Aabra02: Hammy Builds a House

[gmaharriet]

Renegotiate peace is another thing I've never done (though I've read about Bede doing it). I think I understand what you're saying, but if you're talking about overseas AI...is it even possible to renegotiate the type of peace treaty that occurs automatically when you meet a new civ?

When you say, "buy it out", I presume you mean a gpt agreement for now (since we have no trade routes yet) and later it could be a resource or anything per turn from our side. In any event I'd need some advice on who against whom. We only have about 60g in the treasury...is 1 or 2gpt enough? We'd also need to buy an embassy if we ally with any other overseas civ other than China. With our Golden Age ending we might not have much to spare. CA2 shows -2gpt income when the GA ends (if all else remains the same).

Is this the type of agreement I should make with Abu when our alliance with Brennus ends? or do we want to ally with the Arabs at all?

Ya know, this game was originally proposed as a sort of "unofficial" advanced TDG for Aabra and me. This might be a great opportunity to learn this type of concept, but I'd need a lot of very detailed help first time doing it. You're helping a LOT right now with the broad idea, but the "who" and "when" and "why" you'd pick specific civs would be needed for me to fit the ideas in with what I already know about the game.

Edit: @Scout - Thank you for the answers to my earlier questions. It took me a VERY long time to write this post, and I didn't see yours before.

 

[ThinkTank]

lurker's comment:

@ gmahariet: I think your GA has already ended:

Turn 9/150 AD - whack a couple of Arab units...

IBT - most of the fighting is between Brennus and the Barbs...our Golden Age ends.

The treaties for war happiness / trashing reputations / decreasing science rate work like this. You find two distant opponents A and B. You declare on A. With B you make one trade with at least parts 1 and 2:

1. peacy treaty
2. alliance against A
3. whatever money is needed to make B accept this deal

I think Beorn meant "buying it out" to refer to part 3 of this deal. Now very likely B is going to make peace with A before the full 20 turns expire. This involves breaking the deal, so B trashes its rep. Moreover it involves canceling all parts of the deal, including the peace treaty, so in fact B now declares on you giving you war happiness.

Whenever B makes peace with A, it is likely that A will also talk to you. You use this to immediately talk to A and turn the tables, by making this deal with A:

1. peacy treaty
2. alliance against B
3. whatever money is needed to make A accept this deal

So A and B keep at war. If A bails out of this deal before the 20 turns they trash their rep, and you turn the tables again - and so on.

If A and B are on a far away continent you almost cannot loose from this, because even if they sit out the full 20 turns, at the very least it will kill the science rate there. And if they don't sit out the full 20 turns you will get additional war happiness, and have them trash their reps.

 

[gmaharriet]

lurker's comment:

@ gmahariet: I think your GA has already ended:

lurker's comment: Yes, it has, but the effects of its ending are not yet reflected. CA2 shows us as still being in our GA at "turn 0".

Thank you for the additional detail on HOW it works and I believe I understand that part. My question now for the team is...foment between which civs and WHY those specific ones (or does it even matter?), can we afford to do that with only 60g, and when (pre-flight? later? when we have more gold? other circumstances?).

The games in which I've read about this being done are generally Deity or Sid-level games. There is often much discussion before actually deciding who and why. I'm confused by the idea of just randomly starting a war with any overseas civ, especially if none of the others will ally for 1 or 2gpt.

 

[Aabraxan]

. . . . renegociate peace . . . . military alliance . . . . Huge reputation trashing, super decreased science rate.

I'm in the same boat w/ gma here. I understand the broad, general idea, but I'd like to know the specifics of who, whom and why. I've never pulled off anything this diplomatically complex in any of my games.

gma, if you do these deals, please be kind enough to post screenshots of the trade screens. That'd be a big help to me in understanding this.

 

[Beorn-eL-Feared]

Step 1: declare on civ #1, here: Russia.

Make sure you have an embassy with civ #2, here: Greece, before step 2.

Step 2: go in active deals, renegociate the peace treaty (yes I'm sure), include the alliance in the deal.

It is highly doubtful that it will be free of charge.

Step 3: the war goes on.

This war will end before 20 turns, this is a given or just about. When the war is over, you get a message that Greece has declared on you (!) since our peace was contingent on their war. After that, you rinse and repeat: Dial Russia (we are still at war with Russia) and buy someone else against Greece. Before long, permanent world war has erupted.

 

[gmaharriet]

gma, if you do these deals, please be kind enough to post screenshots of the trade screens. That'd be a big help to me in understanding this.

Notice the bolded if. Will do!

 

[gmaharriet]

Dial Russia (we are still at war with Russia) and buy someone else against Greece.

Aha! One of the missing puzzle pieces. Actually, 2 pieces as you've verified that you CAN renegotiate automatic "just met you" peace. Thank you!

Still perplexed about with which civs we do this and whether or not we have enough gpt to make an alliance AND embassies. Maybe a tech PLUS gold???

 

[Bede]

Aha! One of the missing puzzle pieces. Actually, 2 pieces as you've verified that you CAN renegotiate automatic "just met you" peace. Thank you!

Still perplexed about with which civs we do this and whether or not we have enough gpt to make an alliance AND embassies. Maybe a tech PLUS gold???

The key to making this work is not gpt it is cold hard cash.

 

[gmaharriet]

The key to making this work is not gpt it is cold hard cash.

Oh!!! Do I have it backwards then? Instead, we pay lump sum (or tech) up front and their end is per turn payment in the form of a 20-turn alliance? Not repaying us for 20 turns breaks their rep?

Still we need some amount of cash. We have 62g in the treasury. We already have an embassy with China. I looked up the cost of the other embassies in preflight. They are:

England - 96g
Portugal - 51g
Maya - 62g

 

[Beorn-eL-Feared]

Not repaying us for 20 turns breaks their rep?

Exactly, thus slowing down their buying capacity (in parallel to their war chest increase) and blowing their overall relations with the neighborhood.

 

[gmaharriet]

Preflight - 170ad - Turn 0

Move lux slider up to 20% in anticipation of GA ending.

IBT - Arab sword suicides on our pike at Aden. Lots of Celt horses move to front lines. We get the Golden Age end notice.

Babylon market -> colosseum, Aden Lib -> worker

1.) - 190ad - warrior build in Iron City 1 shield short due to GA ending, but will finish next turn. Worker begins chop there for temple build to begin next turn. Galley in Mayan waters spots mainland Chinese border.

IBT - Arabs kill 2 Celtic horses and retreat 2. More Celts move to front lines. English begin Knights Templar.

Iron City warrior -> temple

2.) 210ad - I'm reluctant to foment a war as the only thing we have to offer is our monopoly on Engineering. Decide to wait a bit. Explore with boats.

IBT - China asks us to move our galley...of course. Watch Arabs and Celts fight...the losses are more even this go-round.

Our curragh is lost in dangerous waters.

3.) 230ad - Workers finish jungle road to Aden, begin chopping. No attacks made on Arabs as they're still in singles and would expose our troops.
Galley sails into Portuguese mainland waters.

IBT - Portugal asks our galley to leave...sure. Celts seem to get the best of Arabs this round, but don't take Arab town.

Chinese begin Sun Tzu's. Barb horse climbs mountain just west of Iron City.

4.) 250ad - Cover worker near Iron City with spear. Lob rocks at barb horse until he redlines. Galley explores.

IBT - Watch the Arabs get the best of the Celts. Arab horse leaves, but more barbs show up a few tiles from Iron City.

5.) 260ad - Worker completes chop for temple at Iron City and begins road.

Dial up Liz and declare on her. Dial up Mao and get MA against England for Engineering. When I tried to bring up the peace treaty, everything else greyed out. My conclusion is you cannot renegotiate the "just met you" automatic peace treaties, which was the whole point of this experiment. Edit: Oops!!! If someone else can make this work, I'd be grateful for a step-by-step tutorial. Anyway, we are now allied with China against England with no peace treaty in the bargain.

Here are the trade pics, which I hope are in the order they took place, as I kept trying to get the peace treaty on the screen with the alliance.

DoW on Liz:

Alliance with Mao against England:

Peace Treaty with grey-outs:

China declares on Liz:

IBT - Watch Celts and Arabs get 1 kill each. Barbs head west toward Celtic town and some Celt horseman seem headed that way.

China and Portugal now have Mono, so we should get it next IBT.

6.) 270ad - Galley continues to explore Portugal. There are still no Arabs close enough for us to attack.

IBT - Arabs 2 vs Celts 0. We learn Mono from the GLib. Set research to Chivalry...we could get it at 30% in 35 turns at -15gpt with 127g in the treasury, or at 40% in 25 turns at -25gpt. Decide to wait for Glib.

Two more barb horses show up near Iron City, but it looks like the Celts will take care of them.

7.) 280ad - Change Babylon from Colosseum to Cathedral in 1. Galley explores.

IBT - Celts and Arabs continue to slug it out...almost evenly. Celt horseman kills 1 barb horse, but another barb horse arrives next to Iron City.

Babylon cathedral -> colosseum. Arabia is now in the MA.

8.) 290ad - Lob rock at barb horse next to Iron City and redline. Worker begins irrigation. Galley explores.

IBT - More Celt/Arab fights...about 2 dead each. Celt horseman kills barb horse.

9.) 300ad - Galley explores. This is the last turn of our alliance with the Celts against the Arabs.

IBT - Brennus appears and wants to cancel the alliance and, of course, we could ask him to remove his troops or declare. He has troops ALL over our land, so I just hit "Escape" and decided the year 300ad was a nice round figure for turning this over to Bede, especially since I'd need to ask whether the team wants war happiness from the possible DoW from Brennus or to wait until his troops are fewer.

Afternotes:

I did not play turn 10, so the save will be for 300ad.
I've seen no signs of the war between England with us and China.
No sign of France's location yet.
The cathedral gave us enough happiness to move lux to 10%.
The workers are chopping jungle near Aden covered by only one elite sword.
The Celt/Arab fighting mostly took place 2 or 3 tiles from Aden with no chances to fight.
Sorry if I goofed up the alliance with China against Liz. I could find no way to include the peace treaty.

Arab Front:

Iron City Area:

New explorations:

And the save:

 

[Beorn-eL-Feared]

On the greyed out screen, you need to click the peace treaty to unlock everything else. Try it back again, it'll work.

 

[gmaharriet]

On the greyed out screen, you need to click the peace treaty to unlock everything else. Try it back again, it'll work.

It never occurred to me to click on the words, "peace treaty", with nothing else available. Yes, I just tried it and you're right...it DOES work.

For Aabra's benefit, here are the new screenies and the 250ad save so he can try it. I'm sorry if it's too late to actually change it in the game.

Peace Treaty Screenie (click on the words):

And then you get this:

I really blew it, didn't I?

Here's the 250ad save. Just hit "enter", wait for the Celts and Arabs to stop running around, then go to the diplo screen, declare on Liz, then to Mao, click "Active Deals", peace treaty comes up, click on the words, and (as BeF said) everything else becomes available.

 

[scoutsout]

Dangit...English beginning KT... either there's another smart somebody out there, or we've already got ourselves a runaway.

@Harriet: Don't sweat the small stuff. If Mao can't go 20 rounds with Lizzie, it'll still bust his rep. We'll just have to figure out other ways of fomenting the slugfest. With this crew, we'll figure something out.

No attacks made on Arabs as they're still in singles and would expose our troops.

Nice tactical touch.

 

[scoutsout]

...sorry for the double-post... but... what would you guys think about going full-bore after Abu at this point? Maybe we take some more Arabian cities after a little dink-and-dunk between the Arabs and Celts... sieze a few opportunities.. and THEN look southward... thoughts?

 

[Beorn-eL-Feared]

If we had the ressources and logistics, or if we're mindful of bringing back troops by the time we can hit brennus, I wouldn't mind. The thing is that it'll take forever to walk what troops we have and then the cities we'd gain are further away up North and not as prime for use as Bre's are. If we had been doing horsies instead of swords, I'd be all in, but walking swords back will be a pain.

 

[gmaharriet]

...sorry for the double-post... but... what would you guys think about going full-bore after Abu at this point? Maybe we take some more Arabian cities after a little dink-and-dunk between the Arabs and Celts... sieze a few opportunities.. and THEN look southward... thoughts?

Why not? I just took another look at the 300ad map. If we can get a road through that single jungle tile directly north of Aden, the rest is mostly forest and hills...so long as we go around the marsh tiles.

Would we want Brennus to help? He's been extremely enthusiastic in prosecuting the war against Abu.

 

[gmaharriet]

I almost forgot...

Roster:

Bede - up
Whomp - on deck
Aabraxan -
Beorn-eL-Feared -
scoutsout -
gmaharriet - just played

 

[Bede]

Got it and play it tomorrow.

If I prosecute the Arab it will be to the death or at least down to a rump state.

Have to look at thw map.

Happy Thanksgiving to all!

 

[Bede]

Got it and play it tomorrow.

If I prosecute the Arab it will be to the death or at least down to a rump state.

Have to look at thw map.

Happy Thanksgiving to all!

Well, tomorrow came and went and is no longer today. The next time I can play will be Sunday - which I believe is within Aabraxan's guidelines.