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To follow or not to follow.


Omniscient1

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Not Following a treaty is one of the worst things an alliance could do from the peanut gallery's standpoint, but I thought it be interesting to find out CN's view of not following treaties. Is there ever a reason to not follow a treaty?

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From a purely functionalist standpoint, there is no way to 'enforce' a treaty as binding to all parties. Hence, the social mores against not following a treaty functions as its attempted enforcement. Alliances, assuming perfect knowledge, will act in what is best for their own best interests, treaty be damned. If an alliance follows a treaty, its only beacause they feel its the best course of action. At the point in time a treaty is activated, each party decideds first if it is in their best interests, then constructs a nominally fact based argument to back it up. Lesson is, don't treaty with an alliance you doubt will share your interests, and re-evaluate often.

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Well, it is tough call but alliances can do more to put themselves in better situations and avoid having conflicts like in the BiPolar War. Most recently I think GATO/NSO perhaps should have canceled their treaty a while back. It's quite clear that GATO and NSO would be on opposite sides of most wars and therefore putting one of them in a position of not honoring the MDP they shared. Having friends all over the web is fine but alliances should have a focused FA path. I'm sure friends that they have no treaties with would understand if at some point they have to be at war with each other, understanding would be easier than telling good friends you can't honor the treaty.

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I agree with Fernando. I think the practice of signing MDP's that inevitably fall of opposite sides of wars is irresponsible. In fact, whole system of individual MDP's and chaining is outdated and completely chaotic. It reminds me of Pachinko.

Alliances should start being more realistic about picking an actual bloc/cluster and eliminating conflicting treaties, or at least reaching an understanding with their allies about how they plan to chain their treaties in a real world scenario. There are no clearly defined standards for how to best honor multiple treaties (with different clusters) that I'm aware of. Defend the ally that got attacked first? Defend the ally in the bloc with which you have the most treaties? Defend that ally that's most in danger? Go neutral?

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If you're going to lose, you don't have to follow.

I don't think this is the standard the majority of people actually use, with a few well berated exceptions. Rather, I think its: "If you are going to lose, and you think your ally (or their ally/ally's ally, ect.) behaved like an total idiot and probably deserved it, you don't have to follow the treaty."

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Actually, most alliances casually ignore the intel clauses in the treaties they sign anyway, and many alliances ignore non-aggression clauses as well. The only clauses the peanut gallery cares about are binding defense clauses, you won't even find much in the way of interest for the violation of binding aggression clauses.

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The only time violating a treaty is acceptable in my eyes is in response to a violation from another signatory, be it in letter or in spirit. If you give your word on something there's no excuse to go back on it, unless the other party has gone back on theirs first.

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In theory, a treaty should reflect the actual relationship - what each signatory is willing to do for the other. Just a public statement of what's already in place. So in my view, no. However, if the people agree "we're not going to follow the treaty" in this case - that's essentially changing the agreement right there. So no violation.

If alliances have treaties that no longer fit the reality of the relationship - drop them.

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If the ally tells you not to enter, then you can legitimately choose not to. But i think a lot of alliances would choose to enter regardless.

This is the only reason. If an ally tells you to stay out you have to respect their wishes to be a good ally. Every other situation, eg:spying, should be in the treaty or you cant be trusted as an ally again.

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If a treaty is broken the treaty is declared broken. Then you can be attacked by your treaty pardner. Simple really.

What's all the fuss?

Edit: Come to think of it... I should say void, or cancelled instead of broken, that makes it better.

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They have to be disposable, there are several alliances that if they didnt have a lot of MDP partners to cover the web would be nothing more then inactive paper tigers. So yes there are reasons not to follow treaties, CN is filled with example after example. When war breaks out you pick the ones that will put you on the winning side.

ROAR!

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They have to be disposable, there are several alliances that if they didnt have a lot of MDP partners to cover the web would be nothing more then inactive paper tigers. So yes there are reasons not to follow treaties, CN is filled with example after example. When war breaks out you pick the ones that will put you on the winning side.

ROAR!

I would think that treaties with inactive paper tigers would/should be canceled.

I rather be on the side with my true friends win or lose than just the side that will put me in position to win.

Thorgrum, do you think it would be bad/evil to go after these inactive paper tigers for the reason of them being big but worthless fighters? Maybe force them to shrink and be more efficient? Also, if a treaty is violated and the offended party wants war would the offended party be in the right if it calls on its other allies to war on their former treaty partner? Has an instance like that ever happened?

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Actually, most alliances casually ignore the intel clauses in the treaties they sign anyway, and many alliances ignore non-aggression clauses as well. The only clauses the peanut gallery cares about are binding defense clauses, you won't even find much in the way of interest for the violation of binding aggression clauses.

I care about both as me or my allies have been wronged by both. :|

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Ideally, the only time ye would not follow a treaty be when your matey has broken the treaty or has done something so horrible that ye be cancelling the treaty. The worst part be that the current mindset does nothing to those who do not honor their treaties. If people were held accountable for when they did not honor a call for help then they would mean something and people would put a lot more thought into who they were tied to. Everyone complains how bored they be with the current state of the game. All they have to do be start holding people to their treaties and things will be much more exciting.

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What is the point of having a treaty if you won't follow it? Doing this is bad public relations as it makes you look not credible and unreliable. News about this could get around and no one wants to treaty with you and you're on your own, not to mention the alliance you scorned may end up attacking you.

It's just all-around a bad idea.

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