Gathering Storm - correspondence & foreign affairs

[redstar1]

I'm getting mightily pissed off with these guys....

[redstar1]

Ok draft response..... somewhat confrontational but I'm a bit pissed off

DeepO,

Our intelligence suggests that the Bob nations are in no position currently to seriously threaten the Vox homeland, assuming they really intend to. We are not concerned with the future of Vox.

The favorable price issue regarding Monotheism is one which is certainly difficult to quantify. Suffice to say at this stage we are happy to keep things simple and work on the origional deal.

We are still confused by your theory that all teams will acquire Currency & Construction at the same time. Our proposed deal with you does not follow on from any deals we have with other teams, and as such we expect that when you receive C&C from us, those techs will be exclusive to both our teams. I think therefore that all tech involved in this deal have 'full resell value'.

It may indeed help matters if you can discuss how much gold you can spare for this deal. We are hoping we can make a balanced deal for both sides, and begin a long line of effective, complimentary and advantageous deals for both of us.

Regards

redstar1

[Tiberius]

Is it sure that delmar didn't join them? I didn't see for a long time such levels of nitpicking.

[redstar1]

LOL

They just trying to shaft us. I say we ride em for all they have and throw them to the dogs.

[Tiberius]

I don't think it's wrong intent, but...nevertheless, it pisses me off. One don't emphisize diplomacy whole day long to nitpick then a fvcking treaty until nothing remains from it. Baahhh

If these "strategy" guys (outstanding civ players, nothig to say) won't win the game it will be because they will lose themselves in their self made labyrinth of neverending calculations.

[Tiberius]

Unless this is just a shameless try to trick us, which won't work. I'd almost prefer not to trade Curr+Constr at all to them, just to see them begging then.

[lmtoops]

I was wondering when a delmar reference would come up.

[vondrack]

OK, guys, I have read GS message and got almost as pissed as most of you, I guess... but then, I watched a fine movie and got myself "organized" again. I'm now strongly convinced we can use the situation to our own benefit.

First:

1) Keep in mind we never revealed to GS that we were the "first hand" source of Construction (at first, it was a bit intentional, then it just... hmmm... kinda "went on" ). If they believe we are just reselling it, let it be that way. We do not need to tell them. If they try to push us for even more unfair terms, we will simply stall the negotiations and quietly wait for them to come to us, begging for Construction (as they will be unable to get it anywhere else, thus left stuck in the ancient times, once done with Republic - and IF they end up stuck there, we will only benefit from that... getting a head start on the medieval research, even if not on Theology, which we'd probably normally start with).

2) I agree that GS looked like a much more reasonable trading partner early on... now, it seems like they are just another un-freaking-believably "smart" team very much determined to rip Lego off (has anyone else noticed that we strike best deals with GoW, and quite easily?).

3) Since what DeepO mentions (Rep+40 gold for our techs) is almost what we are looking for, I suggest we hide ANY sign of frustration by their cheeky approach to the deal and strike it. Let them believe they ripped us off big time. Once they find out (when we get Mono from Voxes), it'll be too late for them - and with Monotheism in our pocket, we will be able to set our own course of actions... maybe cooperating, maybe not.

4) Let's mention NOTHING about Voxes. Not even the slightest hint we are actually doing business with them, helping them, or knowing anything about their chances. GS apparently have no clue - and it shall stay that way.

That said, I suggest we respond like this:

Dear DeepO,

We are glad that we are getting to understand each other's stance better. We are now fully aware of your concerns and - even though not all your assumptions are 100% correct - we agree that in general, you often do have a point.

We understand that setting the price for Monotheism in advance is quite tricky. Let's handle it once it is actually available for trading then... we believe that GS' word is to be trusted and that a "favourable price" will, in fact, be a truly favourable price.

To make things simpler to handle, we suggest that we now work on signing a trade agreement regarding the technologies available in the nearest future: Currency, Construction, and Republic.

As our preliminary negotiations with RPers indicate they have no interest in acquiring The Republic (or at least, they pretend so... it may sometimes be difficult to tell what they truly are after), we no longer ask for resale rights to this team - as they would be virtually useless for us for the foreseeable future.

Thus, the deal we would like to talk about now, boils down to:

1) Legoland would provide Currency & Construction to GS one turn before GS would provide Republic to Legoland. Legoland would grant GS rights to resell/trade/gift Currency & Construction to Vox Controli and Neu Demogyptica. Legoland would also agree that it would not attempt to sell/trade/gift Currency or Construction to Vox Controli, nor Neu Demogyptica.

2) GS would agree to provide Legoland with Republic no later than on (its) Turn 84. GS would grant Legoland rights to resell/trade/gift Republic to Glory of War. GS would also agree to not attempt to sell/trade/gift Republic to Glory of War.

3) To offset the difference in research costs between Currency+Construction and Republic (considering the effective trading potential of the resale rights provided by both teams approximately equal), GS will pay Legoland a balance payment of 70 gold, payable on the same turn as the transfer of Republic happens.

Naturally, those 70 gold may go down to as low as 50, if they bargain... as always, let's start a bit higher so that we have some manoeuvring room later on.

Everybody, comment, please. There is no rush (for us ), so I assume we would PM DeepO sometimes tomorrow later in the afternoon or even in the evening European time.

[redstar1]

Yep, looks good.

[Kloreep]

The proposal looks good.

(or at least, they pretend so... it may sometimes be difficult to tell what they truly are after)

What's the point of this sentence? All it does is make a negative comment about the RPers and do nothing to enhance our case for our proposal. I think it should be left at saying they have no interest in Republic.

[redstar1]

Thanks Redstar1,

It's truely a pleasure to see our understanding grow. Allow me to try to improve it a little more, by responding personally, before I post your last message to our board

Further problems have risen on our tech deal. ND is, as was feared, not interested in any of the techs we could offer. We have serious reasons to believe they are researching currency, but republic as well did not interest them. This was before Vox started to negotiate for staying on Bob, so they wouldn't be getting it from Vox, and neither from you... we are wondering where republic would comes from.

This seems (maybe again under the wrong assumptions, but they're the best we can go on right now) to be because either RP is researching the republic, or GoW will sell republic to the other two once it gets it from you. We should definately rule out the second possibility, by forcing NDAs on both GoW and Vox, e.g. for a 10 turn period. If Bob deals amongst itself, we (I mean GS-Lego combined) get less profit from the techs...

If RP is getting republic themselves (which is certainly likely if they don't want to get it from you), it's actually not that bad for the world situation, any team can save more gold for trading techs then beakers needed to do their own research in the same time. If they spend beakers, with the result that both Lego and GS gets a bit less gold in total, it should still favor us because Bob has fewer gold then if they would have bought the techs from us.

One more remark; the value of currency took another dip. Not only can't we sell it to them (which we foresaw), but if they are researching it, it means that the moment you get it, it's third hand, the moment we get it, we're second last for sure. You know that the beaker cost of currency will have dropped close to half its value in game, I hope you are not offended if we regard it the same in our negotiations. Most likely, the same happens with construction, I wouldn't be surprised if actually the deal becomes in your favour if we simply swap curr+constr for republic.

If you would have asked for an amount of gold 10 days ago, I'm sure 70 gold would not have been a problem (it would have been high even then, but it would mean that we could set timing for the release of republic to the world, which we now cannot because RP gets Rep as well), but right now, I don't think my team will agree. Even the 40 I speculated about in last PM starts to sound as a supergift from us, the situation has changed quite a bit, and it forces us to take it into account while renegotiating.

My apologies, but as I still believe that honesty pays off in diplomatic contact, I have to advise you to drop the gold part of the deal, it would make its acceptance on GS's side a lot easier and friendlier. Our whole team agrees that Legoland is our main hope for getting a stable friend in this game, but not eveyone is willing to give up as much to get there. I will offer your proposal to the board, but I doubt it will get accepted...

Maybe it's good to try to speed things up, we're not that far from turn 84 anymore. I would definately meet on Sunday, to discuss this deal if it still needs debate, and start on swapping ideas on future business, to not get crammed for time. Further, I'd be delighted to exchange notes on what we think is happening on Bob, it's clear that they are our common problem in this game if we want to fare well in the (far) future.

BTW, just to confirm that we are still on track for turn 84, but that the slightest disaster (like disease, which always seems to happen at crucial times in this game) will mean turn 85. We miscalculated, and had to adjust plans because of the current threat, but our econ-wizzards wringed another few beakers out of our empire and we should get there in time. It will mean that the delay (between getting and giving rep) we had hoped for is gone, but we're happy we can at least meet our promises to you.

Greetz,
DeepO

[Tiberius]

Dear DeepO,

I can see with great sadnness that you utterly underestimate Legoland. The moment we get Currency is first hand, because we will be the first team who has it. Therefor GS will be the second team to have it, not the last one. Furthermore we are the only one sourse of Construction in the world, so in all honesty we can't see why do you think that the value of these 2 techs "took a dip".

Here is our final offer:
Currency+Construction for Republic + 50 gold.

We are sorry to inform you that under this price we simply won't sell.

Finally, we wish you from all of of our heart a sincere "FVCK YOU".

[lmtoops]

Very well put Tibi....I like your style

[vondrack]

Tibi, those guys are just joke, don't get pissed off at them so easily... this is fun! They are victims of their own feeling of superiority. All it shows is that they are either very bad liars or that their intel is simply woeful...

We will let them be and "offer" (without "accepting") both techs on the next (#82) turn, demonstrating that WE are the first hand source...

And we will either politely "honour" our offer for Rep+70, or increase it to Rep+(80-90), explaining that we were not that sure we would be the first ones to research Currency... And "now", when we know we ARE the first ones, we feel that the price went up...

They are digging their own grave treating us like this... but we will just smile politely and let them stew for a while.

[Tiberius]

Originally posted by vondrack
We will let them be and "offer" (without "accepting") both techs on the next (#82) turn, demonstrating that WE are the first hand source...

I like this. We could send in the same time with the save a message saying that the price of Construction+Currency has went up to Republic+80 for treating us with disrespect and not trusting us.
Seriously though, it is about time to put a foot in the door with the GS.