This message is an apology to BB for the wrongs done to them here. I will give a full explanation of the situation as best as I can, not as an excuse, but as an admission of failings to uphold our own standards of play. I am not playing this age due to rl reasons but I am in Emeriti channels and keep occasional tabs on what is going on so some of the responsibility for not preventing this is on my shoulders. I have read the logs from the relevant discussions and present this apology and summary.
First, Emeriti is against any sort of use of "ghetto friends" to help the positioning of top kingdoms including themselves. This age however, Emeriti had some ex-players who decided to play in a "ghetto" together rather than deal with top kingdom life similar to how other former top kingdom players have done in recent ages. This was not set up to help Emeriti and Emeriti leadership expressed concern when the ex-players chose to explore with bour becoming #1 land and others being large. I think the kingdom was around #5 land also due to the large provinces.
Emeriti leaders expressed concern several times to bour that he was going to farm out and that emeriti leaders were not happy with him being big and not having a strong enough kingdom to avoid farming out. Bour assured them he would make sure he didn't farm out.
Emeriti had about a 30% lead on #2 land until BB got an early ww (with land bonus selected) and jumped from 15k acres to 22.5k acres and then released their off specs to mass explore in post war to about 32.7k acres. At this point it seemed clear that BB was making efforts for the top and Emeriti took notice. Emeriti asked them if they wanted to make a term cf or intended to fight them right away. BB offered a short term cf and emeriti countered with a very long request (expecting some sort of compromise). I believe bb offered yr2+notice and emeriti asked for yr10+notice.
At one point Emeriti felt a term cf with BB was likely and grew concerned that such a term CF would lead to Bour and his big provs on top 5 kd land getting farmed. Emeriti advised Bour to ask BB for a cf with urgency. The reason for this was that if bour could not get the cf, then he either needed a new plan to not get farmed (like razing themselves down) or Emeriti couldn't agree to cf BB since it'd lead to BB farming past them. If bour could get the cf, then Emeriti could have agreed to a cf with BB.
Where things got uglier is when Emeriti discussed the ethics of razing a kd into post war if you don't have any cf with them. Emeriti has many philosophical internal debates about similar things and arguments about this one asked about stuff like "with war wins already so overpowered, should kingdoms be able to explore +50% of their land on essentially no military when they do not have cf deals? Emeriti concluded that on this issue hitting into a post war would not be something they felt appropriate to actually do. During the discussions though, an Emeriti leader did say "if he's going to farm bour next it's bour that should be razing them." Another Emeriti leader "slapped" Bour after this to try and get his attention.
Bour ingamed BB asking for a cf which was read by the BB Steward and not responded to. There was panic at this time because it was feared by both Bour and Emeriti that BB would stall Bours cf talks until BB was trained up and then farm Bour. Bour decided to raze BB to get them to talk to him and then offer back all the land and interest for a cf. This was a mistake for many reasons including that Flogger has normally been considerate of ghetto provinces as long as they don't affect the top competition, and also for the sh*t play of hitting into a post war that many feel is sacred, and also because doing so could affect the situation with Emeriti and BB.
Bour razed 380 acres from BB into their post war in part at the suggestion of some in Emeriti that it was his best chance to force a cf with them. Bour did then offer all of the razed land back plus extra land and gc for a cf. But by this point, BB was too upset to consider resolving it with anything less than heavy destruction.
BB agreed to a Yr4+48h notice cf with Emeriti and refused to cf Bour no matter how much he would give them unless Bour and his kingdom all agreed to not grow past a certain size of about 1000 acres. Bour continued to offer reparations in land and gc but did not feel he could agree to say no one in his kingdom could grow even if he would be willing to not grow himself. He said he was still open to a deal at any time for reparations and I am told that talks with him have now been resumed by BB and hopefully something can be worked out soon.
I also told flogger that Emeriti feels sorry about their role in suggesting Bour try and force a cf through dirty means and wants to ensure that BB gets full reparations and any situation corrections needed so that their position is not hurt by what happened.
Flogger said that BB would not accept anything less than Emeriti agreeing to not compete for #1 and giving up on the age. I reiterated that fixing the situation for BB was the way such things should be handled and trying to end a kingdoms age at the start of YR1 was just not reasonable even though they were wrong to suggest that Bour try and get his cf however necessary. I reiterated that Emeriti and Bour should make concessions to ensure BB's position is not hurt from it.
In summary, Emeriti messed up in encouraging Bour to get a cf with BB through whatever means necessary. Bour also messed up in not being patient with his talks with BB and thinking he could raze BB in post war to force talks and then give the land and more back in diplomacy to get a cf. I apologize for not personally doing something to prevent this earlier when I saw that there were problems. For example, I could have came to BB myself and tried to ask them on behalf of bour for a cf. I also could have said that post war is sacred in all situations and shouldn't even be discussed, however the truth is that I think game mechanics and ethics should be open to debate and are constantly evolving and when I am not playing I try to not interfere too much.
As for what to do now, I propose that BB, Emeriti, and Bour figure out what BB needs to fix the situation to ensure that they have not been penalized from this.
Still too long TLDR - Emeriti advised bour to urgently get a cf with BB urgently so he wouldn't farm out to them if Emeriti cf'd BB. Emeriti suggested he raze into post war to try and force a cf if BB wouldn't agree to one with him. Emeriti's doesn't believe in using ghetto allies for their benefit and although their motivations were just to help Bour not farm out, the situation was magnified when BB decided to not take the land back and cf Bour and instead gave Emeriti a longer cf than BB wanted. Emeriti acted against their own morals and in ways they'd have also been upset if an opponent did to them and apologizes for it and wants to help make it right for BB.
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