Great Embassy: discussion on first contact

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Dominae
5. Opportunity: first blood

What do we do if we stumble onto a momentarily undefended capital, or Settler, or even Worker? Do we seize the day, crippling our nearest neighbor, or work out a deal? Again, I'm inclined to attack first, because what they can give us at this stage in the game is relatively little. Attacking them first may be mean, but it's still honorable (as far as I know).

I would consider the most honorable thing that we ask for a way out of diplomatic situations. If they left their capital undefended, there is little point to diplo, we should take it, period. Settlers is something else: we probably could strike a deal (it has to happen before we move our turn, though), so they buy safe passage of their settler. Workers are not worth fighting for so early in the game, and certainly not if we risk to upset a trading partner which maybe made contact to someone else. But undefended workers could certainly be an incentive to start a war early, or to help tilt the balence when deciding if we are going to war, I consider those nice extras

DeepO

[zeit]

Hmm, I tend to think of the settler grabbing or "safe passage" deal as rather cruel thing to do the unwary rival. One bets on sending his little red riding settler for a little trip to make a little town near the forest, and the big bad wolf (that's us) takes the loot. I don't say we shouldn't do it, but look at our options: If we take the settler we are cruel opportunists, if we ask for a 'fee' for its free passage, we risk being crossed (In their turn they move it away from danger, and we end with nothing). If they pay us, we end up being the bully that extorts the kids in the block.

Perhaps we should take it, and then sell them the workers...
But then again, it's likely they won't have anything to offer so early on .

I'd juge the situation accordingly, perhaps if it's the Roleplay settler, we won't take it and tell them that we consider it a debt of honor.

[nbarclay]

The real question is what kind of long-term relationship we want with the civ and, to some extent, with the rest of the world. If we attack, or even if we use the threat of attack to extort, we make an enemy for life (or at least until they hate or are afraid of someone else more) and the world sees us as aggressors. So our gain had better be commensurate with that cost.

Nathan

[DeepO]

It depends, but the gain is worth it, if we stumble onto their second, or third settler. I agree, extortion might not be considered very sympathic, but if we give these kind of presents to our neighbour, we will be viewed as weak. Sure, it is opportunistic, but what civ wouldn't do it in the same situation? After a few cities are settled, the gain decreases rapidly, and we can be more mellow about it, but if they leave their 2nd settler out in the open uprotected, we can't give it away... the gain is too great for not doing it.

But there are some problems: it has to happen on our turn, so their settler needs to move towards us, instead of our scout moving towards them. Otherwise, they can indeed move away, and the only thing we could get from trying to extort them (apart from bluffing, of course) is a bit of a delay in their settling... there is only small gain there, and not worth the risk of sounding like a bully. Which is why we would have to stop the game on our turn, and not on theirs.

If we move towards their settler, we can't threaten to take it, but we could ask for a nice trade deal... call it a shotgun wedding: they have to be happy to trade, if they don't want that something bad might happen in our relation. In this case, it can only be implicit, or we could try to take the threat away (still hinting at it) in case we would be friends. It still might not be the best thing to happen to us in our diplo contacts, but after all it is their fault, they shouldn't move a settler without a guard. We are not to blame for getting in that situation.

DeepO

[Dominae]

Playing a game against other teams in order to win means that we'll have to become the Big Bad Wolf eventually. If we're planning on attacking our nearest neighbor anyway (something, as Nathan pointed out, we need to discuss; I assume we would attack Glory of War immediately, but not Roleplay), we're crippling ourselves by not capturing their Settlers and Workers (by the way, capturing early Workers is quite an advantage). If the first team that makes an aggressive move is blacklisted by all the other teams...well, I don't understand that logic. If Lux Invicta ruthlessly attacks Legoland, are we not to trust LI ever again?


Dominae

[zeit]

I agree that there might be a great gain for this sort of thing, but more in the form of crippling the opponent. With that said, we should focus on that opponent that we weakend, and wipe him out/bring him to his knees till he is willing to give up /tech/gold/lux/cities etc.

But since we are talking about early settlers, we probably won't have the army to support it, unless we are preparing for this kind of a quick (very) early war. Speaking of which i'm in favor of such war- we have the UU for this (and wiping someone out is worth the GA IMO) and we are are scouting pretty seriously, which means we can have an advantage when it comes to quick precise assaults.

I think attacking stray settlers is a cause for war, on both sides, its more like someone is telling the other that: I want to handicap you, more than he says: I want to strengthen myself (with two worker that actually equals one native).

So both sides jump to war straight away, it would be silly to excpect otherwise. The greatest danger would be that they have an ally.

And regarding the "inevitable" war with the GoW- what's up with you guys? we can manipulate them, we can use them, their mercenary trait is just asking for it. The mercenaries throughout history survived, that's true, but they never became greater power than those who skillfuly employed them. Anyway, GoW might not be a good target early on- they are probably focusing on plans of building their military might. We should wait untill they are ripe- with less advanced techs and cities, weary from foreign wars, and then strike.

[nbarclay]

We need a very careful cost/benefit analysis before we consider fighting an early war. Unless we're in a position to translate weakening an opponent into strengthening ourselves fairly quickly, the cost could easily outweigh any benefit we get out of the fighting. That's doubly true if it means blowing our GA under despotism when most of our cities are too corrupt to use it to build up their infrastrucutre.

Picking off one of a civ's first couple settlers, should the opportunity fall into our laps, would probably be worth it. Odds are good that we could convince our victim to cut their losses rather than further weaken themselves against what would, after their loss, be a stronger opponent. But even that could be a mistake if our main near-term need is for a research partner rather than for more territory.

Nathan

[Dominae]

Agreed. As always, we need more info...


Dominae

[Theseus]

Originally posted by zeit
And regarding the "inevitable" war with the GoW- what's up with you guys? we can manipulate them, we can use them, their mercenary trait is just asking for it. The mercenaries throughout history survived, that's true, but they never became greater power than those who skillfuly employed them. Anyway, GoW might not be a good target early on- they are probably focusing on plans of building their military might. We should wait untill they are ripe- with less advanced techs and cities, weary from foreign wars, and then strike.

Agreed; GoW should first be considered as a tool, I think.

Why go head-to-head, when either we or another team can hire GoW to conduct a war, and then mortally wound them or even take them out when exhausted?

Thus, two or more teams hurt.

[DeepO]

Some sidecomments to the GoW situation. Their mercenary role will not prevent them from being opportunistic themselves, and if we are the first and only contact they have, it is entirely possible that they attack us without any contract on our heads.

Further, I agree fully that if they are off fighting someone else's war, they would make a fine target, but we can't wait too long for it. The beauty of their chosen game strategy is that they are getting paid for some war, while most likely the spoils of the war are theirs as well. If someone pays them to capture / destroy a city, they both get the bounty as the city. I imagine that all deals with them that are in the line of 'capture that city, and give it to us' will be extremely costly.

I don't fear the GoW specifically, but if nobody stands up against them, they have the chance of becoming the biggest civ... they are very dangerous, so if we see a chance of damaging them seriously, we should.

DeepO

[Meshelic]

*bump*

Some new info added, anything else new out there I need to update?

-Mesh

[Meshelic]

NEW INFO

Panzer32 of GoW fame has proposed a deal. It follows this guide:

1.) If our two teams meet before any others, then they would like to trade THEIR initial techs (which I believe is bronze working and...? for OUR initial techs (ceremonial burial and alphabet).
2.) If we do not meet eachother first, this contract is null and void.

That is the only catch. We trade our first tech's for theirs if we meet them before we meet anyone else. And likewise. If we meet someone else first, then the deal is off.

What do you guys think?

[Shiber]

This deal will not favor us if we're going to research bronze working next. Besides, I see little point in committing at this stage.
If we do meet then we'd obviously have an interest to trade techs, regardless of what contracts we've signed before actual contact was made.

[DeepO]

Well.. the catch here is that if they make this deal with more teams, they are assured that their first target for their archers spills their techs to them, and doesn't get much in return. Their initial techs are bronze working and warrior code, which are very powerful techs very early in the game, but not the best to get half way through. Of course they like to trade them to someone else, certainly if they plan on having a couple of archers ready to march in.

Bronze working would be welcome now, but is likely to be the first tech we are going to research anyway (if I'm not mistaken). So if we wouldn't meet them now, but in 10 turns time it's not nearly so useful. We can't wait either, as we need to get to ironworking soon.
Warrior code is not useful for us atm, we don't need it to get to HBR, as we already have WCs in a few turns. But, we would give away masonry and temples, one tech that they wouldn't research but value anyway, and one that is needed for later military techs like mathematics. Not a good deal, in our respect. if we haven't got bronzeworking already, or wouldn't be researching it I can live with it, if they toss in a couple of gold, or a map or something.

DeepO

[alva]

Indeed, this sounds like a lobsided(?) deal to me too.

I guess we could agree to it, and when we do meet, just say we just made contact with someone else.
hmm, nah...

btw: that would mean that if we meet them, we virtually have no defense(at least we would have some attacking units). If an other team goes for this, there would be some major risks involved IMO.