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Paths of Civilization

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Alratan said:
Too few of them to be meaningful or relevant on a societal scale. Travel is also far too dangerous to send their best. They're also just as or more likely to come away filled with envy or desire to take the riches of the Ymaryn for themselves rather than pledging friendship.
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That doesn't match what we're seeing, nations competing in the games are maintaining a friendly disposition in contrast to before the games when friendly would revert to standard mild hostility after so long without trade missions to them.
 
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Adhoc vote count started by Carrnage on Nov 19, 2017 at 6:29 AM, finished with 495 posts and 69 votes.
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Alratan said:
Look at the Storm Ymaryn sitting on the sidelines waiting for us to weaken enough so thet can conquer our western colonies. They clearly don't care about the Games.
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You know... this is a good point. Even the neighbor we have the most cultural affinity with has no inherent hesitation to stab us in the back as soon as they think they can win. The games may not be as useful as we think they are, merely showing off the strength of the Ymaryn. No strength, no peace.
 
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Academia Nut said:
Essentially the Mountain Horse had learned of the ringed armour the People used, but lacking the infrastructure to mass produce the wire they had focused on what they could do with skilled smiths. They had come up with a way to make smaller and lighter but stronger rings by doing tiny, precision work to rivet them together. It was stupidly expensive because of the sheer labour required - only the most elite of the nomads had any ringed armour at all - but it pretty quickly caught on among the smiths and elite warriors of the People. The increased number of cavalry for the patricians to command - and apparently the pasture for them to manage too! - also had them spending money on their precious horses by equipping them with bits of chain to protect vital areas.
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Academia Nut said:
Armour
Riveted maille
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Academia Nut said:
Cavalry
Light barding
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Here is just 1 example of how our tech got out, someone improved on it at great effort; but once we got a single look at it, our other tech and infrastructure lets us exploit it to great effect. Artisan games will be similar, but at a more rapid rate.
 
Thomasfoolery said:
Why would they think they'll lose them? They'll think they'll conquer us and have our cities producing the innovations for them directly.
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Because they might fail and get kicked out, losing the innovation rolls? Besides, all artisan innovation would be shared in Games anyway. There probably will be a situation where they decide that the pros of taking something ours outweigh possible cons and risks, but with Artisan Games, such situations will be more rare.

Honestly, I don't think opening the games will give us many advantages, and others may gain more. But then, I also don't think it'll be very detrimental, and refusing has its risks. In the end, I just don't consider it the hill to argue and die on.
 
[X] [Inno] Looks important, invest heavily (-3 Wealth, -3 Mysticism, -1 Tech, ???)
[X] [AG] They may join (Open games, ???)
[X] [Policy] Switch to Mass Levy
[X] [Kick] 2 Stability, 4 Temp Econ damage
[X] [Trade] Push the guilds to the limit to meet demands (Trade Tech for Wealth, up to 5 per phase, to attempt to top up Wealth)
 
agumentic said:
Because they might fail and get kicked out, losing the innovation rolls?
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If they fail they'll potentially lose a lot more than that. If they're willing to go to war with a great power like us they know they risk annihilation in retaliation if they lose, so they'll only do it if they're confident. The added risk of losing innovation rolls is a pretty trivial addition to what they risk.
 
agumentic said:
Because they might fail and get kicked out, losing the innovation rolls?
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Why would they assume they will fail? By definition when someone is going to war, especially the martial elite, they stake a great deal of personal power and prestige on wining. Why would king X care about the continuing Ymar relations when he will likely be dead his family with him if he loses the war.
 
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DragonParadox said:
You know... this is a good point. Even the neighbor we have the most cultural affinity with has no inherent hesitation to stab us in the back as soon as they think they can win. The games may not be as useful as we think they are, merely showing off the strength of the Ymaryn. No strength, no peace.
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Western ymaryn was literally founded by those that wanted to conquer whatever land they could get away with and those that were willing to break the kings law to make a few coins. They're less the nation we have the most cultural affinity with and more the nation descended from the negative aspects of our culture.
 
Carrnage said:
Western ymaryn was literally founded by those that wanted to conquer whatever land they could get away with and those that were willing to break the kings law to make a few coins. They're less the nation we have the most cultural affinity with and more the nation descended from the negative aspects of our culture.
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They still have more affinity with us then someone like say Freehills. Wanting to conquer whatever land they could get away with is the default state for all civilizations in this age.
 
Carrnage said:
Western ymaryn was literally founded by those that wanted to conquer whatever land they could get away with and those that were willing to break the kings law to make a few coins. They're less the nation we have the most cultural affinity with and more the nation descended from the negative aspects of our culture.
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And they know we're a tough fight more than most. They can also expand West much easier than trying to fight with us.
 
Thomasfoolery said:
If they fail they'll potentially lose a lot more than that. If they're willing to go to war with a great power like us they know they risk annihilation in retaliation if they lose, so they'll only do it if they're confident. The added risk of losing innovation rolls is a pretty trivial addition to what they risk.
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Sure, but if they don't get anything from us, then every little bit they can take and hold is good for them, but if good relationship with us gives them something, then whatever they take needs to outweigh that, and the more they take, the more resistance they'll face and the more resources they'll need to pour into holding whatever they take. That is what should give them pause.
 
[X] [Inno] Looks important, invest heavily (-3 Wealth, -3 Mysticism, -1 Tech, ???)
[X] [AG] They may join (Open games, ???)
[X] [Policy] Switch to Mass Levy
[X] [Kick] 1 Stability, 2 Temp Econ damage
[X] [Trade] Push the guilds to the limit to meet demands (Trade Tech for Wealth, up to 5 per phase, to attempt to top up Wealth)

@Academia Nut Is the Forhuch king a martial hero?
 
[X] [Inno] Looks important, invest heavily (-3 Wealth, -3 Mysticism, -1 Tech, ???)
[X] [AG] They may join (Open games, ???)
[X] [Policy] Switch to Mass Levy
[X] [Kick] 1 Stability, 2 Temp Econ damage
[X] [Trade] Smiths work overtime! (-2 Tech/turn but can meet demand for trade)
 
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BungieONI said:
Also there was the bit about how the People on the ground are pretty confident that we can nick more than they can. The confluence of this has basically made the thread consider it an okay trade. Also you forgot your artisan vote.
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veekie said:
Except we have the Sharingan, so we're always going to steal more than they can, while no amount of looking will tell you anything about an alchemical recipe for dye, metal or fuel.
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This is directly contradicted by the GM's explicit explanation of what the International Games do.

Academia Nut said:
Note: Opening the games means that all participants pool their innovation rolls together and share the results. Subsidizing other participants means that one of their innovation rolls each turn is doubled, and may also allow them to build their own Artisan Games
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We all share the results. That means each of us gets stuff, not that we get everything and they sit around being confused.

If anything, this diminishes the value of our natural tech stealing abilities, as there will be 3 sides from which we can't steal anything.

BungieONI said:
As such if such a thing happened the other participants have carte blanche to attack the instigator since they flagrantly broke the compact represented by the Games. And more than likely, everyone knows this is a thing, or will once they are in it.
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Look at the example of our war with the Trelli.

There, the Games gave us the Casus Belli. We were allowed to go to war to defend Trelli from it's own internal enemies. That very same casus Belli would happily be used by the Storm Ymarin to defend the Western Wall, or by the Freehills to defend Trade. Our war was not popular only because of the fact that we screwed up and decided to fight a war of liberation several millenia early, not because attacking others is not done.

In addition, I disagree with the people thinking that only we can get the fruits of our research. If anything, I'd argue that the other sides are much better suited to do it.

Innovations require wealth to support and to build. Given our double wealth price increase, that cripples our ability to build high level infrastructure. Freehills meanwhile get tonnes of wealth from the straits, and the Storm Ymarin don't seem to do badly either.

Hell, we even know that the SY are explicitly building up their infrastructure. So, while we have to contend with high costs, and multiple wars, they have the resources and the peace to profit from our technologies.

Edit :

In the end, I believe this is a choice, about whether we fear the Non-Games nations enough to give the game-nations a major boosts.

After , I believe that with the International Games we should be getting at least twice as much innovation rolls as we have now. Our partners will benefit more, of course, but we will still benefit a lot.
 
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Can the others even really afford the artisan games?

We had to pay a lot to get enough low level artisans going for masters to spring up.

They presumably don't have that infrastructure backing them up.

And the beneficial part (aside from their innovation rolls) is that they send the best artisans they have to work with us for prestige. Odds are, a lot of them will get poached by the Guilds whom want that foreign talent on their payroll. And given our high standards of living, odds are these guys would take the offer. We may invent the brain drain. It will probably take a while for the effect to become noticeable, but it should eventually.

At that point the others may approach us in technology, but we have the whole infrastructure backing us up. Slaves are an advantage, yes, but so are freemen spending cash on the markets. And for all that they have theoretically the same tech as us, they don't have the gargantuan agricultural surplus that we use to sustain the cities and the income/passive policies we get from it.

Essentially, we need to change our strategy from out-teching the opposition to out-managing them. And that are things they can't easily steal. We have been very much coddled thanks to iron and with it gone we are more or less back on an even footing. But trying to keep everyone less developed than us is a fools game. We will eventually fail as we did with Iron.
 
The other partners can't afford the Artisan games, which is why we need to subsidize them to give them the opportunity if they want too. However, they don't need to have their own games to gain the benefits of ours.

As for infrastructure, we know that the Storm Ymarin are building theirs up. We also know that the Freehills have at least one city. So they have at least some infrastructure, and they don't have to deal with the doubled wealth costs.

On the other hand, all our high level infrastructure is locked behind higher level cities. And you can't have a higher level city without block housing which is unlocked by Panem. I highly doubt either side has Panem, given that neither side had cities when it was developed.

So, at least the high level Ironworks and Markets are locked, as far as we know.
 
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DakkaMania said:
Can the others even really afford the artisan games?

We had to pay a lot to get enough low level artisans going for masters to spring up.

They presumably don't have that infrastructure backing them up.

And the beneficial part (aside from their innovation rolls) is that they send the best artisans they have to work with us for prestige. Odds are, a lot of them will get poached by the Guilds whom want that foreign talent on their payroll. And given our high standards of living, odds are these guys would take the offer. We may invent the brain drain. It will probably take a while for the effect to become noticeable, but it should eventually.

At that point the others may approach us in technology, but we have the whole infrastructure backing us up. Slaves are an advantage, yes, but so are freemen spending cash on the markets. And for all that they have theoretically the same tech as us, they don't have the gargantuan agricultural surplus that we use to sustain the cities and the income/passive policies we get from it.

Essentially, we need to change our strategy from out-teching the opposition to out-managing them. And that are things they can't easily steal. We have been very much coddled thanks to iron and with it gone we are more or less back on an even footing. But trying to keep everyone less developed than us is a fools game. We will eventually fail as we did with Iron.
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One of the most interesting things about most bronze age civilizations in the Levante is that they were very highly specialised with a extremely surprising degree of sophistication in their industry processes (which indeed came back to haunt them when things started to go wrong). If AN decides to take them as inspiration it certainly wouldn't be that hard to believe that they had enough talented guys to at least compete in such events.
 
Is this going to devolve to the level of the "infrastructure is bad" discussion?
Cause that was just sad to watch.
 
Ugh.
On one hand, skyrocketing regional innovations will pay off to us indeed for a lot of reasons in the long term.
On the other hand, in short- and medium-term it will lead to a lot of assholes with primitive conquest-first mentalities and yet big sticks.

How welcoming must we be to people who are almost guaranteed to abuse it, while remaining fundamentally welcoming people?

I honestly have no answer to this question, this is paradox of tolerance through geopolitical lense here.
 
veekie said:
Okay, so we got a few items here:
-The new Forhuch king is not as badass as his predecessor, forcing him to win X amounts of personal prestige to maintain legitimacy.
-We are a giant prestige pinata if they can win.
-However, not winning quickly against us dings Stability
-From context, peacing out also dings stability for them

Ergo, our objective is mainly to not lose and just throw wall after wall of flesh until they break up internally.
I theorized previously that the Nomad Heromaker trait triggers stability or legitimacy losses on weaker kings. Might be that.
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Okay, so the current Forhuch king needs to prove himself (this probably isn't a succession crisis, but if it were then he might actually have bad stats)
And we're likly to be fighting the Highlanders soon, If we get the option to produce a better military/Diplo ruler I suggest we take it, as they're probably Nomad enough that we can annex their armies partially intact if we can overwhelm them, then we could turn them on the Highlanders.
 
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