This is a big decision. If we have to spend too much then we can't upgrade our warriors to immortals (at least in the time frame we want).

Shoot, wish I saw this before making my other post on the poll -- glad to see you are accounting for this possibility.

We can go **NO MORE** than 240 total expenses. 40 for the emabassy leaves 200 for alliances *and* any other trades we want to make with other civs to give them some reason not to join in the war vs us. I proposed 1 gpt and <20 gold per trade, about 3 trades, reducing cash about 50 more.

So 100-200 for the alliance is all we could afford. If the people really want to push it at 250, might be able to stomach it. 300 or above I would veto, jump up and down, and scream about :D

General Charis

One thing to consider is that we have probably at least 5 or 6 turns before we see any significant numbers of enemy troops (assuming the Egyptians don't declare war on us)other than the Americans. It may even be more. We make 14 gpt, I think, which means we would have the money to upgrade one warrior every three turns. With this said, I think we can spend all but 160 gold on alliances, as we will be able to upgrade our six immortals before anyone reaches us. Obviously, the first four would have to be on the American border. If I were playing this game, I would probably spend every cent to get the Egyptians to ally against the Greeks and someone else, as this would provide much needed time to build actual immortals instead of warriors. I would also pop rush one unit in almost every city.

Something I would like to bounce off everyone before I vote is:

Egypt seems to be surrounded by Jungle & Mountains. If they have war chariots, they will not be able to pass. However, if they have horseback riding, the WCs upgrade & I'm not sure they can continue to build the WCs. This would imply that they could have horsemen to attack with. Even if they have horsemen, it would be slow going through the terrain.

Similar case for Rome, who looks like they'll have to suffer the same terrain setback.

I just wanted to help judge their usefulness. I'm not saying this is the main factor, just a factor.

chiefpaco right Egypt would be no help to us until it's too late . We should prepeare for a defensive war and not get them involved.

They've got horseback riding. No way to know how many horsemen they have though.

I feel we need to get Egypt if possible without compromising our immediate upgrades or Immortals. Egypt will provide a force equal to just about any other civ out there (except the US and Babs). At the very least Egypt will be able to take some of the pressure off us from the south.

2 vs. 5 is MUCH better than 1 vs. 6 (since I expect Egypt will be recruited next against us)

Falcon02 it would be 6 against 2 if Egypt joins us or 7 against 1 if Egypt Dominos.

(Babylon, Iroquois, Aztecs, America, Greece & Rome.)

Let's not forget other trades we might want to make with the other non-combatants.

donsig, your right, sorry about that, thought it was 5 when I wrote it, but I was wrong.

We could trade for tech and such from others, but the issue here is Alliances, and our Priority is Egypt since they're close and we actually know exactly where they are.

First, it's NOT 6 vs 2. Egypt does not fight the others.
It's 5 vs 1, and that only if Egypt stops Greece from coming after us.

Second, 5 vs 1, 6 vs 1... is that a big difference? The cash loss sure is!!

5 vs 1 with zero cash left in the bank, zero to two immortals, vs
6 vs 1 with over 400 cash, up to TEN immortals by the time attackers hit our door.

I mean really, isn't this a no-brainer NOT to spend gobs of cash on an alliance to keep back one foe? (EDIT- top two choices are close in the poll, but in reality, the votes are 77% to 23% to not spend more than needed to build at least 6 immortals quickly)

The time to ally was after the babs declared war on us, for a 100% improvement in the odds, not now for a 17% improvement.

General Charis

Once again General Charis is correct - if we buy Egypt as an ally it will be against only one of our enemies. We might get some sort of reverse Domino but there's no guarantees. No guarantees Egypt would do anything even if we ally.with them. There's also the possibility that Egypt (who may not even have horses for their UU) would just end up being absorbed by another country. Not that I would miss Cleo but we'd have to face whoever annexed Egypt.

General Charis is also right about retraining our warriors. However, I would go map shopping first. We picked up Abe's map for 7 gold. If we could get India's map for a round that price we should snap it up.