State Department: Embassys

[Nobody]

The world is hostile. There are nations out there that wish to do us harm, Trading with these nation will pacify them, but currently trade is slow or nonexsistant (not the fault of trade leader but the stuborn AI). Another way to Make them polite is to send ambassordors to them. We now have the ability to write and therefore establish a embassy. A embassy will also allow us to conduct other diplomatic activites like right of passages and Military Allainces. I think we should establish embassys and i would like to do it this turn.

I can't currently load up the save so i can't get quotes on the price of embassys. So if someone could do this it would help. As far as making embassys go i would like to give them to the most dangerous nations first (germany and rome) as they are most likely to attack and need to be calmed down first.

Discuss and i will poll stuff later.

Also if we do open a embassy i there will be a new job opening in the Foreign Department for a Ambassordor, whose job it will be to keep a eye on them. Anyway more to come.

(could some one please post the prices of embassys and our current gold reserves)

 

[vikingruler]

Here are the prices for embassies with other civs:

with Persia = 40 gold
with Germany = 28 gold
with Rome = 35 gold
with France = 30 gold

I agree that we should build an embassy with rome and germany, they are cleary the two biggest military threats to us. also with germany attacking france they will only get larger and be able to attack us on multiple fronts. also, we saw the romans with an archer cleary showing the fact that they have quite a sizable army or at least the capability to build military units. i also think we might want to build one with the french. they are quite close to us so an embassy might make them think twice about war. they are also the only civ who are polite with us. it would be valuable to have an ally in war time and be able to sign a military alliance. additoanlly, a ROP would allow us to do quite a bit of exploration and let us scout out the french army. if we get an embassy with germany, rome, and france we would still have 92 gold left.

 

[Strider]

I think we should save the gold for now. Embassies will be a must later on, but I we should establish them on a case-by-case basis. We don't want to waste the gold for something we won't use for another 100 turns. If we need an embassy with an AI civilizations, than we should get one. However, I don't think we really need an embassy at this moment. The "happiness" effect it has on other civs is minimal, and currently it will just be a waste of gold.

 

[Nobody]

100 turns.

The AI could attack us within 100 turns, if we bulid a embassy with France, Germany and Rome. it will decrease the chnace of a invasion. It won't stop it but it will decrease the chance of it. What good will the gold do sitting in the bank. (buying scince is a good use of money thats the only usefull alternative)

 

[Strider]

The AI could attack us within 100 turns, if we bulid a embassy with France, Germany and Rome. it will decrease the chnace of a invasion.

That kind of speaks for itself. It's kind of like saying that wearing just a hat will decrease the chance of getting skin cancer. Think of the embassy as the hat, and the AI invasion as the burning hot sun. Now give me a hypothesis of what effect that hat will have on decreasing the chance of getting skin cancer.

What good will the gold do sitting in the bank. (buying scince is a good use of money thats the only usefull alternative)

I don't know, why do real banks offer saving accounts?

 

[Nobody]

I don't know, why do real banks offer saving accounts?

If we have our citys razed in the middle ages "because we were saving for space ship parts"

 

[greekguy]

We probably should wait a bit longer, at least until the whole Philo Gambit/Lit. thing is settled. Then we will see our tech. status and then we should start to buy embassies. At this point, I don't think we should, but we definitely should build them in the next term.

 

[vikingruler]

maybe the "happiness" effect is minimal, but i think it will get rome and germany to cautious. also, we can build ROP's with other civs to explore which was something we disscussed right after we discovered the french. also we can build MA's. these would be very useful, especially if germany destroys france. if we have an embassy with rome, and the embassy makes them cautious we may have a chance to get an MA with rome aganist germany, or even vice-versa getting one with germany to attack rome. we have the money, it has no other real use, except saving for SS parts, right?

 

[Strider]

maybe the "happiness" effect is minimal, but i think it will get rome and germany to cautious. also, we can build ROP's with other civs to explore which was something we disscussed right after we discovered the french. also we can build MA's. these would be very useful, especially if germany destroys france. if we have an embassy with rome, and the embassy makes them cautious we may have a chance to get an MA with rome aganist germany, or even vice-versa getting one with germany to attack rome. we have the money, it has no other real use, except saving for SS parts, right?

If we really need an ROP or MA, then we can build a Embassy when we need them. Right now, there is very little advantage to building one. The extra gold may have alot more use than saving for SS parts. Upgrades, Research, Trades, etc. It looks like we might be using the gold surplus to pump research upto 100% in an attempt to grab philsophy first.

 

[vikingruler]

@Strider, i understand the reasons to save gold, but if we got for science at 100% are we really losing a lot of gpt, if any. we still have plenty of money to get embassies and still survive losing some gpt until we get lit or philo. if we don't build embassies with rome and germany, we HAVE to build with france. we can then build ROP's with them and discover their land, this will also let them freely move throughout our empire to get troops to germany.

 

[Civlord]

We don't need embassies for now. Let's save the money to build and support military units to defend our cities and try to expand culturally by building temples. The AI will demand tribute, but we will give them what they want so we won't have an early war.

 

[Icmancin]

I agree with vikingruler. France is the second cheapest Embassy to build and they are less of a threat then Germany. Purhap an Embassy with France to give them an edge against Germany.

 

[Nobody]

using the gold surplus to pump research upto 100%

Also a very good way to spend our gold. Im the Foreign Affairs advisor i am just showing the options. I will poll later today.

 

[Donovan Zoi]

Embassy prices are only going to get more and more expensive, so since we decided to hoard gold over tech we may as well put it to good use.

Besides that, building embassies will show us the locations of neighboring capitals, which will then allow us to determine which nations do not pose an immediate threat. At this early stage, carefully investigating the city screens will give us an idea of each civs strengths and weaknesses.

So, I feel the question should not be Shall we build embassies? Instead, we should be asking ourselves How many?

 

[Strider]

Embassy prices are only going to get more and more expensive, so since we decided to hoard gold over tech we may as well put it to good use.

Yes, embassy prices will get more and more expensive, but we will get richer and richer also. It balances out, actually, it might even be less of a drawback if we buy the embassies later.

 

[Gerikes]

I agree with Strider. Technology should be our concern.

We will have 182 gold after the most likely trade of Writing for Iron Working with Germany, and more depending on how Persia's trades go (perhaps Iron Working for Wheel). Germany's selling price for Iron Working is more than our current 185 gold, and Persia's selling price for the wheel is 147, so it'd be safe to assume we'd be getting at least 35 (Edit: This number not true, I forgot about how it will become less worth after we recieve it. I'm now saying more like 20-30 after we get IW) gold, leaving us with at least 217 gold. (This assumes that Germany and Persia view all tech's the same amount of $, which since they'd be willing to sell each of their techs for the same amount, I would gather to be true). We'd be left with enough money for embassies.

However, should we spend this money right away on Embassies?

I would think that while knowing thy enemy is important, we should be equipping ourselves for a defensive and technological growth opportunity. Instead, I would use this money to purchase, specifically, Warrior Code so that Archers could be produced.

Not only would producing archers help us with Barbarian Camp raiding, but they'd also make other Civ's think twice about attacking us for awhile. It's clear that one of the goals of the upcoming term is to gain back what we've lost, technologically speaking. This would cost us 107 gold from France, bringing us from my estimated 217+ gold to just over 100 gold.

Besides, we have strong relations with France, and a trade of WC with France for gold will only help that. Our defenses could be larger on our Eastern sides with Germany and Rome.

As for building embassies with this last 100 gold, I would have to go against it, unless the persians give us so much money that we could buy an embassy from Germany (who I believe is our greatest threat, even if they are already at war with France) and still keep our heads above 100 gold. My reasoning is that we should keep a sum of 100 gold readily available for responses to threats. We've agreed that, until we can get a better infrastrutcture and military up, we will give in to all threats to avoid an early war. If for some reason we still recieve a threat, we will have money to give them to avoid a hefty gpt ransom (since we will have no techs that they need to use as a ransom).

The question is really how fast do we need WC. We can buy an embassy now, build up to replace the gold lost, then purchase WC 3-4 rounds later (if we stay with our current gpt over tech strategy). If we still don't have any city that would build the archer if the option was available to them, rinse and repeat.

If we change our production to higher tech output, we won't be getting the gold income we used to in order to purchase WC before, and so buying an embassy might be an unwise move because we will be restricting ourselves the ability to buy WC for possibly 16 turns if we go +1 gpt to get Philo for 14 turns then go back to less scientific output.

Finally, you may disagree with my 100 gold policy, but I feel it's a fair policy of being able to have in case of emergency. To spend as much money as we can as soon as we get it would be more efficient, but dangerous. As for the exact number 100, it's just a number out of the air. The important part is that we make a number and stick to it.

 

[vikingruler]

Gerikes you make a convincing case and i agree with you, except of course not building embassies. First of all if we make embassies with everyone but persia we would still have i think the number is 92 gold. that is not factoring in the persian money. persia has over 100 gold we are bound to get at least 30 and i think we could push for 60. they might even give us more. this would give us a nice amount of money while still having 3 embassies. We could also buy WC. I'm personally aganist that. I feel we should research it ourselves. for the money it costs we could be getting it a lot cheaper, maybe not losing any gpt. also, with every civ knowing WC it will be very cheap to research, we could get it in 13 turns with 5gpt. we could probably get in around 4 or 5 turns for 1 or 0 gpt.

 

[Gerikes]

Gerikes you make a convincing case and i agree with you, except of course not building embassies. First of all if we make embassies with everyone but persia we would still have i think the number is 92 gold. that is not factoring in the persian money. persia has over 100 gold we are bound to get at least 30 and i think we could push for 60. they might even give us more. this would give us a nice amount of money while still having 3 embassies. We could also buy WC. I'm personally aganist that. I feel we should research it ourselves. for the money it costs we could be getting it a lot cheaper, maybe not losing any gpt. also, with every civ knowing WC it will be very cheap to research, we could get it in 13 turns with 5gpt. we could probably get in around 4 or 5 turns for 1 or 0 gpt.

So as to check the math, Germ + Rome + France embassies (28 + 35 + 30) would be 93 gold total, subtracted from our original 182 gold after the IW<--->writing trade would leave us with 89 90 gold (that's your 92 number. Edit: This is why I wouldn't get on you about one gold, because the IW <--> Writing is two gold, not three like I originally said. So, we'd actually have 90 gold to be left with). Without WC being bought, then this could be satisfactory, as long as we could both agree that that's enough for an emergency fund.

And this is why it's important for the cohesion between the offices: we need to see how long we are willing to wait for WC. We will be researching LIT or Philo next. Philo at full steam will take 14, LIT at full steam 24, if we can always keep the pop happy. How long are we willing to wait for Archers? Some governers or those in running have already stated that they hope to build archers, but we need a good appoximation as to how long they're willing to wait before building them. Are we willing to wait from 19 turns (14 + 5, bare minimum if all goes well Philo full speed) or 29 turns (24 + 5, if we go Lit full speed all well), moreso if we don't decide for researching WC after Lit/Philo. If so, then perhaps this will work, assuming the Philo research goes correctly, and people are willing to give up the time and/or money. Even given that research costs could go down a bit, I'd still like to see how long governers plan on going before being able to get archers. With a barracks 5 turns away from completion, I would assume not too long. If we can build a plan that gives us WC in the amount of time necessary while not given up too much in gpt, then I would accept this proposal of embassies. I don't see much chance of a plan working, however. Proving me wrong here, though, could help our cause very much.

My wish to trade for WC is with the assumption that A.) The people want archers soon, and B.) They don't want to make 100% science a habit. The real X factor is, like I said, how long we're willing to wait.

 

[vikingruler]

i believe our best bet to get archers soon is after philo. i'm just suggesting this but research WC first, this would be a huge risk but as some people have said the AI is most likely researching MM, that will take at least 20 turns most likely more. therefore, in worst-case scenario we will beat out the AI by one turn. i don't know how much gold we would lose at 100% science but i assume it is 1 or 2 gpt. so we could lose 19 gold or 38. at 2gpt we would still have 72 gold left for an emergency fund.

 

[Gerikes]

i believe our best bet to get archers soon is after philo. i'm just suggesting this but research WC first, this would be a huge risk but as some people have said the AI is most likely researching MM, that will take at least 20 turns most likely more. therefore, in worst-case scenario we will beat out the AI by one turn. i don't know how much gold we would lose at 100% science but i assume it is 1 or 2 gpt. so we could lose 19 gold or 38. at 2gpt we would still have 72 gold left for an emergency fund.

It's an interesting idea, but I believe that our main concern is getting Literature. If people thought that the risk of Philo being lost to ai was not that bad as the Pro-Lit side says, we'd be researching Philo at something other than 100% (perhaps at 80% and get it in 18 turns with +3gpt). It's obviously a risk as it is, however, and I for one wouldn't like to make it riskier.

But as I said earlier, if we had a good idea about when Governors were going to be ready to start building archers, and decide when we would want as a whole to start building them, this matter could be settled more easily.

Edit: BTW, I think people are also scared of the ai getting the tech by a goody hut, which is a reasonable concern, and thus prompts us to try to finish it that much faster to decrease their window of opporunity.