Ending the tech deal with Vox: Whether, When and How

[asleepathewheel]

Originally posted by Aeson
They have to realize that eventually the deal will end. We both can't win. I'm pretty certain they are going to understand this, and even if they don't it's not really our problem. We have been talking about Republic to them under the current agreement, and if we renege on those deals, even just to change the deal a bit, wouldn't be a good idea. A good time to modify the agreement would be after we get their Middle Age tech.

Vox is planning on settling Lux's lost land on BOB right?

I think they realize that we both can't win, they are just in it as long as possible.

And hey, us winning doesn't require their (total) destruction, although a conquest vic will be more fun than say a spaceship or cultural one. Domination would not require their total destruction, maybe exiling them like lux.

I think the time to end the tech agreement is the turn our knights land next to all of their cities. Why give them forewarning that the game has changed?

[Theseus]

I'm with aatw... unless (I don;t remember) we at some point agreed to this 20 turn warning crap.

(Theseus starts sharpening swords and currying the horses... oops, we dont't have either yet!! grrr.)

[nbarclay]

Don't forget that if one civ starts to dominate on Bob, we and Vox may need to ally together to deal with them. We don't need to be burning any bridges at present. And Aeson's thinking that we want Vox's (and Lux's, if possible and if it's different) early medieval tech mirrors my own.

Here's the full text of the cancellation provision:

(2) This agreement may be cancelled by either team under the following conditions. (a) The team wishing to cancel the agreement must provide a minimum of ten turns' notice. (b) Both sides, and especially the side initiating cancellation, are required to act in good faith to ensure that the treaty will be ended (or transitioned to some other arrangement) in a way that is equitable to both. Both agree not to manipulate the timing of tech discovery, tech trades with other parties, the ending of the deal itself, or any other factor in such a way as to obtain an unfair advantage over the other.

To end or transition the deal honorably, I think the best timing would probably be to have the end/transition take effect after we've researched two medieval techs and they've researched one (not counting their free one). Of course if the deal still seems to be providing us with an advantage, we could keep it going longer.

Nathan

[DeepO]

My problem with this is not the timing, as I agree in full, but with the way it will end. Sure, we only agreed to a 10 turn advance warning, but if we simply say "hey, we consider we gave you more then you gave us, so we'll end this deal in 10 turns", they are going to be upset. Maybe the situation calls for that, maybe we'll need them for a lot longer, so the moment we end the deal, we are burning bridges. That's something I don't like, even if I like to have our FP build in one of Vox's cities.

DeepO

[Theseus]

I ABSOLUTELY believe in maintaining our honor.

Nathan, two medieval techs? Don;t quite get that...

[DeepO]

BTW, in order to better assess the costs on both sides, please start keeping a log of everything we got from / gave to them. I think we are currently behind, but will get more then even when the CoL techs are given to Vox, so if we can avoid them getting Knights from us, it would be good for warfare

DeepO

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by Theseus
I ABSOLUTELY believe in maintaining our honor.

Nathan, two medieval techs? Don;t quite get that...

We get their free one plus one other, while they get two we researched. That way (1) the cancellation notice doesn't come practically the moment we get their free tech - at least not unless our research rate is lightning-fast - and (2) each of us will have originated two medieval techs and provided them to the other.

Nathan

[DeepO]

well... I don't think that evens out. We already give republic, which should nearly cover their free tech, add this to all the techs they are getting from us on the CoL deal, and we are being too generous. Maybe this is just an idea, though, and in reality we need to trade 2 techs to get even on costs.

DeepO

[Dominae]

A natural time to end our tech-trading deal will be when we finally want to put their civ to the sword. So all this talk about "ending the deal" should instead be "when are we planning to attack Vox?" I see no reason for ending the deal and not attacking them, and I'm sure they'll think the same way ("Hm, Gathering Storm has no interest in trading with us anymore...well, at least we can still be friends!"). The fact that we have to give 10 turns notice will be awkward, but hopefully we'll be superior enough by then (militarily and economically) that losing the element of surprise will not be a problem. In any case, Theseus seems to me to be the "Here I am, I'm gonna destroy you now!"-type of warmonger, and not the "Ah-ha! You were unprepared, now I've got you!"-type (not sure about Arrian, he's pretty deceptive...).


Dominae

[nbarclay]

Counting techs passed on from others is problematical because there's no telling what deals might have been worked out otherwise. If we hadn't gotten Mathematics from Vox, we could probably get it from ND or Lux for Code of Laws. Conversely, if we wouldn't supply Vox with Literature and Map Making, they could use Philosophy as at least partial payment for them.

If Vox initiates ending the deal, I would have no trouble at all with viewing the disparity in ancient techs as sufficient compensation for our getting an extra medieval tech. But if we're the ones ending the deal, that places a bit of extra burden on us to make sure it's clear that Vox got at least as much out of the deal as we did. Trying to count the disparity in ancient research as worth a medieval tech would leave doubts regarding whether we treated Vox fairly, especially if we cut off the deal practically the moment we get their free medieval tech. But if the number of medieval techs originated by each side is equal, there can be no real doubt that Vox got the greater value of technology out of the deal, and that we therefore did not take unfair advantage of them by ending the deal when we did.

Nathan

[nbarclay]

Dominae, I agree that we probably won't want to end our relationship with Vox unless and until we're ready to attack. But we may want to transition our arrangement to a different footing that compensates us for our faster research rate in some way.

Certainly, plans to attack Vox could be a driving force in determining when we end our agreement with them. But an attack on Vox would send the message, "Beware of Gathering Storm. No matter how good your relationship with them seems to be, they'll attack you the moment they view it as in their best interest to do so." That alone would cause enough negative ramifications regarding other teams' perception of us to potentially give us some problems, and the situation will be even worse if Vox can make a reasonable (even if arguable) claim to having been cheated in the tech deal.

Nathan

[asleepathewheel]

Originally posted by nbarclay
"Beware of Gathering Storm. No matter how good your relationship with them seems to be, they'll attack you the moment they view it as in their best interest to do so."

I would think (hope) thats how the teams are playing it now anyway. The teams are playing to win, after all. Well, Vox (and perhaps Lux) isn't playing to win anymore, but I think the others are. Aren't we? Don't we think the above phrase about the other teams?

Its unfortunate that we did not build an expiration date into initial tech deal, then we could let it lapse and not worry about it.

[Dominae]

Originally posted by nbarclay
Certainly, plans to attack Vox could be a driving force in determining when we end our agreement with them. But an attack on Vox would send the message, "Beware of Gathering Storm. No matter how good your relationship with them seems to be, they'll attack you the moment they view it as in their best interest to do so."

I agree. I've tried to figure out a "nice" way out of our relationship with Vox (one that will allow us to declare war on them perfectly legitimately later on), but failed. Certainly we want them to feel like they've have not been cheated by us. The problem is that the more we try to do this, the more they will feel betrayed when we finally put an end to the deal.

Perhaps we could somehow engineer a situation that would sour our relationship with Vox without making us look like the bad guy. Maybe Lux's (unwanted) appearance could be used to further this end.


Dominae

[Aeson]

A legitimate option is for us to stick with the alliance as it is though. It's been profitable for us, and even if it's more profitable for Vox in the future, we'll still be getting some advantage from it. A joint strike on BOB of some type would surely go better than us weakening each other and then the victor (us ) heading over on our own. It shouldn't tip the balance of power between the two of us either.

There really isn't a pressing need in the next 40+ turns to end or change our trading relationship is there? It obviously can't go on indefinitely, but at this point letting Vox ride our coattails (helping as they can) to #2 while we take care of bigger threats looks like the best option. If we are going to do this though, we need to make plans about how to leverage our Middle Age tech lead into territorial gains on BOB, while making our border with Vox as defensible as possible for the inevitable.

[nbarclay]

If Vox isn't any better than we think they are, I'm not so sure war with them is inevitable. We can get a domination victory with us controlling two thirds of the world and them one third, right? And I think they'd regard that outcome as a success for them.

Dominae, as I recall, one of your biggest objections earlier earlier to allying with Vox for the long haul was that you felt like we should try to find a stronger and more stable partner elsewhere when we could. Do you still think that's feasible, except maybe with Lego?

Nathan