That depends entirely on whether someone or something else sets the Zuma off while their attention and possibly their army is elsewhere. Considering how suddenly and often the Zuma have gone berserk lately, and how trivial some of the reasons for those episodes have been, if I were Terran I would not be at all confident that I could afford to do anything other than watch that border like a hawk and focus all my attention on not only *not* provoking the Zuma, but on making sure that no one else does either.
Heck at this point I would have to start thinking about a policy of constant surveillance of Zuma lands to see who goes in and out, so I know who to blame and which realms to punish when the Zuma next come down on me. And then I would maybe start organizing all the realms that border the Zuma to commit them all to a policy of doing everything possible to prevent *any* character from entering Zuma lands without first obtaining permission from the Moot. I'd seal my borders to non-Moot nobility under threat of war, unless permission is obtained in advance. I'd make it a bannable offense in my realm to enter Zuma lands without permission.
But then, why should I have to do all that? Why should I have to focus so much energy and attention on this when it's not really what I want to be doing? I'm playing Battlemaster, not Zumamaster. And yet as far as I can tell, the *only * way I can be even somewhat certain that the Zuma aren't going to go ballistic on me at unpredictable moments is to prevent *anyone* from talking to them, not just my nobles. And thus the Zuma become more and more of a plot sink. The more I try to avoid dealing with them, the more time and effort I have to devote to that task, which defeats the point, the point being that I'm just not interested in them and would like to be able to pursue my own goals without having to give them any thought at all.
Thank you for describing Terran's strategy. We are actively pursuing almost exactly that strategy. It isn't fun, but, as far as we can tell, it's the only way to not die.
In response to what many have said... I'll be honest: I don't believe for a second that Terran is safe to leave its borders. The Zuma routinely keep 10's of thousands of CS sitting on the border. If your human neighbor did that, you'd be paranoid too. This idea that people are tossing around, that the Zuma can simply be ignored
is total crap. We
were ignoring the Zuma when they attacked Barca and Terran.
The forged message was a creative re-write of an exhortation by one of Terran's council members to
ignore and not talk about the Zuma.The policy of "pretend they're not there"
has been attempted. Unfortunately, it
did not work, ultimately. So now the policy has changed. We cannot afford to ignore the Zuma if they are not going to be passive.
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