The New Grämlins

[Dochartaigh]

[quote name='SynthFG' date='03 July 2010 - 06:29 PM' timestamp='1278199724' post='2359082']
It was never given time to bed down before the retardedness that was the last war, so of course the relationships that were symbolised by the treaties done away with a week or 2 before were still strong

And the idea is more about relationships than treaties, for paperless to work those ties of friendship and common understanding have to be strong, going paperless forces an alliance to pay attention to those relationships

Another way of doing it might be to insist on an sunset period of 6 months to a year in every treaty an alliance signs, forcing both signatories to re examine the relationship every so often
[/quote]

please, paperless just gives the ability for an alliance to bandwagon into any war it please by claiming to have established a relationship. If Ramirus and Grämlins had not been stupid or egotistical and not gone after the unconditional surrender, then once Grämlins rebuilt, who is gonna really state that they had no relations with Gre prior to the war and that Gre is bandwagonning in? not many. Gre would have given some real good firepower to whichever side they joined.

as for re-examining relations, i do believe most alliances do this. maybe not every 6 months or even every year, but most alliances already do this.

[TehChron]

[quote name='SynthFG' date='04 July 2010 - 01:49 AM' timestamp='1278233348' post='2359369']


It really pisses me off that thanks to the current retardedness, what was proving to be a successful experiment will be lumped in with the current mess and consigned to the dustbin of history
[/quote]
No, actually, its situations like this that indicate what the inherent downsides and potential risks of such an approach are.

All it takes is one Ramirus to completely ruin your carefully constructed experiment, and indicate just how badly things can go wrong as a result. As far as Im concerned, the measure of innovation is not how potentially good it can be, but just how spectacularly it fails when put into practice. And this has failed pretty spectacularly for Gramlins. Oh well.

Edited July 4, 2010 by Chron

[shilo]

It's absurd to claim that treaties limit an alliance in its actions. They do not.
Being treatyless or not, an alliance can fight for its friends anytime it wants. However, if you got treaties, it's pretty easy to differentiate when you are opportunistic bandwagon scum, defend a treaty partner, or fight an aggressive war for whatever reasons.
The only difference is how you want to deal with the consequences of your actions: if you are not treatyless, people will call you quickly on what you did, and depending how the war ends, you have to pay a steep price.
When we went in against CnG, we definitely had our good reasons to do so, we surely didn't wake up one morning and thought "hey, it's a good day to attack them!".
But we knew what the consequences would be if we lost, but if you fight for your friends that shouldn't matter.

Now if you are considered a treatyless and "honorable" alliance like the gRAMlins, you of course can say you were just acting to defend your secret friend XYZ, and how can anyone really prove that wasn't the case? So treatyless serves to make you look good when you either actually make opportunistic bandwagon moves, or when you fight an aggressive war like gRAMlins did against IRON.
They don't want to admit that it was an aggressive move, surely they had their reasons, and I since my alliance did the same, and I helped write the DoW, I would be the last one to say it is a bad thing.
But I acknowledge that our attack was aggressive, of course it was intended to help NSO and NpO in the war, but the attack itself was aggressive.

I even think that gRAMlins truly did want to defend MK, but that doesn't change the nature of what they did. They just want to call it something else. That's cowardice in my eyes.

If you want to stand up for your friends, you can do it anytime. However if you want to make sure you always look like the good guys when helping your friends, you are opportunistic scum.


That is what gRAMlins proved, treaties or not, any alliance is sovereign, it's just up to each alliance to be willing to pay the price for it.

Edited July 4, 2010 by shilo

[NLights]

Way to go Gramlins - you ruined the paperless treaty craze too ughhhh

[TypoNinja]

[quote name='SynthFG' date='04 July 2010 - 04:49 AM' timestamp='1278233348' post='2359369']
And the first paragraph accurately described why I agreed that we should go that route, predictability in the treaty web is what allows alliances to
plot curb stomps, a large random element makes that so much harder,
[/quote]


No, it doesn't. It makes it easier. Think, what do people do when attempting to roll an alliance? They try to politically isolate it so it has less allies to call on, because it takes effort and a large advantage to hold a whole alliance down, so you want it stacked as high in your favor as possible.

Karma worked largely in part because NPO hit the worst alliance possible from their point of view, attacking OV got SF and C&G in right away, it showed people a fighting chance existed. Because of a treaty web anybody could follow.

Without treaties is becomes far far easier to isolate someone, a few back room deals, a good strong opening to intimidate anybody who might think of helping and instead someone is more likely to simply burn alone.

[quote]
It really pisses me off that thanks to the current retardedness, what was proving to be a successful experiment will be lumped in with the current mess and consigned to the dustbin of history
[/quote]

If you think it was successful you are kidding yourself, Gre's example in everything since BiPolar is being consigned exactly where it belongs, sterling examples of what not to do.

Edit: what the hell, I think I just managed to multi quote from more than one thread. how the crap did I manage that?

[Dochartaigh]

[quote name='SynthFG' date='04 July 2010 - 03:49 AM' timestamp='1278233348' post='2359369']
It really pisses me off that thanks to the current retardedness, what was proving to be a successful experiment will be lumped in with the current mess and consigned to the dustbin of history
[/quote]

wait, you honestly thought that a treatyless world would somehow end the curbstomps? please. if anything, having no treaties between anyone makes it so much easier to curbstomp. no more having to fight to isolate an alliance, since it would be a simple matter of "Hey, ya'll are friendly with Alliance X but we don't like Alliance X. There are N amount of us and only 1 of them. if you just sit out, we will not harm you." the deterrence factor is almost nil since if you can get enough of the big (both in terms of NS as well as name) alliances behind you and without conflicting treaties, this will be so much easier to do. not to mention, without an actual treaty to back anything, it would be a lot easier for alliances to simply walk away and state that relations with sour. typically, a treaty cancellation would have to be done, which would have to be announced to the world and would draw different reactions (both good and bad). with the paperless route, that is no more. an alliance can simply state "oh this relationship with bad a while ago" and no one would have any real proof otherwise.

this experiment pretty much failed from the moment it was announced. It may have started off looking pretty but given hindsight and some time to think on all the possible implications of this paperless route catching on, it is just so easy to see that it was doomed to fail and fail hard.

[SynthFG]

[quote name='TypoNinja' date='04 July 2010 - 08:22 PM' timestamp='1278271338' post='2359584']

If you think it was successful you are kidding yourself, Gre's example in everything since BiPolar is being consigned exactly where it belongs, sterling examples of what not to do.

[/quote]

And again you make my point for me,
What has occurred in the immediate run up to ESA and since has nothing at all to do with Gre being paperless, yet you and those like you insist on linking them

Yet if you look properly Bi-Polar actually showed that it could work
IRON did not complain that we had not given fair warning or that we had no right to defend MK when we hit IRON, they understood our position and the reason we moved,

Similarly when Zenith looked like they were going to be more trouble than Gre needed in matching up against the soft sub 50k NS underbelly, FARK had no problems in answering Gre's request for assistance due to the strength of that relationship at the time, again to there credit I didn't see Zenith crying about paper when they did,

The truth of the matter is that had Gre done the correct thing and ended the war when the ESA accords were signed very few if any of the people that matter would have a problem with the legitimacy of the paperless route

Edited July 4, 2010 by SynthFG

[Lusitan]

[quote name='SynthFG' date='04 July 2010 - 11:56 PM' timestamp='1278284151' post='2359730']
And again you make my point for me,
What has occurred in the immediate run up to ESA and since has nothing at all to do with Gre being paperless, yet you and those like you insist on linking them

Yet if you look properly Bi-Polar actually showed that it could work
IRON did not complain that we had not given fair warning or that we had no right to defend MK when we hit IRON, they understood our position and the reason we moved,

Similarly when Zenith looked like they were going to be more trouble than Gre needed in matching up against the soft sub 50k NS underbelly, FARK had no problems in answering Gre's request for assistance due to the strength of that relationship at the time, again to there credit I didn't see Zenith crying about paper when they did,

The truth of the matter is that had Gre done the correct thing and ended the war when the ESA accords were signed very few if any of the people that matter would have a problem with the legitimacy of the paperless route
[/quote]


The problem was not this war. We all had very present where Grämlin loyalties were, if anything, from the almost war fiasco earlier that month. And you're right, no one would talk about Grämlins in this conflict and post-conflict season. You can be damn sure though, that in the next war, regardless of the way Grämlins picked the war, there would be people complaining and protesting against Grämlins' treatyless perspective. And this would happen because, contrarly to the Second Unjust War, no one would have any way to predict how Grämlins relationships would be. So yes, it would happen anyway.

[eejack]

[quote name='SynthFG' date='04 July 2010 - 06:56 PM' timestamp='1278284151' post='2359730']
Similarly when Zenith looked like they were going to be more trouble than Gre needed in matching up against the soft sub 50k NS underbelly, FARK had no problems in answering Gre's request for assistance due to the strength of that relationship at the time, again to there credit I didn't see Zenith crying about paper when they did,
[/quote]

That is because Zenith rocked. Though to be completely fair - everyone knew about the relationship between Old Guard and Zenith so Grämlins could predict what they would face. The inherently sneaky backroom only dealings of Grämlins meant Old Guard and Zenith had no idea what we were facing when we protected IRON from Grämlins' aggression.

The paperless treaty system means Grämlins is always the aggressor since they have no treaties that anyone else recognizes. It also means folks can reasonably surmise that Grämlins bought Fark's assistance against Zenith. A little bit of paper completely removes both of those thoughts.

EEjack

edit: werds are tough.

Edited July 5, 2010 by EEjack

[Thorgrum]

[quote name='EEjack' date='05 July 2010 - 01:38 AM' timestamp='1278290292' post='2359817']
That is because Zenith rocked. Though to be completely fair - everyone knew about the relationship between Old Guard and Zenith so Grämlins could predict what they would face. The inherently sneaky backroom only dealings of Grämlins meant Old Guard and Zenith had no idea what we were facing when we protected IRON from Grämlins' aggression.[/quote]

Your first sentence dosent jive with your last, that being said gramlins did not enter into the war aggressively we defended friends. You, and anyone else can scream as loud as you want that gramlins was an aggressor its simply not true. I understand its hard to pull through the idiots here jack, you have people literally copy and pasting the same ditribes over and over again to the point they even belief it to be true.

Its very simple, Iron declared war against an ally of the gramlins. Its irrelevent if that alliance was or was not represented by what others deem acceptable, the facts are the facts.

[quote]The paperless treaty system means Grämlins is always the aggressor since they have no treaties that anyone else recognizes. [/quote]

You dont really believe that do you? Like I said the paragraph before its easy to get caught up with the idiots who want to rewrite history and ignore the facts due to gramlins choice after the ESA, but making absolute statements like this often are the precursor for looking silly later.

[quote]It also means folks can reasonably surmise that Grämlins bought Fark's assistance against Zenith. A little bit of paper completely removes both of those thoughts.[/quote]

Wow, I think you spent a lot of time chatting with duncan king thats pretty sad.

No matter how loud or often people attempt to rewrite the way the gramlins entered this conflict the facts will never change. The ending, you'll get no argument from me they $%&@ed up largely because the brain trust at gre put thier eggs in the Ramirus basket and well, he's a smart guy he just lacks the requsite humility to make that final leap to brilliant.

[Haflinger]

[quote name='Thorgrum' date='04 July 2010 - 09:24 PM' timestamp='1278293075' post='2359843']
You dont really believe that do you? Like I said the paragraph before its easy to get caught up with the idiots who want to rewrite history and ignore the facts due to gramlins choice after the ESA, but making absolute statements like this often are the precursor for looking silly later.
[/quote]
This belief system is really common in certain quarters actually. I've been arguing against it since at least 2008, but the logic is that a war is only defensive if it's launched in response to a defensive clause in a treaty being activated.

Frankly I think it's but a symptom of a larger problem, which is an obsession with the vilification of offensive action being taken, which leads everyone to characterize their wars as defensive in nature, even when they're obviously not. In at least some sense, every war launched is aggressive, and that fact should not make it indefensible.

[eejack]

[quote name='Thorgrum' date='04 July 2010 - 09:24 PM' timestamp='1278293075' post='2359843']
No matter how loud or often people attempt to rewrite the way the gramlins entered this conflict the facts will never change. The ending, you'll get no argument from me they $%&@ed up largely because the brain trust at gre put thier eggs in the Ramirus basket and well, he's a smart guy he just lacks the requsite humility to make that final leap to brilliant.
[/quote]

Honestly I don't know from ramirus ( other than to know he is not as smart he as wants to believe he is ) - I dealt with SynthFG and MatthewPK and that nice fellow from Filipino Heroes. Sadly that alliance disappeared.

However, yes, I personally believe Grämlins were the aggressor and they abused/confounded/worked around the normal political mechanisms to achieve advantages. I do not think they were wrong do so, but it difficult to avoid the sneaky, underhanded, behind the back vibe that goes along with 'secret unwritten' arrangements.

If folks knew the entirety of the treaty web, perhaps the whole of the war could have been avoided. Grämlin obfuscation may have actually escalated and exacerbated the conflict. Certainly it brought in OG and Zenith and Filipino Heroes and escalated Fark's role directly.

What confounds me is individually, grämlins fought with great integrity, yet as an organization chose to use hidden politics.

Thorgrum - my beliefs are based in what I experienced and the folks I spoke with on both sides, yours are colored differently and I apologize if I came across as anything other than respectful of your views.

EEjack

[lonewolfe2015]

Soooo... I'm not sure where this thread has gone to and back, but I have to ask.

Why isn't this war over yet?

And why are the people in charge still keeping their thumbs up their $@! to the point of letting it drag on?

IRON has had the advantage for months now, and they clearly have the strength advantage at this point. Gremlins could have declared all out war by now but they haven't, and it looks like any member in war has effectively given up.

I don't see why this has to keep going on, it's ended the careers of some brilliant people that were in Gremlins, and more before that who gave up.

[Dochartaigh]

[quote name='Thorgrum' date='04 July 2010 - 08:24 PM' timestamp='1278293075' post='2359843']
You dont really believe that do you? Like I said the paragraph before its easy to get caught up with the idiots who want to rewrite history and ignore the facts due to gramlins choice after the ESA, but making absolute statements like this often are the precursor for looking silly later.
[/quote]

the issue with this is it now opens the way for all bandwagoners to claim a "paperless" route. Considering how the curbstomps under NPO and Co were disdained, Gremlins move basically opens the door for just more curbstomps as people now don't even have to worry about somehow justifying a treaty obligation to jump in anymore. they can just state "oh hey, we be friends" and boom that is it.

[TehChron]

[quote name='SynthFG' date='04 July 2010 - 03:56 PM' timestamp='1278284151' post='2359730']
And again you make my point for me,
What has occurred in the immediate run up to ESA and since has nothing at all to do with Gre being paperless, yet you and those like you insist on linking them

Yet if you look properly Bi-Polar actually showed that it could work
IRON did not complain that we had not given fair warning or that we had no right to defend MK when we hit IRON, they understood our position and the reason we moved,

Similarly when Zenith looked like they were going to be more trouble than Gre needed in matching up against the soft sub 50k NS underbelly, FARK had no problems in answering Gre's request for assistance due to the strength of that relationship at the time, again to there credit I didn't see Zenith crying about paper when they did,

The truth of the matter is that had Gre done the correct thing and ended the war when the ESA accords were signed very few if any of the people that matter would have a problem with the legitimacy of the paperless route
[/quote]
That's all well and good, but Im going to repeat what I said earlier because it's actually the most relevant rebuttal (in my view) to your wistful reminiscing about your experiment.

[quote name='Chron' date='04 July 2010 - 07:25 AM' timestamp='1278253486' post='2359447']
No, actually, its situations like this that indicate what the inherent downsides and potential risks of such an approach are.

All it takes is one Ramirus to completely ruin your carefully constructed experiment, and indicate just how badly things can go wrong as a result. As far as Im concerned, the measure of innovation is not how potentially good it can be, but just how spectacularly it fails when put into practice. And this has failed pretty spectacularly for Gramlins. Oh well.
[/quote]

Because of that, it doesn't matter what little details may have been different, ultimately they played out the way they did because Gramlins allowed Ramirus to make his decisions, just like you all decided to go paperless.

You can nitpick via hindsight all you like, but the test run of your paperless route has failed spectacularly. And Ramirus is far from an excuse for why it could work elsewhere, if anything, it's an incredibly powerful example of what likely [i]could[/i] go wrong.

Gramlins current situation, unique in being the "first" paperless alliance, is notable not because it demonstrates the potential benefits of going paperless, but is a living (for now) example of the worst case scenario coming to pass.

And if not even a formerly great alliance like the Gramlins could pull this off, what hope, or even point, is there in any other alliance attempting it themselves?

Gramlins did this to themselves, and thats all this is. The experiment failed. Going paperless failed. Gramlins failed, and now we should all just move on. Gramlins should accept white peace, and then maybe try to rebuild themselves for a second chance, the only other alternative is to lay down and let IRON kill them.

Edited July 5, 2010 by Chron

[shahenshah]

[quote name='Thorgrum' date='05 July 2010 - 06:24 AM' timestamp='1278293075' post='2359843']
Your first sentence dosent jive with your last, that being said gramlins did not enter into the war aggressively we defended friends. You, and anyone else can scream as loud as you want that gramlins was an aggressor its simply not true. I understand its hard to pull through the idiots here jack, you have people literally copy and pasting the same ditribes over and over again to the point they even belief it to be true.

Its very simple, Iron declared war against an ally of the gramlins. Its irrelevent if that alliance was or was not represented by what others deem acceptable, the facts are the facts.



You dont really believe that do you? Like I said the paragraph before its easy to get caught up with the idiots who want to rewrite history and ignore the facts due to gramlins choice after the ESA, but making absolute statements like this often are the precursor for looking silly later.



Wow, I think you spent a lot of time chatting with duncan king thats pretty sad.

No matter how loud or often people attempt to rewrite the way the gramlins entered this conflict the facts will never change. The ending, you'll get no argument from me they $%&@ed up largely because the brain trust at gre put thier eggs in the Ramirus basket and well, he's a smart guy he just lacks the requsite humility to make that final leap to brilliant.
[/quote]

If the purpose of Gre was to enter the war for defense of there friends, then the present conflict would be over. Its pretty clear there was more on the agenda than just saving friends and seeing how far Gre is willing to go for that agenda, they consider it very significant.

See thats the thing, if Gre ended the war with ESA signatories, everyone would "believe" Gre went in for friends, but Gre decided to commit mass idiocide and said they wanted alot more than just saving friends.

[SynthFG]

You honestly believe this was planned from the start,
I've said it a million times and I'll keep saying it until I pound it into some Skulls,
For Gre the end of the war has absolutly nothing to do with the start,

Whilst for IRON and most of the combatants the war may have been a continuous event, for Gre it effectivly ended over a month before the signing of ESA after Zenith and OG were peaced out and the last non peace mode DAWN and IRON nations dropped below effective attack range

It was only in the 2 weeks or so prior to the ESA that the UC surrender thing began to be banded about as an idea,

[Chaoshawk]

Not a very good idea it appears.

[franciscus]

Actually, I will have to agree with SynthFG, going paperless (I mean, completely paperless, though) with a strong alliance would be an interesting experiment. With the one condition to be able to admit you're going into wars aggressively, regardless of your intent or motives and to suck it up if others would name you "bandwagoners". The "bandwagon" label wouldn't have been an issue for Gremlins due to their reputation. While some have/would have doubted Gre's motives as being selfless, many would have not and thus the discussions would have been kept to a minimum. More so, they would have had the ability to put pressure on key points, not by engaging in wars but by intimidating adversaries and being middle-men in negotiations.
If that was the initial intent, I think it might have worked. However, your (their) internal mechanisms have not been balanced enough to prevent failure. If you want to do an experiment of such magnitude and with so much implications, you have to make sure you have checks and balances in place to prevent it from going haywire. That's where the experiment failed.

[SynthFG]

[quote name='franciscus' date='05 July 2010 - 11:46 AM' timestamp='1278326761' post='2360179']
Actually, I will have to agree with SynthFG, going paperless (I mean, completely paperless, though) with a strong alliance would be an interesting experiment. With the one condition to be able to admit you're going into wars aggressively, regardless of your intent or motives and to suck it up if others would name you "bandwagoners". The "bandwagon" label wouldn't have been an issue for Gremlins due to their reputation. While some have/would have doubted Gre's motives as being selfless, many would have not and thus the discussions would have been kept to a minimum. More so, they would have had the ability to put pressure on key points, not by engaging in wars but by intimidating adversaries and being middle-men in negotiations.
If that was the initial intent, I think it might have worked. However, your (their) internal mechanisms have not been balanced enough to prevent failure. If you want to do an experiment of such magnitude and with so much implications, you have to make sure you have checks and balances in place to prevent it from going haywire. That's where the experiment failed.
[/quote]

The experiment didn't fail tho
Paper or paperless has absolutly nothing to do with what Gre are trying to pull now,
The insane idea off demanding UC surrender when not one of the primary parties in the conflict was never going to work, especialy when the allies won't support it and you do not have the strenght to impose it yourself

It was an interesting idea, but it should have gone back into the draw as soon as MK rejected and never been suggested yet alone demanded of IRON,
Going alone was beyond even the retardedness of TOP and IRON kicking off a global conflict with a pre-emptive strike

[Bob Janova]

They didn't kick it off, not that that much mitigates the retardedness of the move.

Regarding a paperless FA, you can go back in the Grämlins and Citadel forums to see my detailed arguments against it, but essentially it is bad because it means that any war you enter will be [i]legally[/i] aggressive, and will therefore cause treaties to chain against you. (Read the non-chaining clause of any treaty that has one and it will talk about treaty ties, not 'friendships'.) That's a different thing to being 'morally defensive'; a good example would be Grämlins' entry into Karma, which was legally an aggressive war against IRON but we were joining the defensive side of the war. That aggressive entry would have caused IRON's treaties to chain onto us if not for the infamous deal, which is why said deal had to be done.

An alliance or bloc which is large enough to just do what it likes can get away with a paperless policy, because in the end if you have more tanks than the rest of the world put together, they can't stop you and won't try. The Orders back in the days when they rolled together could just about have done this, as can be seen from the number of binding treaties which were ignored by allies of stomping victims. But Grämlins (or even Harmlins) was never going to be able to do that. You were 'permitted' to enter this war without much criticism because most of the moral crusaders were either already shouting at TOP and IRON for the pre-empt, or in Supergrievances and happy enough to take the extra firepower to stop it being a close fight. Also, all of IRON's treaty partners were already occupied with the war so you didn't bring in any extra chains (like TOP and IRON did by pre-empting), except possibly DAWN who are fairly minor.

I agree with you that the insanity of the post-ESA war does not reflect on the paperless policy, but that policy itself is a huge liability. The only reason it wasn't a complete disaster in this case is because someone else did something even stupider, and also you could point at recently cancelled paper treaties and say 'These guys are still our allies' – not something you can do with a real, long term paperless policy.

[StevieG]

[quote name='SynthFG' date='06 July 2010 - 12:24 AM' timestamp='1278329030' post='2360187']
The experiment didn't fail tho
Paper or paperless has absolutly nothing to do with what Gre are trying to pull now,
The insane idea off demanding UC surrender when not one of the primary parties in the conflict was never going to work, especialy when the allies won't support it and you do not have the strenght to impose it yourself

It was an interesting idea, but it should have gone back into the draw as soon as MK rejected and never been suggested yet alone demanded of IRON,
Going alone was beyond even the retardedness of TOP and IRON kicking off a global conflict with a pre-emptive strike
[/quote]

I have to agree here. The debate can rage on whether or not going paperless is a good or a bad thing for the world we live in. However, the complete lunacy of what has gone on after the war should have ended, should have no bearing on the paperless/non paperless debate.

Edit: Also, because of what happened we probably wont see if the experiment would have failed or been a success. This war was probably too close to the Gremlins going paperless decision in order to be used as a gauge of success or failure.

Edited July 5, 2010 by StevieG

[Thorgrum]

[quote name='Dochartaigh' date='05 July 2010 - 06:45 AM' timestamp='1278308734' post='2360054']
the issue with this is it now opens the way for all bandwagoners to claim a "paperless" route. Considering how the curbstomps under NPO and Co were disdained, Gremlins move basically opens the door for just more curbstomps as people now don't even have to worry about somehow justifying a treaty obligation to jump in anymore. they can just state "oh hey, we be friends" and boom that is it.
[/quote]

You forgot to qualify your reply with "the issue [b]for me is[/b]" the problem is you along with some of your cohorts replying seem to apply absolute conditions to the entire system. Wonderful, but it dosent make it true. It could happen that way, it could open the way for "all bandwagoners to claim a paperless route" but it dosent mean it will.

You seem to spend a great deal of time worrying about the far reaching affect of a dying alliances FA choices and thier global impact. Who knows Doch, someone at some alliance right now might be rubbing thier hands together and plotting their next bandwagoning action based on Gramlins choice to defend an ally. They may even be ready to cancel treaties exclusively for this reason, I mean its not what the gramlins did, I know I was there but lets not let facts get in the way of silly supposition.

Because as we know before, if you had a paper treaty you were worried about having an open door to get in on a curbstomp. Cool story bro.

[Zangmonkey]

[quote name='Mr Damsky' date='03 July 2010 - 05:47 PM' timestamp='1278204415' post='2359147']
The treaty web becomes "retarded" when treaties conflict. Conflicting treaties cause uncertainty during war because it becomes difficult to predict sides. By not naming who you're going to defend (via treaty) and only labeling them as your "friends"; you (and by extension MHA) become variables in conflicts because no one knows who your friends are and if they might change.

And yes, a treaty that's not written down isn't a treaty so don't claim that your treaty partners are set in stone.
[/quote]


Have you failed to realize the ambiguity itself can serve as a war deterrent?

Perhaps a part of our thought-process was that it's too simple for people simply to check CN Wiki, tally the totals for sides then march to war.
Variables are quite a relevant element; just look at how people have howled about our "bandwagoning" despite the fast that we joined immediately when the odds were against us, sought no spoils of war, and did not march off with our "side" as though we had earned the victory ourselves.

Now we are met with claims that we didn't do those things because we are insane... rather than the reality which is that we never cared about "the odds", "the spoils" or "the glory"

But it seems to me that this concept is so foreign to many people who can do nothing but parrot something about how not having a treaty inherently makes us aggressors and/or bandwagoners.

[ironchef]

[quote name='Matthew PK' date='05 July 2010 - 07:34 AM' timestamp='1278340476' post='2360240']
Have you failed to realize the ambiguity itself can serve as a war deterrent?

Perhaps a part of our thought-process was that it's too simple for people simply to check CN Wiki, tally the totals for sides then march to war.
Variables are quite a relevant element; just look at how people have howled about our "bandwagoning" despite the fast that we joined immediately when the odds were against us, sought no spoils of war, and did not march off with our "side" as though we had earned the victory ourselves.

Now we are met with claims that we didn't do those things because we are insane... rather than the reality which is that we never cared about "the odds", "the spoils" or "the glory"


But it seems to me that this concept is so foreign to many people who can do nothing but parrot something about how not having a treaty inherently makes us aggressors and/or bandwagoners.
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Wow Matt, there are people like Thorgrum who post to show why being paperless has its merits and then you come in and crap all over it. How Gre used their paperless policy was opportunistic at best. It gave you another chance to pound on IRON and make them pay for their sorted past no matter who they attacked.

As for "the glory" that is the only reason you joined in the fun. If not, this little stunt regarding unconditional surrender with terms to be unveiled after the fact never would have taken place. You would have left the field of battle with your so called friends without the "the spoils" or "the glory" and people would have respected that because it would have shown honor. What you have done from the time you entered the war up to today is show nothing but cowardice, opportunism, arrogance, and detestation.
Now you come magnanimously bearing an amendment to a peace treaty you didn’t take part in so IRON and DAWN can find peace like it’s your place to give it to them. The phrase “Pride cometh before a fall” has never fit any situation better than it does this one. IRON has had a real solution to end this conflict on the table for three months now. Your pride is keeping you form doing the right thing and taking it. You can take the agreement of white peace with IRON and DAWN and end this war with what is left of your alliance or you can continue to show the world just how arrogant and stubborn you really are.