SGOTM 15 - Misfit Gypsy Nuts

We need to do some sim testing of attacking that stack to see if it is a reasonable proposition.

If we draft now, we'd get what, archers? How fast can we get to gunpowder? Drafting muskets would be useful ...

We have 50% bonus from terrain on defense, right? So maybe the question is do we have enough troops so that we would not lose the city to his killer units (as opposed to his bombard units that don't kill)? Do we kill more of his stack going out to attack him, or letting him impale on our defense? Can we get enough reinforcements there to mop up his wounded units?

Even if we cat his stack, how low will the damage go on his units? Will we be able to kill any of them with our mere axes? My recollection from pitboss games is that a large stack of siege units in the target stack make the collateral damage disappointing.

Some sims will be critical ...

dV

Ron, i'm done with my turnset. Forgot to mention we met the team mansa/huayna during my turnset. I think we can buy time if we attack with cats, maybe the AI will stop to heal instead of attacking. We can go monarchy/feud or gunpowder.

Been out all afternoon/evening and a bit the worse for wear for constructive thoughts. As it is now I think we can draft axes. Must admit I've never drafted them tho I know you draft maces!

Def need to attack his stack now with the cats and hope she waits to heal giving us a few options. Need to study the save a bit more when I've not had much to drink but if we have iron that might be the best tech for us..

Mmm couple more options we can draft muskets but that is 3 turns at golden age speed which might turn into 4 or 5 perhaps we can use the gp to bulb monarchy this turn which should get us to feudalism at the end of next turn perhaps? Sell marble/gold for what we can get. Lib to Liz for 310 gold. Col to Ghengis cheaply should give us 400 in the bank which will allow us to upgrade a couple of archers to Lbs when we get it.

Civics need to change to slave/theocracy for 5 xp units out of the gate. If our cats can stall the attack for 1 turn it might be enough to get a few lb defenders which should be promoted drill for fs purposes against her siege.

Anyway at least it makes the game interesting..

edit: p.s well done on getting us to Lib first C63...

Yay! First to Liberalism

If Ron gets an award for most Constructive turnset (with Sistine's, etc) then C63 gets the award for most Destructive (adrianj gets the award for putting his head in the sand )

Hatty has 13 units in that main stack that can attack, + another 2 nearby? How many do we have in Kyoto?

Our catapults staying put aren't completely horrible defenders, as they will always give the attacker -50% -25% (I WISH it was 50%!) for crossing the river and won't lost HP to bombarding. They also count as extra 'bodies' that Hatty's stack will need to work through.

Assuming we switch to Slavery + Nationalism + Police State + Theocracy, we should be able to generate 2 units/turn from Kyoto. Units currently stationed in Tokyo and Osaka, plus units drafted this turn can add another 4 to the numbers in Kyoto on the turn Hatty reaches us. So, a total of 8 units extra in the space of 2 turns, with up to 6 units arriving every subsequent turn.

Even if they are trashy units like axes (drafted) and spears (whipped), I think we might stand a chance.

Monarchy/Feudalism or Gunpowder... Monarchy is basically a 1 turn tech, so seems super wasteful to bulb it. But this is a pretty extraordinary situation... My feeling is that we should use the GProphet and whatever GArtist we have lying around to extend the Golden Age. This might save us a turn on whichever of these techs we aim for, as well as give us a big boost to production that it looks like we could really need. Shame about spending the GArtist, but these are extraordinary times... (I have assumed we have a GArtist, since the Golden Disc icon on the GProphet isn't greyed out. Ignore this paragraph if I'm wrong of course.)

Since we met Mansa/Huayna quite recently, we might not have so much -ve relations with them from different religion. Perhaps a tech gift/cheap sale to them might get them in the mood to trade? If we could *somehow* pick up Monarchy+Feud through trade, that would be magic.

Regarding the AP - there's a definite danger of Hatty defying the proposal to end the war vs us. I wonder... does it make any difference in this respect if we actually ask to end the war vs Hatty? If she is portrayed as the victim. Seems unlikely, but would be good to know, if there is a way to test it.

Looking at the screenshot of Kyoto from before C63 started the turnset, I can see 20 units stationed in Kyoto! Do we still have that many? It's a tremendously great number and gives me hope.

If we do decide to defend, it might be wise to remove the GG so that it doesn't die in round 1. Any troops that survive round 1 could really benefit from the extra healing.

It might be too much to ask of Hatty, but if she doesn't stand on or pillage the copper tile, Kyoto will have 20 base . Add in Police State and that is a sustainable 1 archer/turn on top of whatever we draft.

Another point to add: How far away from another border expansion is Kyoto? If more than 1 turn, will it be reduced to 1 turn if we complete the Mandir build or assign some artists? Popping the borders another ring will give Hatty more incentive to slow down and bombard away the defences.

I thought that drafting was limited to so-called defensive units ... archers, LB, muskets, rifle, infantry, and I suppose MI. Can we really draft axes, maces, grenadiers, marines, etc?

In a pitboss game, trying to defend against Rusten's 150 stack with my 75 stack (lol), he had about 50 siege in it, who as I recall did not sustain collateral damage, but apparently used up the collateral damage hit opportunities. I only did damage to 2 or 3 units getting collateral damage per round (compared to the 5 or so I expected). So let's not rush into the assumption that a cat attack is the way to go unless we sim it. I have been disappointed before ...

Maybe if we have enough siege in the city, that provides us with the same collat soaking effect? I think our natural defense (can't be catted away) in Kyoto shouldn't be too easily dismissed.

dV

I am certainly leaning toward simply defending with our stack of cats.

@dV - Maces can definitely be drafted - they are the default option if you don't have knowledge of Gunpowder. I think they might even be chosen in preference to longbows.

Our tech options are therefore:
Monarcy + Feudalism => enables Longbows => Costs 468 + 1092 = 1560.
Metal Casting + Machinery => enables Macemen => Costs 702 + 1092 = 1794.
Gunpowder => enables Muskets => Costs 1872.

Machinery is also one tech away from Engineering.

I think we should choose whichever we can get the soonest. This would seem to be Feudalism.

adrianj said:

I am certainly leaning toward simply defending with our stack of cats.

@dV - Maces can definitely be drafted - they are the default option if you don't have knowledge of Gunpowder. I think they might even be chosen in preference to longbows.

Our tech options are therefore:
Monarcy + Feudalism => enables Longbows => Costs 468 + 1092 = 1560.
Metal Casting + Machinery => enables Macemen => Costs 702 + 1092 = 1794.
Gunpowder => enables Muskets => Costs 1872.

Machinery is also one tech away from Engineering.

I think we should choose whichever we can get the soonest. This would seem to be Feudalism.

Click to expand...

If we are going to run another golden age I think I would prefer to go to gunpowder first. Its the same 3 turns and with money from Liz etc we will have the cash to burn then 3 turns from now we can draft muskets. Don't think you can draft archers.

Just found an article it goes warriors - axes - maces - muskets etc. So we can draft axes now.

Who's up anyway..

Presumably C63 settled the GArtist in Bombay, as was the plan? In which case, we probably can't extend the golden age.

Another aspect that will put the brakes on our tech rate is if we switch out from Bureacracy, Caste System or Representation. Even with a golden age, we could find our tech rate is almost halved as Delhi loses the Bureau bonus and all the artist specialists go back to work their farms.

Question we should ask ourselves - do we risk *delaying* the switch to war-time civics until after we have learned our chosen military tech?

This is how things could play out if we delay the civic switch (I'm assuming we have 20 units in Kyoto <= This would be really good to know!):


This is what it might look like if we switch immediately.

The first option seems a bit more risky in the near future, ie, T171 will be a real nail biter. It's also extremely risky if we don't reach the tech we are expecting after 3 turns.

The second option we have so many units that Hatty's current stack doesn't have much chance.
Longer term however, we might wish we went for the faster tech route. If Liz jumps in as well with more maces, trebs and knights then our large numbers of archers+axes might not look so great.

It is risky but I think delaying the civics switch to get our tech goal is a good idea. Empty out the cities to pile units into Kyoto. Sheer weight of numbers should hopefully see us home. Alternatively, we could stay in Representation and Caste (not move to Police State/Slavery) and switch to Nationhood and Police State, to get us the beakers we need while being able to draftand switch to the others civics in 5 turns if we need.

Is anybody available to produce a screenshot from inside Kyoto?

Some screen shots, Kyoto included.

Thanks Griff

So Kyoto has 21 units, 8 of them catapults.

And we do have a GArtist and GProphet both available for a potential golden age extension.

I think we go for the hi-tech approach, delaying the civic change until we have learnt a good military tech. I am also starting to think that we make that tech Gunpowder, because muskets can be drafted and they will be better defenders than longbows. Can we reach Gunpowder in 3 turns?

All unit defensive bonuses = +25% river +25% hill. (assume cultural defense bombarded away).
Try to give units Guerilla promos as they give better defence than CG.
LB defensive bonuses = +25% city +25% hill. GU2 LB = 6 * 2.5 = 15, GU2 = 6 * 2.25 = 13.5.
CG2 Musket = 9 * 2 = 18, CG1 = 9 * 1.75 = 15.75.
C2 Maceman = 9.6 * 1.5 = 14.4. C1 = 8.8 * 1.5 = 13.2.

However, we can't upgrade archers to muskets, but we can upgrade them to longbows.

I also think we should move the GG to a tile 1W of the city so that it can't be attacked in round 1 of the fight.

Mmm both gp and feudalism have merits and I think we should do both of them.

Because of the upgrade to archers and the inherent bonus of LBs for city defence/hill defence. Plus there a lot cheaper than muskets I would go LBs first. Bear in mind its just not Hattie we will have to defend against but LIzzie at some point and Genghis is wheeoh as well.

Tech trades the only way we will be able to trade is converting Hammie to hindu. None of the AI will trade at cautious and thats the best we can hope for atm.

Def move the GG 1w. Still gives the healing bonus to adjacent tiles.

Promotions?? I still favour drill out of the gate for LBs on defence against alot of siege. I think there is an excellent chance in this game we might end up with a drill IV, CG3, guerilla 2 etc unit...

Kyoto's cultural boundaries are going to expand in 2 turns which will give it 60% defence so I'd change to archer this turn, ditto every other city except Palit, Vijay and Agra which I would put on hindu missionaries to spam Hammie and hopefully get him to change and trade with us. Mainly due to the time it takes units to get to Kyoto. Change to mil once the missionaries are done. Rinse and repeat till all his cities ar hindu. Esp as we don't want him attacking us now.

Shame all our Japanese cities don't have barracks though.

Have to agree atm don't change civics until we see what we need in a couple of turns.

Might be an idea to play 1 turn at a time at the moment and upload though we will have to be quick as the end of the game is looming quite near.

So my favoured route would be to keep civics as are. Change all cities to archers except missionary cities. Sell Lib and CoL for 400 gold. Prob gold as well. Keep marble as still fancy Delhi for building the Taj.

Play 1 turn and see what things look like. Moving toops from Tok/Kyoto will result in unhappies but think more important for the defenders to be in Kyoto. Also have a 5 cats which will be back in 3 turns.

I think we really need to sell off Liberalism ASAP. It may be a shot in the dark, but if even 1 or 2 AI go Free Religion, it is positive for us.

Need to look closer at it tomorrow after some sleep.

I agree with playing the game 1 turn at a time for the next few turns. Who is up?

What would a 1 turn PPP look like?

1) Move Osaka+Tokyo units toward Kyoto.
2) Move anything else that still has move points left.
3) Trigger second golden age? (See question below)
4) Change builds in all cities: Osaka+Tokyo+Kyoto+Bombay+Vara to archers. Delhi to Taj Mahal. Vijay+Patal+Agra to Missionaries.
5) Change tech path to Monarchy->Feudalism.
6) Move GG out of Kyoto.
7) Trade out techs for lump sums of cash. Lib to Liz, CoL to Genghis.
8) Trade out gems. Renegotiate other deals.
9) Give defending units useful promotions.

Questions:
Our current golden age shows one turn remaining. Does that mean we still get the benefit of it the end of this turn, or do we need to launch next GAge right now?
Do we want to trade out gems? Tokyo+Osaka for example will get some

Apart from Liz don't want to give out paper - edu - lib cheaply as most AI don't have education though can be done at a later date. No benefit to us even if they go FR as still won't trade etc. Probably wouldn't have much to trade by then either..

Resources we can cancel the gems deal with Shaka as we don't have any atm and sell gold/stone instead for 19gpt to others. Obv we want to keep marble for Taj build.

Need to launch the GA now for the benefit (well pretty certain anyway).

Was thinking we can rotate Taj build with mil but if we max hammers now can build Taj in 8 turns just in time for another Golden Age. + Do have some forests to chop which could bring down the time as they are out of the BFC.

Just another thought. If Delhi wasn't built on copper and our source was destroyed by spies the only units we could draft would be warriors.

Looks like it would be McArine up? Though I'm in favour of anyone who thinks they have a lucky rng stretch due them.

Just a thought would it better to promote units now before there attacked as not sure how many would be left after they've been attacked and at least this way we get some benefit from the promotions?

Edit again. Kyoto if it changes one scientist to an artist (prob should do both) it will pop its borders again this turn so that should be added to PPP as well .

So if we all agree I don't think it matters who takes the save for 1 turn but be sure to write that you've got the save before doing it. Off to a concert tonight so I'm unavailable tonight.

Just another thought. If Delhi wasn't built on copper and our source was destroyed by spies the only units we could draft would be warriors

Click to expand...

I'm almost tempted to gift away our copper resources just so we can do this

I'm surprised Kyoto was running artists at all- though we got lib in super fast time so the results speak for themselves. Switching to artists would be my preferred.