The ND threat.

[DeepO]

Krill, something related perhaps... they will never buy that this attack on us is a ruse to attack GoW. However they did mention their fleets themselves...

my version:
- with our side of Legoland in ND's hands, ND is very close to dominination. All they need is to attack your side of Legoland, and possibly a few cities on Bob. With only a few nukes they can keep GoW from retaking the cities for one turn (which is all they need). Whether GoW nukes them or bombs them makes no difference anymore, as ND will have won.

I wouldn't exagerate, though. GoW will reinforce their borders with ND. Which means ND has to do the same in that cold border war. Which means less defense on our side... we don't need to push them into doing that, it will happen without our involvement. So, it's better to keep low, and not draw attention.

DeepO

[Cort Haus]

All good points, Deepo.

Krill, that's an interesting scenario - and maybe worth running by GoW.

[Cort Haus]

draft message to GoW

Hi MZ,

Thanks for your reply. The statement of neutrality implies that you do not have an MPP with ND that would come into effect if GS were to defend themselves against the ND aggression. This is good news.

ND's aggression against GS - first seizing our Uranium then attacking our holdings (under RP stewardship) - has effectively broken a trade treaty in a way that prevents GS from retaliating without being the in-game treaty breakers with associated penalties. It remains to be seen at this point whether ND will hand over the tech they owe us.

Without Uranium it is effectively game-over for GS, which tends to influence things towards the blaze-of-glory side of the options. To this end, we have no choice but to return to Lego and take back our side of it by force, even driving ND from that continent if necessary. Should that eventuality arise, what would GoW's position be on GS attacking ND on GoW's half of Lego? Seeing as ND have misused the gift they recieved from GoW by using it as a staging post to seize GS land on Lego, we could only hypothetically return those holdings to GoW under condition that they remain GoW cities and are not forwarded to ND.

On the eve of tactical nukes, Uranium becomes essential to offer a deterrent and keep the peace. Would GoW be in a position to trade Uranium to GS should ND not end its occupation of the GS source? On a related question, would GoW be able to trade any of the luxuries that GS would lose in a war with ND?

If ND were to eliminate RP, they would only need Lego's and Vox's vote to win. Hunting down that settler could still be critical.

If ND build Manhatten they also have a shot at victory. With our side of Legoland in ND's hands, ND is very close to dominination. All they need is to attack your side of Legoland, and possibly a few cities on Bob. With only a few nukes they can keep GoW from retaking the cities for one turn (which is all they need). Whether you nuke them or bomb them would make no difference anymore, as ND would have won.

If GoW could mediate a truce where we get our holdings back, together with compensation we would certainly consider it, but it seems that ND is determined to go to war.

We live in Interesting Times, as they say in, er, China

Regards,

-Cort

{edit - truce para near end added}

[asleepathewheel]

great message!

[Krill]

A couple of things:

• Has Trip told MZ about the Mob bug and wonnder builds?
  
• I am certain that Aeson knows this, but I can get a Carrier from Monsoon (in addition to the one from Typhoon). We just have to sacrifice the DD build in OB by a god knows how long, and build a Marine in Arashi instead of an MI. We need to hack into the buld queue at the start of the turn, though. We would waste 0 shields on the Carrier, 2 shields on the DD from WW by stealing the desert from OB, and OB goes further into the red with reegards too food.
  
  Next turn we would have to change the build in Monsoon to a carrier, via hacking. Monsoon would have to use one hill from WW in addition to it's own, and the grassland and Bonus grasland from Arashi, and Arashi would then be at 44spt, wasting no shields to finish the Marine/Tank. WW would have us the irrigated desert, to not starve, and get 18 shields. OB coontinues to starve (it will hold).
  
  The following two turns, WW has to use two hills and the desert, to get the DD on time (turn 257), wasting two shields. OB is behind time, but we could change it to an MI, wasting no shields, and getting it in 6 turns (including turn 253, 1315AD)

One less DD, one less MI, but one more carrier and one more Marine/Tank. Your choice.

[Theseus]

Originally posted by Krill

• GoW: What if ND finish Manhattan, and build the nukes, as planned. But what if they then hit GoW instead of us? Even with Manhattan built we can't build any nukes without Uranium. If ND took out the Uranium, with a Nuke, and took the FP core (Yellowknife?) and the majorty oof GoWs Carrier fleet, then ND have won the game. Nothing we can do, as they don't even need to invade us, just settle Legoland, and rush Temples. GoW can't pilage ND without their carrier fleet/s either

I was just wondering what would happen if the above scenario were played out...

No insult intended, but this sounds very Germanic to me.

I think I have a *feel* for how MZ thinks, and he could be led to this thinking in a heartbeat.

[Cort Haus]

I think I have a *feel* for how MZ thinks, and he could be led to this thinking in a heartbeat.

Indeed. He might not be so keen to sit this out if he percieves the stakes to be high enough. I also think he'd like the idea of ND and GS battering each other down, but if GS were to be destroyed with ND still strong GoW would have lost.

[Krill]

No insult intended, but this sounds very Germanic to me.

and this mean?

[Cort Haus]

I asked MZ to hang on a bit before playing the turn, in case any points arose here. After a few hours, I sent our message with a couple of word tweaks, and thanked him for holding on.

[DeepO]

Good message, CH.

As to the ND-can-win-by-domination thing: Sure. It is possible. But we don't need to convince MZ of this, he already knows. Why do you think he stressed in public that in case ND returns the land to either us, or leave it open they won't interfere (implying that they can't allow that ND gets the land themselves)? GoW fears a ND domination, as they know it won't take a lot of extra land. Legoland is basically for any team that is willing to send a decent army there, it can be taken in 1 turn, all threatened harbors destroyed, and nobody can retake it. GoW knows this...

However, there is something else here. My intuition says that that message was just an expression of a treaty that GoW and ND had beforehand. When ND got the cities from GoW, and when they occupied our uranium source, I'm sure they did it with approval of GoW. GoW, OTOH, can say that they were not involved, while it does serve their purpose as well. This last message from MZ sounds the same: In front, ND and GoW agreed that ND was allowed to clean Legoland from all GS or RP forces, at the very express condition that ND didn't claim the land themselves. So, they can do what they want, as long as it doesn't hurt GoW.

If we can convince MZ that they are hurting GoW in the long term, or indirectly, we got ourselves an ally (albeit one that will not go for the kill, but for the win.). The point that, if we are kept from getting uranium means we can only go out in a blaze of glory is very dangerous to GoW as well. We could e.g. come up with crazy ideas like: let's take all the capitals of the world (we already conquered 2 of them, only 2 more to go). What does it matter, when we are lost anyway?

I'm sure MZ knows this. We don't need to threaten them directly, just telling them that if ND provokes us, and denies us what we owe makes us gung ho to the point where we do crazy things just because we can is frightening to them. So let that simmer a bit, without any further direct references to it.

DeepO

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by Krill

No insult intended, but this sounds very Germanic to me.

and this mean?

He's not wanting to give offence to Sir Ralph, assuming SR is still reading?

Come out, come out, wherever you are, you old grouch!

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by DeepO
Good message, CH.

As to the ND-can-win-by-domination thing: Sure. It is possible. But we don't need to convince MZ of this, he already knows. Why do you think he stressed in public that in case ND returns the land to either us, or leave it open they won't interfere (implying that they can't allow that ND gets the land themselves)? GoW fears a ND domination, as they know it won't take a lot of extra land. Legoland is basically for any team that is willing to send a decent army there, it can be taken in 1 turn, all threatened harbors destroyed, and nobody can retake it. GoW knows this...

However, there is something else here. My intuition says that that message was just an expression of a treaty that GoW and ND had beforehand. When ND got the cities from GoW, and when they occupied our uranium source, I'm sure they did it with approval of GoW. GoW, OTOH, can say that they were not involved, while it does serve their purpose as well. This last message from MZ sounds the same: In front, ND and GoW agreed that ND was allowed to clean Legoland from all GS or RP forces, at the very express condition that ND didn't claim the land themselves. So, they can do what they want, as long as it doesn't hurt GoW.

If we can convince MZ that they are hurting GoW in the long term, or indirectly, we got ourselves an ally (albeit one that will not go for the kill, but for the win.). The point that, if we are kept from getting uranium means we can only go out in a blaze of glory is very dangerous to GoW as well. We could e.g. come up with crazy ideas like: let's take all the capitals of the world (we already conquered 2 of them, only 2 more to go). What does it matter, when we are lost anyway?

I'm sure MZ knows this. We don't need to threaten them directly, just telling them that if ND provokes us, and denies us what we owe makes us gung ho to the point where we do crazy things just because we can is frightening to them. So let that simmer a bit, without any further direct references to it.

DeepO

Would it benefit us in the least to make MZ think we might flip a coin to pick a target?

Would he want it to end tails and have marines and tanks all over GoW like a bad case of fleas?

[Cort Haus]

Well, it seems that GoW will trade us luxuries but not Uranium, and that whilst we are free to attack ND off Bob, the old 'Bob for the Bobians' pact is still in place.

[DeepO]

Originally posted by notyoueither
Would it benefit us in the least to make MZ think we might flip a coin to pick a target?

Would he want it to end tails and have marines and tanks all over GoW like a bad case of fleas?

It's an interesting idea, however there is one major problem with it. If we act like total loonies, ND and GoW will have a reason to band together and come after us. It must be an implicit threat to their security, but the moment we say something like 'let's flip a coin, and attack one of the two Bobians', we're gone.

Tricky... how can you endanger their security, without threatening them...

Another far-fetched idea is that we declare that we are from now on known as Greenpeace, and as we are denied uranium, we set out to occupy all the uranium sources in the world, no matter in who's territory they lay. No cities or so, only the sources. This would mean that neither ND nor GoW can build nukes or the SS, so a direct disadvantage to GoW.

DeepO

[DeepO]

MZ response ideas:

- MPP: good. Especially good that they don't mind us going for the ND cities on Legoland, as we want them off the continent.

- Bob for the Bobians: that is tricky to answer. In itself it is bad news. We can't start negotiating right now (has to wait until we have the save, and are ready to invade), as there might be options. But can we lie to GoW? I'd like to avoid that. We could say something like: we don't have the forces to attack Bob, ND is stronger than us and we're alone. But if you would decide to attack them on Bob, we'll gladly help. It's a bit stretching the thruth, though.

- treaties: he misunderstood. Technically we would be breaking the treaty, but ND still owes us a tech. They are in our debts. The act of breaking the treaty itself is of no importance, however them 'stealing' a tech from us is!

- lux: many thanks for this!

- Uranium: we understand. It does limit our options. It means we have to go to war, without any option (apart from a magic relocation of a source into Stormia of course).
As to why we let it slip: we didn't. ND has occupied our source for 2(3?) turns, denying us the possibility to build a city. We didn't had a settler ready so asked them politely to go away as they were tresspassing (if I'm not mistaken, their inf was not fortified). We asked them twice, and before having the chance of asking them again they attacked RP. Remember that we have to play nice, as we don't want to give a reason for them to keep the tech they owe us.

- Uranium is one of the reasons for the attack. The other is land (as mentioned in previous mail, they can certainly go for domination), another is a possibility for the UN when RP is gone (which means that it is in GoW's best interest to protect RP, how unlikely it seems. At least until Lego is gone). And maybe they want a provocation of us, so they have a reason and a chance to invade Stormia as well. They're welcome to try.

- mediation: We don't think it will succeed, but we're certainly not the ones aiming for war. It will lead to our destruction, without much doubt. But if they force us, they will get hurt. The tactic of keeping a navy of carriers afloat to bomb their cities is just as good for us (ask whether this would also fall under the Bob for the Bobians treaty. GoW should welcome the opportunity normally)

DeepO