lots of people said:
there is no reason to be meek.
My dear fellow councilors!
Let me remind you that going to war isn't just a logical decision, it's also an emotional one.
I can tell you first hand that discussions of who to attack don't just flow from power scores, proximity, and long-term strategy. Although all those things are very important… it much easier to attack someone who is ticking you off than someone that is being nice to you.
In the first MTDG, team MIA almost went to war with the Dnuts because we perceived them as rude, uncooperative, and (most dramatically) because we had reason to believe they broke a treaty with us. Now, in our case, logic prevailed and we went after our much more strategic target (the much closer and bigger threat) team KISS. However, KISS has also done plenty of things to tick us off. If KISS has been flattering us with more pretty words… it's hard to say. People can get pretty worked up over small diplomatic things, and conversely, it's very hard to attack a team that you genuinely like.
We can't change the strategic considerations that BABE is debating… but we can try to make them like us. If they like us, we may pick up an ally or two on their team that will go to bat for us in their forums, and advocate attacking someone other than us.
It's a small chance, but if we do anything that can even remotely be considered as rude, we're just making it easier for them to attack us.
We don't need to be weak sounding – that'd be a terrible mistake. But I think we can convey strength and friendship at the same time. A good step here would be to just mention that we know they're looking for someone to kill, but we're confident it won't be us! Just letting them know that we expect an attack is a good deterrent, I think.
Therefore, I suggest that we send a letter brimming with friendship, acknowledging that they're on the lookout for a target, and dangling the possibility of access to our knowledge…
We then follow up with an article in the RoundTable announcing that we're in the Middle Ages, and hope that fear of our MDI combined with our friendly attitude will persuade BABE to go look elsewhere for their conquests.
Here's my proposal:
Dear Alessandra (and all Babes)!
What a pleasure to meet you! We welcome you to the coasts of The Council.
We hope we can build a peaceful and profitable relationship with you. Of course, we recognize that there is iron behind the smiling faces of your lovely ambassadors, and we fully expect the mighty armies of the BABES to march forth in due time. Therefore, it obviously becomes us to see if we can make ourselves a less appealing target and more appealing friend.
In addition to our military builds, which we hope you won't take as a personal affront, we'd like to explore options for peace.
You currently don't have any knowledge we lack, but would you be interested in purchasing some of our tech at a discount? For example, Mathematics for 120 gold?
We're open to any suggestion if the idea of trading gold for tech appeals to you at all?
Let us know.
All the best,
General_W, speaking with the voice of The Council
Obviously, the proposal for math isn't that great of a deal (240 beakers for math at monopoly costs) but I'm just trying to sound them out.
Feedback?