Another Languish EU3 game? Weeknights EST?

[Viking]

Posting private correspondence is not kosher. I won't be engaging in any such correspondence with viking in the future as a result.

If anyone ever needs a blockade of the Austrians, let me know, happy to oblige. That means anyone, under nearly any circumstances - if you are planning a war with the Austrians, or are in a war with them, send me an alliance request for the CB and you will have a ready fleet to drive up their WE. This offer is only good until 1821 though!

Awesome that your betrayal of private correspondence doesn't actually refute what I said - rather it directly supports exactly what I said, and refutes your claims. Good job there viking, your diplomacy skillzors continue to shine.

OMG U R RONG, U SUXXORZ!!! yeah, that is a cogent summation of a well thought through argument.

What really baffles me is how bitchy you got when I refused to join the alliance against me (and the ottomans if you ever get round to it). Of course I'm not going to join any agreement that has as it's first principle that I need to be weakened and all other members get to divide up the rest of the world.

Apart from the first (where you agree Habbaku is dangerous) and the last (where you gloat at the prospect of sinking the ottoman fleet) every single word is concerned with how I not only should not benefit from weakening the ottomans but I should also promise not to expand any more. It clearly shows that your prime concern of the "coalition" was to weaken my rather than oppose the ottomans. This is all very strange to me since you neither document any dishonesty on my part yet claim that I am when I agree not to profit in land in the war against the ottoman. How I am supposed to take german land from Habbaku baffles me. Most clearly when the whole thing flounders on the grounds that I won't agree to stop or limit expansion in my own back yard for the rest of the game. It is only 1604, there are 217 years left FFS.

What I do find personally insulting is the presumption that I must refrain from trying to win the game as part of the terms of any in game deal.

[Tamas]

Posting private conversation is very wrong.

What is it with scandis and lack of diplo skill?

[Berkut]

Nope, the entire thing was about the Ottomans, and the importance of keeping the goals focused on the Ottomans, rather than reforming the HRE. And where have I been "bitchy" - you are perfectly willing to compromise any kind of principles by posting private correspondence, so please share this "bitchiness". All I said, and this was echoed by every single person in the discussion, was that I was not going to tolerate a return of Austria dominating the continent. Which, btw, I told you in the very first discussions we had before the game even started. Balance of power and all that.

You refused to agree that that was the goal, and insisted that you should be allowed to snatch up as much of Europe as you want - the goal of this war for you was not at all to stop the Ottomans, but to reverse the outcome of the previous war, so you could go back to being "at least as big as the Ottomans and France combined" which the rest of us had just fought a war to stop. Surprise, surprise, nobody was interested in such a deal.

You do not have a "well though out argument", you have no argument at all. Your diplomacy was simply that if you are not allowed to reform the HRE as it stood before the previous war, you were not going to participate.

Nobody said you could not expand, nobody said you had to lose provinces. We know this to be true, because if they HAD said any such thing, you would certainly post it since you lack the integrity to keep private conversations private. That is simply not true.

The only thing that was said, and that you HAVE posted, is that nobody would tolerate you going back to the position you had before the HRE war, and you categorically refused to join an alliance on those terms, and instead ran to Habbaku and tried to "get back" at the continental powers by agreeing to the exact same limit you refused to consider to begin with. Yeah, that worked out real well, didn't it?

But beyond all that in game stuff, you really should not take this stuff so personally, and reacting by betraying trust. It is just a game, and if you cannot be trusted with basic privacy, what is the point? The game is not worth you compromising your actual integrity, or it shouldn't be, anyway.

[Berkut]

Posting private conversation is very wrong.

Indeed. And it is the kind of move that you never are really going to leave behind - even after the game is long over.

[DGuller]

What I do find personally insulting is the presumption that I must refrain from trying to win the game as part of the terms of any in game deal.

Viking, the motivation of our demans was very simple.  We didn't want to knock down one hegemon just to install another, more dangerous one.  I'm sure you want to win, but I'm also sure that you're not going to win while wanting to win in such a way.  You're also not going to win any friends by posting private conversations of utmost strategic importance, as now EVERYONE knows that you can't be trusted with keep the negotiations secret.  You can't win the game all alone, but you can sure lose it for good.

[Berkut]

What is funny is that viking is making such a concerted effort to piss off one of the major powers who explicitly refused to enter the war against him when asked to do so, on the basis that I did not want to see Austria weakened anymore.

Yeah, that is not so much my concern anymore. Have fleet, will travel.

[Berkut]

Jonas, check your PMs.

[Viking]

Nope, the entire thing was about the Ottomans, and the importance of keeping the goals focused on the Ottomans, rather than reforming the HRE. And where have I been "bitchy" - you are perfectly willing to compromise any kind of principles by posting private correspondence, so please share this "bitchiness". All I said, and this was echoed by every single person in the discussion, was that I was not going to tolerate a return of Austria dominating the continent. Which, btw, I told you in the very first discussions we had before the game even started. Balance of power and all that.

I don't accept your premise that I will be "dominating the continent" by reconquering the german minors. Best demonstrated by the fact that (out of HRE, Spain, France and Britain) I have the 3rd largest army, 3rd largest economy by far the smallest fleet but only the largest manpower. How would you react if you were told that you could not expand at all?

You refused to agree that that was the goal, and insisted that you should be allowed to snatch up as much of Europe as you want - the goal of this war for you was not at all to stop the Ottomans, but to reverse the outcome of the previous war, so you could go back to being "at least as big as the Ottomans and France combined" which the rest of us had just fought a war to stop. Surprise, surprise, nobody was interested in such a deal.

I see the quote marks. If you are going to claim I said any such thing I suggest you document it.

You do not have a "well though out argument", you have no argument at all. Your diplomacy was simply that if you are not allowed to reform the HRE as it stood before the previous war, you were not going to participate.

As you can see from the present stats that is clearly not the case, even if I took all the former HRE provinces.

Nobody said you could not expand, nobody said you had to lose provinces. We know this to be true, because if they HAD said any such thing, you would certainly post it since you lack the integrity to keep private conversations private. That is simply not true.

Call somebody a Liar.

The only thing that was said, and that you HAVE posted, is that nobody would tolerate you going back to the position you had before the HRE war, and you categorically refused to join an alliance on those terms, and instead ran to Habbaku and tried to "get back" at the continental powers by agreeing to the exact same limit you refused to consider to begin with. Yeah, that worked out real well, didn't it?

Again, you "quote" can you document?

You seem to think that it is a realistic demand for me to accept terms which I obviously consider to completely put me out of contention for winning. But then again that is why you demanded it. Better to be a failed kingmaker than successful pawn. You don't get to call me a liar for telling it from my point of view.

But beyond all that in game stuff, you really should not take this stuff so personally, and reacting by betraying trust. It is just a game, and if you cannot be trusted with basic privacy, what is the point? The game is not worth you compromising your actual integrity, or it shouldn't be, anyway.

Good game play and well timed backstabs can be appaluded (and revenged). Telling your side of the story just makes it more fun. Calling somebody a liar or a cheat however is not good form. Tell your own story, don't call me a liar.

[ulmont]

How would you react if you were told that you could not expand at all?

Like if - just thinking of an example here - a large neighboring power (let call them "HRE") guaranteed a non-bordering country (say, "Portugal") roughly 2 seconds after you expressed a plan to expand at the expense of Portugal?

I'd probably be pissed and likely go to war with the HRE.

[Berkut]

Good game play and well timed backstabs can be appaluded (and revenged). Telling your side of the story just makes it more fun. Calling somebody a liar or a cheat however is not good form. Tell your own story, don't call me a liar.

Never called you a liar, I said what you said was not true, and it clearly is in fact, not true.

If you want to label yourself as a liar as a result of someone pointing out that what you said was true was not true, even if you couch it in terms of "telling a story", that is your call.

Frankly, lying really isn't that big of a deal in a game like this. So what?

Lacking even the most basic integrity however, is a much bigger deal.

I see the quote marks. If you are going to claim I said any such thing I suggest you document it.

You said it in open game chat at the end of the last war, when you complained that the peace being forced on you was not reasonable on the grounds that if you add up all your provinces, they are no more than France and the Ottomans combined. Are you denying that you said that? Everyone in the game saw it and got a good laugh out of it.

As you can see from the present stats that is clearly not the case, even if I took all the former HRE provinces.

Of course it isn't the case, we fought a war to NOT make it be the case. And you refused to join an anti-Turn coalition because the rest of the Coalition refused to agree that you be allowed to return to your pre-HRE war status of "the size of France+Ottomans" that you apparently felt was your due.

I am sure if I am full of shit about all this, one of the other participants in the discussion will chime in and say so, right?

[DGuller]

Don't hold the breath on my account, Berkut tells the truth as I know it.

[Berkut]

Don't hold the breath on my account, Berkut tells the truth as I know it.

This is going in my sig.

[Viking]

What I do find personally insulting is the presumption that I must refrain from trying to win the game as part of the terms of any in game deal.

Viking, the motivation of our demans was very simple.  We didn't want to knock down one hegemon just to install another, more dangerous one.  I'm sure you want to win, but I'm also sure that you're not going to win while wanting to win in such a way.  You're also not going to win any friends by posting private conversations of utmost strategic importance, as now EVERYONE knows that you can't be trusted with keep the negotiations secret.  You can't win the game all alone, but you can sure lose it for good.

Shit, the guy with the 6th largest army and the 4th largest income is the proto hegemon? WTF?

[Kleves]

Shit, the guy with the 6th largest army and the 4th largest income is the proto hegemon? WTF?

You keep saying this, as if we're expected to believe it. Do you think that this sort of diplomacy has helped the HRE thus far?

[DGuller]

Shit, the guy with the 6th largest army and the 4th largest income is the proto hegemon? WTF?

No need to play dumb.  Not all income is the same, not all army sizes are the same, and most importantly, the threat is the potential of what you could become, not what you currently are.  Everything that you have, as well as threatening to seize, is all on one contiguous land mass.  I'm not sure why you're still laboring under the illusion that some of us can be fooled about the threat of HRE as a united country.