Vox Diplomacy

[notyoueither]

Done sent this to me by messanger.

I don't have time to talk right now, but I just wanted to point out that there are now two teams ahead of us in score. Both GS and Vox are already falling behind, and every turn we stay at war instead of cooperating we fall further behind.

[vmxa1]

That was understood from the start. Lots of ground will be made up, if we take them down and later we will have contacts and can cooperate with others.

Getting peace with Vox will not let us get into first place now.

[Blake]

Score is meaningless and usually poorer players have better score, through useless research and unproductive population. For example whipping always reduces your score, but it provides massive turn advantage so the reduction is score is errenous. Likewise having cities overpopulation (unhappy population) increases score but reduces real power.

Score doesn't really become meaningful until much later...

[notyoueither]

I have thought about some possibilities, but have held them to myself. Discussions with ACen have shown me that perhaps I have been too inactive in the department of creative thought re Vox.

OK. There are two possibilities here short of cats and leveling the Voice. Both require that the people of Vox recognize the inevitability of their situation, but they still wish to continue in the game.

1. They can become our vassals. They build a settler, move it to where we tell them to and build what we tell them to. We occupy the Voice.

2. We occupy the Voice, Vox become extinct, and we accept the members of Vox into the Storm. They are assimilated.

Strangely enough, the people from ACen I have talked to favour the second option. In fact, they brought this up. They feel that vassals would be worse for the other teams (2 caps, support, etc) and the players on the defeated team themselves.

So, what it boils down to is a question of whether we are willing to offer 'the people' of the Voice life (in this game) or do we prefer them to be deceased (individually).

When the time comes, and the cats batter down the defences of the Voice, do we at that time accept any refugees if they say no now?

[Randolph]

Would it be a violation of the rules to offer all members of Vox immediate acceptance into GS in exchange for emptying their city for us to walk into? I'm guessing this has been covered, and it's against the rules.

[notyoueither]

They (2 people from ACen) are proposing assimilation as preferable.

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by Randolph
Would it be a violation of the rules to offer all members of Vox immediate acceptance into GS in exchange for emptying their city for us to walk into? I'm guessing this has been covered, and it's against the rules.

It's not forbidden by the rules. In fact, it may be explicitly allowed the way the rules post in the main forum stands.

The use of a fake war for the purpose of mutually gaining experienced units, or for the purpose of razing a city no longer desired by its owner. This means, you may not diplomatically invite another team to declare war on you for the above illicit purposes. Certainly you can trick a team into razing a city you don't want, or into attacking you with poor units to train your units, but it must not be agreed upon by both teams. Fake wars for other purposes ARE permitted, and are not distinguished from actual wars by game rules. If you have any questions about a potential war, please consult the admins. However, the general rule is that they are permitted except for two very specific circumstances.

And there has been nothing fake about the last 40 turns (we've been at war for 40 turns as of our next turn).

The proposal is this. We approach Vox and say, do you see any hope? No? Are you willing to consider your options or should we fight it out to the bitter end?

[Randolph]

Originally posted by notyoueither


It's not forbidden by the rules. In fact, it may be explicitly allowed the way the rules post in the main forum stands.

Interesting, sorry for bring up the same issue as you did in the vox thread (which is obviously the right place). I hadn't gotten to that yet.

[notyoueither]

np. See you there/here.

[Randolph]

I don't like option (1), I can't see it working out well. How much interest are they going to have in the game if they're our eternal vassal? OTOH (2) would great, we'd probably end up letting them in after we defeat them anyway, and it would be a huge economic jump compared to researching catapults and pounding them out of the Voice.

We haven't said anything horribly mean about them have we?? I suppose we could always re-write a little history.

[notyoueither]

2 occured to me a long while ago. I put it aside as being too gamey.

Much to my surprise it was proposed by one of our new neighbours.

It certainly would have been too gamey on turn 2 of the war. Is it on turn 40 when they have shown no ability to resist and we are in fact building while choking them?

[Randolph]

Originally posted by notyoueither


And there has been nothing fake about the last 40 turns (we've been at war for 40 turns as of our next turn).

The proposal is this. We approach Vox and say, do you see any hope? No? Are you willing to consider your options or should we fight it out to the bitter end?

There's no doubt that the war is real, the question is whether it is ok to use a out-of-game reward for an in-game action. I suppose it could be abstracted as an in-game reason, giving in to an overwhelming opposing army is certainly something that has been done historically. Whether it's "fair" to the other teams is a bit questionable (we'd be getting a major boost compared to having to play out the war). That said, if it's not against the rules, then it's within the rules, and we should give it a try (assuming the consensus is for it).

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by Randolph
That said, if it's not against the rules, then it's within the rules, and we should give it a try (assuming the consensus is for it).

Indeed. Let's hear it.

[Blake]

Um... well I've always been at least half in favor of an ultimation. Definitely, it wouldn't be tolerable for them to join GS after we've destroyed them the hard way, especially if they put up no real fight. If the war goes to the bitter end, any merger will be bitter.

Honestly though at this point I'd rather just kill them off, the good honest way. This suggestion of surrender is just the initial reaction from AC, we had much the same initial reaction but later soured to the idea.

But if we do want to make this offer now is the time. Vox are completely out of options. We have met the other teams and swayed them to our side or at least convinced them that Vox are a lost cause now. There can be no savior for Vox.

[notyoueither]

Well, I've been chatting with Jon Miller, off the record...

What? How did you think diplomats get anything done?

At any rate, I think we can put this idea away for now. If it happened at all, I would want it to be unanimous on thier side. It is not even unanimous for Jon Miller.