Team Sarantium Diplomacy

[UnOrthOdOx]

If you go re-read Plato's PM's, they pretty much follow the same pattern.

[UnOrthOdOx]

UnO, Kloreep, and Team Merc

This is in response to your recent correspondence and the news that you have agreed to 'rent' units to Team Horde and will be declaring war on us.

You can appreciate that this comes as a bit of a surprise to our team, especially after we worked so hard to engage you in teach deals, as was recommended to us, and to ensure that these deals would benefit your team.

So we need to clarify a few points:

1. You are cancelling the previously agreed-to open borders arrangement with our civ. You indicate that this was to expire soon. In fact, the agreement was signed on January 29 , so that makes it turn 65 or 66. It was for a 20 turn period which means it has expired some 10 turns ago. You did NOT cancel it after the 20 turn period. Normal legal precedence would suggest that the agreement is still in force via practice.

2. Are you also, in effect, cancelling this deal as well?

I wrote:

quote:


Team Mercenary supplies:
Masonry 114
Sailing 143
workboat/settler credit of 15
unit rental of 70
and previous credit of 69

TOTAL 411

Sarantium supplies:
HBR or Mathematics 357
IW research credit 12 (see previous correspondence and agreement)
TOTAL 369

Sarantium owes Team mercenary 42 gold/research credits

We can include this in the tech deal for construction, which as we discussed earlier, will be Sarantium's next research project.

I think we are pretty much on the same page here. Let me know.



You wrote:

quote:


We're close enough to agreement not to make this a big issue. 2 gold.

Onto the rental.



And you have clearly acknowledged the deal given that you have asked about the research time to math several times.

So, we are not sure what happens with this deal now. Any suggestions?

3. And you are modifying the terms of use for your units AFTER establishing and agreeing to a price, in that we are now unable to stack them with our units. We had fully intended on using one of our chariots in conjuction with your stack to pillage a road tile per turn. Will a discount on this rental be forthcoming?

Thank you.

Beta, Team Sarantium

[UnOrthOdOx]

Proposed response:

UnO, Kloreep, and Team Merc

This is in response to your recent correspondence and the news that you have agreed to 'rent' units to Team Horde and will be declaring war on us.

You can appreciate that this comes as a bit of a surprise to our team, especially after we worked so hard to engage you in teach deals, as was recommended to us, and to ensure that these deals would benefit your team.

So we need to clarify a few points:

1. You are cancelling the previously agreed-to open borders arrangement with our civ. You indicate that this was to expire soon. In fact, the agreement was signed on January 29 , so that makes it turn 65 or 66. It was for a 20 turn period which means it has expired some 10 turns ago. You did NOT cancel it after the 20 turn period. Normal legal precedence would suggest that the agreement is still in force via practice.

I sent the original proposal of the open borders on Jan 29, that is true. And while the original wording was eventually agreed to, the agreement did not occur in game until turn 74. Since turn 94 ends as soon as you end your turn, the agreement is therefore over.

2. Are you also, in effect, cancelling this deal as well?

I wrote:

Team Mercenary supplies:
Masonry 114
Sailing 143
workboat/settler credit of 15
unit rental of 70
and previous credit of 69

TOTAL 411

Sarantium supplies:
HBR or Mathematics 357
IW research credit 12 (see previous correspondence and agreement)
TOTAL 369

Sarantium owes Team mercenary 42 gold/research credits

We can include this in the tech deal for construction, which as we discussed earlier, will be Sarantium's next research project.

I think we are pretty much on the same page here. Let me know.

You wrote:

We're close enough to agreement not to make this a big issue. 2 gold.

Onto the rental.

And you have clearly acknowledged the deal given that you have asked about the research time to math several times.

So, we are not sure what happens with this deal now. Any suggestions?

We are not cancelling this deal and expect to complete it as soon as possible. There was never a date assigned to completion of this, just an understanding that it will occur when both teams have the items ready. Fact is, we do not have sailing ready at the moment, and you are already receiving advances on this deal with rental of units.

3. And you are modifying the terms of use for your units AFTER establishing and agreeing to a price, in that we are now unable to stack them with our units. We had fully intended on using one of our chariots in conjuction with your stack to pillage a road tile per turn. Will a discount on this rental be forthcoming?

We have not modified terms of use on our units. We have always stated that our units could be used in any way allowed by game mechanics and rules. You are receiving that. If you will read our public threads, we have stated several times there is a possibility of game mechanics interfering with some limited potential uses. We see this as one such case. No warning was given to Team Mercenary how you intended to use our units. We could not have then foreseen this problem to advise you of it.

[UnOrthOdOx]

I'm heading into the hole for the rest of the week. I'll try to check in from time to time, but can't guarantee anything.

[polarnomad]

Hole?

[Kloreep]

Looks like a good response to me UnO. Though I fear that they may have a point regarding stacking. They didn't notify us, but we didn't notify them... it's bit of a mess.

Anyhow, I'll send your response as written this evening, if there aren't any comments.

[Kloreep]

Sent the response via e-mail to Sarantium's main address (CCed Beta). I reformatted it for e-mail quoting and rewrote the first paragraph to not include the "I" since it was me sending it:

The original proposal for open borders was sent on Jan 29, that is true. And while the original wording was eventually agreed to, the agreement did not occur in game until turn 74. Since turn 94 ends as soon as you end your turn, the agreement will therefore be over at that time.

And signed it Team Mercenary

Otherwise it was sent as written by UnO.

[UnOrthOdOx]

Originally posted by polarnomad
Hole?

How does one put this...

You've most likely heard of the term "Fire in the Hole". If not, google it.

Anyway, before there can be a 'fire' in the 'hole'. Both the 'hole' and the 'fire' must be prepared. Now, things like cell phones or lan lines create a field that is strong enough to set the 'fire' before intended, so there is a very strict dead air space in and around the 'hole'. There are never more than 2 people in the 'hole' at a time, but consider how large a 'fire' is expected when an entire week is devoted to creating it, and you get a sense of what I do.

It is a 3 hour drive home from the 'hole', thus I'm typically not able to get time to look in from home either.

There, that shouldn't violate anything...

[polarnomad]

Don't work too hard!

[Kloreep]

Kloreep, Uno and Team Merc

Thanks for your recent response. I apologize if I sounded miffed during my last message (I was. ) The team has pretty much calmed down, accepted the facts, and we are moving on.

I would like to confirm that the tech deal we had planned will be finalized sometime after peace is reached - whenever that is. We will have to complete that deal in order to make the rental payment on the four units, with or without a discount.

And on that topic, we would like to discuss the possibility of a further rental of units. Although we have good home defences (we were worried about Keshik end runs) we will likely be pulling some of our forward units back. In order to keep the pressure on the Horde, and outlast them in this struggle, we would like to rent 6 more units. We are pretty sure that our economic and production capability will eventually win out. As with the first rental, a mix of spears and axes would work well. We will need to discuss how these units will be paid for. Presumably the construction tech can be used.

Look forward to your response.

Regards ...Beta of Sarantium

[polarnomad]

We're in the money!!

This is a great turn of events.

[UnOrthOdOx]

Word of caution.

This could be a ploy to leave our military away from our lands. It's something I would do...

These two continue to keep deadlocked on each other, and we're golden, yes. But we have to consider the possibility they have joined and are at fake war. (Though, admittedly, fake wars are extremely difficult to do convincingly, and if they pull it off, I'll praise them publicly)

I suggest a polite response saying, to the effect, we would love to work with them further when possible, but we must attend to our own defense for the time being.

[Kloreep]

I agree we need to focus on our own defense in the short term.

Now that you mention it, that line about "we're pulling our units back" is a bit suspicious. There's no way their units can reach home in time to defend against our stack; their homeland will have to take care of itself. So is that just an excuse to have the stack heading toward our territory?

A short response saying rentals won't be possible short-term sounds good. Longer term, if they stick to wanting rentals, we can see what we can work out, but we don't even have adequate defense ourselves at the moment.

[Kloreep]

Proposed response. Will send tonight pending objections/modifications from the rest of the team.

Beta & Sarantium,

Yes, the tech deal & payment on your contract will unfortunately have to wait for in-game peace. Since I can't disclose the specifics of the Horde contract, I'm not sure we can lay out a specific timetable right now, so I'm afraid that will have to wait for the time being.

On further rentals: we look forward to doing further business with you. Be advised, however, that our short-term capabilities are limited. Team Mercenary must attend to itself from time to time. We will likely not be able to make rentals on short notice. How soon would you want the 6-unit mix you mention?

-Kloreep, Team Mercenary

[Kloreep]

Sent the above to Team Sarantium's main address.