The REAL Turn 42

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by Theseus
Like I said, unstable. How about IW now for Writing and contact later?

I was thinking along the same lines. Here's a response I've written for Jon Miller and am about to click "send" on:

I've presented your message to the team, but here's my own, personal reaction. Our original arrangement was designed so that the first stage of the trade would give you a higher-value tech and the second would give us a higher-value tech so that the two exchanges would balance. Now you are asking for two consecutive exchanges where you end up with the higher value. Does that seem fair to you? It certainly doesn't to me - especially not when you sound like you want to then trade Writing to another civ to further enrich yourselves.

I'm willing to propose the following counter-offer to Gathering Storm:

(1) We go ahead with the Iron Working for Alphabet now. (That helps both of us compared with if you would make an exchange with our rival to your north (which I suspect is Lux)).

(2) When we get Writing, we trade it to you for whatever contacts with other civs you have at the time.

(3) We retain an exclusive right to trade Writing to other civs. Considering that compared with our original agreement, you will be getting Writing for nothing more than contact information, that does not seem like an unreasonable stipulation.

(4) You agree not to try to renegotiate the deal further, even if an opportunity comes up where you might be able to get a deal you like better on Writing elsewhere.

I don't know how my own team will react to this, and it's certainly not an official proposal yet, but I'll go ahead and bring it up with you at the same time I do with Gathering Storm so you folks can go ahead and start thinking about whether you would agree to it if we make it (or something similar) an official offer.

Nathan

[Shiber]

Beautiful!
They will not go back on such a promise. It would be too much.
I suggest that we take the deal (while it's up!), and tell them that the exact details will be worked out later. Give them our most honest word that we will work out a fair deal. Begin researching writing.

Regarding the fair deal I mentioned above, an arrangement where we send them writing, and they in turn send back contacts with Civ X and promise not to sell writing to Civ X (which makes up for the difference in beaker cost between Writing and IW, and the original The Wheel and BW, which sums up to 72 beakers if I'm not mistaken). Seems very fair to me, in fact.
If they don't agree to the patent on writing, then we could suggest that they pay us an additional 45 gold (that should keep them from upgrading any warriors soon) as "royalties". Remind them that we did not ask to put a patent on The Wheel, and that they can broker this tech as well if they wish, as long as they pay us in gold as compensation.

[Shiber]

Nathan, if they take this deal then so will I.
I like the way we're giving them alphabet as well (which they already admitted that they could get almost for free), while hampering their deal with Civ X (certainly this would put a blow in their relations with Civ X, should they agree to this deal), and demanding contacts with all the others civs that they have met (could be more than one) and patent protection.
Marvelous.

[Shiber]

Originally posted by Theseus
Like I said, unstable.

Not a very attractive trait for a neighbor, I must agree. Let's hope that Civ X are more stable, more trustworthy and are a better research partner.
If we play our cards well, we can eventually leave Vox far behind on the tech race, and by the time we conquer Vox, Civ X would be behind as well...
/me wipes the drool off his chin.

[Lawrence of Arabia]

Vox wouldnt do this if they werent more afraid of Civ X then us. I think that we have proven to them that we are a peace loving people.

[nbarclay]

One interesting question is whether The Wheel is what they traded to get Iron Working earlier than they would have otherwise. If so, the first stage of the trade deal was very, very clearly in their favor, and BetaHound's efforts to claim otherwise are laughable.

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by Lawrence of Arabia
Vox wouldnt do this if they werent more afraid of Civ X then us. I think that we have proven to them that we are a peace loving people.

This looks to me far more like a matter of pursuing technological advantage as best they can given the limitations of their own research capacity than like any kind of matter of fear.

[nbarclay]

Here's Jon Miller's unofficial response to my unofficial proposal.

most assuredly writing would be only the first step

I personally am (I admit this is unofficial) visualising a trading block of our 3 nations

I assure you that we would pass on what was gained from our other neighbor, in exchange for getting future stuff from you

(with which we will give to the other trading partner to get future stuff to give to you)

I have not been that involved with this, but I think that the other civ would give us something you would want for writing, which we would than pass off to you

I will further my idea (and your message) to the other members and find out what we could get from the other civ for writing

I erpsoanlly would like to see the three of us conduct our research in a manner by which non is wasted (we were very upset by the waste from our research into ironworking)

[nbarclay]

My response (and this time I'll leave it here for at least a while before sending it):

I very much like the idea of a three-way partnership, but would be extremely nervous about engaging in such a partnership on terms where every trade has to go through you. I can understand that you would really like to be in a situation where you can leverage your monopoly on contact with "Civ X" (as we sometimes refer to your mysterious neighbor) to ensure that you do not get left out of the loop, but I hope you can understand our extreme reluctance to accept a situation where our links with the outside world remain so horribly fragile for the foreseeable future. Frankly, a partnership where both the flow of communications and the flow of technology has to go through you would not feel like a true partnership at all (at least to me).

What I've envisioned as the best possible scenario beyond Writing (and I've actually had this basic concept in mind for some time now) would be if we research Code of Laws, you research Philosophy, and a third civilization researches Literature. That would set up research for Republic at the earliest possible date, with the ability to build libraries gained along the way to further speed research (and, in the process, enhance our nations' culture).

Prior to that, at the Writing stage, it might be possible to line things up so that Civ X will research something else (Mathematics, maybe?) while we research Writing, and then we would trade Writing to Civ X for what they researched and trade what they researched to you for something you research in the meantime. In such an arrangement, I fully recognize that the tech you research would have to be a less valuable one if you are to start work on Philosophy in a timely manner.

One other thing about such an arrangement is that techs researched and shared in such a manner would have to be viewed either (1) as joint property, with the proceeds of any sale outside our group (whether gold or additional technology) shared equally or (2) as belonging exclusively (for trading purposes) to the civ that researched the tech. Without such a provision, one of us could betray the others by selling techs researched by all three of us and keeping the proceeds to themselves.

Anyhow, that's my current thinking on this matter (and still at highly preliminary stages, since I imagine all three civs will need to give the matter a great deal of thought before making such a long-term formal commitment).

Nathan

[Theseus]

Interesting... did you see the comment about lost shields in researching IW? So they did trade for it... when?

They are known liars and cheats.

[nbarclay]

If the rest of the team concurs, I'd like to send my message above to Vox with an opening paragraph along the lines of:

Gathering Storm has agreed to make my earlier offer regarding Alphabet, Iron Working, Writing, and contacts official. Of course if a three-way partnership can be arranged, we would be willing to consider amending the deal appropriately.

[Dominae]

I know I sound like a broken record, but I do not see the point of negotiating "unoficially" with members of Vox, posting the results here, and then "going ahead" to "officially" make the proposals. I honestly do not care how Vox handles their diplomacy, but I'm uncomfortable having all dealings between our teams start and end with Nathan and Jon Miller exclusively.

Any "unofficial" communication is probably taken seriously by Vox (we must assume so). So even though we're claiming that we're "just talking", this talk can have diplomatic repercussions. Maybe we will not be interested in a three-way partnership at all once we contact team X, so "unoficially" disussing it is not in our best interests at this time. Maybe the team actually wants to get rid of Vox at the first opportunity (who knows? we haven't had any polls lately).

The whole point of having a school of diplomacy is to discuss these matters, come to an agreement and present a unified and coherent front. So I suggest the diplomats need to do a bit more work during the next few turns pinning down exactly what we do and do not want from Vox. This will create a policy with which Nathan, Sir Ralph or nye can use to play the turns.


Dominae

[Shiber]

I like your proposal, and your wording.

[nbarclay]

How does this sound as an official message? Does it reflect the stance we want to take?

Greetings People of Vox Controli,

Gathering Storm has agreed to make my earlier offer regarding Alphabet, Iron Working, Writing, and contacts official. The concept of a three-way partnership is definitely an interesting one, but our diplomats and economists really need more time to consider the issue before we can make any kind of commitment, even an informal one. In the meantime, we need to get Iron Working now so we can move on with our research into Writing without undercutting our ability to maintian parity in defensive technologies. Your failure to keep your commitment in a timely manner has already cost us valuable time, and while we can understand your desire to renegotiate in light of changing circumstances, any further delay can only hurt relations between our peoples.

Sincerely,

The People of Gathering Storm
Nathan Barclay, Chief Economist

Edit: Changed a line that Theseus was concerned might express weakness.

[Dominae]

Nathan, very nice! That is exactly the kind of stance I believe we should be taking toward Vox at this point. Even peaceful partners can give each other a push once in a while (see France, Germany and the U.S. for a real-world example).




Dominae