[Spoilers] Louis XIV of Babylon

[Ellimist]

Nice, neat, diplomatic doubletalk all the time is counterproductive. Look what it did for Sullla in RBP2. "Honest" dialogue seems to lead to better results in the long run.

[SleepingMoogle]

And the saga continues.

Hi SleepingMoogle,

I've said before that we told you about the Hanging Gardens as soon as we confirmed our decision to go for them. I don't know what more we can do to convince you of that, because apparently you've already made up your mind that we're "evil" (for some reason?) regardless of what we say. The Pyramids were always our number one priority until Mackoti took them - and had Mackoti been a turn or two later in starting them, we would certainly have got them.

As for your bizarre comparison to "prom", I'm not sure what I can say except... uh, games are different to real life? You're getting awfully close to personal attacks here, blurring the line between the player and the person. I'm a bit surprised at that - it's just a game, dude, and this isn't that big a deal.

Perhaps a comparison within the game would be more appropriate. Should you be able to expect that you won't get attacked if you've only ever had casual conversations about peace, and have never actually signed a NAP with your rival? I think not. In the same way, you can't expect that any wonder that you've brought up in the course of casual conversation is automatically yours, without some sort of actual agreement. And once again, for the record, we've always been upfront and honest with you about everything, as evidenced by us beginning this whole discussion in the first place.

I just don't understand your logic. You accuse us of using your one sentence from long ago about considering the Hanging Gardens against you - which we didn't even do, as I've explained - and yet you do far worse by taking the large amount of information we've just given you and attempting to stab us in the back with it. We told you in good faith that we were building the Hanging Gardens as soon as we confirmed our decision, and you responded by badmouthing us and immediately trying to use that information against us. If I were not certain that we'd get the Hanging Gardens regardless of whatever you tried to do at this point, I'd think that was a pretty low blow on your part. Maybe it is anyway.

We've basically said: "Hi, we're building this wonder you once expressed interested in, what can we offer you to make it worth your while to not compete if we delay it?"

You've basically replied: "Screw you, we'd rather sabotage and cripple our empire than ever discuss any kind of beneficial deal with you."

Forgive me if I find that somewhat illogical. Even more so than giving vast amounts of free commerce to an Aggressive Great Lighthouse builder whose only close land neighbour is you. (Seriously, you're brutally attacking us - a distant nation - over a mutually beneficial deal proposition, while letting your immediate neighbour and greatest threat become far more dangerous for no apparent reason. But I digress.)

Just to be clear - as it seems you may have forgotten - our primary build date for the Hanging Gardens really is a no-contest. We're already ahead of you in that race, and if you force our hand (as you seem to be trying to do), you will not beat us and will only hurt yourselves by trying.

This entire conversation has been all about the secondary build date we're looking at, which would involve us delaying the Hanging Gardens a few turns to a point where you might otherwise be able to compete (so that we can build a couple more cities).

Here's what you could do at this point:

* Sabotage your nation by insisting on rushing out the Hanging Gardens as fast as you can, which still will not be fast enough to beat our primary build date. (And even if, as you seem to believe, you succeeded in completing the wonder - which you wouldn't - it wouldn't be worth the cost to you anyway, rushing it out with such a small number of cities.) Result: We'd end up with the wonder, and you wouldn't end up with any deal to compensate your failed attempt. Okay for us - crippling for you.

* Continue to badmouth us while quietly resigning defeat on the race, instead trying to get us to build the wonder more quickly and less efficiently through lack of info. As with the above option though, this would still leave us with the wonder, and you without any kind of compensation for your loss. Same result: okay for us - crippling for you.

* Talk reasonably with us about what you feel would be a fair deal in return for not competing with us on the wonder. This would allow us to complete the wonder at our secondary build date (with more cities), and you would get a great deal in return. Win-win for both of us.

The Hanging Gardens isn't a particularly useful wonder to you anyway, especially with so few cities. I still don't understand why you don't see that. What's the point in sacrificing everything for a failed attempt at a wonder that won't do much for you anyway? There are plenty of more useful options out there. The Parthenon, the Temple of Artemis, the Great Wall, the Statue of Zeus, and Shwedagon Paya are all early wonders which are still available. All are equal to or cheaper in cost to the Aqueduct + Hanging Gardens (for an Industrious nation), and almost all would benefit you much more.

The Parthenon, for instance, would be excellent for you with your cheap Libraries and early Scientists. The Statue of Zeus, on the other hand, would be great for deterring your ever-expanding nearby Aggressive neighbour from thinking about invading you. Shwedagon Paya would do a similar thing by enabling access to earlier Theocracy, again deterring potential invaders (and you even have the Gold to speed it up). The Temple of Artemis would allow you to somewhat compete with Rego in trade routes, and would net a whole bunch of great person points in one go. Finally, the Great Wall - despite its nerfing through the rules of this game - would still give great passive espionage benefits through a Great Spy or two, and another reason to deter potential invaders from fighting with you (faster Great Generals). Plus it's dirt cheap at this point.

You could simply say the word and have us not contest you on any of these wonders... rather than making a failed attempt at the Hanging Gardens and getting nothing in return. Or we could discuss resource trades - for instance, I could supply free health to effectively give you half the benefit of the wonder. I'm open to negotiation, if you'd only be willing to listen and discuss rather than insult and threaten.

Either way, can we please talk calmly and rationally about this soon - ideally via chat. Maintaining this kamikaze attitude isn't going to get you anywhere, and hurts you far more than it hurts us.

Kind regards,
Lord Parkin

And my response:

Lord Parkin,

If you felt there was a personal attack in my previous message, then I apologize because that was not the intent. Perhaps the comparison was not quite perfect, but I hope the idea behind it makes sense at least.

Anyway, chat is unfortunately tricky for me as during working days I'm limited to a small window during the evening (this will probably be morning hours for you right?), but honestly our discussion is at a deadlock and I don't see any real possibilities of progress either way. You're confident you'll build the gardens and so am I. I'm not quite certain what you would have to offer to persuade me to drop the wonder to you, but your suggestions so far are pitifully short of the mark.

The main problem I have with all of this right now isn't even that you are going for the wonder, but rather they way in which you're doing it. Even if your decision to switch to the Gardens wasn't made until after the Pyramids was finished, then certainly it has been a plan B for a while. A plan B that you neglected to mention to me until you told me you were taking the Gardens.

And there's another major annoyance: You're both cocksure and arrogant in your negotiations. In all the suggestions you made so far to work this out, not one includes you giving up on the wonder and that suggests to me you never even entertained the thought. Instead, you asserted you were taking the wonder and there's nothing I can do about it, and you offer consolation prices that we both know don't even come close to the value of the Gardens, along with threats that I'd just be wasting hammers if I'm persisting in this.

If I'm to take a guess, between the two of us you're the one who's worried about losing the race. If I was having any doubts, I would have been doing exactly what you're doing now: offering concessions to try and make you drop out of the race. But I am confident, so there really is no need for me to do that. Again, I would suggest to you to switch your aims elsewhere. If you're that sure the Great Wall is an awesome wonder on this map, then perhaps you should go for it instead.

-SleepingMoogle

PS. I'm not quite sure where I'm badmouthing or backstabbing you, but that accusation seems to be quite far off the mark as well. No offense taken though. :-)

So now I'm apparently going to have a chat with him somewhere tonight. I honestly can't think of any way LP could convince me to change my plans at this point, but we'll see.

[SleepingMoogle]

Lord Parkin and I chatted for a while last night. I'm not quite sure why he preferred it over emails since what I got was basically a wall of text in chat format. Still, credit where it's due, he did his best to make a persuasive argument to make me drop the Gardens.

Most likely the chat ended in disappointment for him; I chose not to change plans because I honestly can't think of anything LP can offer me at this time that would be tempting enough (something which I noted before going into the chat). His offers were:

*A promise not to compete on another wonder (or wonders). This I felt was a bit silly because we're currently racing to a wonder that he never noted interest in before. Besides, all the wonders available now or in the near future are not on my list, and it's way too early to consider the ones further away.

*A free resource. LP specifically mentioned health, but probably would consider happiness as well. Unfortunately health doesn't seem to be a big issue on this map (and that is not taking into account Babylon's UB), and by the time we could trade happiness resources I'm certain to be in HR already.

*A promise to come to my aid in a conflict with another Civ. This might be interesting if there's only one target he could realistically provide assistance with (Sunrise and Rego), and I'm not planning aggression against them anytime soon.

*A non-specified future favor. Honestly though, this was so vague I discarded it pretty much immediately.

Perhaps LP's effort were hampered by his attitude up until this point, but I simply couldn't see any of his offers compare to me landing the Gardens a few turns from now. Interestingly, it was again LP making all the offers so I'm still assuming he's genuinely worried on losing the race.

The main argument was that he could land the wonder before me (although he supplied no evidence to support this), and the reason for him to want me to drop out is so that he could found some more cities before finishing the wonder (he is at 6 right now if memory serves me correctly). He kept hammering the point that with my current 5 cities, the Gardens would be a net loss for me.

Aside from the fact that LP rushing the wonder at 6 cities would be better for me (and everyone else) than letting him get more pop points. Plako may be scary right now, but LP's score suggests that he may very well become a force to be wary of as well (I don't have demo visibility on him yet, but working on it). Denying him the wonder to prevent him from becoming another runaway power makes sense in and of itself.

Also, I don't plan on being at 5 cities when finishing the Gardens. I made sure to drop some hints that I was dead set on getting the Wonder as a point of pride (which is partially true, so hopefully he'll have swallowed that one hook, line and sinker) but the truth is that I plan on having 8 cities when the wonder finishes. 8 Population is 240 hammers to whip, while the Wonder only costs me 200 due to the Industrious trait. I still lose out a bit as the Aqueduct costs another 100, but the 'net loss' isn't nearly as bad as Lord Parkin tried to make it sound.

So, for now we're moving forwards as planned.


I do have to thank LP for getting my full attention back into the game. Without him, I'm not sure I would be planning nearly as much as I do now. :-)

[Sciz]

Yes! Time to get that wonder!

[SleepingMoogle]

Okay, I screwed up somewhere. Not on the Gardens; they will still be finished two turns from now. However, when shaving off turns I seem to have miscalculated the position of the Settlers, and they are effectively one turn behind schedule. This mishap will still allow me to plant one city in the north as planned, but the southern Wine city will have to be settled on top of the Wines rather than south of it. This is probably not all that bad in the end, but I just don't like settling on top of resources. The eighth Settler simply cannot reach the intended tile in time to found a city.

So yeah.. go me.

As Lord Parkin contacted me last night and tried to dissuade me from racing him (again), I'm now convinced that I'll beat him to it. There's simply no other reason for him to keep trying unless he knows he's behind. Still, I'm not going to chance delaying the Gardens for even one turn just to settle as originally intended. If that caused me to lose the race, I'd bash my head on the desk until this game ends.

Anyway, since Settler 8 cannot reach his location as intended (he was supposed to settle the coastal location northwest of REM State), I sent him south instead to settle the Corn and Pigs location east of the Wine city. Backfilling can always be delayed, settling frontier land is on a timer. I'll post an update on the progress next turn, but unless LP beats me to it then, the worst case scenario is that we'll have a coin toss to see who lands the Gardens.


And now for a bit of diplomacy.

According to the United Nations thread, Luddite had met me this turn. It actually took a while to figure out where, but he has a scout in Mackoti's border city and this probably would have been missed otherwise. Does that mean the two have buried the axe again? Luddite had not yet contact me directly yet, so I sent him a quick greeting mail.

Also, the scouting Warrior that went west has stumbled across Plako's borders as well. I sent him a quick mail about it and stated my intent to explore further west.

Finally, a bit of a diplomatic pickle. After informing Rego about settling the wine city, he sent a response which included his intent to settle the clam site east of his current border. Here is the land currently in between us:

This is something we'd probably end up discussing sooner or later, but I'd really rather not simply give this site away and allow the Zulu's to settle in what I consider disputed lands. We agreed not to settle towards each other unannounced, and Rego has kept to that agreement, but this site threatens to stake a claim in land that is in my own visor.

Rego noted that Reading is his second city, while I'm about to settle my sixth. I'd rather define the distance from where our original settlers started though. Given our mirrored starts, if the Zulus started as far north as I did, they would have planted their second city a long way south. It would be akin to me settling the Wines location. I don't know exactly where they started out, but that seems like a better way to judge who has the better claim.

Anyway, messages are are reasonable so I'm sure we can work out something. But if I were to give up that site, I need some guarantees it will mark the end of their expansion into what is basically 'my south'. Thoughts welcome of course.

Given the above, I also approached Mackoti about the open land that still lies between our Civs. Figuring out the eventual borders is probably a bit of a diplomatic priority.

[SleepingMoogle]

Turn 83. No Gardens BIDL so at worst we have a coin flip. I'm up to 7 cities, which is good enough.



Might as well do it in style too.

[Krill]

That...sets a new record if you get it.

[SleepingMoogle]

That sounds rather ominous.

[Krill]

Nah, IIRC fastest anyone got a wonder pre-t100 was a one turn Oracle back in the MTDG, but that was only 150 base hammers in 1 turn. You just managed to make, what, 200 base hammers in 1 turn?

[scooter]

How'd you manage the 100h overflow? Just curious what the logistics were for planning it out.