ELECTION: Minster of Diplomacy, Science and Trade

[mapfi]

This poll will be open for 5 days, till January 20th, approximately 7:15pm GMT

We have two candidates, Immortal Wombat and Locutus.

nomination thread

[Turambar]

So what are your views on the current Austrian situation?

[Locutus]

Writing as I speak...

[H Tower]

hopefully IW will find the time to write a campaign speech before the majority vote

[Frozzy]

I'm holding until the time comes.

[Locutus]

Honoured Citizens of Lemuria,

These are difficult times for Lemuria. We have barely established our first city and already are our borders threatened by the treaterous Austrians. We cannot trust these savages! Word goes that they serve monkey brains as a delicacy at the palaces of Vienna. Monkey brains! Poor cute little lemurs are being slaughtered to serve as meal for the Austrian empress We must destroy such evil vermin, we must wipe them from the face of the earth!!

However, the Austrians are powerful. The rumour goes that they have as many as a dozen powerful cities with mighty walls, and that their army is ten times larger than our own And their soldiers are equipped with magical weapons that can kill a man from a stone throw's disctance! We would not last an hour in a battle against such mighty and evil black magic! And we don't even know the location of a single of their cities, so even if we could defeat them, where must we go to fight them?

Therefore it is imperative that we befriend them. We must make them believe we are their friends and can be trusted enough for them to let their guard down. We should convince them that it is in our mutual interest if they were to provide us with their maps. We should pretend that this is merely to allow our forces to move around their territory and to allow our envoys to visit their cities and provide them with gifts, but in reality we must use these maps to plan our assault If this means that we must give away some of Lemuria's gold supply, the finest gold in all the world, then that is a sacrifice we will have to make. It will more than repay itself once our mighty armies stand on the smoldering rubble of Vienna! We shall wait for the right moment, when they trust us and won't see us coming, and then attack and crush them. In the meantime, we shall send our wise men to their cities and spy on them, see if the rumours of their magical weapons are true, and if so, replicate these for our own use. We can then fight them with their own weapons -- for evil must be fought with evil!

This is the policy that I will carry out when I am elected as Minister of Diplomacy, Science and Trade. This is what I believe to be the only right course of action for Lemuria. And I will be more than happy to sacrifice myself by visiting the smelly and polluted streets of Vienna and to endure the unpleasent presence of the arrogant and snobby 'empress' Maria. And I will even pretend to the Austrians that I enjoy it, to convince them that we are genuine friends and can be trusted. This is a harsh punishment to have to endure, but in the interest of Lemuria, I shall be honoured to do so.

If you wish Lemuria to triumph over Austria, vote for me!

I thank you for your attention,

Your humble servant,

Locutus

[H Tower]

locutus, your speech only covers one third of your office. And I also question your use of sensationalism in your speech. Dead monkeys and 12 cities indeed

[Locutus]

I covered the Science too ('evil magic weapons that kill from a stone throw's distance'), even though that will probably involve little work during the next term. We must gain Ballistics ASAP, but there's not too much that can be done to speed up the process. Only building a 2nd city will accelerate that process, or a goody hut resulting from exploration. But both require peace with the Austrians, so those factors are dependent on the Diplomacy...

Until we invent Trade (which is still a good deal away), the last 1/3 of this office is non-existant...

[Maquiladora]

Locutus' vote against me in the MoD election decided for me, if i get into office i can only work best with people who want me there.

[Dinner]

How would you go about increasing our rate of technology acquisition?

[Turambar]

Locutus attitude towards the Austrians is the same as mine so he gets my vote.

[HuangShang]

i see that IW is winning....

[mapfi]

a lot can change in 5 days and I'll certainly won't give my vote away while I haven't heard from both contestants - though I have to admit that I can't see how IW's policy will work out - mistakes have already been made.

[Devil of Truth]

IW did a great job! He certainly got us debating... But I have been waiting for Locutus to join the fray. So by the breadth of a neutrino’s squiggly bits - I’ll vote for Locutus.

[Locutus]

Originally posted by Oerdin
How would you go about increasing our rate of technology acquisition?

A good question. There are number of ways in which this could be achieved:

1) Decreasing wages and maximizing science tax. At present however the wages are already at a minimum and the science tax at a maximum so there isn't much to be gained here. When our empire grows, lower morale amongst our people may force us to increase wages or rations or to reduce the workdays. If we would leave the wages at a minimum, this would mean either production or food collection would have to suffer, something which would probably not weigh up against the science benefit achieved with that. So I won't push too strongly to keep the wages as low as they are now. However, I will do everything in my power to make sure the science tax remains where it is now, this is imperative to ensure we keep up with our neighbours technologically.

2) Increase the number of commerce collected. This can be done in two ways: by making our existing cities grow and by acquiring more cities. Since I do not believe that acquiring cities by military force is a realistic option at this point, I will push for the creation of at least 1 Settler, who must found a new city for us. When determining the location of this city, I will do everything I can to ensure this location is suitable for commerce collection and thus favourable for our rate of technology acquisition.

3) To make our existing city grow, we could employ farmers, but I would be against this. This may in the long run increase our science and production output, in the short run it will severely hamper both, which is IMO not in our interest as we need to invent Ballistics and build Settlers and Warriors as fast as possible. So at least in the short run, I will oppose the use of farmers, although I do believe that it is imperative for our cities to grow.

4) The final option to increase the rate of technology acquisition is by exploration: we live in a large, mostly unexplored world, and there will no doubt be many lost tribes and abandoned villages which could serve us well by granting us new advances, cities or Settlers. I will push for seeking these out as fast as we can. This will serve two purposes: it will deny the Austrians access to these advantages, while we ourselves will benefit from them.



I hope IW will show up anytime soon as debating on my own is hardly how I had hoped this campaign would go...