Getting the World at War

[mad-bax]

We can get a military alliance with:

China vs Persia and Byzantines for free.
Portugal vs Byzantines for free.
Hittites vs Byzantines for a tech.
Maya vs Byzantines for 12gpt
French vs Byzantines and Persia for 28gpt

I know 40gpt seems like a lot of money, and we have to be careful because of the anarchy period just around the corner, but I think this would be a tremendously powerful move for the game.

Edit: This would kill the tech pace completely. It would almost certainly ruin some reputations and it would weaken all the most powerful civs. In 20 turns time we will be a republic, building some markets etc and preparing for war with China who would be a complete pushover.
What does everyone think?

 

[Ginger_Ale]

I would do the ones with China, Portugal, and Hittites. I find it very unlikely we'll start landing troops by Lisbon within 20 turns, so a deal with them is fine.

 

[mad-bax]

But it is the Maya and French we need to slow down. Preventing them trading with the Byzantines and forcing them to produce units instead of libraries and markets will have a huge long term benefit for us.

 

[MOTH]

Doesn't subsequent MA's get more expensive? If so then we may need to do the Maya and French first or possibly just leave them out.

Did the Byzantine's declare war on us? I'd prefer to see us in wars against thoses nations that give us War Happiness.

 

[mad-bax]

We are at war with the Byzantines after refusing to pay tribute.

I can't play with the order of the trades since it would involve an irreversible game action. I don't know how the trades would change. The French trade is expensive and I can understand pple not wanting to go there. The Mayan MA is pretty cheap though. They really would keep the Byzantines busy.

 

[MOTH]

Ok, I'm in favor of all but the French. We can scrape togather 12 gpt in Anarchy if we need to and want to revolt before the 20 turns are up.

I would do the treaties in this order:
Maya, China, Portugal, Hittites

 

[mad-bax]

WE will have to persuade the External Consul of the plan first. But it does seem workable.

 

[classical_hero]

WE will have to persuade the External Consul of the plan first. But it does seem workable.

Why did you come up ith such a brillant strategy when you are not the EC? It seems like this office is made for you.

 

[zyxy]

I like the general idea. We should definitely get Portugal at war, so that they can send their forces elsewhere. China would not be bad either (most likely our next major target).

Some questions (sorry, I can't look at the save now):
- Are we also at war with Persia? Who declared?
- Can the Byzantines hold out against all these civs?
- How about ally with France vs Persia only. Is that cheap(er)? They won;t reach Byz anyway.
- what happened to our valuable currency tech? EDIT: nevermind. Somehow I missed that there was another TC during the elections.
- Portugal will not loose units vs Byz (too far). Can we set them on Persia instead?

 

[Furiey]

Get the Portugese involved against the Byzantines (and the Persians?) - we need to draw all those units out of Portugal for our invasion.

We won't have to deal with them all if we can capture the Portugese cities before they can return, so even if they don't lose them all, getting them a long way away so they are out of the picture would do the job as well.

 

[Bertie]

WE will have to persuade the External Consul of the plan first. But it does seem workable.

The External Consul is easily persuaded when he sees a great idea. Thanks for starting this thread, mad-bax.

Having the Byzantines declare on us is perfect! I agree we want to get as many civs at war as possible. Getting the Chinese, Portuguese, & Hittites involved is cheap and a no brainer, as is the 12 GPT for the Mayans. The Hittites will actually pay us some gold, and we can also get Japan involved for tech and they’ll pay us some gold. I’m also in favor of paying the French, although that’s a lot of gold. Even if we’d acquire the Republic next turn (which we can; see below) we’re not going to be ready to revolt for a bit IMO. We need to build some infrastructure, and I’d prefer we do some pop rushing before we enter Republic. For that reason the 40 GPT (for Maya and France) doesn’t bother me given what we gain from it.

One thing we might consider – and I almost hesitate to bring it up least I be charged with changing my mind too much – is the Dutch will now make peace with us and give us either the Republic or Monotheism. If they give us Monotheism, they’ll also give us all of their gold (160 pieces) plus 4 GPT. I’ll bet with Monotheism we could get France in the war cheap; they might even pay us. I’ll also bet we can trade Monotheism to someone for the Republic. Big downside, of course, is we haven’t completed our business with the Dutch. In particular, we haven’t taken either Amsterdam or Arnhem, both of which are crucial. I prefer to take at least Amsterdam and Arnhem before we make a peace treaty, but I guess we should consider making peace now and using Monotheism to lure France into a MA if we don’t want to spend the gold.

Anyway, I’ll let the discussion develop a bit further before I do any polling, and will use this as the official discussion poll. I’ll probably do two polls, both with yes/no/abstain options. The first will be the China, Portuguese, Hittites, Japan, and Maya; the second will be France alone.

@zyxy: We declared on Persia & entered into some MAs specifically in order to try to get the world fighting.

Edit: Poll up HERE .

 

[Stuck_as_a_Mac]

Culture enjoys the prospect of this.
Don't forget: whenever tech is slowed down, culture is too. Plus, we can deny the big military wonder thanks to Isaac.
We can successfully slow the worlds cultural production to a standstill and keep ours up. If we give a fraction of the budget to the production of libraries and temples (yes, Rik. I'm still building them), we can catapult ourselves past our neighbors.
Also, more tech leads = more SGLs. More SGLs = More wonders = more culture.
Hmmm... war for the sake of culture...
Eh.. it worked for Benjamin Britten. (well, granted that masterpiece arived after teh war)