Team Saber Embassy

[peter grimes]

Now we come clean with FREE, and figure out a way to use SABER to both of our advantages.

How? I don't know. How do you put three scientific teams to work on the same goal? Maybe it doesn't make sense.

The alternative: delay a little bit, saying that we're looking to weigh all of our options here, and don't want to get tied into something at this early stage.

 

[General_W]

Reposted for reference:
Letter from Saber:

Spoiler :

Dear Council,

We're very pleased to hear from you this soon. I must admit that it's quite an achievement to reach a consensus on an important issue like this in a matter of hours. I hope that our team can respond at the same pace when you need something.

We agree to the deal you suggested. Our turn player has sent our offer of Warrior Code and the Wheel.

Perhaps it is also time to plan some of our research to avoid doing double research. We think that our main goal at the moment is the Republic, but after that we will need to get all required ancient techs. This can be done very effectively if we're working together.

Yours Sincerely,

Dutchfire
Team Saber

Also – as an FYI – I had a short chat with Dutchfire today, not worth reposting it here. Bottom line is I told him it might take a while to get an answer on the coordinate to Republic thing, and he seemed ok with that. Said they were still discussing details on their forum also.

I agree that we can't do much till we hear from FREE, but at some point, I still think we need to come clean with Saber if we want to have a chance at a good relationship.
It'll be a little fishy coming clean now, but our last letter was vague enough, that as long as we pretty much give them the truth in our next letter, we can probably get away without a reputation hit.

Course, maybe FREE has had second thoughts – and now we can just jump ship to Saber! I hope FREE is just slow, but it's nice to have options anyway.

 

[zyxy]

An alternative would be to tell them we're afraid of giving them lit and republic pre-requisites because we need to get mechanized infantry before Chamnix gets sipahis.

SABER is moving fast! They have sent the techs in-game, so we will have to decide what to do.

This may not be the right thread to discuss it, but we really need an answer from FREE before the game gets back to us. I think we need to make it clear to them that they need to get off their lazy behinds and do something. So I would send FREE a letter with the following ingredients (nicely phrased of course, but with a sense of urgency):

Concerning the immediate trade with SABER:
1) SABER is moving faster than we expected and has offered the small trade deal (WC+WH for IW+CB) in-game, without our explicit consent, but they could have misunderstood our delay tactics. Next turn we have to accept or decline it.
2) We are inclined to accept and will share the techs freely with FREE, free of charge.
3) We need an answer from FREE concerning this deal before the turn gets back to us. We will not ask for an extension, it will look too suspicious. (Chamnix asked for an extension last turn and has been playing slow for a couple of turns, so everybody will know we've met.) If we don't get an answer, we will decide as we think best.
4) We haven't really committed to anything, but of course SABER will not like a rebuttal. If FREE refuses, but at the same time signs our treaty, then we will go along, but we will be forced to explain to SABER why we refuse. (Read: we want FREE to commit to the treaty before we get into trouble with SABER, and even then we are not going to take the blame alone.)

Concerning the longer run:
5) For the moment we are acting as if the MAAP treaty has been signed and agreed, but of course it has not been signed by FREE. In the meantime, SABER is proposing a more encompassing research deal now. Here too, we have reached a decision point.
6) We want to know FREE's decision on our treaty within X days (X=3 maybe). Otherwise we will have to conclude they are not interested and we feel free to ignore the treaty and do as we please.
7) We also need to know FREE's position on further cooperation with SABER.

 

[Paul#42]

In the current deal, we could be bold and decline, replying we are missing the initially offered gold...

This is rather hard to interpret for them (and for us how they would react)... quite a gamble.

However if they raise their offer, we won not only time but gold also...

 

[donsig]

We already told SABER we don't want gold so we shouldn't use that as an excuse for declining the trade.

I think that if we give FREE a heads up on the deal, give them a reasonable amount of time to reply and then don't hear from them we make our own decision. I wouldn't give FREE a deadline but would tell them that if we don't hear from them by the time we have to play our turn that we'll assume they don't want to veto the deal.

Looking towards the future, perhaps we should loosen up a little and deal with SABER. They are scientific and will also get a free MA tech. Perhaps FREE would not mind being part of a three way deal wherein we all share the free tech we get. It's kind of a gamble since we may not all get different free techs.

 

[General_W]

We already told SABER we don't want gold so we shouldn't use that as an excuse for declining the trade.

I think that if we give FREE a heads up on the deal, give them a reasonable amount of time to reply and then don't hear from them we make our own decision.

- now that we've sent FREE 2 notes, I feel like we've done even more than can be expected in absense of a signed treaty.
We're free to do what we want if FREE doesn't get back to us... ie, sign the deal with Saber.

Looking towards the future, perhaps we should loosen up a little and deal with SABER. They are scientific and will also get a free MA tech.

This idea still makes me a little queasy.
If FREE goes crazy on us… then, yeah. An alliance with Saber is better than nothing!

However, if we help Saber do well, especially going into the Middle Ages and in the run-up to them getting Sipahi, sure, we'll probably avoid being their target – but then we're going to find ourselves allied with someone that controls 2 or 3 continents and that there's no way we're going to be able to beat.
They're scientific like us, and we may have a more productive core thanks to our commercial trait, but they'll use their industrious trait to rapidly make vast specialist farms, and leave us in their dust.
I would REALLY rather not have to face Saber as our main opponent… and if we want to avoid that, we need to do what we can to make sure they don't have any easy targets for their Sipahi. The LAST thing we want to do is help them get to Military Tradition ahead of everyone else.

I feel pretty strongly that Saber should only be a fall-back plan for us, and/or a VERY Jr. research partner at most.

 

[AutomatedTeller]

I think the deal with SABER is reasonable and benefits both us and FREE. I think we should do it, since we have to move the game forward.

 

[tomasjj]

I don't think FREE will have major objections to this deal with SABER.
If they do, they sould have spoken up sooner, and if they use it as a poor excuse to cancel the treaty, it just goes to show that they were not comitted, and thus not the partner we thought.

Not that I think this is the case though...

 

[sirdanilot]

In my opinion you should accept the deal without the consent of free, and accept it as soon as possible. We are not yet obliged to hold up this deal, and it is their own fault they did not respond quickly. If they didn't like our deal with saber, bad luck for them.
Accept the deal with saber, and do it now.

 

[Niklas]

I agree with all previous speakers. I can't for the world see a reason why FREE would object to this deal, and if they do they should have said so.

 

[zyxy]

Obviously, those sipahi's are completely useless if we just block our shores with units...

That goes for all the UU's btw. There will probably not be any fighting until marines, or it will be in the very early Middle Ages, before everyone can block their shorelines.

 

[donsig]

Obviously, those sipahi's are completely useless if we just block our shores with units...

That goes for all the UU's btw. There will probably not be any fighting until marines, or it will be in the very early Middle Ages, before everyone can block their shorelines.

Can we afford that many units? It is an interesting concept though. Also, unless SABER gets the GLH it will be difficult for them to mount an invasion without astronomy. We really need to determine whether we should be afraid of SABER in the middle ages or later (or both). It is fear of what they will be able to do later that we are basing our trade posture on. Though I think low participation on team FREE is good for us - I think they will be more inclined to work with us which will mitigate our need for a back-up partner.

 

[Paul#42]

Can we afford that many units?

How long is England's coast? - Just count the tiles!
I just "measured" the tiles we'd have to cover: approach. 75. We can subtract our coastal towns (now 3, planned 13). That makes it 62 units.

That's the amount of H'watchas that could stop an invasion of some 20 veteran units. I guess any invasion in multiplayer game would be executed with some more units, so blocking should be cheapest, especially we would not necessarily need to have 62 H'watchas.

 

[peter grimes]

This is getting off topic here, but I'll contribute anyway

We aren't solely reliant of military units to occupy the shore tiles. Workers do just as well. Plus, we'll have LOS warning where the ships are coming from, which means that unless they are coming from all sides at once, we don't even need to have every single tile covered: just enough tiles on either side of where their ships are able to move.

Imagine the frustration at not being able to land you mighty mighty Sipahis because there are a handful of workers 'improving' the shore

But back to the topic at hand: The trade with Saber shouldn't ruffle feathers with Free. I mean, we've bent over backwards to keep them informed here, and they've failed to even respond once. I understand they're having problems with participation, but it really doesn't take much time to write a quick email:
Thanks for keeping us informed, but we don't have an answer for you yet...

 

[dl123654]

This is getting off topic here, but I'll contribute anyway

We aren't solely reliant of military units to occupy the shore tiles. Workers do just as well. Plus, we'll have LOS warning where the ships are coming from, which means that unless they are coming from all sides at once, we don't even need to have every single tile covered: just enough tiles on either side of where their ships are able to move.

Imagine the frustration at not being able to land you mighty mighty Sipahis because there are a handful of workers 'improving' the shore

But back to the topic at hand: The trade with Saber shouldn't ruffle feathers with Free. I mean, we've bent over backwards to keep them informed here, and they've failed to even respond once. I understand they're having problems with participation, but it really doesn't take much time to write a quick email:
Thanks for keeping us informed, but we don't have an answer for you yet...

Workers (non combat units) can't block in conquests

 

[peter grimes]

Woops! I didn't know that!

Well, we still don't need a single military unit for each tile. I'd think that around 24 to 30 would be sufficient for budgeting purposes.

 

[AutomatedTeller]

We would actually only be safe until bombers and perhaps carriers - but by then, we should be ahead of most of our opponents

 

[General_W]

We would actually only be safe until bombers and perhaps carriers - but by then, we should be ahead of most of our opponents

Oh yes... they laughed at our choice of Korea in the beginning... no one is laughing now!!
Things are looking pretty good for us. This is pretty much an ideal map for Korea.

 

[Aigburth]

Oh yes... they laughed at our choice of Korea in the beginning... no one is laughing now!!
Things are looking pretty good for us. This is pretty much an ideal map for Korea.

Yeah I am really happy about our civ choice!

Vikings would have been a good choice for a warmongoring team though no-one could have forseen that, essentially you would would have marines at the time of invention! I think most people thought this was going to be a pangea map.

Regarding coast blocking, once navigation or magnetism is researched an attack could come from any direction, are galleons 4 move? If so then they could come out of the fog and land troops in a single turn implying that to be 100% safe we would need to cover every tile. Maybe we could ICS our coast reducing the number of units required to cover, the increased unit support would also help. This discussion should really be in a dedicated military thread but I guess we don't really have much of a need for one just yet.

 

[Aigburth]

Back on topic Shall we just not send any reply to SABER for a while? They would have started their next research project (COL?) so there wont be the same kind of urgency, lets wait until they send us a chaser!