Machiavelli Institute : The right use of ROP

[DAVOUT]

It seems that there are controversial opinions on the question of Right of Passage.

This thread is opened to try to clarify this diplomatic feature.

[GePap]

Right now I see no reason for us to sign any RoP agreemenst since we want to slow A.I growth, not help it along. I am also 100% opposed to using RoP to get right next to cities and attacking, a first class reputation killer. Any RoP we sign puts us in a 20 turn diplomatic bind which currently we don't need. Perhaps as part of a peace with france, we could force them to give us one (we would need an embassy), to make expansion into Anabanana Minor easier.

[DAVOUT]

I largely agree with you : I am a bit worry by the fact that many people apparently believe that a ROP has no cost, and are willing to distribute them as free bananas.

[kring]

I also limit my giving out RoPs for the reasons mentioned above. We could use Galleys to send troops to Anabanana Minor to avoid some of the problems of going through France, or at least limiting time inside their borders if we did.

I am also against using RoP to sneak attack. At this level, the less we do to cause ourselves long term problems, the easier to hold our own and win.

[jdd2007]

i would use veto power on any RoP agreements, if need be, but i dont i would need to. at the moment we could not gain any advantage for making one.

*Glory to Country through Strength and Honor!*

[adaMada]

I think that there is one valid use for a ROP -- to prevent a civ that might otherwise attack us (think: persia) from doing so when we are unprepared. Though it would give them an advantage, I'd still be strongly in favor of giving them one if we believe that War will otherwise occur. I don't consider ROPs to be free bananas, but I'm not above using one as a little bribe to stop an AI civ from damaging us .

Just my two cents...

-- adaMada

[kring]

I have been attacked by countries, usually the more aggressive ones but not always, using RoP, so that isn't a guarantee. True, sometimes, a RoP will prevent an attack. I wouldn't want to count on Persia not using it to attack.

Several times I have triied this experiment. The turn after I was attacked, I saved the game; went into the autosave and played from the point either just before the attack or several turns before; and played more than a dozen different games in each of the cases; some starting several turns before the attack. All to see if anything would prevent the attack. The first thing I did was make a RoP with the civ; it still attacked. When I was done experimenting, I went back to playing the original save. The RoP itself never, by itself, stopped the attack. It even accelerated the attack in some cases.

The AI has done(RoP abuse) this to other AI civs in a number of my games.

[DAVOUT]

Originally posted by adaMada
I think that there is one valid use for a ROP -- to prevent a civ that might otherwise attack us (think: persia) from doing so when we are unprepared. Though it would give them an advantage, I'd still be strongly in favor of giving them one if we believe that War will otherwise occur. I don't consider ROPs to be free bananas, but I'm not above using one as a little bribe to stop an AI civ from damaging us .

Just my two cents...

-- adaMada

I do not really figure the difference between a free banana and a little bribe.

It seems that you underestimate the cost and value of the ROP, and that you overestimate its effects on the AI.

[Epistax]

Personally I do not have a problem with ROP agreements, because.

IF another civilization settles a city close to our area, our culture will deliver it into our hands.

IF the civilization settles a city far away from our area, then it will not last.

Additionally, a ROP agreement almost never allows a civilization to walk on new territory boxed in. We do not have an inpenatrable wall of culture.

Also, a ROP agreement promotes conflict between rival civilizations as they have freer access to eachothers cities (that is, if we were to sign it with greece, they might declare war on germany).

Currently we do not have a wall of culture, so a ROP agreement would have zero negative effects. They can get to the other side already, and they wont declare war while the ROP is in effect. Additionally, we can extract funds from such agreements.

Simply put: ROP insures safety from a civilization, gives whatever it was traded for, and it improves our intelligence on the enemy (seeing new units, seeing wars, etc).

Finally, there is nothing funnier than signing two ROP agreements with rival civs and then to see them duke it out in your territory. Pull up a chair.

For the sanity of this thread, when you reply, don't quote this whole message.

[Kloreep]

I have a question: does the AI receive as stiff rep penalties for abusing a ROP as the human player does? If they don't, the risk is probably higher.

If they do, we might actually want to lure an AI civ into doing this once we have a strong defense, just to sabotage them diplomatically.

[Sheik]

We don't need right of passage at this moment.

[Spiffor]

Sorry to be dissonant, but I think we should sign RoPs with every Civ which is not a direct and obvious threat to us (and I don't deem the immortalless and REXing Persia to be an immediate threat).

RoPs are not intended to avoid wars. But they can be used to ruin the reputation of an attacking Civ (effectively limiting its likeliness to ally with other Civs). Tehy're also very good to raise AI's behavious towards us, which means the sell cheaper and buy higher.
It also means their prices to ally against us will be higher, especially if they don't want to ruin their reputation.

Let's face it : after the war with France, and the Finishing-off war with America, we'll be the largest Civ, and the first power after developing our infrastructure. But the odds won't be outstanding. Beating one AI will be pretty easy, beating 2 would be tricky, and beating 3 AIs allied against us would be near impossible.
We need polite / gracious neighbours to avoid being attacked by several of them, unexpectedly. It will also give us the initiative of war, as soon as a RoP treaty is over.

(of course I favor an absolutely spotless reputation over the whole course of the game)

EDIT : but I agree, RoPs are currently unnecessary, as the Ais didn't create embassies towards each other. Once AIs begin to sign RoPs among each other, we'll have to do the same.

[Shiber]

Why don't we sign RoPs with distant civs (those located in Abananaba Minor for example). They would never make any use of it anyway, but it will improve our diplomatic relations.
It might also deter our neighboring civs from attacking us, seeing that we have agreements and good relations with many other civs.

[Robber Baron]

Great thread! I've always been wary about RoPs in my games, and never permitted them. I had no idea they can do as much good as Spiffor suggests. It sounds as though an RoP won't forestall attack from an implacible enemy, and will probably make its first strike more devastating. We should avoid giving out RoPs to civs that seem likely to strike first. (The Persians, IMO; maybe Aztecs? The Germans?).

But on the other hand we should seriously consider extending them to other civs. We are, after all, a central power on Abananaba -- and probably before long will be THE central continental power. Meaning, if we cut off all civs, we will seriously piss off a lot of them. We should certainly permit civs from one side of us to go to war against civs on the other -- and an RoP amounts to invaluable intelligence about how a war is going. (And if we have settlers waiting to move into abandoned territory .... )

Sounds to me like RoPs have a definte role in our strategy. The key then becomes sorting out which civs are destined to be implacable enemies, and which more flexible roles to play/be manipulated.

[Mr. President]

I would prefer to sign ROPs as the need arises, for instance if it would help us prosecute a war by opening a shorter route to move troops.

[Togas]

Originally posted by kring
The first thing I did was make a RoP with the civ; it still attacked.

The RoP itself never, by itself, stopped the attack. It even accelerated the attack in some cases.

The AI has done(RoP abuse) this to other AI civs in a number of my games.

This has been my experience as well. In my last game I used the preemptive RoP tactic to dissuade an agressive enemy from attacking me after he dropped several knights into my territory. He agreed. The turn after that he declared war.

I have also seen the AI do this to other AI opponents. In fact I'll often bribe them to do this to their "allies."

Unless we need the RoP to get to territory we could not otherwise reach, it's not worth it.

--Togas

[Epistax]

How about this. We use ROP agreements with those that are not near us, such as the Romans, Babylonians etc. We can use it as a general purpose trade item good for money and making the civ happier with us.

I have no fear of the english, romans, babs, iroqs, and those other people near the babs.

[Robber Baron]

Will we be able to use RoPs to promote, or at least support, scenarios in which distant civs would make war on civs we want to weaken -- if, say, the Greeks wanted for some reason to make war on the Persians? If that kind of opportunity opens itself, we definitely want to take advantage.

[Shiber]

I agree. I myself suggested a similar plan earlier, but it is different in one aspect.
My proposal was to offer this to all the civs in Abananaba Minor but not to our neighbors. Each of them is dangerous to us.
Take the English for example. They may seem harmless now but they are technologically advanced and they're expansionists stuck between three powerful civilizations. They may decide it's a good idea to attack sooner or later. I'm not saying that they would, but there's a considerable chance, whereas with the Abananaba Minors it's a safe bet that they won't abuse the agreement.
So what I'm saying is: we have nothing to lose from signing a RoP with the Abananaba Minor civs, only to gain, and therefore we should sign these treaties with them next turn.

[DAVOUT]

This is to summarize what has been discussed till now on the right use of ROP agreements.

Feel free to indicate any error (material or interpretation), I ll edit it as required.


Preliminary synthesis

- Everybody agrees on sneak attack during a ROP agreement : Strictly forbidden.

The cost of ROP agreements
- Binds us during 20 turns (Gepap, Davout) ; Spiffor says, in his positive style, that we gain freedom to attack at the end of the 20 turns !
- A ROP agreement does NOT prevent an AI to attack (tested by Kring and Togas).

The value of ROP agreements
- Increase the chances of conflict between the AI civ (Epistax, Kloreep, Spiffor).
- Improve intelligence on enemy civ (Espitax, Robber Baron).
- Raise trade conditions we obtain from our partner and deteriorate those granted by our partner to our enemies (Spiffor).


Preliminary conclusion

Right now there is no need to sign ROP agreements (Gepap, JD2007, Sheik, Spiffor, MrPresident, Davout, Skywalker). Nevertheless, considering the above, this is far from precluding an appropriate use of ROP agreements in the future.
ROP agreements with Abananaba Minor civs are to be considered (Shiber).



Everything of importance has certainly not yet been noted, so all comments, either by those presently taking part or by new ones, will still be appreciated.

[Shiber]

I say we should sign agreements with the Abananaba Minor civs for the reasons mentioned in my post above. You can add that.

[Kuciwalker]

First, I would like to point out to many of you in this thread that it's Abananaba, not Anabanana. Anyway, I agree that we should not sign any RoP's yet.

[DAVOUT]

Shiber,
Edited.

Skywalker,
Edited.

[jdd2007]

a RoP could very possibly be good in the near-future. which civ(s) would be the best, do you think?

Greece immediately comes to mind...

*Glory to Country through Strength and Honor!*

[DAVOUT]

It all depends of what the AI will do. I see two hot areas : the Abananaba strait, and the Munich-Ubergorsk area. Which civ will do what ? I cant tell, but we must be prepared to have unpleasant surprises, and it is therefore important not to grant ROP agreements prematurely.

[DAVOUT]

In the light of recent events (war declared on us by Persia after signing a ROP with us), I suggest the following policy :

when a RoP is granted, we should send immediately at least one unit wandering throughout the adverse country for intelligence gathering and implicit threat of pillaging in case the treaty is broken, and if possible several offensive units able to take a city.

This is the logical consequence of the AI behaviour ; it adds to the cost of the RoP but greatly increases our security.

[Shiber]

A great idea!
This can assure us that the AIs don't betray on us, and if they do - POW! They lose a city.
BANG! ZOOM!! RIGHT IN THE KISSER!!!

Sorry, got carried away.

[Robber Baron]

I agree, DAVOUT.
I wonder if this deters the AI civs from violating an RoP. In any event, it would be satisfying to be able to punish them quickly for doing so.

[DAVOUT]

A perfect scenario of war could begin with a ROP. During 20 turns our units enter the ennemy land and go to strategic locations : roads connecting the capital, ressources, highly productive mines. Then at the end of the 20 turns the main army start taking cities when the units in place destroy the economy and the communication.