SGOTM 15 - Unusual Suspects

I checked the save so here are some more details. We should connect the cows--Bolly is at its health cap. Should we save our new GG or settle him? If so, where? Probably Drona or Bolly. We have several nearly completed units that should probably be finished before starting buildings or whatever; we're sorta barely positive on the cash flow at 0% but a few more units won't break the bank, and we need that spear in Vijay just in case.

Pata will pop its borders in 2 turns so no need to run an artist there. I'd switch from the marble to the bananas to grow next turn so you can 2-whip the granary (before switching to Caste!).

Regarding settling and techs: We can finish Sailing in 1 turn and IW in about 2, but the latter would leave us dangerously close to strike conditions. If we got Sailing and delayed the switch from slavery by a turn, Delhi could 2-whip a galley and then finish its settler to settle the island. I'd probably take 2 sites there: 1W of sheep and NE of corn. The prior could make a good Moai city with 3 hills for mines, 4 forests to chop, and the lake. The alternative would be the mainland fish site but we'd need a border pop to get the fish and the timing isn't great for running an artist (for 3 turns) to do that (unless we can delay the switch back to slavery); it'll take 6 turns to finish the settler and get him there. Without the fish the city will take quite awhile to grow and its only good tile will be the marble, which isn't quarried yet. If we do take that site, we need to have the marble quarried to get its extra hammer and 2 commerce, otherwise the city will be a significant drag on our economy. We'll also need another workboat for the new city (whipped from Delhi?). I'm leaning toward the Sailing/island idea. If we do that, we'll need to send a worker with the settler and eventually a defender.

In the east: We currently have 6 full strength axes (including the one in Osaka), 4 full cats and 2 wounded, and 1 full archer, so we may not need to wait for units to heal to continue. The wounded cats are still useful for bombarding. On the other hand, it would be safer to wait for our lone spear to heal, along with the 2 wounded cats. I guess the question is, how big a hurry are we in? It's going to take a long time to research Paper (or anything other than Sailing or IW) in our current financial situation so the only way to get more techs soon is to extort them from Toku for peace. He's 9 turns from Construction, but he might get it from somebody else in trade or gift. Ditto for Feudalism and LBs. My guess is we should proceed with prudent haste.
 
I don't think Toku has much of a military left. I was going to move our stack into the city, heal one turn and then move out.

Since the settling issue is still being debated, I think I should wait for a consensus before proceeding. I have family stuff to do most of the day anyway, so I won't play until this evening (8 hours or so from this post), regardless.
 
Thanks kcd.

1. Declare war on X
Prerequisite: One Full Member must be at war with X and at least one Non-Vassal Full Member must not be at war with X, and X must be a Non-Vassal Non-Member.
If passed, all Members are instantly at war with X.

Some crazy thinking. What about a strategy to tries to get Toku to the switch to Hindu. After the war, gift a couple a hindu infected so-so cities to him and see if he would switch. Then when we are declared on we should get the vote - right? And the Zulu either need to defy and get negative diplo or join the fray?

With +4 diplo for shared religion and +2 shared military struggles and city gift diplo perhaps even get him to pleased.

Just a thought.
 
Thanks kcd.



Some crazy thinking. What about a strategy to tries to get Toku to the switch to Hindu. After the war, gift a couple a hindu infected so-so cities to him and see if he would switch. Then when we are declared on we should get the vote - right? And the Zulu either need to defy and get negative diplo or join the fray?

With +4 diplo for shared religion and +2 shared military struggles and city gift diplo perhaps even get him to pleased.

Just a thought.

That sound workable... unless its Shakagawa that DOWs us.:lol: Note, Hindu in a Toku city would halve the costs of espionage there, as well. So if we have to take a crap city in the east, we should have a hindu missionary ready to infect it if we can, before giving it back and taking Kago, ;)
 
Some crazy thinking. What about a strategy to tries to get Toku to the switch to Hindu. After the war, gift a couple a hindu infected so-so cities to him and see if he would switch. Then when we are declared on we should get the vote - right? And the Zulu either need to defy and get negative diplo or join the fray? ... With +4 diplo for shared religion and +2 shared military struggles and city gift diplo perhaps even get him to pleased.

That is crazy! But they'll never expect it! ;) We should think about this some more--it's going to take some effort and crazy thinking (and probably a lot of luck) to pull off a Religious win, which is probably the only chance we have at a quick finish.

On the settling issue, I should repeat others' earlier points about the benefits of offshore trade routes. And with 4 forests to chop (and the stone bonus), the Moai are practically built already. I'm really liking the island idea.
 
The kid's swimming lesson was cancelled, so I have more Civ4 time. :)

I like the gifting Hindu cities idea. We can build a missionary when we switch back to OR. Let's see what the eastern Japanese empire looks like. We could always found a less than so-so city for him if we like the existing ones.

The only objection to the mainland fish city site over the island was that we don't want Toku (mis)placing a city there. We have a couple of axes close to intercept if that happens, and we could put our next city there. I'd vote for the island.

So, revised tech path: CS (next turn) > Sailing (1 turn) > Paper (save up cash first). Yes?
 
For fun i took one of the test games we were using and used WB to replace budd with hindu in Toku cities to see if he we would flip. He did on the very next turn. I then DOWed him for the -3 diplo and took a city. I then gave him a +4 trade and after a few turns he was at pleased. See attached. after gifting a few more cities I had him at +10. And managed to get a total of 5 AI with at least one city of Hindu. Now the test game was NOT all Tokus, but it does seen like it is an option.
 

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Nice work, SH! :goodjob: I don't think (?) that choosing to use this strategy changes Trys's plan, does it? But the choice of city(ies) to gift will depend on what we see in Toku's land so let's not play too far. As for settling the island vs the mainland fish site, we don't have open borders with anybody so nobody can get to that site--unless we're at war, of course, but I don't think I've ever seen an AI try to settle a city anywhere near the front lines--I don't think there's any worry about the fish site being taken.

Oh, BTW, I forgot we needed finish CS first. :blush: There's no way we can finish IW quickly--Sailing is the best we can do, and even that will leave us with very little cash. Switching to Bureau will significantly improve our cash flow, though, so we should be safe. Worst case, we can run some merchants after switching to Caste, but I don't think that will be necessary.

I know Trys is anxious (me too :))and has the time to play soon, but I think we need some more discussion and agreement on what to do before giving a green light. I'm pretty happy with the plan, though, assuming we go for Sailing, settle on the island, continue the attack with little or no waiting, and incorporate my MM suggestions. I'm not sure what to do with the GG--just hold onto him until we know where our HE is going (?).
 
Updated PPP:

Heal the stack in Kyoto for a few turns and advance on Toku's remaining eastern cities. We will leave Kagoshima for now.

Bollywood: Switch build to Hindu monastery, then either finish colosseum or build units depending on the situation. Build a Hindu missionary for one of Toku's cities after the switch to OR.

Vijay: Grow 1 turn and 2 pop whip the Hindu temple before switch to Caste. Build workers and settlers to prevent growth and reduce whip unhappiness.

Bombay: Finish granary then build Hindu temple.

Delhi: 2 pop whip a galley (before CS switch) and then finish settler to settle the island (1W of the sheep), then build another settler or a library. Build more cottages here.

Pata: Switch from the marble to the bananas to grow next turn to 2 pop whip the granary before switching to Caste, finish cat, then build Hindu temple. Run an artist after the switch to pop borders, then build WB for crabs. Quarry the marble.

Holy Cow: finish cat and then Christian temple or more units. Connect road to cows.

Drona: finish cat then start Hindu monastery (will need courthouse soon) or more units.

Osaka: switch between cat and granary. Run an artist after switch to CS to pop borders.

Kyoto: Buddhist temple when it comes out of revolt?

Civics: Switch to Bureaucracy when CS done. Also switch to Caste System and OR. Switch back to Slavery if military situation dictates.

Tech: finish Civil Service (1 turn), then tech then start Paper. Get Alphabet, IW, and whatever else from Toku soon. Self tech Sailing for a galley? We could also use Currency ASAP. (Edit: CS (1 turn) > Sailing (1 turn) > Paper at 0% research for a few turns to save up cash.)

Spread Hinduism to Holy Cow, Osaka, Kyoto. We don't have any cities without a religion already present.

Save the GG for now.

Pause conditions:
*Another DoW (i.e. the start of a Buddhist dogpile).
*Cats coming from Hammy in the north.
*Someone techs Feudalism.
*We are ready to extort peace from Toku
*Hammy will accept peace.

Play 10 turns or until a pause condition is met.
 
Heal the stack in Kyoto for a few turns and advance on Toku's remaining eastern cities.
We may not need to heal much/at all, and speed might be vital. Maybe send out a partial stack (all healthy combat units) to assess the situation? The scout would be good for sneaking into Toku's territory and back out but we probably want him to stay in Kyoto to heal units.

Pata: Switch from the marble to the bananas to grow next turn to 2 pop whip the granary before switching to Caste, finish cat, then build Hindu temple. Run an artist after the switch to pop borders, then build WB for crabs. Quarry the marble.
No need for the artist--borders will pop in 2 turns from Hinduism. We already have a WB for the crabs. If/when we settle the fish site, though, we'll need a WB for there.

Tech: finish Civil Service (1 turn), then tech then start Paper. Get Alphabet, IW, and whatever else from Toku soon. Self tech Sailing for a galley? We could also use Currency ASAP.
I vote for Sailing immediately after CS, then Paper at 0%. Currency would be good, but maybe we can steal that from somebody? In any case, we're hedging our bets by running 0% so that's not critical.
 
I vote for Sailing immediately after CS, then Paper at 0%. Currency would be good, but maybe we can steal that from somebody? In any case, we're hedging our bets by running 0% so that's not critical.

Oops. Yeah, I forgot to update that when I copy-pasted the old PPP. Agreed. My proposal is CS (1 turn) > Sailing (1 turn) > Paper (at 0% research to save up cash for the push).
 
Fire when ready!
 
One late thought: Would it be better to get Sailing first and then finish CS? The idea would be to start a galley and then 2-whip it the turn we get CS so we could immediately revolt to Bureau, OrgRel, and Caste. See what you think.
 
One late thought: Would it be better to get Sailing first and then finish CS? The idea would be to start a galley and then 2-whip it the turn we get CS so we could immediately revolt to Bureau, OrgRel, and Caste. See what you think.

Sorry - I missed this. Things are going well, but I forgot to whip the Hindu temple in Vijay because Hammy sent a small stack with a HA, so I moved up the spear in Vijay to finish it. We have popped borders in Pata and Osaka. I am debating switching back to Slavery for 5 turns to whip the temple and whip away unhappy citizens in Kyoto (which is starving anyway). Tokyo is ours, and has Islam, so we have another religion.

I have a settling question: Our settler is currently 1W of the sheep on the island, but there is a whales we would miss out on unless we settle 1NW of of current location. Do we want to move for the whales?

Here's a picture to help:

Spoiler :


I await your input.
 
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