14-12-2002 21:57									#1
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Well - I am still going to write up the intro letter - but in the meantime - we have our first FA decison to make. Read the following I received from Nuclear Winter. Question is - do we want to do this - particularly given the discussion in the moves thread about getting off the island,

Then again - Spain will be one of the first to map making - and if they contact us first on the map - we will have iron working to trade. Here is his note:

Hello Betahound, minister of foreign affairs of the Vox Controli
We Spaniards would like to make an early contact, so if you could provide us with some kind of guidelines as to were in the world you are...(on the top of the earth, on the down of the earth, your wise men provably have already mentioned something as such...) we would be glad to provide guidelines on were does the Mighty kingdom of Spain lies...
If there is anything you want to discuss, just Pm or mail me... It is a plesure to make contact with your people... Also, donīt forget to contact me about anything you want to be discussed in the roleplay forum... think of me as your pal in the roleplay team...
Hope we make contact soon, so then we can make good trade...

Nuclearis Winterius the II

	14-12-2002 23:02									#2
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This is getting good. Of course we don't know if they even will go for map making first. Such decisions

It's a risk that they won't give us their location, but I doubt they would screw us over so early. And given the position we are in I think it is worth the risk. There is a possiblility they may use this information to come over and attack us. Depending on where they are in the world this may not be possible with tiremes, and either way would be difficult and resource draining at this point in the game.

I say we exchange this info. We should probably get a majority who agrees.

Also I noticed in the save game thread someone wanting to discuss something before sending the save. I'm figuring 2 civs have already made actual contact on the map. Not sure how this will affect us yet. They could combine research efforts and jump to a lead though.

	14-12-2002 23:31									#3
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Concerning telling them "generally" where we are located should be fine (ie, north-eastern sector). Plus it will indicate our "good nature" towards them...for now. So I agree with Dissident - exchange the information.

	15-12-2002 06:49									#4
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(Ok - here is my proposed intro letter. Please let me know if you think it hits the right note - or if there is anything else we want to say. I may customize it a bit for each civ I'm talking to.)

Esteemed representative of the fine people of ......... I, BetaHound, have been chosen to speak to you on behalf of the Controller and the citizens of Vox Controli. In this correspondence, I am not only introducing myself, but more importantly, the nation of the One Voice - Vox Controli.

As a form of introduction, and to allow you a better insight into our civilization, I have chosen to read to you today, selected readings from The One Book, and more specifically, Jon's letter to the Controllians.

"Controllians 6, Verses 1 to 5.

1. In the beginning, there were many voices. And it was chaos. And it was not good.

2. And 'The Voice' called to jon miller, and he went onto the great mountain, the One Peak. And there 'The Voice' spoke to jon.

3. He spent 18 days and 15 nights on the One Peak (ed Scholars are still debating to this day what jon did for the other 3 nights) and returned with the law of our people on one stone, drawn up as the One Commandment:

4. Thou shalt speak with One Voice.

5. And then there was one controller, chosen by the people, and there was One Voice, and One Voice only. And there was order. And it was good."

This should help to clarify who we are. We are not a fascist state. We are not a dictatorship. We are a small, but well ordered civilization. We are democratic. But we acknowledge, and accept as is our law, the need to speak with One Voice.

We look forward to cordial and productive relations with you, your leaders, and your people. We approach you in friendship, but stand ready to defend our rights, our citizens, and our land.

We speak forthrightly, and expect the same of you. We have long memories.

I know we share the same goal of improving our respective and cherished homelands. Together, we can achieve more. I look forward to further discussions with you.

So, once again, our salutations to you, our honored guest, and to your nation.

Till next we meet, I remain, sincerely yours,

BetaHound
Voice of Foreign Affairs (VFA)
Vox Controli

(woof)

	15-12-2002 12:50									#5
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looks good so far

	15-12-2002 18:07									#6
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Sounds great.

	15-12-2002 21:11									#7
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good

Jon Miller

	15-12-2002 23:04									#8
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OK - next question. Where/How should I contact the other civs. It would seem the choices are:

1.PM to their FA person

2. Post it on the their team threads on the open PTW forum

3. Post it on our both their team threads and our open FA thread.

4. Start a new thread on the open forum - something along the lines of - Greetings from Vox Controli, or Selected Readings from the One Book. Could be fun to see the responses. And I could post other selected readins from the one book there as well.

I say - 1 and 4.

What say yee?

	15-12-2002 23:08									#9
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Definetely 1&2. The rest, you should do the way you see fit.

	15-12-2002 23:19									#10
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Yes - that makes sense. I think I will still start a general Vox Controli thread in the open forum for selected readings from the One Book. Just to let my creative wanderings have a good run.

	15-12-2002 23:31									#11
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you are our voice

and it is up to you as to how you present us

Jon Miller

	15-12-2002 23:33									#12
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OK. Thanks jon.

I will be communicating with the other teams today, using the script above.


(unleash the hounds .....)

	15-12-2002 23:47									#13
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yeah creating a thread explaining us might be useful too. Or we can just use the existing one. It's up to you.

	16-12-2002 19:26									#14
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We are starting to get responses back to my initial correspondence. I will post them here as they come in.

Greetings from Gathering Storm
Greetings Ambasador Betahound. I, ManicStarSeed want to extend good wishes from Gathering Storm. Feel free to contact me via PM regarding anything you wish to discuss. If you have any questions you want me to direct to the team, please do not hesitate to ask. I expect to be able to respond (at least with a confirmation of receipt) with in 24 hours. If you do not here from me within 24 hours RL has taken over and Meshelic, our Foreign Minister should be able to help you.

Now for business..
I do have a question for you.

Can I post (verbatum) the contents of your PMs to me back to the Gathering Storm private forum? It will make our internal discussion run more smoothly. I would gladly extend the same courtisy (sp)

Again Greetings and good gaming

ManicStarSeed (Mss)

(i told them to please, by all means, post my message in their forum - ignorance breeds fear - knowledge breeds understanding and friendship.) (must be that Christmas spirit coming out)

	17-12-2002 04:04									#15
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And from Neu Demogyptica:

Your Letter to Neu Demogyptica
Dear Betahound of Vox Controli,

i am writing to you in the name of the people of Neu Demogyptica. We read your letter with great interest and we felt quite impressed by the given piece of history of your democratic civilization, which appears to be honourable and thrustworthy.

To allow friendship to grow between our great civilizations, i would like to introduce the people of Neu Demogyptica to you.

We are an expansionist and religious civilization under the leadership of Fritz Demogypt. We are democratic and peaceful, but we are also sovereign and do not accept any kind of extortion, nor do we fear to fight for our freedom and sovereignty. We respect our neighbours and seek friendship and peace, as long as they do not threaten our god-given right to develop our great culture.

We are looking forward to meet the people of Vox Controli in the world and we feel that our both civilizations will benefit from good relations and friendship to each other, which will hopefully pass the test of time.

Sincerly yours,
Picahulu, Foreign Affairs of Neu Demogyptica

(I will send back a 'glad to hear from you' note. )

	17-12-2002 21:26									#16
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BTW - here was the extra bit I added to the response to Spain/RolePlay. You will recall they asked for info as to where we are in the world, and we agreed to give them some idea.

"You have asked for our understanding of where we are in the world, in order to facilitate contact as soon as possible. We expect similar information in return.

The Civilization of Vox Controli sits in the Northern Hemisphere, and from our initial understanding of the world, to the East. (As you appreciate my dear sir, perspective is everything.) There is much ocean to be seen, however we reside on a landmass of, as yet, undetermined proportions. It is a fine land, with much promise."

That was two days ago. As of yet, no response. My friendly reminder goes out later today.

	18-12-2002 00:30									#17
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(Patience young Skywalker...)

And lo and behold - their response. Looks like we have to discuss if we want to reveal our techs - which they will know anyway - we are the Persians - and we would have gone to iron working next - which we did. Do we want to say we have met no one yet - including no barbarians?

And how do you interpret their location? Are they to our east? Or are they east of the centre?

Here's the note:

Diplomacy 2
My friend BetaHound:
We the Spaniards, glorious sons of the sea spirits, merged with the land and forest spirits, envy of the world, would be eagerly looking to meet your people... our explorers can meet yours at the middle(a little to the east) of the world localization, just near the squidda minor constelation. We could enlight your nice people with the secrets of the spirits, and of how to deal with the dead(it is no proper manner to throw them to rot anywere...) and we can teach you the most valuable knowledge of how to carve drawings into stone and give them a meaning... of course, we would like to exachange those for secret knowledge you may have, so if you could please tell about what kind of secrets your wise-men know, we might teach you ours if you teach yours, and of course depending on the valuability of the knowledge we may give or ask for a little gold in adittion to the secret.
Also we would like to know if you have already met some other tribe... fort the land spirits have only revealed to us barbarians so far... no settled tribes as us. Anyway, if the spirits guide our wanderers toward other nations we may come to share knowledge with them. In case you have already met any other tribe, please contact us and maybe we could find a manner to introduce our representants to them.
Also our Lord Togas has expressed great desire of one day contacting your Leader personally, to discuss important matters so that you can also make contact with the mighty voice of El tyranno, Lord Togas (Our One Voice).

May our nations grow prosper and rich, and with the blesses of the spirits!
Nuclear Winter the II
__________________
Seņor Nuclearis Winterius the II,
Squid Lord, Wine Marquis, and Diplomat with the Voxians...

	18-12-2002 00:44									#18
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We should focus on getting Pottery. Granaries are important for plains cities.

	18-12-2002 02:06									#19
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Getting some action now - and this one we need to discuss. I'm not sure trading mini-maps outside the game is in keeping with the spirit of the game - even if we did agree to do it. He says 'in game' - but we can't do that until we meet, can we. Eli or Diss- I am presuming that if you pop up the foreign affairs advisor, no other civs are showing as of yet.

This may need discussion in the general forum as to what can and acnnot be traded outside the game?

Here's GoW response to my letter:

Trade Minimaps with Vox Controlli?
The Glory of War is interested in a trade of in game mini-maps with Vox Controlli, so we could see where we are located in relation to each other. This would help our team's trading potential. It would also not give away valuable terrain info. If your team is interested, please PM me a reply. Thank you,

Panzer32
__________________

	18-12-2002 03:46									#20
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Of course we can't trade until we actuall meet them. And even then don't we need a harbour and they need a harbour? Or is that just for trade routes. I guess we can exchange techs when we actually meet.

I'm undecided on the mini-maps. It isn't very realistic (well actually we shouldn't even be speaking yet). But if we don't do it and someone else does they may have an advantage of trading techs.

Anybody else have any thoughts on this?

	18-12-2002 04:01									#21
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Dissident - I agree it isn't realistic. And as I said above, I'm not sure it was intended in the spirit of the game. I assumed you could chat all you want - but only do trades of 'real' things, like gold, tech, luxuries, AND maps, through the game.

jon - you following this. What's your take. Is this something we need to discuss in public forum? There was a thread earlier about this kind of stuff, but it didn't deal specifically with trading maps, or get into this level of detail.

	18-12-2002 04:03									#22
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jon - I am going to confirm with Panzer what he meant by 'in game' and mini-maps. I am ssuming he is talking about trading screen shots - similar to what we see.

	18-12-2002 04:42									#23
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dont trade him the whole map just the mini map

	18-12-2002 07:05									#24
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hmm

I have to say that I am not sure if I am a big fan of providing anymore info than chat info

and we could doctor a minimap

(Eli??, could you)

do so so that they do not recoginise things about us of strategic import

also, I think that you should, Beta, verify what they emant by in game and minimap

Jon mililer

	18-12-2002 07:06									#25
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(how would you guys feel about doctoring a minimap?

just so that they do not realise things of strategic import (The bottleneck)

Jon Miller

	18-12-2002 08:01									#26
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OK jon - will do. Panzer32 just asked me about our response in the Civ3Dem game weekly chat - my first. I said we were thinking about it. I will ask for clarification.

The doctored up mini-map is not a bad idea. Especially for those guys.

	18-12-2002 08:13									#27
	Put an end to popups!

Ok - asked and answered - here is the correspondence.

?

quote:


BetaHound wrote on 17th December 2002 10:06 pm:

Hi Panzer.

We are not certain as to what you are asking. You are asking to trade the mini-map, from the game save? And to trade it outside the game - ie via e-mail between one of us and one of you? Is this what you are asking? Just want to be clear.

Beta. VFA Vox C.




Yes that's what I'm asking.

So - what do we do?

1. Ok - do it as requested.

2. No - not in our best interests

3. No - not in keeping with the spirit of the game

4. Ok - but jon's idea - a doctored mini-map.

Keep in mind - this is GoW we are dealing with. The less they know, the better.

	18-12-2002 11:57									#28
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I vote No.

If they want to meet us maybe we can try to meet around the equator when we both get map making.

	18-12-2002 14:00									#29
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No.

	18-12-2002 17:17									#30
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no