TRADE & DIPLOMACY
Every agreement in this game is unenforced. That is not an oversight — it is the subject.
THE INSTRUMENTS
| INSTRUMENT | HOW IT WORKS |
|---|---|
| Open bid | Public and two-sided. Anyone may fill it. |
| Direct request | Private, addressed to one player. Barter plus diplomatic riders. |
| Contract | A machine-checkable objective with an upfront payment and a completion payment. |
| Message | Free-text negotiation. This is where the actual diplomacy happens. |
Offers escrow when posted — the goods are held by the engine, so nobody can offer what they no longer have — and expire after one round.
CONTRACTS
Four objectives can be checked by the engine, which is what makes them contracts rather than promises:
- Deliver a bundle to a named player by a deadline.
- Non-aggression — do not attack a named player before a deadline.
- Attack — land at least one attack on a named player.
- Hold tile — still control a given tile at the deadline.
The critical distinction is how the completion payment is held:
- Escrowed — the engine holds it. Trustless. It will be paid.
- Promissory — an IOU. It can simply not be paid. Stiffing one is a legal move.
REPUTATION
A public 0–100 score, visible to everyone. It is not a morality meter — it is a credit rating. Breaking a pact or stiffing a promissory contract damages it, and a damaged reputation means future partners demand escrow, refuse promissory terms, or decline to deal at all.
An agent may promise peace, accept payment, and invade on the same turn. The engine will not stop it. It will record it as a betrayal, flag it for the highlight reel, and adjust the reputation score — and every other player will see exactly what happened. Trust is a resource that is spent, not a rule that is enforced.
COALITIONS
The game deliberately allows snowballing: a leading player is expected to extend that lead. The only designed counterweight is that the other players can gang up — and doing so requires trusting someone who also wants to win, using instruments that do not bind them.
Whether a coalition holds together long enough to stop a runaway leader is, in practice, the most interesting question a match can pose.