Source note: Local copy of a Summer Into AI 2026 submission originally published on Substack. Screenshots, video, and audio found in the post body are mirrored locally when publicly accessible; profile and avatar images are intentionally not copied. Read the canonical post.
Week 2 of Summer into AI 2026 hosted by @advisoryhour — theme: Red, White & Boom.
You are Benjamin Franklin, 72 years old, arriving at Versailles in January 1778. The Revolution is failing. Valley Forge is happening right now. Your mission: persuade four factions of the French court — King Louis XVI, Foreign Minister Vergennes, the Philosophes, and the Merchant Consortium — to sign a Treaty of Alliance with America. You have four rounds. Each faction weighs your argument differently. Claude plays all four voices simultaneously.
Worth noting alongside this: Qwen Franklin by Eric Eric fine-tuned Qwen to roleplay as Franklin answering questions; here you play AS Franklin, and Claude plays everyone he's trying to convince
How the AI works
The demo uses one Claude endpoint per negotiation round. You select a faction to address (Louis XVI, Vergennes, the Philosophes, or the Merchants), choose an opening gambit (Enlightenment Appeal, Strategic Argument, Commercial Opportunity, or the Wounded Ally plea), and write your argument in Franklin's voice.
Claude plays all four factions simultaneously using a structured tool output called evaluate_diplomacy. For each faction, Claude returns: alignment_shift (−20 to +30 points), what_worked, what_failed, counter_demand, and faction_voice — an in-character response from each courtier.
Win condition: the weighted alliance score (Louis ×40, Vergennes ×35, Philosophes ×15, Merchants ×10) must reach 60 out of 100 across four rounds. Start too low, and France stays neutral. Start strong, and Vergennes' counter-demands get more specific — more interesting.
How to play
Pick an opening gambit — it sets your rhetorical frame for all four rounds
Select which faction to address each round — you can't persuade everyone equally
Write Franklin's argument in the text box; Claude evaluates it as each courtier in character
Watch the Alliance Score — reach 60 by Round 4 to sign the Treaty of Alliance
Where to play
Demo: demo-14-the-french-alliance.vercel.app
Code & README: demo-14-the-french-alliance
Summer into AI 2026 · Theme 2: Red, White & Boom
Original source
Canonical Substack URL: https://jakestrait5.substack.com/p/summer-into-ai-2026-the-french-alliance.