Offer That nets us Gene splicing

Flubber · October 5, 2003, 11:43

The Hive sent this to me-- I see that the turn has passed already so I fear their offer was too late .. .

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Greetings Ambassador Flubber,

I have been very busy due to the turn planning now taking over a day to
do. I would like to apologise on behalf of the Hive for lack of
catering
at the party we invited you to. In fact the lack of party altogether. I
left it in someone elses hands.

I would be appreciated if all correspondance between the yourself and
the
chairman Voltaire be given to me. There have been a few gaps in the
correspondance that never made it to the Hive archives, it is believed
some messages by yourself and the chairman are missing. I am hoping to
fill in all these gaps in our archives.

Your previous offer of a pact hasn't yet been seriously considered as
nobody started the discussion. I will attempt to rectify that.
I'm going to suggest a "research and non-agression pact", similar to
what
the hive agreed to with the drones. When the Hive has spoken to the
other two factions and asserted their stance towards us, further
discussions on alliance issues will commence.

The Hive recognises that the pirates are a leading power and so the
state
of our relations are important.

The Hive can possibly trade Flexibility for Gene Splicing. We finish
Flexibility ourselves next turn, however with some cooperation with the
Peace we will be able to redirect to Gene Splicing. This will boost
both
our respective techonology and help us catch up with the University who
undoubtedly has a large tech lead.

If we can close this trade before the hive's next turn that would be
great. However, if we don't it may be a while before the hive will be
able
to obtain any techs you will be interested in.

Anyway I've still got to organise the discussions on these issues. This
message is being sent pre-emptively so that the Peace can discuss these
possible offers while the Hive gets organised.

PS: sorry for lack of roleplay in this message, I'm kindof falling
behind
in things I have to do.

Kody

johndmuller · October 5, 2003, 12:40

I'd be agreeable to that deal (I presume that we would have to give them Doc:Flex right away with the understanding that they give us GS (having switched out of Flex in the nick of time). We might need to cover the possibility of them not being offered GS, but IIRC, Kody was one of the active participants in the thread leading to the tech offerings spreadsheet, so he is probably using it here and would then be reasonably sure what their offerings would be (we can't verify that ourselves without knowing all the techs they have). OTOH, while I wouldn't think so, the wording could suggest that they need our assistance in the form of an additional tech in order to be able to research GS, so we should probably clarify for the record at least, whether or not they believe that they will be able to switch to GS.

In any case we would have to trust them - something I would usually have no trouble doing were it not for the strange behavior of the Borg in this game. Still I am willing to give the Hive the benefit of the doubt.

There may be some fear of helping them due to their sudden jump in the status chart, but I am still more worried about the Drones than anyone else, even without having gotten any really detailed info on their situation.

Hercules · October 5, 2003, 15:00

Let's go for it and the Hive haven't played the current turn yet, but it is now well past 36 hours since they received it. I presume the can delay the research by a year so that we can send them Doc:Flex. We would get Gene by return or within a year.

Ambassador Flubber should contact Kody now, I feel.

Flubber · October 6, 2003, 10:37

Latest from the HIve

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I apologies for that. However Comrade Kody took over the diplomatic dealings due to a breakdown of communications on my end (e-mail problems). The Hive is all missing diplomatic messages written by Peace to Voltaire, for the period of the 17th of September to the 5th of October. It would be appreciated if we could obtain any such missing messages from that time period.

The last communication was the following message.

Ambassador Flubber,

I regret to inform you that we indeed have not acquired non-linear
mathematics as of yet, I have put forth a request to our Department of
Development, as well as the Department of Science, to ascertain when we
will be able to acquire such knowledge.

I will pass on your suggestion of a future binding tech-trade agreement to
the People.s Congress and Central Continuing Committee. Please feel free
to present us with such an offer at any time, the Hive would be most
obliged to consider it.

We will await your final decision on the .Applied Physics-Doctrine:
Mobility. question, and we are prepared to at any time listen to
counteroffers which you present.

I will be contacting you again soon with the information you have
requested.

Sincerely,
Voltaire
Chairman of the Central Continuing Committee

We are pleased to report that our trade negotiations have proceeded well and that the Hive has approved the trade proposal with overwhelming support.

So this does not occur again it would be appreciated if all future
messages be carbon copied to two Hive members (myself and Comrade Kody).

Our Department of Development has informed us that for these arrangement to work you must set Doctrine: Flexibility to accept this turn in order for us to get Gene Splicing next turn, upon which we will send it to you as per our agreement.

Furthermore we bring more good news; the Hive has accepted and approved the pact with PEACE. Though in order to take into account changes in public opinion we would ask that our non-aggression pact have a clause stipulating that the pact will be brought up for review and renewal in 35-years. We would appreciate if you could pass this information along to the PEACE government for approval, if you do not agree with the stipulated review-renewal period you may reject the issued proposal and we can continue negotiations further until both parties are satisfied.

-Chairman Voltaire

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So they might have been lying when they pressed the immediacy of the doc flex trade but I doubt it given that they are offering pact as well.

Regardless I think we should make the trade . . . Doc flex is in the hands of 5 factions now anyway and gene splicing is a very valuable tech.

AS for pacting with the HIve, I would be in favor in terma of trade since we will get more than they but there are concerns as to infiltration.

johndmuller · October 6, 2003, 21:23

Trade is still OK with me, although some back and forth about what-ifs viz-a-viz not being offered NG to research might be more helpful in advance than after the fact.

As to pacting, that is OK with me too; despite their advantage in manpower, if they can piece together a map of our territory from looking into the base windows, more power to them. As to us having other pacts, if I were them, that wouldn't paticularly bother me; the main downside would be that they would know specifically what our techs and tech rate were (and of course whether we had any military power or not), but nothing really to worry about if they are not in our neighborhood.

Kody · June 13, 2004, 10:00

The trade I was thinking about was solely tech trading at the time.