this gets too technical I may have to bow out and have another more experienced 'tech tree' person do much of the discussions. I will, of course, be available to act on any agreements that may be proposed.

[Googlie]

Inspired by the "Oil for Food" scandal at the UN (btw, is that receiving the coverage in Europe that it is in the US?) how about "crawlers for tech" program.

They need techs (Ecol Eng and Env, Econ - when we steal it from Zak)

We need crawlers - for building SP's - even better than cash

It does 2 things: ties up Morgan bases producing crawlers and frees up our bases to produce units (or crawlers as well)

................ and we have a trannie that's soon going to be off their coast .............

(maybe 2 crawlers plus 100 ec's for each of those 2 techs?)

[Kassiopeia]

Oil for Food, I've heard about it but mostly through Apolyton. There can be an article here and there in the papers, but I doubt it's getting as much coverage as it would in the promised land of the evil Chinese conspiracy using the UN and its black mind control ray helicopters.

[Googlie]

I suggest a response to Mead along the following lines:

Our short-term research goal is Intellectual Integrity, as we wish to build the CDF (we share a fairly long border with Yang, and in the inevitable conflict we'd rather not fight him with one hand tied behind our backs)

But we need to get Doc Loyalty in order to proceed, so that will be our immediate goal (we could probe it from Yang, but that will prolly trigger the vendetta that we're not quite ready to face yet, so would rather acquire it by other means, with self-research as a last resort). We will likely switch next year to Doc Loyalty when our current research effort matures

As to longer term co-operation in leapfrogging - we see Doc Air as a distinct possibility. We will have Gene Splicing and HEC, prereqs for SFF, and if we both researched that, as soon as one had it the other could switch to Doc Air.

If you are interested in boosting minerals in the short term, there is a trade we would consider that might appeal to you (which redresses one of our weaknesses while giving you an essential "builder's " tech.

We can send you Ecological Engineering in exchange for 2 crawlers and 100 ec's. (The mechanics work - we'll sail a transport to Vander Eudaimonocs and turn over control to you - you load it with 2 crawlers and sail it to our closest port and turn over control to us, and viola, it's done .... might need to offload the crawlers first, and turn over control individually - I'll sceanrio test that if you have any interest in the idea)

Note that I haven't said what we are currently researching (but hinting at HEC - we'll need to get that from Lal)

Comments?

[Kassiopeia]

Illuminatus says:

I am not sure if we can organise it in next few days, nor who will attend besides Lord Chaos. Please coordinate details with him (CT) in future regarding the summit. Also, please inform him how urgent is this summit.

Googlie, can I leave it up to you to organize the summit? I'm almost at 30k (29456) words and things are getting really interesting. I'm giving you an indefinite carte blanche, if that hasn't been obvious or clear to anyone yet. I will do my best to prepare for and attend the summit, though.

[Googlie]

GGLIE accepts the mission

(but shouldn't this be in the Gaian thread?)

[Googlie]

The turn ius still a couple of days from Morgan, but they are patiently awaiting a response to their last post in the embassy

Does anyone have an objection to my posting as a reply the draft that is a couple of posts above? Or maybe a better idea?

[Maniac]

The message sounds great!

Some comments:

How about adding after this:

But we need to get Doc Loyalty in order to proceed, so that will be our immediate goal (we could probe it from Yang, but that will prolly trigger the vendetta that we're not quite ready to face yet, so would rather acquire it by other means, with self-research as a last resort). We will likely switch next year to Doc Loyalty when our current research effort matures

something like this:

We were therefore wondering if you would be interested in a combined project to research Intellectual Integrity. We think this tech is not only useful for us, but also for you, as it is together with AdapEcon, which you will soon have, a prerequisite for Planetary Economics and the Ascetic Virtues, which you indicated you consider an important secret project for you.


Regarding Ecological Engineering, 100c and 2 crawlers would be a very good price. Though I'm wondering, would you plan to use those crawlers to harvest resources, or to be soon used to hurry a secret project?

If it would be to harvest resources, way to go!

If it would be to hurry a secret project, I'm wondering whether a pure sum of credits wouldn't be more advantagous for us. After all, the Morganites will probably think in terms of "a 3-row crawler = 60 credits". Or even as equal to 75 credits, if they follow our line of thought while discussing the cost of probe actions that one mineral equals 2.5 credits when building units.

With that in mind, we could get more minerals ourselves by upgrading self-built crawlers with Morganite credits. Upgrading a 0-1-1 crawler to a 0-2t-1 costs 90 credits for a gain of 5 mineral rows. That's less than 2 energy per mineral.

Another drawback is that we'd lose control over SNC Pegasus for a long time. While the crawlers could be dropped off on the coasts near SC34, the Pegasus would have to move way back to Gythium Harbour to be able to turn over unit control again. That would give the Morganites free exploration and show them a base they could try to infiltrate (on the other side they could be less inclined to try and infiltrate our crater bases then ).

[Googlie]

Yaeh - that loss of Pegasus' use (particularly if, in the meatime, we got the MCC's extra 2 mp's for it) would be penal. And in a PM, Arginine did say they'd be willing to pay +/- 250 ec's for the right tech

One of ther ideas with the crawlers was to stall for time - we still have to relieve Zak of that etch when he gets it in 2152. With straight cash, there'd be an element of "sure, we'll send the ec's next turn" We'd then have to 'fess up that we dpn't have it yet, tipping our hand, and if Morgan has built any probefoils then he'll head for where he thinks the AI is to steal it from them.

(And without harping on about the timing of the Uni invasion, do we know if Zak will keep his current research - Env Econ in 2152 - if under attack, or would the AI switch to a conquer tech . IIRC one of their "bonuses" is that they don't lose lab points when switching mid tech, only human players do.)