Quoted By:
<span class="mu-r">”Of course, we don't expect you to produce this for charity. Nor would we insult you with idle threats and demands of tribute; after all, this ship isn't armed and we are no fighters by ourselves! So, we offer to start sending you the following in compensation.”</span>
<span class="mu-r">”Firstly, <span class="mu-s">Somatotroph</span> hormones, harvested from our own organ farms. We use these to boost the development speed of young Esaal to get them into fighting shape faster. Your biotechnology is better then ours, so with just a few tweaks you can use it on your own populations, but this way you won't have to farm the raw materials yourselves. Secondly, mass <span class="mu-s">Limestone derivatives</span> from our nearby worlds, delivered via kinetic bombardments. Obviously these are only valuable in mass, but useful for building materials for cities and not easy to find unless you own a planet that possesses a fossil record; like our new ocean planet we found! Our AI say that you expanded and took the Hazaar territory recently, so these will be really useful. Third, and finally, we'll provide a few shipments of <span class="mu-s">Tactile Gold</span> to sweeten the deal. Our menfolk really don't care about that kind of thing, and it'd be a waste to just melt it down into circuits. We think this would be a fair trade between our peoples.”</span>
<span class="mu-g">”I'm surprised you didn't offer anything more strategic. What about the mass deposits of Azurium you acquired during the Baalathi conquest?”</span>
She frowns. <span class="mu-r">”...I don't think the menfolk would like that trade very much, your Majesty. It would have to go much further up the chain of command then myself. I'm sure we can come to compromise without that silly boy stuff. What do you say?”</span>
She is correct, those would be helpful in your expansion into the former HVS systems- helping to build cities. You could even use the hormones to boost the population growth of your Vetucker and Swall minorities, though you aren't very much into drugging up your entire population like the Esaal and Consortium seem so eager to do. Finally, the gold is nice, but a simple luxury to improve citizen happiness, not having much <span class="mu-i">objective</span> value.
However, one of your biggest advantages in space is your superior computers. While this trade offer wouldn't involve you turning over the secret of the Threemind or your better AI technology, more AI cores is always better, and will lead to exponential gains in their industry, science, and warfare sectors over a long enough period of time. It won't be enough to keep up with you, but it will inevitably shrink the gap between your two powers.
How do you want to handle this?
>Accept the Trade Offer as is
>Grant the request, but give faulty AI cores that can be exploited later
>Request Azurium instead (1 in 3 chance to succeed)
>"Let's have that ocean planet instead and I'll make all the AI cores you want."
>Decline
