STR-03 Viking Traders

[karr1255]

pre turn - Huayna already has economics, guess somebody missed that. I gift banking to Asoka because we don't have a bonus for good trade with him and I'd really like to form a perm alliance with him. And just like that we have another +1 with him, total is +14 now. I don't like all the engineers because working the plain cottages gives same completion time in a lot of cities but also growth and commerce.

T1 - I finally revolt to free market and aw look at that:

I check trades and get another +1 gold out of Shaka. Then I gift Toku drama and theology and get another +2 now were up to +11 with him. If we get a perm alliance with him, this will be a SG for the ages.

T2 - After free market our economy gets a nice boost, now running 80% at -16. Research is set to nationalism since we can get Taj Mahal for sure.

T3 - Everything looking good.

T4 - Gift music to Toku and he goes up to friendly. This is history in the making boys. (he is still so far behind in tech it's pathetic)

T5 - Quin has a quite the military, but no one is a threat to us because of our diplomatic work.

T6 - 2 banks done and I build a galleon and in the capitol a grocer.

T7 - Nationalism done -> researching mil tradition for some def pacts. And I start the Hermitage in Timbuktu, it's under heavy cultural pressure.

T8 - Get ready for the craziest turn in this SG. First this happens:

What do I do now? Both are our best trading partners and the rule says we have to support our partners but who? I agree to join in the war, since Toku has much more power and forming an alliance with Toku would be the most challenging and best twist to this game imho. After I declare look at this:

After I refuse, I try to sue for peace with Asoka and include peace with Toku, which doesn't work and I can't throw in techs. However he agrees to cease fire between us just like that on the same turn. Well, that was quite the phony war.
I know that this was absolutely ********, but I thought I HAD to accept if Toku asks me to join. Well I guess if we're already at war I should have attacked, but I just thought this would be too easy and just put a bad taste in my mouth because he was THE trading partner. In a nutshell our relations with Asoka took a big hit (+5 and pleased now) and with Toku they're great (+12). No gain but a really stupid situation, sorry guys.



T9 - Taj Mahal due in 16 turns and our economy is actually getting better. No trade routes with India but we are running 80% at -3.

T10 - zzz

T11 - Huayna starts a golden age but he's still far behind in tech.

T12 - Sign open borders with Asoka. And Toku is at war with Mansa now too.

T13 - zzz

T14 - Trade rice to Quin for fur.

T15 - Mil tradition in -> researching gunpowder. Great scientist is born in our capitol and I let him rest there to discuss his use.


I screwed up the turncount somewhere. Well the next player will get a free turn, I told you that I'm a little drunk.

Now we could bribe Toku to make peace with Mansa and Asoka and get a def pact with him asap. The longer they hold the better the relations get. Also the use for the GS needs to be discussed.
I hope that I didn't totally screw up, but I just didn't want to take the holy city from Asoka. It would have been just too easy and still felt lika a backstab.

 

[Bede]

Boy does this come around fast.

Toku needs to get out of his war with Mansa before we can do anything with a defensive pact leading to a permanent alliance. As I understand the vanilla version it take forty turns of either joint warfare or a defensive pact to get a permanent alliance, in addition to some other factors (realtive strength being one of them) Has it changed in Warlords?

Heading down the diplomatic path requires an assessment of who the oppnent is going to be, then trying to manage around that. It is even possible to help determine who the opponent is going to be with a little judicious trimming of the opposition. The most favorable outcome arrives when you can forge a friendship with the third and fourth most populous nations by trimming the fifth and sixth down to neglible size. You need 61% of the total vote, determined by population and it is safest to have at least 30% native while your two allies make up the additional needed 31%.

So who do we cultivate and who do we spurn, and who is the most likely opponent?

I'll pick Huyana as the strongest candidate for that position right now. And Toku and Quin, or Toku and Shaka would make good choices for the bedfellows, so perhaps some proselytizing of Islam to the Japanese and the Zulu and we curry favor with Quin through trade.

And favored civics play a major role here as well. The risk is that our two bedfellows will have favored civics in competing portions of the tree. Hereditary Rule and Police State, for example. So One Must Choose Wisely.

And I got it for tomorrow night.

 

[Pvblivs]

The rule is: Who attacks our trading partner is attacked by us. To me this implies: We don't agree to attack one of our trading partners. If Toku attacked Asoka we would have to attack Toku (and make him our vassal, else this would be not winnable) This was really the part of your after all nice turnset. And I'm sure it screwed our position up a bit.

BTW: I wrote that HC has Economics already. We discovered it for Free Markets and not for the Merchant though he would've been nice.

 

[angeleyes]

We certainly should have declared on Toku..Do we want a diplomatic victory with a permanent alliance with Toku?? That would indeed be a real achievement.
We are going to make Toku a diplomatic winner? But his favorite civic is mercantilism while we are traders and are not even allowed to take mercantilism.
Imo we can't be traders and have an alliance with Toku and go for diplomatic victory. Best would be imo to repair our mistake against Asoka and declare on Toku.

Favorite civics:
Asoka: Free Religion,
Huayna: Hereditary Rule,
Mansa: Free Market,
Qin: Bureaucracy,
Shaka: Police State,
Toku: Mercantilism

 

[Pvblivs]

Agree on this. Toku attacked our trading partner. If and only if they're still at war we should attack Toku. Nice side-effect: Mutual struggle with Asoka.

It is not required that we kill Toku. If he's weak enough he can as well capitulate giving us his votes for diplomatic victory anyway...

Declaring on Asoka can't be undone, our relations are damaged severely

 

[karr1255]

I knew the trading partner variant, however Toku was a good partner too and asked first. That's why I thought it would have been against the rules to decline one of our partners help in the first place.

I still think we should just stick with Toku now, we already have +12 no - and friendly relations. After a def pact we could get the alliance without the civic bonus. But it's probably better I don't interfere in these diplomatic decisions anymore.

/e:

The rule is: Who attacks our trading partner is attacked by us. To me this implies: We don't agree to attack one of our trading partners.

But that means we can't attack our help either of them. See my confusion?

 

[Bede]

How did Asoka achieve such iconic status as a trading partner?

At the end of my last turnset but one we had a resource deal and 9 commerce from him in trade routes. At the end of my last turnset we had 0 commerce in trade routes and only the ongoing resource deal, while we had over 10 commerce from Toku. So the situation is fluid...

So we must be flexible to keep pace with the situation, and go where the money is. We are traders after all.

And if I had to pick a bosom buddy trade partner it would not be Asoka just based on trade route income even before the war. Both Shaka and Toku contributed more to our coffers than Asoka.

I'll look at the other saves later, but I don't think my conclusion will change:

Attacking Toku will hurt our trading position more than the phoney war with Asoka ever did.

Now if the team consensus is that Toku deserves a little smack down I will try and set it up.

 

[Pvblivs]

But that means we can't attack our help either of them. See my confusion?

It's very simple:
1. If >anyone< asks us to attack our trading partner we always decline, because if he's the one who attacks, this automatically collides with 2.
2. If >anyone< attacks our trading partner (it may be the same guy from 1, or even our trading partner who attacks the guy himself (and this one is our trading partner), we attack the aggressor.
3. The aggressor is the one who actually declares the war.

There is no conflict, or am I wrong? Furthermore we had those good relations with the defender (Asoka) before we have now with Toku (the aggressor). It is our failure. So we should not betray the faithful (Asoka) and join the betrayer. We have to deal with it.

Edit: Bede: The question is, do we have trade deals with Asoka when Toku asks us to wipe him out? What can be done then is to press F4 and check it. If Asoka is not our trading partner, ok, them I am wrong. If yes, we broke our main variant.

 

[karr1255]

The trade route income definitely speaks for Toku. We get 0 from Asoka and +35 after bonuses from Toku. By those numbers it's pretty clear and we have good relations with him. Maybe the "war" with Asoka was a big mistake (variant confusion ) but now shattering the relations with Toku too just doesn't help us imo.

 

[Pvblivs]

Ok. If it is so, that we had hardly any trades compared with Toku, I agree.

Please stick to the variant. What else are we playing this for, I wonder?

 

[karr1255]

On another note:

Mansa declared war on Toku now so we should declare on Mansa right?

/e: From a trading standpoint Toku was the better partner. Asoka just had a bigger +we care for our brothers of the faith. The aggressor fact does make sense though.

 

[angeleyes]

I agree with Pvblvis, according to the variant we are obliged to declare on Toku, no matter if he's a great trading partner or not, just because Asoka was a tradingpartner of us. That we declared on Asoka wasn't against the variant, that we did not declare on Toku was against it, but, allthough a little late, we can still do our duty.

But let Strauss decide what to do

This kind of mistakes makes the game a bit more exciting, not?

 

[Pvblivs]

Right, karr. If we had trades with Toku then... Why did we miss it?

And yes, we're learning to stick to our principles. It wouldn't be the worst to have Mansa destroyed for attacking Toku and in return making Toku capitulate to us for his war against Asoka.

Though it could hurt our relations with other isles and make our Diplomatic victory plans impossible. Not easy, is it?

 

[karr1255]

But if we declare on Toku we can't declare on Mansa anymore this wouldn't make sense.

 

[Strauss]

Hmmm... this is a bit of a mess. Tokugawa attacks Asoka, we join Toku, then immediately sign a cease-fire and now we should attack Tokugawa

Two things went wrong here:
1) We should have attacked Tokugawa instead of Asoka in the first place. Even though Toku brings in more money than Asoka, he was still the agressor and should have been punished.
2) Once we declared on Asoka, we should have actually joined the fight. Immediately signing a cease-fire after a declaration of war is somewhat lame IMO.

However, the damage has been done already and I don't think we should declare war on Toku. Attacking him will only make things worse. We should now try to negotiate peace between the both of them as quickly as possible.

Mansa, however, is both an agressor and doesn't have anything substantial to offer us as trading partner. He should be punished. Don't you just love politics?

 

[angeleyes]

I don't think we should declare war on Toku. Attacking him will only make things worse. We should now try to negotiate peace between the both of them as quickly as possible.

?? I don't get this. According to the variant we are obliged to declare on Toku, no matter if it's good or bad for us.

Mansa, however, is both an agressor and doesn't have anything substantial to offer us as trading partner. He should be punished. Don't you just love politics?

Toku started the war against Asoka. So we should help Asoka which we didn't. Then Asoka asks Mansa to help him (what we already were supposed to do). In fact the little tiny Mansa is doing our job and now we want punish Mansa for this???? If we had declared war on Toku immediately, Mansa should have joined us.

Imo we should declare on Toku immediately, (and not on Mansa), if you want to keep the variant intact.

 

[karr1255]

At this point I would bribe Toku into peace with both, which he will do for some old techs and go on from there. If we declare on Toku now we are back to crippling everyone and win the game as usual. That's why I took nothing from Asoka in the first place.

 

[Pvblivs]

If Toku is the defined aggressor there's no reason to attack Mansa because Mansa was doing our job, right.

I would restart. That means: Get all into peace. And the next one attacking a trade partner is attacked.

Another thing: Think about who we want as trading partners. As you see it's not that easy if we just trade with everyone, is it?

 

[karr1255]

Exactly my thought. I screwed the variant up and I'm sorry. But since Toku will make peace with everyone, my vote goes to this option and then if anyone is the aggressor against a trading partner attack him.

My thoughts on our trading partners:

Asoka: relations are in an ok shape he doesn't give us much in form of trade routes. However he's easy to please so keep him as long as he doesn't bothers us.

Toku: Best partner at this moment and best trade route income. He is a crazy guy but maybe this works out. I'd like to keep him because it's most challenging.

Qin: A backstabber but it looks good now. His trade routes are decent but he wouldn't be a big loss. His military is mainly defensive too.
Huayna: He might be the strongest rival but he gives great trade route income. BUT he would probably be our rival in the diplo vote so no long term relationship here.

Shaka: Doesn't add much and is soo far behind in tech. Maybe if we can convince him to vote for us instead of Huayna that would be great. Otherwise maybe even a military threat.

Mansa: We screwed him and he still likes us. No real threat more like a little pet but if he becomes annoying I'd leave him at the gas station.

 

[Pvblivs]

If Quin is a backstabber we might soon be at war against him anyway, even if he would not backstab us... Same with Toku. We may like him, but if he's impatient with his sword we are at war one day.