[SPOILERS] Margarita and the Lurkers

[B4ndit]

But where to go with first settler? South/North? Check out screenshot from my previous post:


red circle is the location of the latest DT's city.

Our options on south:

option 1.
Settling only "very good city"

option 2.
Settling "Frontier"

option 3.
quickly settling both "Settle if allowed" and "Frontier city" with some maceman garrison to cool down DT's objections.

[Catwalk]

What's your NAP status with DT? The red circle invalidates "settle if allowed". Is that water at the bottom right coastal? I think I'd only settle Frontier, and I wouldn't make it an urgent priority. Also, make it high priority to scout out this area.

[B4ndit]

I have a chariot roaming there. Yes this water is coastal. NAP with DT expires in t135. I'm trying to prolong it until t150. If that won't happen in next turn or two, I will have to produce some military as a precaution

Yuufo. He has agreed to selling one or two fast workers for 80 gold each (better then our deal for spy, which is being sold for 80 gold). About spionage/technology, that's what I have proposed:

(...)
So lets say we are going for Construction (350 science). You discover it, I produce a spy: if stealing succeeds first time I pay you half of the gold that would cost us to research this technology (with libraries and no marketplaces 100 gold equals to 125 science). Gold to science ratio can be easily and precisely counted by moving science slider. If moving science slider gives you 10 more gold and 12 less science, that gives gold to science ratio 1.2. Assuming hypothetical 1.2 ratio for Construction worth of 350 science i would pay you (350 / 1.2) / 2 = 146 gold. If my spy fails then either one of two options:
- i have to produce new one, and my payment will be reduced by hammers to gold ratio (I have no idea what that ratio is :S x1.5? x2?)
- or MUCH more FAIR option, for each two lost spies, you gift me one.

One last thing, in that deal I would be loosing my espionage points from Great Spy, and you wouldn't.

I hope that what I have written is understandable I will say it one more time. I want nothing more then FAIR deal and FAIR cooperation.

[Catwalk]

Two fast workers for 80 gold is an amazing deal, and you need those workers too. Your espionage offer to him is far too generous IMO. What happens to caught spies, does he keep them? I suggested 100 gold for Monarchy which is a more expensive tech, and I thought that was on the high end. It may be difficult to backtrack now, though. However, peace matters far more than stealing and if he's willing to research certain techs along with that agreement it could work out okay.

[B4ndit]

He is insisting on "equal tech pace". Me paying less then I have proposed would mean that I would outpaced him. But maybe that just my inexperience. Nevertheless I valued long term peace and tech speed up more and what's also important, my proposal is indeed FAIR and meaning that we will both tech 50% faster then separately (or he following me).

[Catwalk]

I think it's unfair, but I did indeed point out myself that long-term peace is what matters. See if you can get more fast workers for 80 gold though, that's a steal. Do you have any say in which techs he researches? Try to get a small clause in about that, at least about making suggestions. Suggest Monarchy first.

[B4ndit]

I was a little bit worried about DT. He hasn't responded to my request about prolonging NAP from t135 to t150. Fortunatelly I have checked it again in our diplomail and apparently Asterix has signed a NAP with DT until t150. Don't know why I have thought it was to t135

[B4ndit]

So here is another co-operative spionage proposal, this time from suttree:

- here's how a co-operative espionage deal would work:

When you have a spy in one of our cities, you can see a list of the cost in EP's after modifiers:



You have already used a great spy against Yuufo, so your modifier for "Espionage Point Spending" is very large and ours is relatively small - the game uses your total EP's accumulated over the course of the game. This modifier will only continue to grow if you decide to run an espionage economy. In our case, it means that we are less likely to be interested in an espionage economy.

If you also have:

(a) A city that has trade routes with you
(b) A city with your state religion
© A city close to your empire

AND we choose not to run counter-espionage, it becomes cheaper for you to produce EP's than beakers.

If you take the cost shown on the tech screen (F6) and divide by your science multiplier (~1.25 for now since you likely have many libraries) and by the prereq/known tech bonuses(~1.20+0.03=1.23) you get a "Raw Cost" of the tech that you can compare to the "EP Cost" as shown in the screenshot above.

For our cooperation, we would ask only that you split the commerce savings evenly with us. That is, you would take the "Raw Cost" subtract the "EP Cost" and pay us half that value in gold on the turn after you successfully steal. This would be in your favour since it would ignore the gold multiplier you get from markets and the "free" EP's you get from courthouses. You get cheap tech, we get a little spending money, and nobody has to go to war! We have an NAP until t220 so we are perfect partners for co-operative espionage.

If we could come to an agreement, we might also be interested in paying you to switch our civics as the game progresses.

[B4ndit]

And one more interesting message from the DMOC:

Catwalk/Bandit,

Okay, I'm happy we have a long NAP. There should be no need for us to fight anyway. I was just talking to Yuufo and he informed me that he, in fact, has no plans to invade you. He said that he intends to play peacefully. He could be lying to us, but he's playing the turns in just one or two minutes. (...)

Meanwhile, SutOxy appear to be running away with the rest of the game. =( We noticed that they finished Alphabet, got The Parthenon, and a Great Scientist! Since they already have the Mausoleum of Maussolos, I fear that they will try to start a chain of consecutive Golden Ages (three, four?) that includes one from The Taj Mahal. With that in mind, we have a few things we'd like to discuss.

(1) How are your current relations with SutOxy? Do you have an NAP with them? (We have one lasting to turn 150, but we wouldn't be in any shape to attack them anyway.) We convinced SutOxy to agree to an imbalanced trade of happy-happy resources with them offering 3 extra gold per turn.

(2) We have a strong ally in the Yossarian/Caledorn team. They are also well aware of SutOxy's runaway position, so if you're willing to discuss with both of us, we can come up with a plan to stop or mitigate SutOxy.

(...)

(4) Finally, our tech plan shouldn't be much of a surprise. We are trying to get Civil Service quickly, and then beeline towards Guilds so that we can deploy cataphracts. Any technology plans for your empire?

I don't know how to handle it diplomatically. We hap NAP with suttree with non disclosure agreement. I should just answer DMOC something like "Sorry, we are unable to help you with SutOxy. Nevertheless we are also deeply worried about SutOxy's running away from the rest of us"?

[Catwalk]

I have no idea really Oh, the joys of playing a full diplo game again. I guess we have 3 options:
A) Lie outright to DMOC
B) Honestly say that we have a non-disclosure agreement with suttree and Oxy
C) Make a vague statement
D) Ask suttree and Oxy how they view the non-disclosure agreement

All 3 are acceptable options, in the sense that neither is poor sportsmanship. You could argue that B) isn't, as non-disclosure implies that we can't tell anyone about the non-disclosure :P D) might be interesting, as it would light a fire under suttree's feet. We could also do so without telling them any specifics. Sticky situation indeed... I'll post more on it later today.

For that matter, let's ask any lurkers who happen to be around. What's common protocol in diplo games on how to treat non-disclosure agreements?