by Burning
Good choice of topic, Ryan. As others have said it matters to me what the situation is. Take the original example:Ranior wrote:
The specific situation is the following: I'm say the Witches who are pretty high up in the Air Cult. The Cultists are in the game and have just offered me leech. But they are fighting me for the Air Cult, although they also have several other cult fights going on. I want that leech, but I don't want them to move on Air. I'm fine if they move on the other cults.
So a strange thought crosses my mind--could I make them an offer? Suppose I say I will accept their leech if they promise not to move up Air.
So a strange thought crosses my mind--could I make them an offer? Suppose I say I will accept their leech if they promise not to move up Air.
If I was playing offline with some of the usual players, and I was competing with cultists on a different cult, I would scoff at or boo the players that made the deal. But they would know (I hope) that it's in jest. My friends don't play tm that much* and I win more than my share so have no reason to complain.
However if I was the cultist player that got the offer, I would probably say something like "you'll see what cult I want if you take the leech". Perhaps point out that I'm competing with witches and other players, or perhaps point at some upcoming cult bonus, if any. If I was witches I wouldn't offer but might comment aloud about my thoughts (without expecting cultists to offer any deal, it's just how I play sometimes).
*neither do I to be honest. At least one person I play offline with started playing on bga, so maybe I'm outclassed soon.
I have another somewhat similar situation to consider. On the base game map, yellow and blue can often share the west, leeching from each other. Some time ago I was playing nomads, with among others a first-time player playing mermaids. When, do you think, it's okay to mention the possible partnership, if at all?
As I recall I didn't mention anything until some way into the game when we had both built a few things in the west and another player was complaining about a lack of power. But from then on me and the mermaids player high-fived each other when building there. (Well, that stopped after I took an obvious connection hex from mermaids and she was forced to tripe-dig with workers.)
On snellman I would consider any of this somehow inappropriate (unless agreed beforehand, or perhaps some kind of teaching game). Not least from a time perspective: to set up a deal would probably require 3-4 lines of chat, and unless the players happen to be online at the same time/can check whenever, that might extend the game a day or more.