Note sent to Epsilon. I tried to keep it light and sweet, so they would be less likely to suspect a :backstab:

Greetings!

Things are going well here in Piffle-land. I was welcomed as a hero. A parade was held in my honor, but the streets were strangely empty! Creepy, it was. I could hear crickets chirping on the breeze.

So decided to get right down to business, poring over the histories that were recorded over the years. It has taken a real effort to get through it all, but I am now well-briefed in all the affairs of Piffle. It's a fascinating country - you should really visit sometime! It'll be just like the old times. All you need to do is ask. There's no need to skulk around in the shadows, all cloak-and-dagger like. So I have to insist that your agent leave Brilliant! and exit our borders. Having her snooping around does not foster an atmosphere of trust, as you'd surely agree if the situation were reversed!

You'll see that our cartographic expedition is outside of Port Tropi *cough* I mean, Port Freedom. Our intention is to sail through, and continue mapping the oceans on the other side of the continent. If you are worried that those troops are bound for Innovia, your worries are unfounded. When Innovia saw us drawing near they laughed at our backwards uniforms. Can you even imagine? Why, we've got the best uniforms the world has ever seen!

If there's anything we can do for you, please let us know. But it seems that the mighty Epsilonian army has Innovia pretty well under heel.

We'll have Democracy soon, and are willing to trade. We can't trade on Artillery, due to restrictions built into the agreement through which we got it. You understand, I'm sure.

All the Best,
Your Ally,
Peter the Piffle

I don't expect them to want Democracy, so we'll see what happens. I'd really like us to get Combustion from them :evil:

Response from General_W:

Dear Peter of Piffle,

The Leader, may he live forever, sends you his warm regards and wishes
you well in your new post as leader of the Piffles.

Now – as for your letter – The Leader bids me respond to you thusly:

1) Our Alleged Spy
We know not of which you speak? These aren't the droids you're
looking for? Any spies that we never sent have recently left and are
no longer never there. Hopefully that clears things up.

2) Cartographic Rapid Action Photo Expedition
We're afraid the Leader is going to have to deny any
Piffle vessels access to our canal cities. However, since you seem to
be interested in exploring – we ARE willing to offer a map trade. This
will accomplish your stated goals much more quickly and efficiently
and won't tempt actions that would be unfortunate for either of our
peoples.

3) Anything Piffle can do for Epsilon?
Two things actually :)
A) Our last agreement with you stipulated a trade of Democracy for
Electricity. (per letter from Killercane 2/27/08). We sent Electricity
immediately back then, but we have yet to receive Democracy from you.
We'd appreciate that knowledge of how to make people feel like they
have a say in what The Leader does.
B) Due to heightened tensions in the Golden Halls, mostly in response
to the recent coup in Piffle, we'd like to humbly request that you not
send any ships within unit-landing distance of our coastline. (If this
line is unclear, we're willing to draw a map for you). Not only will
keeping your ships a safe distance from our coast help reduce tension
during this transition time- it will also ensure there are no
unfortunate "sinking of the whole fleet" incidents sparked by
over-zealous Epsilonian naval commanders. :thumbsup:



The Leader, may he live forever, is looking forward to a long and
continued prosperous relationship with Piffle. After the conquest of
Innovia is completed, we will be gifting you innovian cities, as
promised, and then we'll proceed to help you dispose of Aloha… unless
as the new leader over there you manage to handle that yourself in the
coming years? :D

All the Best,
Your Allies,
General_W, Servant of the Leader, Epsilon Team!

:hmm: looks like we have to respond to the map trade bit - is there any reason not to?

Also, I think we should stipulate that if we aren't bringing troop carriers near them, then they also can't bring troop carriers near us. Fair is fair, right?

We'll see if the spy has left. They probably think that I simply 'remembered' the spy from when I was a naive Epsilonian Scion.

I'll review the letter mentioning the trade for Democracy, but if that checks out, I think we'll be bound to send it.

That bit about the Innovian cities is curious - how should we handle that?? :dubious:

OKay, after some digging, I found the part that G_W was referring to:
here was a proposal to send you Democracy in exchange for Electricity. The only hold up is the presence of spies in this world of ours, and as a caveat we would ask that no spies enter our lands as that will be viewed as an unfriendly act.

Please bear with us as there is not much activity on the forum. If you would like to go ahead with that deal just let us know when you need Democracy!

The way I read that, Democracy is dependent on their abstaining from spying on us. So how on earth do we enforce that??


Dear General_W, Eternal Slavant of The Leader:

Thanks for writing back so promptly :) I'm glad we didn't receive 2 weeks of silence - that would certainly have been a cause for suspicion!

Regarding the Spy, and Democracy:
Democracy is still a couple of turns away, but we'll send that along in a belated exchange for Electricity as long as we can come to an understanding about the other part of Killercane's note:
There was a proposal to send you Democracy in exchange for Electricity. The only hold up is the presence of spies in this world of ours, and as a caveat we would ask that no spies enter our lands as that will be viewed as an unfriendly act.
We really have no problem with the Democracy trade, as you were honorable with the gift of Electricity. But then there was that matter of the spy remaining in our borders.
How do we move forward with a guarantee that the spy won't return? There's no way Piffle can release Democracy to you with the possibility that the Spy may return in the future: we obviously wouldn't be able to rescind the Democracy / Electricity trade. Any ideas?

Regarding the Cartographic Rapid Exposure Photographic Expedition:
A map trade would suffice. We'll propose it on our turn. Thanks :thumbsup:

Regarding the proposed Troop Transport Zone of Exclusion:
A fair idea, as long as it's entered into bilaterally. We cannot abide by a rule our ally does not hold himself to ;) As long as we're both playing by the same rules, that will be no problem. But how to deal with this once we share cities on the same landmass? That will take a little wording - or a little trust. It seems like that's been missing between us lately. Perhaps my ascendance here can change that? :dunno:

We were also hoping to get an update on your tech plans. We're caught between going for Combustion or Flight. The advances in military lately have forced us to halt our fight against Aloha, so getting a little further in tech before resuming War seems smart. Are you heading for Plastics? We sure could use Tanks! :spear:

All the Best,
Peter the Piffle

Sent 5/10/08

The way I read that, Democracy is dependent on their abstaining from spying on us. So how on earth do we enforce that??Well, I certainly haven't dug back through the thread as you have ... but, I don't recall the Democracy deal being contingent on no spying. :dunno: To be honest, I think we owe them Democracy.

The first quote in my post just above is from Killercane, in a message sent to Epsilon. We'll see what they write back - I'm not of the opinion that we should withhold the tech from them. I just want to keep them from snooping around and discovering our end-game plan!

I don't know ... maybe it is just me ... But I would think the more we harp on not spying, the more suspicious / curious they would be. And thus the more likely they are to spy. Now I don't want you to divulge any "for Epsilon eyes only" secrets that you may have in your possession. But you obviously know these folks better than I do, so it absolutely needs to be your call.

Good point, Conroe. Why should we be so keen to keep their spy out if we don't have anything to hide? :hmm:

Now that the spy has been in the territory for a full turn after we were given an assurance that she was never there, we are forced to either ignore her, or deal with it at some point.

If we ignore her, and she starts walking, I'll have to keep close tabs on where she is so that I can switch Hamburger's production before she has a chance to investigate it. I was thinking about pillaging the roads between Brilliant! and our core, but that's likely to hurt us more than it's worth.

If we ignore her, we also lull Epsilon! into a feeling of security - that they've pulled a fast one on us. We could rename certain units (an old trick of mine ;)) to let them know that we see here. e.g. a worker could be called 'Memphus' Mom', a GS could be renamed to 'Spy Catcher'.

When it comes down to it, there really is nothing we can do about the spy. We can't deport her, and she's basically free to walk all over our lands for as long as we have Open Borders. If we close down the Open Borders, their Frigates won't be able to track our troops as easily. Many of them have Sentry, but at least we can keep the troops inland a bit.

So perhaps, in the end, the best thing to do is to leave the spy issue alone, and 'pretend' that it's been dealt with.

Message from Epsilon:
Dear Peter of Piffle,

Thanks for your quick response!

1) Eye Spy
The Leader, in his infinite wisdom, has agreed to provide you a
screenshot of Brilliant showing that our spy has, in fact withdrawn.
In addition, we'll remind you that you can use the Defense Screen as a
work-around to check that there are no Epsilon spies in your
territory. We will honor the no-spy amendment to the
Democracy-Electricity deal, and look forward to receiving this
knowledge from you when you get it.

2) It's a Map Wrap
We look forward to accepting the proposed map trade

3) No Sail Zones
We agree it's only fair that this works both ways. Our ships will stay
a safe distance from your coast, and we will not make use of any of
your canal cities.

4) Sharing a Landmass
Perhaps you're overlooking the fact that we already share a landmass? :lol:
Our plan is to gift you cities on the far east of the Innovian
Landmass. This will give us some degree of separation. From there, I
guess it's just a matter of "trust, but verify" for both sides.

5) Tech Plans
We would suggest that you go for Flight next. Our plans take us down
the Combustion -> Plastics path next.

How's all that sound?

Hope you are getting fully settled into the Piffle Palace.
Accompanying this letter, please find a band of musical performers,
from The Leader's own private slave collection. We hope you enjoy them
as they provide much needed diversion from the rigors of managing the
affairs of State.
The
Leader's Wonder Performers (http://youtube.com/watch?v=eBGIQ7ZuuiU&feature=related)


All the Best,
General_W
Servant of The Leader
Epsilon Team!


This screenshot was attached with the save:
http://xs227.xs.to/xs227/08203/civ4screenshot0007734.jpg.xs.jpg (http://xs.to/xs.php?h=xs227&d=08203&f=civ4screenshot0007734.jpg)

So I guess they may honor the agreement! :dunno:

Okay, response time:
1725 To Piffle.

Interesting drop in Piffle Power yet at the same Times Aloha's increased....troop swap? i wonder what is a brewing.... :mischief:

I think we should follow up on their point #4 from the letter above.

Proposed letter:
Hello Epsilon!
I'd love to thank you for the gift of the The Leader's Wonder Performers (http://youtube.com/watch?v=eBGIQ7ZuuiU&feature=related), but I can't. You see, as soon as the palace guards saw the performance, they promptly went AWOL. We suspect they defected to the nasty Alohans to the north, but we haven't been able to confirm this. Have you seen them, by any chance?

No, no, our honorable soldiers would never willingly abandon us. They were part of a reparations package that Aloha and we had been [oh so slowly] working out over the past several months :lol:. The slow pace of this game, and the change in leadership, has made certain aspects of diplomacy turn the consistency of year-old oatmeal :rolleyes:.

We noticed that you took Glassport. Congratulations! Is this one of the 'cities on the far east of the Innovian Landmass' that is slated for eventual Pifflenatrian administration? We have units in the area (3 cavalry) that can assist with any change in ownership. Please let us know before the next save comes around so we can better prepare :)

All the best,
Peter the Piffle

Thoughts? I'd really like to send this out in a day or two.

EDIT: sent June 4.

Thoughts? I'd really like to send this out in a day or two.Reparations, eh? An excellent response! :thumbsup: :thumbsup: I say send it!

Response from Epsilon:
All Hail Piffle ! ~

As mentioend we see that your troops have shown up to take the glory for the destruction of the Innovian force. As history proves The English are know for this. But fret not, the hard work the leader has put in completing all of his promises to Piffle, will continue forward!

Changing gears slighty, has new interest of a second advance on Aloha comes up in the halls of the English. I only ask as I am sure our 6 cavalry and 3 galleons are very tired and if there is no plans of an upcommign attack (once which Epsilon would have your back) then perhaps it is time for Piffle to keep their end of the bargain and return the troops? If not, that you feel the soldiers have become accoustomed to the enlgishes ways then we at epsilon understand and are sure we can come to some other sort of agreement.

Back to the Innovian War! Yes we have captured Glassport, and that leaves Innovia with only 4 cities left, 1 of which will fall next turn. Glassport is on the cities that will be transfered to your control! Along with the one other of your choosing. Finally there is also the city to the North of your Cavarly. (weaverville) Our advance is going the other direction and we lack the troops to capture the city. Our spy tells us currently it is unoccupied, but Innovia is known to use the draft, and as mentioend we only have 1 unit left in glassport for MP not enough to advace. Please see the attached picture our spy managed to sneak out of there if it helps make up your mind to attack.

Glassport & the other city of your choosing will be gifted to you upon the succesful wipe of Innovia. The only reason the leaders asks this is Glassport was the recent site of a strategic military "culture" bomb, one whiich now hold great military signifigance to the succesful campaign. If we were to gift it now the influence to the West of it would be lost and could allow potential Innovian rebels to catch us by surprise.

We are always open to new technology deals as it seems that Piffle engine is reving quite high!

Memphus on Belhalf of the Leader.

I think this pretty much seals the deal: We should attack Innovia now. I was really hoping to get somebody else's opinion on this first, but it seems like we've already discussed it a few weeks ago.

Proposed Repsonse:

Greetings, Espilon!

We have much to discuss, so I will try to stay focused here. Thank you very much for the intel on Weaverville. As it happened, we were planning on declaring war soon anyway - but your timely intel allowed us to take advantage of this wonderful opportunity :) We expect to take the town next turn, unless they had units far outside the borders that we couldn't see. But would they really be that clever? :smug:

We declined your offer of Silks, as we have no need at all of such things. We are close to our health cap in a few cities, but happiness we have tons of, now that we are no longer at war with Aloha. Speaking of which, the Cavalry and Galleons are still of use to us, now that we've opened up more against Innovia. If their families are getting anxious, perhaps there's some other method of compensation that could be arranged?

We understand your concerns about Glassport, and think your decision to be a wise one. ;) Once Weaverville is dealt with, Glassport should fall into place, no?

Regarding Aloha, you bring up one of the things that kept a reparations deal from passing along smoothly. In fact, we were in no rush to hammer things out because we had been hoping to get a tech edge: Helicopters. It is still our desire to make this happen, but we need to develop some of our infrastructure a little more before going back to a full-time war footing. Some factories are due to complete soon, and at that point they should be able to get back to military production. We'll keep you updated, especially as we get close to assembling a landing force. Would you consider declaring war on Aloha at the same time? It could prove to be quite beneficial for us!

All the best,
Peter the Piffle


Is that too over the top?? :dunno:

What are Epsilon's troop concentrations in Aloha?

Unknown. We'd have to get line-of-sight into Aloha's land, or ask them to tell us. But I'm hoping that they have landed a significant force - all the better for us to hopefully take out one or two of their towns!

Proposed Blackmail letter to Epsilon:


Subject: A Message from Dr. Strangelove

Greetings, slaves of The Leader!

Your messenger was welcomed with all the fanfare due a diplomatic mission of such gravity. Fear not for his safety, though there be three wars raging in the world these days: We will keep him here, safe and sound, until your next messenger arrives with a response to this letter. :)

Your offer of technology trade appears generous, but upon close analysis our advisers pointed out that the strategic balance will shift too much against us for our safety and security. We therefore would require that you teach us the knowledge of Industrialism, Combustion and Radio. Fission can not be part of the deal - those pesky IAEA inspectors are everywhere these days!

Without knowing which city is building the UN, there is no way that we can assure you that a mis-fired missile won't hit it. Our targeting technology is, sadly, not nearly as sophisticated as it might be were we to have a complete understanding of all the technology you currently have. Until that happens, there can be no assurances against wayward ICBMs.

You had also asked for an update on our situation with Aloha. As I'm sure you understand from talking with them, they are an inscrutable nation. We are so thoroughly fed up with their antics that we use their capital's coordinates for targeting exercises. Say the word, and we'll "light one off", as they say :evil:


EDIT: Sent 7/7/08!

I love the last two paragraphs. I think it does a wonderful job of making us look unstable :evil:

I like it! Detailed, yet surprisingly vague ... :thumbsup: :thumbsup:

Its a good letter Pete. Lets nuke em!

Letter has been sent to Epsilon's gmail ;)

With the save, Epsilon sends a short note:

General has a letter coming

.......

It's been a couple days, and still no letter from G_W. So I reply:

Where's that letter? Any idea what the synopsis is?

Message in from Epsilon:
Hey Guys ~

Memphus here. General is MIA...not good. So I Guess Ill write it. We just discovered plastics this turn,.. so we can now send over industrialism please ask for it :). We understand you can't send over Fission. We also understand thast a nuke may go "astray"... That said based on the one we can see in Brilliant (naval ships have good binauculars) and the vast amount of gold you have spent I would guess that you have 3-4 of them. That said I am sure aloha is in for a surprise!!

Innovia is almsot dead, 2 more turns and the only city left is the one by your cavalry. Can they capture it? Our Spies indicate they will have another unit ready in 2 turns.

As for The location of the UN it is being built in Mighty Bulwark. Any Stray Nuke that lands in that vicinity would definetly stall progress as all the anti nuclear protesters would show up... (not to mention working in fallout wouldn't be too pleasant)

Looking forward to continuing to work together

Memphus

Well, the save has been played and sent, but we didn't ask for Industrialism or anything. They balked at our demand for Combustion and Radio...

I think we need to be firm here:

Greetings, Slaves of The Leader!

Perhaps our message to you became garbled in the translation. We cannot guarantee our missile's accuracy until we have knowledge of Combustion, Radio, and Industrialism. One of those alone isn't good enough.

All the Best,
Peter the Piffle


Thoughts?

Whoops! I never went back and sent that letter :blush:

Here's the letter I just sent to them:

Whoops! You didn't send us the techs we needed. But you have our assurance that when the UN vote comes around, we will vote for you. Epsilon's Diplomacy wrapped this game up for them a long time ago.

We have proposed a trade in game to straighten this all out. Just accept it so we can get this game over with :)

Best,
Peter the Piffle

I don't think they went for the trade:


it's on. Like Donkey Kong.

:lol:

Response sent to Epsilon:

:lol:

One of the guys I went to high school with is a Donkey Kong maniac, actually. He was in that movie about those DK guys.

We've decided to give you another chance at peace. If you fail to accept it, be prepared for more brimstone :p

-Piffle

A message to me from General_W, Slave of The Leader:


Hey Peter,

Hope your week is off to a good start!
I don't know if you've seen the turn-tracker thread or not, but it looks like the Civ4 Game is over.
Victory for The Leader!
(come on - some part of you must still be happy about that ;-) )

Great game! Thanks for taking over for Piffle, you saved the game.
However... your name *has* been etched in infamy as the worst traitor The Leader has ever known... and the greatest butcher of Epsilon citizens... but ah well ;-)

If I can get Piffle's password - I need to advance the save one more round so that I can get some closing shots I need for my final video. I've also e-mailed Robbo asking for Aloha's password.

Do you mind letting me have the password?

Thanks!
And again - great game :-)

- Josh
Servant of The Leader
Epsilon Team!

Is this a trick? Asking for our password?? :hmm:

j/k :)