Being offered gold in exchange of accepting AI embassy

Hi,

Been away for a while since having watched some experienced players video about BNW and practicing.

BTW, watching videos help a great deal.

Don't know what the reasons are, very inclined towards cultural victory. Even though knowingly almost 4 competing civs are ahead of me on the cultural side of things, still want to go for the cultural victory.

I am in early game right now. And after meeting Byzantine, Inca and Egypt, they all offered 1 gold/turn for 25 turns in exchange of my accepting their embassies. I have accepted them, what could be the downside of it?

You don'tget to see their embassy. Research writing at once and then payback the embassy, 1 gpt for 25 turns.

Selling off your embassy is almost giving something for nothing. In most cases, the 30 total gold you get from selling your embassy won't make a difference. So it's usually better to wait until you can exchange embassies (or just refrain altogether).

If you're playing on a difficulty where the AI takes time to get money and connect resources, you can sell it if you want the gold. Then you can just grab their embassy whenever you have a luxury/strategic resource and they have less than 7/2 gpt to offer. However, I've found that embassies acquired in this way (compound trade) can lead to bugs later on.

The AI doesn't actually know where you are from the start, so if their scouts have not discovered your lands yet, it's obviously pretty difficult for them to attack you. Selling an embassy immediately shows the AI where your capital is, so you forfeit this advantage. As a result, selling an embassy to peaceful or distant civs is usually fine, but selling one to a nearby warmonger that hasn't discovered your capital is probably a bad idea.

1 GPT (sometimes a bit more if you have a DoF) can actually make a difference that early in the game, especially if you sell multiple embassies. I teach finance at a university, so I strongly believe that trading 1 GPT now (selling embassy) for 1 GPT in the future (buying embassy) is a good idea. Selling 4 embassies is 120 gold over 30 turns, which is too much gold to ignore that early on in the game.

There are some AIs you don't want to give your embassy to, but once you've seen their scout next to your capital, it's irrelevant anyway.

Most of the time I sell embassies except to Ashurbanipal, Oda, Monty, Attila, Shaka, and a few others.

Scouting and seeing ai capitals won't have you needing to pay for an embassy. You could also scout out the capitals to save embassy gold. Either way though, everyone's capital usually appears around the world congress era. Way after embassies, but you have to zoom in to the cities to see their names.

The AI will know what wonders you build in your capital if you exhange embassies.
So you don't want to exchange embassys with the AIs and prevent them to see your capital if possible.

GenuineRisk said:

Selling 4 embassies is 120 gold over 30 turns, which is too much gold to ignore that early on in the game.

Click to expand...

That is not half an archer though, and it seems to open up too many possibilities for forward-settling. So even if it works well enough 9/10 games, you have the one game where the cost was much, much too high.

So I don't like selling embassies until I have my expos down -- and by then writing is just about up anyway.

But since lately people have been advocating this, I have started selling embassies for 45 gold lump sum when I have a DoF going. Now, I just scoffed at 120 over 30 turns, but the lump sum is just so much more tangible for me how it is working for me. Like people said, later gold is less valuable than early gold. So this gets me 45 gold early and I pay it back later for only 30 (1gpt for 30 turns). Very helpful early, and I don't miss it all later.

What about declaring friends? If I accept that, does it damage my relationships with others, if I go for a cultural victory I suppose that will not affect that much.

IMACIVFAN said:

What about declaring friends? If I accept that, does it damage my relationships with others, if I go for a cultural victory I suppose that will not affect that much.

Click to expand...

It will negetively affect relations with other civs that dislike or hate the civ that you made a DoF with. The inverse is true for civs that also like the civ you made the DoF with.

I tend to use a few criteria to judge who/when to sell embassies to.


Civs that have already scouted my cap i sell too.

If i am done expanding or know i cant get an expo stolen i will sell to non-warmongers.

if i am done expanding and have a standing army capable of fending off an attack i will sell to any civ.

i will sell to any civ at any time if i know they are too far away to cause me any trouble.

sure its not a huge amount of gold,but it might be enough for a few key unit upgrades,buying lux/resource tiles in 3rd ring,rush buying a critical building ect.

Phukit said:

sure its not a huge amount of gold, but it might be enough for a few key unit upgrades, buying lux/resource tiles in 3rd ring, rush buying a critical building etc.

Click to expand...

You have those all in the plural when, at best, it gets you half of one of them!

beetle said:

You have those all in the plural when, at best, it gets you half of one of them!

Click to expand...

if i have 280 gold then sell my embassies for 120 i can now rush buy say ....a library that i otherwise could not have.perhaps this allows me to get NC up and running sooner.

Clearly selling or not selling embassies is not going to break the game in one way or the other.

But then civ isnt about pushing game breaking edges now is it? its about stacking the small ones ,especially early for maximum effect.

would you rather be the first person to meet a city state or the 2nd?

exactly.



If you can put a little extra gold into your pocket for little to no risk especially at a time when gold can be hard to come by why wouldnt you?

Phukit said:

If you can put a little extra gold into your pocket for little to no risk especially at a time when gold can be hard to come by why wouldnt you?

Click to expand...

Civ is a game of opportunity costs. No decision is made in a vacuum. If accumulating that money means you have to pay it back out later, then it's not "free money." If accumulating that money means your city gets taken from you, it wasn't beneficial. I can offer counterarguments to these as well, but that's the point. It's a discussion. It's subjective. There's no right answer. Like even if you thought doing it was the right thing, if you had a map rich with gold, you might refrain and vice versa.

clearly,I agree.which is why i have a set criteria before i will sell an embassy.I have games where i never sell them.Though unless its for a CS quest i have never paid for an AI embassy.

And I am usually for the most part more inclined to sell my embassy than trade embassies.

its amazing how quickly the AIs will add their embassy to a 7gpt lux trade

It just sounded like bettle was dismissing it simply because it isnt " a lot" of gold but i could be wrong.

Phukit said:

if i have 280 gold then sell my embassies for 120 i can now rush buy say ....a library that i otherwise could not have.perhaps this allows me to get NC up and running sooner.

Click to expand...

That is 120 gold after 30 turns -- too long to wait on libraries.

Clearly selling or not selling embassies is not going to break the game in one way or the other.

Click to expand...

Agreed.

But then civ isnt about pushing game breaking edges now is it? its about stacking the small ones, especially early for maximum effect.

Click to expand...

I am not sure about that characterization. I mean, I think the things that have the largest impact are pretty obvious in hindsight. The little details that folks like to obsess over have only a little impact.

would you rather be the first person to meet a city state or the 2nd?

Click to expand...

Something with double the impact. Pretty much the opposite.

If you can put a little extra gold into your pocket for little to no risk especially at a time when gold can be hard to come by why wouldnt you?

Click to expand...

Because the cost can be high (forward settling) and the payoff minimal (15 gold, net, at best). Really attention could be much better spent.

beetle said:

That is 120 gold after 30 turns -- too long to wait on libraries.

Click to expand...

I dont expect to buy all the libraries,but buying the library in the last expo helps.

beetle said:

Agreed.

Click to expand...

beetle said:

I am not sure about that characterization. I mean, I think the things that have the largest impact are pretty obvious in hindsight. The little details that folks like to obsess over have only a little impact.

Click to expand...

but a series of well timed and executed little impacts can amount to great deal over time.

beetle said:

Something with double the impact. Pretty much the opposite.

Click to expand...

selling an embassy for 1gpt to a non threatening neighbour that has already scouted your cap when you only have 1gpt is double the impact.

beetle said:

Because the cost can be high (forward settling) and the payoff minimal (15 gold, net, at best). Really attention could be much better spent.

Click to expand...

im not sure why you feel the need to buy their embassies back from them when they are almost always happy to include them for free in lux trades
.And i clearly dont advocate blindly selling embassies to every and any civ

I supposed it all depends on what kind of game you are looking to play.
But if you are seriously trying to not just beat but conquer deity these little things will add up.

In the micromanagement thread you seem almost too keen on dismissing a gain of 220 hammers over the course of a game through micromanaging.

I think you tend to look at each area of the game as something seperate from the whole.

but over the course of a game when strategically used,those extra hammers,extra gold,extra food and saved worker turns add up.

how many times have you missed an important wonder by a few turns?

how many losses would have turned into victories had you hit a key tech just a few turns sooner? gotten that expo out a few turns earlier? gotten that lux hooked up sooner?

Phukit said:

I dont expect to buy all the libraries,but buying the library in the last expo helps.








but a series of well timed and executed little impacts can amount to great deal over time.




selling an embassy for 1gpt to a non threatening neighbour that has already scouted your cap when you only have 1gpt is double the impact.





im not sure why you feel the need to buy their embassies back from them when they are almost always happy to include them for free in lux trades
.And i clearly dont advocate blindly selling embassies to every and any civ

I supposed it all depends on what kind of game you are looking to play.
But if you are seriously trying to not just beat but conquer deity these little things will add up.

In the micromanagement thread you seem almost too keen on dismissing a gain of 220 hammers over the course of a game through micromanaging.

I think you tend to look at each area of the game as something seperate from the whole.

but over the course of a game when strategically used,those extra hammers,extra gold,extra food and saved worker turns add up.

how many times have you missed an important wonder by a few turns?

how many losses would have turned into victories had you hit a key tech just a few turns sooner? gotten that expo out a few turns earlier? gotten that lux hooked up sooner?

Click to expand...

Some wonders aren't even worth to build because Ai usually already has them or almost has them particularly when they have better technology. Machinery is usually a really important technology. If you don't have it nor its xbs then it could be difficult to protect yourself if you get attacked soon.

Phukit said:

im not sure why you feel the need to buy their embassies back from them when they are almost always happy to include them for free in lux trades

Click to expand...

Nuts, I had not thought of that! 30 gold is better the 15 gold I have been finagling!

it is important to note that you can sell your embassies all game long,its not a one shot deal.over the course of a game this a huge amount of gold