Plans for the Future

[Arnelos]

As I posted in the correspondance thread, we just got this from Cort Haus:

Greetings, friends at RP.

When you open the save you shoud find Astronomy in there - with the warmest compliments of GS. We can tell you that GoW and ND do not have these yet, so please observe NDA conditions, though Lego and Vox do have Astronomy.

We have studied our economy and concluded that despite your 15 turns or so of 1 scientist research of the tech, it is best for us to research Banking immediately, which we are doing at a four-turn pace. We calculate the banks we build will boost our research to win back these four turns by the end of the era.

We are running a defecit however, so we must ask you to help us with gpt. It's good value, we're sure you agree If we do the research, while you contibute GPT, we can both be in the industrial era in no time. GS commercial output will surge over the next 10-15 turns as the program of post-war economic builds starts to bear fruit.

So apart from the cats for your sea-wall, which we are pleased to see rolling out from your cities, we would suggest that you build markets, aquas and harbours to boost pop and pump out the gold. You'll want to keep yourselves some gpt for rushing some builds, so offer us what you can. We're running a 20gpt defecit at the moment, so getting that covered would help.

Perhaps Navigation or Democracy at 40-turn could be considered - or maybe the scientist would even be better working mines and fields. This would be something to discuss and consider.

Meanwhile, your galley can return home safely via the sea now, and we will shield it as it gets close to your port. We can also use galleys to screen the coastline from GoW ships, allowing you to take up the north and westerrn positions on the sea wall when the time comes.

Regards,

Cort Haus.
on behalf of your good friends Gathering Storm.

We should probably start looking at ways to do what GS is requesting, which I agree with them is probably the best strategy for the alliance right now.

We can use this thread to discuss this and other threads for the future, both immediate and long-term.

[Togas]

I like the idea of sending them gpt so that they can quickly research tech.

I would also like to send SOME gold to Vox to buy Printing Press from them. I know that we probably don't have to buy it, I'm sure GS would eventually funnel it in our direction, but I want to give the impression to the rest of the world that we're an independent nation and not just a mere puppet of GS.

Also, if any of the nations out there understand how we feel, it's Vox. I'd like to see if we can't improve relations with them.

--Togas

p.s. They want 200g or 10gpt for the tech.

[Arnelos]

Originally posted by Togas
I like the idea of sending them gpt so that they can quickly research tech.

I would also like to send SOME gold to Vox to buy Printing Press from them. I know that we probably don't have to buy it, I'm sure GS would eventually funnel it in our direction, but I want to give the impression to the rest of the world that we're an independent nation and not just a mere puppet of GS.

Also, if any of the nations out there understand how we feel, it's Vox. I'd like to see if we can't improve relations with them.

--Togas

p.s. They want 200g or 10gpt for the tech.

You know... because of the empathy factor (if nothing else), we can probably get techs from Vox (or perhaps even another) for better price than GS could.

It may even pay to have GS leave us to do the tech trading for them, assuming we can get techs without having to sign an NDA. Even if we have to and it works out to be more efficient, it's worth exploring...

We should bring this up with GS when we discuss things with them. I think they might actually LIKE this idea, especially if we can get techs more easily than they could on the market.

[Aidun]

Yes, but isn't it better to use the 200g to fund GS for 10 turns? and get tech for free. Then we keep the money inside the alliance so the alliance profits from it instead of the world outside. This is part of the basis of the European cooperation.

Aidun.

[E_T]

What are our Military plans?

I don't know what our Military situation is at this point in time, but shouldn't we also look to expand it, so that we can take advantage of the eventual conflict that we will be involved with.

Also, once we have peace, do we want to change our government again?

E_T

[Aidun]

Let's keep the military that low that it doesn't cost us more than 0 gpt under a monarchy government and a nominally higher, but, when crossing out the benefits of republic/democracy against the maintainance costs of the army, compareable amount of gold under a republic or democracy government.

Let's first make sure that we thighten the gap between the Eastern Alliance (us, nice name, isn't it?) and Legoland.

Aidun

[Togas]

Changing Governments:

Does anyone think we should change to Republic? We'll make additional gold but we'll have additional upkeep costs.

However, with GS doing most of the seawall for us, and with us focusing on commerce, Republic may be the way to go.

--Togas

[Arnelos]

Agreed on switch to Republic. We should make peace with both GoW and ND, though.

[Aidun]

Arnelos, did you get something from them (GoW)?
Let's make peace.
Let's go for republic.

Aidun

[Togas]

Sounds good. Let's move past the war, turn our focus to becoming a sound commercial nation, end the wars, switch to Rep, and build a lot of markets and banks.

--Togas

[jdjdjd]

Hi again... That sounds good to me too.

[Togas]

Just to update everyone:

Right now we're giving GS 20gpt. Once this runs out we can easily give them 30gpt. In fact, we could do so now if we truely wanted to, but I'd prefer to stock it up in the bank just in case we need it.

We are giving Vox 4gpt (total of 80g) for Printing Press. We could have received this tech for free from GS, however, I'd like for us to shed our image of GS's lackeys and try to at least pretend to be an independent nation, and not a protectorate. We need to buy our own techs occasionally ... we also should tell other nations that we're buying techs from GS ... heck, we're paying them most of our GPT every turn!

Once our cities build needed temples and harbors (in some areas so that they can grow) they all need to build marketplaces and banks. The larger ones need Cathedrals. El Paso already has a Cathedral, Monterrey will probably need one soon.

Once those are done, we need to either invest in libraries and universities, build units, or build wonders. Maybe a bit of them all.

We should continue to discuss this.

--Togas

[Arnelos]

Originally posted by Togas
Just to update everyone:

Right now we're giving GS 20gpt. Once this runs out we can easily give them 30gpt. In fact, we could do so now if we truely wanted to, but I'd prefer to stock it up in the bank just in case we need it.

We are giving Vox 4gpt (total of 80g) for Printing Press. We could have received this tech for free from GS, however, I'd like for us to shed our image of GS's lackeys and try to at least pretend to be an independent nation, and not a protectorate. We need to buy our own techs occasionally ... we also should tell other nations that we're buying techs from GS ... heck, we're paying them most of our GPT every turn!

Once our cities build needed temples and harbors (in some areas so that they can grow) they all need to build marketplaces and banks. The larger ones need Cathedrals. El Paso already has a Cathedral, Monterrey will probably need one soon.

Once those are done, we need to either invest in libraries and universities, build units, or build wonders. Maybe a bit of them all.

We should continue to discuss this.

--Togas

Scientific improvements will only be useful for culture as long as we're so small that we can only do 40-turn research. Basically, we should completely everything else first.

Things we need most right now are Marketplaces, Temples, Aqueducts, Granaries, Cathedrals, and Banks (probably in that order).

Once those are done, we can look at other cultural improvements such as Colloseums, Libraries, and Universities.

This said, however, I think the thing we should really do is consider a wonder prebuild, probably using a palace build in El Paso and/or a small wonder build in Monterrey. Since GS is keeping us up in technology and our cities are under no threat of attack untl Amphibious Warfare, we have a serious shot at a wonder... the one most useful to the GS/RP alliance (for RP to get, not GS) would be ToE, though obviously Legoland will be in competition for it. We should seriously look at doing something like that to help the alliance.

Of course, we'd start the wonder prebuilds after we'd already completed the other projects.

Also keep in mind the Vox Controli probably has the same idea.

Ultimately, the ultimate pre-build wonder we could do is the United Nations, but by then marines are an issue and we'll need to have all cities other than the U.N. city building military units.

Hell... if someone else builds the U.N. and we have 2 prebuilds at work, we could always complete the Manhattan Project, build an ICBM and nuke Imperial City.

[Togas]

We're the only civ with a UU still to be built. I'm particularly fond of our UU and I'd like to see us get a ton of Conquistadors and Galleons to make us useful in whatever big war comes next.

However, we need horses and I'm not sure who's going to give them to us. Please discuss.

Once El Paso finishes the Bank, we should begin building a wonder there with a Palace prebuild

Once Monterrey finishes it's cathedral and a bank, it should also start on a Wonder.

All our other cities are coastal, and once they get their markets in place, we can begin to churn out a few more ships, and also build additional units for our completed seawall. I'd like to allow GS to retire from their watch duty of our coasts. It's an important step towards being independent (or appearing to be).

--Togas