Only the Paranoid Survive

[ManicStarSeed]

I have been thinking about Betahound's message of peace and I am a little concerned. His "next few turns will get very grusome" remarks makes me wonder a bit. It might be just some pufffed feathers, Banana knows that he is capable, but I think that there might be something more afoot. He acknowledges that they are crying uncle, but maintains that the next few turns will be ugly. Are they gonna gift D' ville? To coinside with an overseas army's arrival? Dissident stated that things going according to plan? Were the planning on getting their arses kicked? All whole prepare us for a foreign invasion by streching or armies thin? They might think we have debilitated our defenses by the Inchon/off offensive.

I suggest we take take out what Voxian forces that remain in the south and get D'ville before they do something like gift it to GOW, RP or worse... Lego.

As for peace the plea for peace, I wonder if this is Beta's way of saying our global political relations are about to turn for the worst because of this accursed Voxian scheme.
then again, How much should we let this offer of peace get in the way of our Manifest Destiny.

Mss

[zeit]

There is a sense of foreboding in his message- It reeks of it.

There can be one simple answer for this: we'll can go ahead and ask him, in these peace talks he invites us to.

[Arrian]

Have we responded to Vox's offer at all?

I don't mind saying no (or saying "we're willing to talk, but on your time, not ours"), but silence isn't a good thing, I think.

-Arrian

[vulture]

I'd guess that by the 'things getting messy in the next few turns' bit, he just means that the heavy fighting anticipated is going to cost us both quite a few units, and (he hopes) it is in both our best interests to avoid this. I suspect that Dissident's comments are just bravado and trying to push us into a peace treaty that saves them.

If they gift D'ville to anyone, we could just raze / capture it anyway, with the same justification that Bob used against Vox (and if they gift it to GoW we might even get to raze it before GoW know that they've been given it).

The big advantage to Vox in gifting the town is that they can move all their units into it, give it away, and move the units back north to their capitol, to bolster their defences.

[Harovan]

To ignore their message is impolite. We should answer. However, a simple "no" should suffice.

[zeit]

I think we have some sort of a split.

Do we offer them peace if they leave the continent?

I'll just tell them we are considering the conditions under which we are willing to cease hostilities, and that we havn't decided yet.

That's okay?

There's nothing wrong in saying "get off the continent" after such message, right?

[vulture]

Makes sense to me. BTW I was previously in favour of peace in return for everything south of Elipolis, but seeing how badly defended it is (a warrior is the best unit there???) it looks like their core is badly defended, and we have a lot to gain by pushing on with the war now...

[Arrian]

They deserve a response. Even if the response is "no, you die."

Personally, I'd prefer we said something like this:

"Your peace proposal has been received and there has been some discussion. However, we can't hold up the game discussing it, and so we played the turn. If you really want peace, may we suggest sending us a formal proposal, and using some of your teams time on the clock to do it, so that we may have time to properly discuss it (your time, plus the time between us, plus our time)? Please understand, however, that hostilities in the game will continue unless and until a formal deal is reached."

Something like that.

-Arrian

[zeit]

I'll also add that "we're possible discussing terms, however that we see it as a necessity that you will have to take dire measures to ensure our safety, or something

[ManicStarSeed]

I am writing something to send to Vox..
I will post it in a few....

Mss

[ManicStarSeed]

How about this..



People of Vox:

Gathering Storm acknowlegdes your plea for peace. Gathering Storm is considering your request. Please understand that there are many in the Storm that will accept nothing less than an unconditional surrender. In other words peace on our terms, Are you still willing to talk peace?

We can't hold up the game discussing it, and so we played the turn. If you really want peace, may we suggest sending us a formal proposal, and using some of your teams time on the clock to do it, so that we may have time to properly discuss it (your time, plus the time between us, plus our time)? Please understand, however, that hostilities in the game will continue unless and until a formal deal is reached.


Mss


[edit] added Arrians bit..

[ManicStarSeed]

I will send this to Beta, Eli and Dissident by 2 pm PDT (5pm EDT)

Mss

[Shiber]

I'm with it.

[Arrian]

Could we tone down the "plea for peace" part, though?

We know they're begging... I don't see the need to rub it in.

-Arrian

[Shiber]

We were overly paranoid about RP... partially because of some note with the words "I will deny ever having sent this". Now look at where this has got us.

I think that we should change our approach completely. First of all, we must realize that other teams may not share our standards of "honor", as Togas displayed very well in the announcement thread. And those teams know that in the end we will deal with them anyway, even if they play less than honorably according to our standards, because if we break off from every team that doesn't play 100% "honorably" we will soon have to close down the diplomatic scholia. Messages like "we expect you to do X, or else we'll view you as unhonorable" do not work, on the contrary - they may often backfire.
Second of all, many teams, or individuals in these teams in positions of power, believe in a free market economy. Therefore, if some team ditches us a few turns before conducting a deal that they promised to do (but didn't actually make any official commitments about it) in favor of another team which can offer them a better deal, they are not opportunistic in the negative meaning of the word, they just play the cruel game of free market economy.