Gathering Storm - correspondence & foreign affairs

[Tiberius]

No, we don't have to renew the luxury trade. Why don't you just read the treaty? that was a bit harsh

2. This deal is considered indefinate, and is not bound to the 20-turn limits PtW defines.

If they ever ally with us, they will do it out of necessity, not because we talk nicely with them. We aren't exactly in love with GS and yet we would help them, to avoid the Bob civs gaining too much power.

What's the point of talking with them? To say what?
"Hello, at the moment we are an alliance against you and we might kill some of your knights, but don't worry, on the long run we will give you saltpeter". or "What are you researching? Invention? Oh, we already have Gunpowder, but can't give it to you; you must first lose the war on Bob".

PS Please excuse my style. I've spent almost all day on the Off topic forum and that leave marks Nevertheless, my points are valid. IMHO

[vondrack]

Tibi is right about the lux deal - it was GS specifically arranging for its "indefinitness". All we need to do is renew it ingame - and doing that without any talking may help more than talking about it...

And, even if he really sounds quite 'off-topic'ish in his post, he's right in that teams ally mostly out of necessity in this game, not because being friends with each other. Even our help to Voxes, which might have been perceived as generous, was in large part motivated by our own benefit.

GS would have no choice but to come to our aid, unless they completely gave up their hopes of winning the game (which I do not believe they would do ever). If GoW & ND invaded and conquered us (after conquering Bob), then GS would be doomed to fall as well.

It's exactly the same reasoning that makes us consider it necessary to come to GS aid, if GoW & ND invaded Stormia.

[Tiberius]

Originally posted by vondrack
And, even if he really sounds quite 'off-topic'ish in his post,

Yes, sorry for that. It is a hard life over there, you have to be tougher than here

[redstar1]

How is saying 'Hello guys, just checking in. Long time no speak!' helping GS?

Maybe it will make them feel good about themselves?

I don't see the harm in it personally. Its still quite possible we won't have to go to war with them and they'll be forced off Bob. In which case why risk alienating ourselves from them?

[vondrack]

Perhaps talking in a non-official way might do the trick... because we do not want to get into any official conversation, with questions being asked and replies being avoided (that need not necessarily help GS, but might hurt us anyway).

Do we have anyone we could just chit-chat a bit with? I could try nye - but he's been having difficult times recently, with his mother passing away...

[redstar1]

Agreed, I don't think it need be official. Just to let them know we are still here and keep the lines of communication open. It doesn't help us at the minute to have them think ill of us. There's plenty of time for that when we crush their forces

I used to have a mate in GS but he hasn't been around for a while....

[vondrack]

As part of my communications with Theseus (regarding the PtWDG save forwarding), he tried to test the waters:

Ummm, new subject: What would you say to a worldwide alliance against ND? Splitting up Bob? Re-building RP? Competing in a build-off?

Theseus / Richard

I sent him the following response (I did not feel there was a need to discuss, as our stance is given for this moment):

Ummm... on that new subject... to be honest, it's not really what Lego is planning for or thinking about.

I believe that Arnelos has already informed GS about our chat few days ago. I officially informed him Legoland was not going to help RP in the war, even if RP was to leave the game. I would rather not elaborate on our reasons - but the decision has been extensively discussed and is an almost unanimously accepted by the whole Lego team.

We may be wrong, of course, but our analyses indicate we do not really have to fear ND. We generally have no interest in expanding over to Bob, so getting involved in an aggressive war over there makes little sense for us.

We are watching the developments on Bob closely and if things go "wrong" from our PoV, we'll certainly revisit our plans and overall strategy. But for the moment, we are not ready, nor willing to engage in hostilities against ND.

Best Regards,
Radek aka vondrack

[Sharpe]

We may be wrong, of course, but our analyses indicate we do not really have to fear ND. We generally have no interest in expanding over to Bob, so getting involved in an aggressive war over there makes little sense for us.

Actually I DO believe that we have reason to fear ND - I believe that with their aggressiveness and their organizational skills, they have perhaps emerged as a greater threat than GS to win the game.

Also, unofficially, I was chatting with some GoW members (about Civ, Diablo and other stuff) and from their opinions it seems that they might be favouring going after GS on Stormia after Bob is secured - so I think that we should start deciding how to deal with that possibility and what our response would be.

On the other hand, I was discussing with one of them about the "reallocation" of cities on Bob after the war and he wondered whether there might be problems - I would worry if GoW does not get their fair share of the allocation especially given the richness of the south that ND would likely get.

Be aware that all of these people stated that these were their OPINIONS not official GoW policy. But still it is some things to think about.

In my opinion, we are reaching the time for making some critical decisions - and we should try to make them before the events overtake us - as timing may well be crucial.

[vondrack]

Frankly, I believe there is not much to debate - I assume we will quite easily agree that...

...if GoW does not get their fair share of Bob, we ally with them and GS and cut ND to size. If we did not, ND would win the game in the long run simply by being the biggest guy in the neighbourhood.

...if GoW and ND went after GS on Stormia, we would ally with GS and make sure the Bobians bleed heavily, but gain not a single tile of Stormia. If not, the balance of power would be seriously broken in favour of them, us being left with just the weak Voxes on our side.

Everything boils down to whether ND and GoW keep their promises. If ND shafts GoW, we make sure they do not get away with it. If ND and GoW continue fighting GS even after driving them off Bob, then we will be very justified in switching sides, since we made it abundantly clear we would NOT support attacking GS on Stormia.

Other than that, I would not support changing sides, as we would be breaking our own promises (the clearly declared goal of this alliance is to split Bob between GoW and ND, with RP either dead or in exile and GS left with Stormia only).

This is actually why I was slightly favouring sending MORE troops over to Bob - I do not fear GoW and ND going directly after us on Legos with a massive army. Not within the foreseeable future. What I cannot completely rule out, though, even if I consider it unlikely (as I trust their words quite a lot), is the possibility of them not following the "plans" precisely as agreed upon with us - i.e. either not splitting Bob to our liking or going after GS on Stormia (after all, they did not expressly promise to let GS be after driving them off Bob, I think).

If that's the case, then troops back home will be of little use, since they will not be "visible" and "ready for immediate action" - unlike a strong stack on Bob that would be able to strike at the very heartland of GoW & ND, if they decided to cross our plans.

But then again - I truly believe GoW and ND will keep their promises and split Bob equally, ending the war after conquering the whole of the continent.

[ZargonX]

Slightly off-topic, but interesting:

Take a look at the Balanced PBEM in the PBEM forum; it's mostly GS guys. I guess it explains alot of their diplomatic problems in the this game, as they perfer to play MP games where diplomacy is not a factor

[vondrack]

Good point. I noticed the same thing in a very interesting thread with an AAR of a PBEM game played by several Strat forum guys (Dominae, Sir Ralph, Dave McW, alexman, jshelr, Nor Me). It bears the same marks.

They may be great economists, great generals... but they simply miss the point of trading in general.

[vondrack]

Alright, a stern warning... let's fine-tune its sternness until RP fixes yet another game crash.

Here is my humble attempt:

Honourable Nation of Gathering Storm,

It has been brought to our attention that a strong force of your War Chicken in full arms just recently landed on the Eastern coast of Bob, roughly South of Yellowknife.

Although we can naturally not be sure about the plans and intentions of your generals, we feel the only reason for such a force to land there would be an attack at the "homeland" cities of GoW and ND.

We are sorry to inform you that if such an attack was to happen or become imminent, we would consider it an act threatening Legoland's long-term interests, and as such would cause our nations to enter the state of war with no further warning.

Respectfully,
The Senate of Legoland

[Tiberius]

It is very well written and I wouldn't like to see it modified, maybe except for one small addition:

somewhere near/after the "enter the state of war" thing add a few words saying "which would obviously void any current trade deal between our nations" or something similar in meaning. I know this is self-implied, but I'd like to avoid later flame-wars that we broke or not our trade agreement.

[redstar1]

Or if you want a British foreign office slant on it :

Our dearest chums of Gathering Storm,

After having a chat with some of the chaps across the sea, its been pointed out that you have a jolly large force somewhere near Yellowknife.

Far be it for us to interfere but we have to say that we aren't quite tip-top with the idea of you having a picnic so close to GOW's back yard. In fact, we are afraid to say thats its really just not on old boy.

We do beleive that we still have a common interest as well as a lucrative trade deal. Were you to start a bit of a scrap up north then we would really have to rethink. I'm sure you understand we can't really do deals with anyone we don't think is sound.

In short, we'd like you to have a think about the old gameplan. I'f you want a cup of tea and a chat just let us know.

Yours Imperiously,

Lego

[Tiberius]

You have quite a style