Commerce TC2 Poll: Declare War on India?

[Octavian X]

Interesting discussion has been running around the forums as of late, and as we're now given the extra time to plan from President DaveShack, now is the perfect time to poll on one of the more controversial issues.

It has been proposed that we should declare war on India immeadiately, capture Ghandi's two undefended workers right next to our warrior, and have our new 'employees' run back home with the warrior to prepare for the Indian onslaught.

Discussion (with images and links to more relevant discussions) may be found in this thread: Early Warfare

This poll will run for three days, and is public.

The question:
Should we delcare WAR on India immeadiately?
YES - and capture the two Indian workers immeadiately.
YES - but don't capture the workers
NO
ABSTAIN

The answers, I hope, are self-explanatory. And, as always, if you spot a flaw in the poll, please tell me so I can post a new one quickly!

 

[blackheart]

No. We'd be annihilated by the superior Indian army (and capacity for cheating).

 

[Black_Hole]

is this really something that commerce should be heading?

 

[snipelfritz]

NO!!! Even if we win it will slow our early production too much. If we win, we have crippled one of our enemies, yet we have been slowed down considerably as well. Doesn't that just give an advantage to every other nation.

Wait until the risk is less, and the reward is greater.

 

[Ashburnham]

I agree with snipelfritz. There are a lot of things we need to do to put our nation on a strong footing early. Wasting our time and resources building units is only going to hurt us, regardless of how the war goes.

 

[Stuck_as_a_Mac]

we dont have the forces yet. if we do declare on ghandi dammit, we should wait until we have some sort of a military (of course, with technology provided by them and any other neighbors)

 

[donsig]

Bah humbug! Snag those two free workers and make India the first colony in our new empire.

 

[GenMarshall]

No war, No Blood for workers.

Our army is way to small and our production is insufficant to have a decent military production at the moment. Also, we dont even have a reasonable tech to enable us to build spearmen.

 

[YNCS]

Bah humbug!

I have to disagree, Ebenezer.

We've got a whole 1½ warriors in our army. That's not enought to go to war with. So we'd have to build some more warriors at the expense of not building settlers. But this is the game's expansion phase, and there's at least one more civ on this island/continent. If we get involved in a long war with the Indians, that just lets the other civ expand at our expense.

Besides, what's the point of this war? We're grabbing a couple of slave units and hoping the Indians don't get excited enough to smack us down. If we were taking an Indian city, I could see going to war, but we're not strong enough for that. All this war will do is smear our reputation with our immediate neighbor for a miniscule gain.

 

[mad-bax]

Wow! Closer than I imagined.

I Voted Yes capture the workers. I have used this tactic many times and have never regretted it IIRC. Of those who voted no, I wonder how many have tried it?

Respect for the AI and Fear of the AI are two different things folks.

 

[Gregski]

In my ignorant opinion, we are not equipped to go to war just yet. We need to settle a few cities first.

 

[Black_Hole]

come on, take a risk, go for the workers!
and who better to start the war than George W. Bush?

 

[MOTH]

Are we brave English warriors or are we mice? The Indian barbarians are no match for the might of the English! Cheerio and all that.

There is very little risk for a great chance to accelerate our expansion. The 2 slave workers alone are worth slightly more than one English worker without costing us the population point or time to built it.

Someone also speculated that the Indians have already built a settler. This settler could right now be ready to settle next to our Western cow. A war could scare it off for a little while and give us the chance to get our settler in position. Alternatively Greece might even give us the city in exchange for peace!

 

[Rik Meleet]

No

Because the simple question: Why ? can not be answered in such a way that warring is better than expanding in this part of the game.
Every possible argument for war has a side-effect that neutralises that benefit to such extent that we'd be harming ourselves more than we could ever gain by it.

 

[mhcarver]

NO
There is to much at risk and not enough to gain, wait until we have a much larger and advanced army

 

[classical_hero]

No

Because the simple question: Why ? can not be answered in such a way that warring is better than expanding in this part of the game.
Every possible argument for war has a side-effect that neutralises that benefit to such extent that we'd be harming ourselves more than we could ever gain by it.

I agree with this sentiment. It is foolish to waste a perfectly good ally and trading partner. We can use India for our benefit, with them staying alive.

 

[classical_hero]

NO
There is to much at risk and not enough to gain, wait until we have a much larger and advanced army

I would say that we should not declare war with them unless absolutely necessary.

 

[Bill_in_PDX]

The workers are tempting, but there is no assurance that Ghandi will accept his loss without building a force to come and smack us back. He is likely building a escort unit now, thus probably already has a bigger military. Given our weakness, there would be nothing compelling him to make peace. In turn, we would have to shift to military production.

No one here fears the AI. We are simply looking at the game as it sits now.

 

[vikingruler]

Absoulutley not. like everyone said the war would waste time, slow our expansion and risk us losing the game this early. also, it would hurt our exploration. the warrior in position to capture the slave workers who btw would work a hell of a lot slower then normal ones would have to escort them all the back, and risk being killed by any of the 5 or more enemy warriors. they could be right behind the workers right now. so while the warrior is escorting them to camelot, it can't explore up north. as i said in Early War, we wait for swordsmen and then destroy them.

 

[mad-bax]

Well it's moot now as the poll is decided already. Our war with India may well be archers V Elephants or Longbows V Cavalry and rifles. Its a pretty big assumption to expect to get iron.

I'm not unhappy at the result, since due process was followed, and that's democracy. It's also why companies are not democracies.

I am a little disappointed that the the anti-war proponents put forward no argument to counter those put forward by the pro movement. Still, I tried.