Magna Graecia: Titanomachia (A City State Quest)

[phil03]

By having us split our focus against the more dangerous Tarentines or else letting them raise havoc among the small Epulian League cities of the north when we'd rather they didn't, yes. However, that's piggybacking off of a much stronger power slugging it out with us, not posing an existential threat in their own right.
Since then, Taras got severely bloodied and are at least nominally friends of Eretria; Eretria has only grown further in power, stature and allies (the existing ones also now being less distracted and strengthened). Please name the power with whom the Dauni now combine with to make a terrible threat to us; surely if the Dauni intend to be treacherous and invade us but are not strong enough to do it on their own, they have some sort of power that they would intend to strike us down alongside.

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Corinth for once, Athens if my worst fears when it come to refuse the treaty come to pass, some ennemies we might have to fight due to the present instability in Italia, or somebody we don't suspect yet.

At the end of the day I don't think anybody argue that Dauni are an existential threat by themselves but also believing they aren't a threat at all is probably going too far on the other direction.

Certainly we have far more reasons to fear them then Samnites about whom we have actual canonical evidence they are rather unlikely to repeat the type of attack they launched on Kymai and whose last cannonically mentionned activities around Epulia go back to the first itteration of the game.

 

[kilopi505]

[X] [Athenai] Refuse the Treaty [Taras will be extremely grateful, Athenai will be unhappy, Eretrian grain trade may be superseded in favor of the Bosporos].

[X] [Hyria] Grant Hyria autonomy and Artahias allyship [+5,500 freemen providing tributes and levies including heavier infantry, Artahias becomes a loyal Eretrian ally rather than vassal].

[X] [Dauni] The Path of Peace [Eretria and the Dauni will cease hostility, open trade to one another, and stop plotting against one another].

I, Hermesdora Eretriazenis the Psiloi, do cast my vote on the following issues on this day!

On the matter of the Messapii, I vote for allyship for Artahias and autonomy for Hyria! My reason for such is that Artahias styles himself savior of the Messapii. Letting him advance to allyhood from vassalhood would improve his position in the places he controls while at the same time denying him more territory in his control! And besides, was not our intention on the Messapii and the Peuketii to turn them into Hellenes? Well, Hyria just did a most Hellene act! A sign from the gods that our intention is succeeding!

On the matter of the Dauni, let us snap the swords and exchange adzes and coins! We haven't been at war with them inside our lifetime in the first place!

And on the Athenian proposal, a flat no. We finally have peace with Taras. Why endanger that?

I, Hermesdora Eretriazenis have voted! I shall now return to my thermopolium, where my wife and children are now working.

Bryzos' Thermopolium! Oldest operating thermopolium in Eretria! With a branch in Egnatia! We have fish, squid and sea weed soups! Eat at us!

 

[McLuvin]

By having us split our focus against the more dangerous Tarentines or else letting them raise havoc among the small Epulian League cities of the north when we'd rather they didn't, yes. However, that's piggybacking off of a much stronger power slugging it out with us, not posing an existential threat in their own right.
Since then, Taras got severely bloodied and are at least nominally friends of Eretria; Eretria has only grown further in power, stature and allies (the existing ones also now being less distracted and strengthened). Please name the power with whom the Dauni now combine with to make a terrible threat to us; surely if the Dauni intend to be treacherous and invade us but are not strong enough to do it on their own, they have some sort of power that they would intend to strike us down alongside.

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And you're suggesting there aren't any other major powers that could present a similar issue. Athens, Sparta, Taras if we piss them off again as they mainly took damage to their fleets and skirmishes, and have experienced an immigration wave and been focussing on re holding their fleets and expanding their treasury with trade.

That's not even talking about possible Vassal revolts or if the cities internal stability tanks die to the Metic problem.

There are other possible threats too, like the Etruscans and Korinthinos.

I just lifted almost half a dozen powers that could cause issue enough to open a window of opportunity for the Dauni, and that's before we also bring up vassal revolt and internal strife.

So yeah, there's a few problems with your idea of our security, especially as it's mid term thinking at the very best, even if you were correct in any way about the state of Taras alone, let alone not ignoring the other multitude of potential issues and enemies.

On the matter of the Dauni, let us snap the swords and exchange adzes and coins! We haven't been at war with them inside our lifetime in the first place!

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*looks at the Salentine war*

Does no one else remember that?

 

[kilopi505]

*looks at the Salentine war*

Does no one else remember that?

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I, Hermesdora Eretriazenis, recall no incident where Eretrian hoplitai and Dauni warrior clashed against each other during our war with Taras!

My fellow citizens! Vote to give Hyria autonomy and Artahias allyhood!

A vote for Hyria's subjugation is a vote against turning our vassals into proper Hellenes!

 

[fasquardon]

There isn't really such a thing as a 'psilloi' class

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I am well aware, but it was a useful shorthand to give people an idea where Kleon sits without using terminology that was apt to make people think of anachronistic economic systems.

I'm also not really sure you can just survive off being a playwright; it seems more of a side-occupation at this point, and you'd be a farmer or an urban laborer as your other job (which would be impressive given you'd probably want to be literate to be a playwright).

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Not off plays alone, to be sure. My thought was that Eretria's uniquely politicized and money-grubbing theater, the rather anti-fun and ascetic laws the city chose, the much reduced use of slave labour which boosts the waged economy and the existence of street performers who repeat plays or parts of plays for people who can't afford theater entry and it seemed to me that Eretria was well placed to develop a very active but low-culture theater tradition. I decided to make Kleon a playwright to explore that dimension of Eretrian culture.

If that's unrealistic in your view, that's no problem. I'm not too attached to this idea. ^_^

I don't accept the premise here at all, nor the comment that a preference for the current balance would require Eretria to remain small.

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Fair enough. We'll see if either of us are correct (or if we are both wrong in different ways) as the quest continues.

Eretria doesn't have a sterling reputation of not breaking its word

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Say what? Eretria has a reputation for breaking its word now?

fasquardon

 

[McLuvin]

I, Hermesdora Eretriazenis, recall no incident where Eretrian hoplitai and Dauni warrior clashed against each other during our war with Taras!

My fellow citizens! Vote to give Hyria autonomy and Artahias allyhood!

A vote for Hyria's subjugation is a vote against turning our vassals into proper Hellenes!

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OOC: Dude they even called up their armies, until bribery and our allies in the Kingdom caused them to disband.

They were literally a single step away from invading us.

 

[NuclearConsensus]

Say what? Eretria has a reputation for breaking its word now?

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Leaving aside the matter with Taras, which is well known, there was the time where we angered Thurii by allying Krotone, and then the time we maybe angered Krotone by telling those other guys whose name escapes me at the moment to sack Lokri.
EDIT: I remember now, it was Rhegion!

Also, votes.
[X] [Hyria] Grant Hyria autonomy and Artahias allyship [+5,500 freemen providing tributes and levies including heavier infantry, Artahias becomes a loyal Eretrian ally rather than vassal].

[X] [Dauni] The Path of Peace [Eretria and the Dauni will cease hostility, open trade to one another, and stop plotting against one another].

[X] [Athenai] Accept the Athenian treaty [Athenai will be grateful, Taras will be disturbed, Eretrian grain trade will grow faster in the future].

 

[Kipeci]

Corinth for once, Athens if my worst fears when it come to refuse the treaty come to pass, some ennemies we might have to fight due to the present instability in Italia, or somebody we don't suspect yet.

At the end of the day I don't think anybody argue that Dauni are an existential threat by themselves but also believing they aren't a threat at all is probably going too far on the other direction.

Certainly we have far more reasons to fear them then Samnites about whom we have actual canonical evidence they are rather unlikely to repeat the type of attack they launched on Kymai and whose last cannonically mentionned activities around Epulia go back to the first itteration of the game.

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Coincidentally, if my ideas go through about the treaty with Athens as I hope then the only two you found plausible enough to mention by name are taken care of. The Dauni alone are not able to take us on, they need to phone a friend; we enjoy a dominant position in southern Italy considering our allies, our affairs are in order in Sicily, and if friendship with Athens goes through then most of our naval worries evaporate. They don't have a plausible path to successfully betray us as of now, and trading with them will only lend incentives to not go to war. Both Eretria and the Samnites are quite scary; it makes plenty of sense for them to try to make peace with one side and focus on defending from the other.

We have in this update pretty clear threats about the Dauni throwing the gates open to present to Samnites should we try to conquer them, and given how the Oscan peoples have seized upon opportunities I don't really see a reason for them to ignore it. Sure, they may not launch a full scale migration invasion of the sort that destroyed Kymai, but they have more limited forms of war available to them that are nonetheless potent as Paestum can attest to. Heck, the Dauni have never launched any such migration in all our time bordering each other but that hasn't stopped you and plenty of others from sweating bullets over having them as neighbors.

And on the Athenian proposal, a flat no. We finally have peace with Taras. Why endanger that?

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Because friendship with Athens does far more to secure us than the same with Taras. We have relations with plenty of Italiote land powers that can slot in to fill a similar if lessened role, and we can beat Taras in a fight as previously proven. However, Athens is capable of almost totally neutering the threat from Korinthos, and becoming friends with it also makes the possibility of Athenian intervention against us vanishingly small. Since they are the single power most capable of carving up our league with their naval dominance and we cannot take their vast numbers of skilled triremes with our own far smaller navy, it's more advantageous to be friends with Athens- and, for icing on top, this would boost our grain trade with them while the Tarentine option would harm it.

And you're suggesting there aren't any other major powers that could present a similar issue. Athens, Sparta, Taras if we piss them off again as they mainly took damage to their fleets and skirmishes, and have experienced an immigration wave and been focussing on re holding their fleets and expanding their treasury with trade.

That's not even talking about possible Vassal revolts or if the cities internal stability tanks die to the Metic problem.

There are other possible threats too, like the Etruscans and Korinthinos.

I just lifted almost half a dozen powers that could cause issue enough to open a window of opportunity for the Dauni, and that's before we also bring up vassal revolt and internal strife.

So yeah, there's a few problems with your idea of our security, especially as it's mid term thinking at the very best, even if you were correct in any way about the state of Taras alone, let alone not ignoring the other multitude of potential issues and enemies.

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Athens is going to be a friend if we take the treaty as we wished, Sparta is landlocked all the way over in Hellas, and whatever benefit Taras has accrued in immigration and fleets since the last time we beat them has been greatly exceeded by what our whole league has received. Plus, the idea of a Taras that so heavily disdains the barbaroi as striking up a secret alliance with the Dauni to stab newly reconciled Eretria in the back seems patently ridiculous. If you seriously think that the Dauni are going to bring the Etruscans down to attack Eretria in a secret gotcha attack planned for when we let our guard down by foolishly accepting their proposal for trade instead of incessant raiding, I really don't know what to make of it.

 

[butchock]

My friends, why are we turning our backs on people yearning to breath free? Did we not previously save an entire polis from destruction, a polis who didnt ask for aid if i may add, yet we would not extend a helping hand to people who called out to us for succor? Are we so enamored with the Mesapii king that we would allow his tyranny all for the sake of expediency? Now, i also hear talk that these Hyrians are fools for trying to fight off oppression, that is the most dissapointing of all, for if our forefathers thought like that then they would have bowed before the Mede instead of fighting for our liberty!"
So say I, Kalyx the animal breeder

 

[phil03]

Coincidentally, if my ideas go through about the treaty with Athens as I hope then the only two you found plausible enough to mention by name are taken care of. The Dauni alone are not able to take us on, they need to phone a friend; we enjoy a dominant position in southern Italy considering our allies, our affairs are in order in Sicily, and if friendship with Athens goes through then most of our naval worries evaporate. They don't have a plausible path to successfully betray us as of now, and trading with them will only lend incentives to not go to war. Both Eretria and the Samnites are quite scary; it makes plenty of sense for them to try to make peace with one side and focus on defending from the other.

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I do believe that both seeing the present instability in Italy degenerate into a conflict and imagining that further developments we simply can't foresee at this point would gain us new ennemies are both quite plausible, its simply that the nature of those scenarios prevent us from being able to name who the ennemies would be at this point. Moreover, the war party is still significant in Taras and while we are stronger then they we would still have a pretty good fight on our hand in a potential future conflict, one where a Dauni intervention could definitely tip the balance against.

In any case the treaty with Athens seem to be bound to be rejected, despite both of our arguments for it, so those two and Corinth would definitely remain concerns.

 

[McLuvin]

Athens is going to be a friend if we take the treaty as we wished, Sparta is landlocked all the way over in Hellas, and whatever benefit Taras has accrued in immigration and fleets since the last time we beat them has been greatly exceeded by what our whole league has received. Plus, the idea of a Taras that so heavily disdains the barbaroi as striking up a secret alliance with the Dauni to stab newly reconciled Eretria in the back seems patently ridiculous. If you seriously think that the Dauni are going to bring the Etruscans down to attack Eretria in a secret gotcha attack planned for when we let our guard down by foolishly accepting their proposal for trade instead of incessant raiding, I really don't know what to make of it.

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In order:

Athens, the vote to get a treaty with them is losing harder than any other vote currently available, I'm sorry, but it doesn't seem like that part of your strategy or argument is going to work out. Which also brings in he massive danger of Korinthinos and their desire to regain their Hegemony in the Adriatic.

Sparta, it has an entire League of allies and historically was able to contest Athens itself repeatedly on the waves, with at least 180 Triremes.

Taras, our league expansion has barely given us any Hoplite's and the Messapi are in fact weaker than they were at the start of the Salentine war, we have only utterly surpassed them with our naval power, meanwhile they have rejuvenated their skirmisher line, though it is still inferior to our own as it was before, but hold a major advantage over us in heavy infantry, the core of Hellenic warfare.

And would they ally with the Dauni? No. Is their categoric evidence and precedence of the Dauni using a conflict with Taras to prepare to invade us?

Very much so.

Etruscans, we have Ankon and the ever growing possibility of conflict over land with them, which has been increasing since the Linean reforms. To ignore that possibly being a future issue while others crow about the Samnites constantly is like saying that the dog starving in your back garden is less likely to eventually attack you than the wolf wandering on the other side of the forest from you.

There is a distinct possibility with a future conflict with the Etruscans, and considering our track record we'll probably ignore it until after they've burned Ankin to the ground and told us we can't make war against them ever again as they deliver the heads of the cities leaders to us.

We have many future potential enemies. We have a very brief window to sort out the Iapgyians and invade the Dauni before all the world comes rushing back in on us potentially in the next few years. I'd prefer we take that chance. Before we end up with a knife in our back. Again.

 

[Cetashwayo]

I admit to being a bit confused about underrating of the Dauni. Under a capable commander they killed an Eretrian strategos and humiliated its armies.

Sparta, it has an entire League of allies and historically was able to contest Athens itself repeatedly on the waves, with at least 180 Triremes.

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Sparta needed Persian support to fight Athenai at all, it had no navy of its own, and that doesn't come into play until after the Sicilian expedition. The Korinthians spent most of the early part of the war incapable of doing anything because Athenai would beat their shit in so hard if they did, as they did at Naupaktos.

Etruscans, we have Ankon and the ever growing possibility of conflict over land with them, which has been increasing since the Linean reforms.

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You're confusing the Picentini, a local Italic tribe, and the Etruscans.

 

[McLuvin]

Sparta needed Persian support to fight Athenai at all, it had no navy of its own, and that doesn't come into play until after the Sicilian expedition. The Korinthians spent most of the early part of the war incapable of doing anything because Athenai would beat their shit in so hard if they did, as they did at Naupaktos.

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The Spartans have a League, who provides their fleet, which was my point, and looking it up they deployed 170 Triremes at one point. According to your own claims that Korinth had around 80? At one point in the thread I believe, they aren't entirely reliant on that one single vassal getting punched by Athens...

Which means that in the future, Sparta as a Hegemon can send a larger fleet than us, and a larger army, if they were that way inclined.

The argument is about how in the future, we will have enemies that will leave us as vulnerable to Dauni attack as we were during the Salentine war.

At least that's what I'm arguing, as I see now to be perhaps one of the only times we'll get where we don't have a half dozen enemies abroad. Something that'll change very vey soon...

You're confusing the Picentini, a local Italic tribe, and the Etruscans

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Apologies. But the point still stands that those Italliotes are a potential future enemy, one that could give the Dauni an opening to try to screw us. Again.

I admit to being a bit confused about underrating of the Dauni. Under a capable commander they killed an Eretrian strategos and humiliated its armies

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Via ambush and treachery from those we thought were on our side, when we had vastly inferior skirmishers and cavalry to what we have now and stronger cohesion, being backed by the Peuketii, and we still managed to save the bulk of our army, come back, and vassalise the Peuketii

In a one vs one battle, as it stands now? I'm putting my money on Eretria every single time.

 

[DkArthas]

[X] [Hyria] Allow Artahias to subjugate Hyria [+10,900 freemen providing tribute and levies, Hyrian revolt is crushed and Artahias becomes an Eretrian vassal just as the Peuketii].
[X] [Dauni] The Path of Pain [Eretria will continue to recieve options relating to war against the Dauni, there will be no easing of hostilities].
[X] [Athenai] Accept the Athenian treaty [Athenai will be grateful, Taras will be disturbed, Eretrian grain trade will grow faster in the future].

Taras is too close to us to ever be a True long term ally, so Athenai it is.

 

[Cetashwayo]

The Spartans has a League, who provides their fleet, which was my point, and looking it up they deployed 170 Triremes at one point. According to your own claims that they had around 80? At one point in the thread I believe.

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The League's main naval power is Korinthos.

As to Sparta's own triremes, Sparta deployed those triremes explicitly paid for by Persian gold with mercenaries crewing them. It requires Persian gold to do so. While Spartan adventurism was a problem it was rarely directed towards the west; amusingly, in fact, the Spartans invaded Anatolia in the 390s to recover some humiliation in being dependent on Persia to beat Athenai. This is an alternate history and such a thing could happen, but it's one of the less likely scenarios. More likely would simply be supporting Korinthian punitive action.

Via ambush and treachery from those we thought were on our side, when we had vastly inferior skirmishes and cavalry to what we have now and stronger cohesion, being backed by the Peuketii, and we still managed to save the bulk of our army, come back, and vandalise the Peuketii

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And what do you know of Dauni capabilities since then? You fought them once, very briefly and seized some coastal land around the salt flats during the succession dispute which brought Ausculos to power. I've said in the past you don't even know if they use Hoplites much, or the quality of them, or what work Ausculos has done.

I also think that some people have somewhat misunderstood the reality of the Dauni forts. They were never meant to be solely used against the Samnites, and in fact using them against the Samnites was a simple excuse for strengthening their most important cities against an Eretrian attack. It was never a matter of contradiction, but that these forts always had a dual purpose. If the Samnites attack them they have many strongpoints and high walls to prevent them from sneaking in, and if the Eretrians attack them they're good positions at the end of a long, disruptable supply line in marshy ground.

 

[Kipeci]

I do believe that both seeing the present instability in Italy degenerate into a conflict and imagining that further developments we simply can't foresee at this point would gain us new ennemies are both quite plausible, its simply that the nature of those scenarios prevent us from being able to name who the ennemies would be at this point. Moreover, the war party is still significant in Taras and while we are stronger then they we would still have a pretty good fight on our hand in a potential future conflict, one where a Dauni intervention could definitely tip the balance against.

In any case the treaty with Athens seem to be bound to be rejected, despite both of our arguments for it, so those two and Corinth would definitely remain concerns.

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I believe in trying to boost our allies and minimize our enemies. The way I see it, attacking the Dauni in net effect adds to the enemy pile; it adds internal problems with serfs who hate us, adds significant frontiers with Samnites who have been hostile in the past and have a way of fighting that traditional Greek hoplites of even well-regarded cities have been shown to not engage effectively as well as the Frentani, distracts us from other problems for years, all for some serfs and trade goods. Whereas if we make peace with the Dauni, that mollifies them in at least the short term and gives us some smaller share of trade goods for no blood shed, and we can use the breathing space to maybe deal with other problems before they get to the point of Eretria being directly threatened and the opportunity presenting itself for all enemies to pile on.

I've seen worse lopsided votes that have come out victorious in the end, and the recent trend is for a lot of people to be voting in favor of Athens now that its benefits have been pointed out.

In order:

Athens, the vote to get a treaty with them is losing harder than any other vote currently available, I'm sorry, but it doesn't seem like that .org of your strategy or argument is going to work out.

Sparta, it has an entire League of allies and historically was able to contest Athens itself repeatedly on the waves, with at least 180 Triremes.

Taras, our league has barely given us any Hoplite's and the Messapi are in fact weaker than they were at the start of the Salentine war, we have only utterly surpassed them with our naval power, meanwhile they have rejuvenated their skirmished line, though it is still inferior to our own as it was before, but hold a major advantage over us in heavy infantry, the core of Hellenic warfare.

And would they ally with the Dauni? No. Is their catergoroc evidence and precedence of the Dauni using a conflict with Taras to prepare ton invade us?

Very much so.

Etruscans, we have Ankon and the ever growing possibility of conflict over land with them, which has been increasing since the Linean reforms. To ignore that possibly being a future issue while others crow about the Samnites constantly is like saying that the dog starving on your back garden is less likely to eventually attack you than the elf wandering on the other side of the forest from you.

There is a distinct possibility with a future conflict with the Etruscans, and considering our track record we'll probably ignore it until after they've burned Ankin to the ground and told us we can't make war against them ever again as they deliver the heads of the cities leaders to us.

We have many future potential enemies. We have a very brief window to sort out the Iapgyians and invade the Dauni before all the world comes rushing back in on us potentially in the next few years. I'd prefer we take that chance. Before we end up with a knife in our back. Again.

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I'm still feeling bullish that we'll go for Athens in the end of this vote.

In the course of this CYOA, Athens has relentlessly mugged the other side for their lunch money in naval affairs and come out better in that respect than was historically the case, and it seems that the Sicilian Expedition is unlikely to happen from how successfully their diplomatic attempts went to kick Syrakousai down and given the ahistorically large amount of support to Athens is coming from the area.

Taras had a substantial number killed in the end of the war and we have had greater immigration; additionally, we have more allies available and stronger ones (in particular, anti-Taras Thurii has grown powerful) since we no longer have Syrakousai looming terribly over us all and much of the Italiote League are now either our allies or close to us while the Taras-aligned Lokri Epixephyrii has been utterly trashed. They now have their peace faction in charge and their war faction was utterly humiliated by their disgrace of a term, so I think it unlikely that they step up for round two unless we have a sustained campaign of annoyance.

The Picentini I intend to buy off, but at any rate they don't exactly pose an existential threat to Eretria being that they are way out there and only have any contact with Ankon and I don't think we'll load up our entire military to go there in such a case but merely an expeditionary force as was done against the Liburnians, which would leave us with plenty of men to oppose the Dauni.

The Dauni are far more useful as a fortified buffer against more challenging foes and dumping ground for trade goods than they are as disgruntled serfs on a devastated frontier with the shepherds.

 

[Shard]

[X] [Athenai] Refuse the Treaty [Taras will be extremely grateful, Athenai will be unhappy, Eretrian grain trade may be superseded in favor of the Bosporos].

Minimum engagement in the Sparta-Athens war, thanks.

Thinking about the other options.

 

[Karugus]

Teutan already told us how the Dauni plan to wage their war. We do not have any ready counter to a policy of scorched earth in the middle of their country requiring long supply lines to support lengthy sieges. We have no better siege techniques than constructing a ramp, and we would have multiple cities and fortresses to siege. The war could drag on for years, quite easily.

Or maybe the Dauni would crumple because their King isn't really popular but we don't know that, and he's already had the chance to remove the most obvious troublemakers, and there's going to be a natural tendency to rally to him in defense against Eretrian invasion.

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Is it really?

Do we actually care about holding all of the Dauni when we know we'll need to break it up even in the event of subjugating all of it? Seize Salapia and Herdonia and we've got the vast majority of what we want out of the picture, pin them up in their other fortifications for a while, and incentivize the Peuketti to sack, pillage and slaughter to their hearts content. Make this a war not of territory, or subjugation, or even annihilation. But a war to break the back of the Dauni's population and economy so that they'll be easy prey to return to or ignore at our leisure. Scorched Earth and Fabian tactics do a lot less when devastation and depopulation of the countryside is the attacker's goal.

And Salapia and Herdonia are the least likely cities to demand a full scale siege and some of the easiest to supply our forces at. Razing Auscula would just be lovely bonus objective that's unlikely to be viable.

 

[Duesal]

[X] [Hyria] Allow Artahias to subjugate Hyria [+10,900 freemen providing tribute and levies, Hyrian revolt is crushed and Artahias becomes an Eretrian vassal just as the Peuketii].
[X] [Dauni] The Path of Pain [Eretria will continue to recieve options relating to war against the Dauni, there will be no easing of hostilities].
[X] [Athenai] Refuse the Treaty [Taras will be extremely grateful, Athenai will be unhappy, Eretrian grain trade may be superseded in favor of the Bosporos].

 

[Cetashwayo]

Also sorry missed Redium's question earlier, I was out. @Redium, the treaty is one of friendship, not alliance. Hence why it breaks the spirit, not the letter, of the Tarentine reconciliation treaty.

 

[Simon_Jester]

The Athenian Agora is a place for discussion as well as commerce- the conversations of life and philosophy conducted on the Eretrian assembly field are the preserve of the agora in Athenai. It was there that I met a man by the man of Sokrates, who was given to much fanfare among his students for his ability in philosophy and wordcraft. However, I came away utterly unimpressed, as there seemed not an ounce of respect for public duty in this man, and indeed he expressed doubt at the very ideal of unity to which we Eretrians owe our lives! I would rather never eat a fig so long as I live than be forced to discourse with him again...

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Sadly, our confusing old man was no match for Athens' confusing old man.

[] [Athenai] Accept the Athenian treaty [Athenai will be grateful, Taras will be disturbed, Eretrian grain trade will grow faster in the future].
[] [Athenai] Refuse the Treaty [Taras will be extremely grateful, Athenai will be unhappy, Eretrian grain trade may be superseded in favor of the Bosporos].

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Hmm... Without having participated in the discussion to date, I'm actually predisposed to say no to the treaty.

I'd rather have allies in Italy and be a distant neutral to Athens than have angry neighbors in Italy and be the kind of friendly near-vassal to Athens that we may find ourselves becoming.

 

[Kipeci]

[X] [Athenai] Refuse the Treaty [Taras will be extremely grateful, Athenai will be unhappy, Eretrian grain trade may be superseded in favor of the Bosporos].

Minimum engagement in the Sparta-Athens war, thanks.

Thinking about the other options.

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I don't really get the initial push for neutrality, and think this has been a terrible missed opportunity. So long as the Athenian side with us has naval supremacy, we can't really be touched by the powerhouse of the Spartan-aligned powers. We have been giving up on opportunities to profit by closer association with Athens and gaining at the expense of Korinthos.

 

[Simon_Jester]

I don't really get the initial push for neutrality, and think this has been a terrible missed opportunity. So long as the Athenian side with us has naval supremacy, we can't really be touched by the powerhouse of the Spartan-aligned powers. We have been giving up on opportunities to profit by closer association with Athens and gaining at the expense of Korinthos.

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Frankly, Corinth could probably kick us in the balls pretty hard in a naval war before the Athenians even showed up to do anything helpful about it...

 

[Secretariat]

My vision fails, friends, and so it falls to my sons to guide me through the ekklesia. But the clouding of my eyes is in its way a blessing -- friends, I listen more closely, and in my old age I find that I see clearly the hearts of men and women.

And so, it has come to a decision point. While we have made great gains in the east, it has come at the expense of our position at home; as a poleis, we have left our hearth untended for too long, and now the fire that was Eretrian power ebbs and weakens.

Thus, we must ask ourselves. We have no good choices left, only difficult ones -- we must decide where to cut our losses, and what to salvage such that the poleis prospers most.

My counsel, friends, is that we must contest the salt plains of the Dauni. There is profit there, such that we may recoup our losses elsewhere -- there is little to be gained from fighting in Hellas, and much to be gained from the friendship of Taras. Let us court the friendship of Hyria and let Artahias pursue his will; let us turn our efforts towards the Dauni, and avenge this insult.

[X] [Hyria] Grant Hyria autonomy and Artahias allyship [+5,500 freemen providing tributes and levies including heavier infantry, Artahias becomes a loyal Eretrian ally rather than vassal].
[X] [Dauni] The Path of Pain [Eretria will continue to recieve options relating to war against the Dauni, there will be no easing of hostilities].
[X] [Athenai] Refuse the Treaty [Taras will be extremely grateful, Athenai will be unhappy, Eretrian grain trade may be superseded in favor of the Bosporos].

 

[Cetashwayo]

Sadly, our confusing old man was no match for Athens' confusing old man.

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Just a reality of the two cities. Eretria is pretty extremely anti-individualist, and its obsession with unity quashes a lot of what Sokrates does in Athenai. Something like his hemlock trial, at the end of a long period of paranoia, horrible things happening to Athenai, and a tyrannical government he had friends in, would happen much more rapidly in Eretria. He would find himself exiled, or expelled from public life and forced to retire to the countryside, or might just leave.

Obander is a quirky guy and a philosopher but all of his philosophy is political and polis-centric to Eretria, and it mostly exists to exalt Eretria. This is part of why the city's had shit plays for so long- it's hard to express stories and tales which aren't somehow exalting Eretria. Something like Lysistrata could cause a riot because of how offensive it would be to the idea of unity in wartime.

You can tell this is starting to break down- for all of Obander's discussion about aristocrats serving the state and unity and so on, he comes home to an enormous political crisis in his own faction. Eretria has better plays now.

Eretria's a weird city, but it's comprehensibly weird. Demos Drakonia having a three-decade long tenure makes a lot more sense if you remember that the ideal of unity can get overbearing and be used to shut down change while elites are relatively willing to cooperate with one another. It's been precisely the response to public pressure which has made the demoi more open, and the political earthquake started by the surprise augur all those turns ago may just get far bigger next turn.