SGOTM 05 - Geezers

Never tried that, but it sounds reasonable, especially for mongols

OK, here we go:

Turn 0 (170 AD)

• Switch wounded units off of galley, replace with healthy.
• Send a Keshik to the south of silver island to scout.
• Suicide the two workers on silver island.
• Set research to 30%.
• Decide to only suicide one archer. Decide it will be the non-promoted archer in Beshbalik. Send an axe towards Beshbalik so I can suicide the archer next turn.

IBT

• Sally lands two chariots next to Ning-Tsai.
• Alex sends a galley out with a settler, blocks our galleys from moving towards Corinth.

Turn 1 (185 AD)

• Offload troops from galleys just in case Alex decides to attack with his galley.
• Move our reserve Keshik (near Karakorum) to Ning-Tsai.
• Move the axe heading for Beshbalik back to Turfan (Turfan could be reached by a Sally-Galley as well).
• Move one of the chariots in Old Sarai north to act as a reserve in place of the Keshik.

IBT

• Sally chariot dies attacking Keshik. The other chariot moves on tile and can pillage next turn.
• Confusianism is founded in Corinth.

Turn 2 (200 AD)

• Reload galley, move them off towards Corinth.
• Kill 2nd chariot near Ning-Tsai with Keshik.
• Ning-Tsai now has severe war weariness. Two unhappy faces and is starving. I can't whip the library being built, so I switch to Granary and whip it for the two unhappy citizens.
• Move some units on silver island to prepare for Alex's invasion force.

IBT

• Alex lands his massive invasion force (consisting of a settler and archer) right in the middle of five units on silver island.

Turn 3 (215)

• A Khesik on silver island gets the honor of providing Hawk his first Alex scalp of the game.
• Suicide the newly captured settler (worker).
• Ning-Tsai finished Granary, back to Library.

Turn 4 (230 AD)

Nothing

IBT

• Izzy offers peace, I accept. It appears WW drops in two cities.

Turn 5 (245 AD)

• Troops land near Corinth. Notice a grassland mine, assume it is iron.

IBT

• Barb pillages Corinth's iron mine. I'm sure he meant well.

Turn 6 (260 AD)

• Turfan Granary -> Library
• Lose one axeman (70% odds) capturing Corinth. Get 64 gold. Hawk pauses to relish in the capture of an Alex city.
• We also captured a worker in Corinth. I keep this one for later use (nothing for him to do at the moment).
• Decide to leave the five remaining invaders in Corinth in case the lush island AI's also realize Corinth is a holy city. Send galleys back to silver island to pick up some axemen for a pillage force.
• Move research to 40% (-6), construction in 9.

Turn 7 (275 AD)

• Karakorum Library -> Settler (for silver island). I decide to leave the citizens on the cottages. Moving one to the pigs would speed production of the settler, but our priority is commerce.
• A barb HA on Sally's mainland reveals 3 axes, a chariot, a spear, and 2 archers in Medina. And this isn't even his capital!

Turn 8 (290 AD)

Nada

Turn 9 (305 AD)

• 4 Axes heading towards Athens to pillage copper.
• 2 Keshiks left guarding silver island in case Alex lands another settler.
• Turfan now has one unhappy citizen, but isn't starving.

Turn 10 (320 AD)

• Corinth comes out of revolt. We are +1 gold at 30%!
• Set research to 80%, construction in 2 turns. Athens, here we come!
• Corinth begins to build a granary.

My thoughts on next turns:

• The four axes are close to the copper. I think we should land on the hill and pillage the copper. If Alex burns a couple of troops attacking the axes, all the better.
• If Alex does not come after the axes, I would not move them from the hill. No reason to put them at risk trying to pillage the horses. However, if Alex suicides a couple of units on our axes, we might go after the horses as well.
• Whatever we do, don't pillage his cottages. We will need them immediately.
• I decided not to follow Sam's clever ideas to use our Keshiks in Corinth as pillagers. Three reasons: I'm afraid an AI might be coming for Corinth, if they leave Corinth we need to pay for supply, and I'd hate to stumble into a spear and lose one. However, if things settle down and we don't see any attackers, we might want to come back to this idea. (On the other hand, we might need a couple of these units to help capture Athens.)
• As soon as constr comes up, we should switch several cities to cats. Don't let the current builds finish, we want cats asap.
• I was thinking we might want to clear Sally off his island. Razing his cities could provide some nice gold. Also, if his island is isolated and we clear him off, maybe the barbs settle their and help us towards dom. However, based on the number of units in Medina, I'm not so sure. He might be a tough nut to crack. Something to think about.
• I would follow Corinth's Granary with a Monestary. In fact, I almost started building one first, but decided a granary was critical to allow us to take advantage of the food and whip. Once we have monestary, we can get confusianism back to our mainland and consider a religion switch.

Good solid turnset The-Hawk.

The-Hawk said:

My thoughts on next turns:

• The four axes are close to the copper. I think we should land on the hill and pillage the copper. If Alex burns a couple of troops attacking the axes, all the better.
• If Alex does not come after the axes, I would not move them from the hill. No reason to put them at risk trying to pillage the horses. However, if Alex suicides a couple of units on our axes, we might go after the horses as well.
• Whatever we do, don't pillage his cottages. We will need them immediately.
• I decided not to follow Sam's clever ideas to use our Keshiks in Corinth as pillagers. Three reasons: I'm afraid an AI might be coming for Corinth, if they leave Corinth we need to pay for supply, and I'd hate to stumble into a spear and lose one. However, if things settle down and we don't see any attackers, we might want to come back to this idea. (On the other hand, we might need a couple of these units to help capture Athens.)
• As soon as constr comes up, we should switch several cities to cats. Don't let the current builds finish, we want cats asap.
• I was thinking we might want to clear Sally off his island. Razing his cities could provide some nice gold. Also, if his island is isolated and we clear him off, maybe the barbs settle their and help us towards dom. However, based on the number of units in Medina, I'm not so sure. He might be a tough nut to crack. Something to think about.
• I would follow Corinth's Granary with a Monestary. In fact, I almost started building one first, but decided a granary was critical to allow us to take advantage of the food and whip. Once we have monestary, we can get confusianism back to our mainland and consider a religion switch.

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I certainly agree on pillaging the copper. As far as pillaging the horses we'll have to see what forces Alex has in his city. I'm not sure the increased risk of losing/wounding axes is worth pillaging the horses. However hopefully Alex is building another settler.

I didn't mean us to try a pillaging economy until after Alex was gone so I'm fine with your decision. Sally's power graph is less than ours so I don't think he can have too many other strong military units at present. Perhaps some of those forces are intended for another attack against us. I'm in two minds about attacking Sally. It would be good to prevent annoying attacks so that we don't have to leave a decent proportion of our military for defence. OTOH there's the question of how much it might distract us. Would building more galleys to sink his settlers/attack forces be more advantageous in the short term?

Monastery in Corinth sounds good to me. Whether or not we adopt a religion is another matter. I'm not sure that the benefits of adopting confucianism, as opposed to simply building temples/monasteries, outweigh the diplo hit we'll get from the other AI for having a different religion. Since we can't make use of any of the religious civics I would be against it for the time being.

It's interesting to note that we can get construction in 3 turns @ 50% for a total cost of 33 as compared to the 2 turns @ 80% for a total cost of 56 . I'm fine with carrying on at 80% but I thought I would mention the option. We need to decide what to research next. IW is 5 turns @ 50% whilst CoL is 30 turns @ 50%. The figures are 3 & 18 turns respectively @ 80% but I don't believe that research rate is sustainable at present. I think it really comes down to how feasible it is to absorb the maintenance.

Alright... so it's my turnset now? [Nervous gulp!]

I've just downloaded the 320AD save - thankyou, The-Hawk - will try to get going by tonight.

Pariah said:

I've just downloaded the 320AD save - thankyou, The-Hawk - will try to get going by tonight.

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Hold on... what are your plans for the turnset? The rest of the team haven't had a chance to comment yet. Amongst other things we need to decide which tech to research after construction. We've plenty of time to go yet so playng the turnset can wait until tomorrow night.

I notice from the results & progress page that more of the teams are getting to the 'meatier bit' of this game, and a couple of interesting things caught my eye.

We're not top of the scores, though we're not doing badly. The current top scorers are Gypsy Kings - and if you remember they were the ones who did something interestingly cultural quite early on. The other team just pipping us on score right now are Fifth Element, who had a much later cultural boost. I guess both of these teams went for a wonder, which is also borne out by their lack of progress on the Power chart at the same period.

The other eye-catching fact: just what happened to Murky Waters at 1000BC - 850BC??! A violent drop in score and a small drop in power. Maybe we're right to keep our eyes on Sally and his sneak attack potential!

I did notice that too. Strange enough, there is no drop in power. Maybe a city lost without a lost unit?

And while we seem to comment less and less, the other teams talk more and more. Murky Waters are close to 1500 replies ^^

Just checking in from a crappy internet kiosk I managed to find in this international airport terminal. The screen is terrible. I can only see half the page. And the keyboard is so small and hard to use. Plus it is 5:30am.

That's the level of commitment we expect from true Geezers.

Unfortunately, I have no actual useful strategic comments to make about our game itself, other than "do something good!"

Now, where can I find another coffee?

Sally
I would also like to see us damage Sally to the point where he won't annoy us any more. Even more so, Hawk's idea of clearing Sally's island to leave a barbarian breeding-ground strikes me as interesting. Trouble is, all this is taking us in the wrong direction. I can see that we would have to virtually abandon our beach-head in Corinth to get enough military force to take Sally out.

I think we really have to concentrate on our main objectives. Leave Sally for now. Maybe some extra galleys (as Sam suggests) are a good idea, though, as coastal patrols.
Concentrate our forces on Athens, then our economy, then building up our presence in Lushland ready for the big push!

Research
Looking at the save, and I notice the barbs have helped us research several things. IronWorking is at 401/585, Monotheism 60/351, Calendar 140/1023.
Iron is the main one of interest here, of course. I'm not sure how fast the barbs are adding to this pot, but we could (e.g) have it in 6 turns at 40% if we decided to research it, which is heartening.

By the way, we can research CoL without having Alphabet first. Writing is the pre-req. (I was getting confused earlier, I think) This is a more substantial proposition to research, however, as it would take us 36 turns at 40% to get there.

Pushing Forward
After we take Athens, and turn our attentions to Lushland, I'd be in favour of sending some pillaging Keshiks out in front. Not just for pillage, but as advanced scouts. Remember they have the advantage of ignoring terrain movement costs, so we can speed them through the forests and jungle, or advance into forest leaving one move for escape in case we come across a spear. At this point we could also push our advancing edge up to the barb cities of Magyar and/or Phoenician (as long as we guard our backs in Corinth against a coastal assault).

Harbourboy said:

Just checking in from a crappy internet kiosk I managed to find in this international airport terminal. The screen is terrible. I can only see half the page. And the keyboard is so small and hard to use. Plus it is 5:30am.

That's the level of commitment we expect from true Geezers.

Unfortunately, I have no actual useful strategic comments to make about our game itself, other than "do something good!"

Now, where can I find another coffee?

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Hey! Harbourboy. I didn't notice you there.
That is commitment to the cause. (Though I do recall you do all your best work at 5:30am )
We'll do as you wish! The next city we raze will be dedicated to you in your absence!

Raze away and make sure you take the "Surfnet Premiere" internet kiosk with you. Next time, I'm bringing a laptop with a wireless card - for business class luxury surfing. This is torture.

LOL
The Surfnet forces are as good as dust!

Harbourboy said:

This is torture.

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Trying to use a turkish keyboard whilst trying to write english comes a close second.

AgedOne said:

IronWorking is at 401/585, Monotheism 60/351, Calendar 140/1023. Iron is the main one of interest here, of course. I'm not sure how fast the barbs are adding to this pot, but we could (e.g) have it in 6 turns at 40% if we decided to research it, which is heartening.

By the way, we can research CoL without having Alphabet first. Writing is the pre-req. (I was getting confused earlier, I think) This is a more substantial proposition to research, however, as it would take us 36 turns at 40% to get there.

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I think drhirsch makes a good point about the limited use of IW given our unhappiness. However, given how close we are to finishing it, I think we should go ahead and get it. Clearing jungles takes forever, if we are able to make peace with anyone and reduce WW, then we'll be glad we got some cottages prepared. Besides, it gives our workers something to do.

Come to think of it, I also would consider following IW with Calendar. If we get plantations on the Dyes, we'll get an instant economic boost. Who knows, maybe even better than courthouses in the short term. Having said that, if we wait longer on CoL, then we can't get cracking on lush island. Maybe CoL should be after IW, then Calendars.

Would Alex make peace for COL ? We need cats anyway, so peace for 10 turns will not delay our plans for long. It would be a nice and cheap way to get it and it would be worth it IMO to wait a few turns taking Alex out.

I'll try Markh's suggestion and demand CoL from Alex. 10 turns of peace on that front isn't so bad, it may allow me to establish some presence on Saladin's island and start pillaging. But I will try to build up strength for a renewed assault on Alexander by my immediate successor.

Iron Working has to be priority in our own research, followed by Calendar. We can't rely on keshiks and axemen too long - our enemies won't.

Sounds good, although I would not send too much to Sally. We should mainly concentrate getting some cats over to Athens and finish Alex off.

I just remembered that we do not have alphabet or do we ? If not we cannot get a tech for peace. That option is moot then.

Pariah said:

I'll try Markh's suggestion and demand CoL from Alex. 10 turns of peace on that front isn't so bad, it may allow me to establish some presence on Saladin's island and start pillaging.

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I really don't think we want to be diverting troops to Sally's land at present. We have Alex to take down as well as our homeland and Corinth to defend. Once Alex is down then we can consider whether we want to attack Sally's land or not. For the time being I think we're better looking to sink his galleys instead.

Sam_Yeager said:

I really don't think we want to be diverting troops to Sally's land at present. We have Alex to take down as well as our homeland and Corinth to defend. Once Alex is down then we can consider whether we want to attack Sally's land or not. For the time being I think we're better looking to sink his galleys instead.

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I did not have a look at the save lately, so I am not aware of the route to Sally. Is there only one passage ? If so, I would place galleys at the passage, so he cannot get through without attacking our galleys. Galleys defend better than they attack. In my experience you need at least 2 galleys to sink one, so trying to sink his will be costly.

markh said:

If so, I would place galleys at the passage, so he cannot get through without attacking our galleys. Galleys defend better than they attack. In my experience you need at least 2 galleys to sink one, so trying to sink his will be costly.

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Yes that's what I meant. I just didn't phrase my comments very well.