[BTS] World Wide Wonder

[IPEX-731BA5DD06]

Cease fire, either side can re-declare at any time. Most likely to be the human, but never know.

I think taking Londimium, we've broken churchhills back, but that remains to be seen.

Maces and crossbows v's Swords and Catapults, no wonder we're doing it so hard

[Brian Shanahan]

Originally Posted by IPEX-731BA5DD06

Cease fire, either side can re-declare at any time. Most likely to be the human, but never know.

I think taking Londimium, we've broken churchhills back, but that remains to be seen.

Maces and crossbows v's Swords and Catapults, no wonder we're doing it so hard

Well as they say "if it's hard to do then it's not worth trying." I think take a ceasefire, and just funnel most of the military towards Londinium and Eboracum. Then sucker punch him outside Hastings.

[Stochastic]

Churchill isn't interested in a cease fire either, I'm sure he is full of inspiring and defiant speeches for his court bards to spread throughout the land.

So here is my plan, I'll try to play sometime tomorrow, the 10 turn set will really help me out now that the summer is done.
1) Hold London. This will require some LBs (4?) so that the Preats can get moving. At least one will come from Eboractum, I plan on not working the cottages for a bit as I will whip the Monastery and work the pasture over a paltry 2 commerce.

2) Build up for the next wave of attacks. Units needed (as I see it) are mostly Preats and Trebs with a Pike for each attacking stack. Since we have spies for the culture defense, I'm thinking that we only need 3-4 Trebs to suicide per city. We have 6 preats, I'd like 16, and 3 trebs, I'd like 8. I'll see how many can get.
I'm going to have no qualms about whipping Antium, it has a large happy cap and is working several unimproved tiles. Soon Ravana will also have unimproved tiles to whip out so I'll get some more units there.
Rome will join in too after the UoS, I'll whip the temple, and overflow into units, and maybe whip the monastery too as it has a lot of food surplus.
Neapolis will stick to Trebs, with max two pop whips.

Note that I'm not actually planing on taking any cities this set as I think that would drastically over extend our forces, especially with a potential threat from Catherine

Looking at the shape of England, I'm thinking that it might actually make more sense to avoid Hastings for now and take out Coventry and maybe Nottingham if we have the units to make two stacks. Then England will be divided and he will have a much harder time building up a concentration of units.

For techs, I'll finish off Edu obviously (though hold off on universities except for Rome and bank gold instead so that we can get more units), for the next tech I'm thinking that we should get Lib up to one turn away and then go for Nationalism for the Taj. Since our chosen VC is Diplo I think we should try to get Sci Meth from lib, but obviously that will depend on the AI tech rate.

[IPEX-731BA5DD06]

Why are we doing Education, if we're at war.

Why not do guilds for 9 turns, others don't even have paper. Build Stables in production cities while teching guilds, Spam out Knights with Flanking 2, Run all over Churchhill.

Education, we're only building 1 University at moment, and that's Rome.

We're in WAR to win, Liberalism is only 1 Tech, Good, but not as good as getting more land Faster.

We can then Assimilate Isabella into our Empire and build Forbidden Palace in London. We'll have land to be Number 1, and now only need to manipulate the Builder of the U.N. to be a loathed A.I. Gandhi, Founder of Judaism who's only bordered by William, is a Great Candidate, or William who's Founded Confucianism. Are both Candidates, we just need to get Catherine to Friendly and Keep Hammurabi there and we're golden.

Easy out, Guilds=>Knights, Run over Churchhill, immediately destroy Isabella, no Vassals, no mercy and tech out a U.N. win.

[IPEX-731BA5DD06]

Idea's, Split England in half, get to Spanish border, IMMEDIATELY declare war on Isabella, eradicate her completely, finish off England.

To this End, Tech Guilds, Knights=2 move through Churchhill's lands, Anti Longbow units, Immediately move into Spain.

Sit back and Tech to U.N.

Selected Candidate ,would have to be William. He has MUCH more land to expand into Southwards.

Only Problem is He'll go Free Religion on us, so we NEED TO GET CATHERINE TO FRIENDLY.

Hereditary Rule, Is a must, as much as I love Representation.
Stay Hindu, no Free Religion.
Land=Power=Population=Research potential.
No Vassals, they'll only give us -1 "you've taken our opponents as your vassal" etc

William has the Potential to go Cultural on us as well, 2 founded Religions, Spamming from Gandhi's Judaism, and spread of 4th religion, or he founds Islam.

[Thy_Spellcraft]

Sounds good so far but maybe edu --> gunpowder is another possebility to get some military tech online.. We're half through edu and going for muskets would solve some counter problems like pikes or xbows..
And concerning building military in Rome: Did we already build every WW possible?

[cripp7]

I like the idea of knights to run through the rest of the land, as long as the others don't get Paper we'll still have a great chance at Lib. For the moment stick to building preats/trebs going Guilds > Edu.

We can keep Will out of FR by spies. Just have to switch him before the vote. We still haven't met WvO who resides with Ghandi.


I'm going out of town this weekend and will be back Sunday afternoon.

[Stochastic]

Interesting point about getting knights, I hadn't even considered getting another military unit (clearly far too much autopilot on my part). For knights I wonder if they will be worth it, Izzy doesn't even have MC right now she is so backwards, so Preats and Trebs should mop her up no problem. Churchhill has WEs and those will be the only offensive unit he can build after we've stolen the iron and copper so knights will be less useful with him too. As I see it the main advantage of knights is the potential speed, using spies to remove defenses and then quickly moving between cities. But I think that all possible speed gained will be lost in the extra time it will take to research guilds and then build knights. Gunpowder might be an option too, but that will come even later.

But since I can certainly seen either Knights or Gunpowder being an interesting option I think I'll hold off on playing my set for another 24hrs to see what the consensus is.

For the UN, won't Hammy be our challenger? He looks larger than the Dutch right now, but maybe I'm just bad at estimating size and future growth potential. I'm assuming that we will have to build it in our capital, preventing any potential shenanigans of gifting it to some hated civ.

[Thy_Spellcraft]

I still would keep going for edu as the speed we'd win through using knights we'll have to pay in losses or nearly dead knights 'cause there are no collateral weapons nearby to soften the defenders. And what's about some stack defence? So I don't see us winning any other speed than reinforcement right now. And as mentioned above we'd also need treb-reenforcements!

[IPEX-731BA5DD06]

Yeah, look only 6 turns on Education, Capital gives something like ~40-60% of research for empire, so building a University would be worth it.

Longer way, but quicker in the end overall. But we really need to split Churchhill in 2, and assimilate Isabella quickly.

On Van Orange, the only Dutch player, He has lots of Vacant land to expand into, as opposed to Hammurabi, who's settled all available land.

Trouble is, with Astronomy, they'll head over to the virgin lands, but will spin off Vassals, who add to population etc. But overall Van Orange has land links and 100% boost to Population, not only 50% for a Colony.

[Brian Shanahan]

Originally Posted by Thy_Spellcraft

I still would keep going for edu as the speed we'd win through using knights we'll have to pay in losses or nearly dead knights 'cause there are no collateral weapons nearby to soften the defenders. And what's about some stack defence? So I don't see us winning any other speed than reinforcement right now. And as mentioned above we'd also need treb-reenforcements!

This would get my vote too, frankly our military is not in a position to wait for guilds or gunpowder, we need reinforcements two turns ago. Win or cripple Churchill with what we have, his power IMO at the moment is fairly illusory (problem is so is ours).

I wouldn't be too worried about Willems possible vassals, as the land isn't that good. We could always go for a more modern war if needs be.

[ifinnem]

Hey guys
Sorry for being MIA - just moved back to the US and still trying to get apartment, utilities etc set up.
Please count me out for the moment

[Stochastic]

OK, looks like we're staying the course, so I'll stick with edu and then bank cash until we get a uni up at Rome. Playing in ~6hrs

[Stochastic]

Here is the set, things didn't go quite as smoothly as hoped, but I think we are back on track.

General review: Whipped a lot of units out for 1pop right before completion to help squeeze out more Preats and LBs (each whip generally ended up with another Preat the turn after). I know that this is generally considered rude in an SG because it limits the actions of people for the next many sets (two will still be angry when my set comes up again!), but I felt that we were in a very tight bind and desperately needed fast units.

Spoiler:

Whip anger turns left:

Lost (intentionally) and retook Londondinium.
We now have a stack that is almost large enough to split in two, my recommended targets are Hastings (guard our flank and take out a productive city) and Coventry (cut England in two and gain Marble for the HE).
We can probably also get away with swapping slowly out of all out military and build a monastery (AP hammers) followed by a uni in one or two of our commerce cities.

Inherited Turn 228?? I'll play 12 to get us back on track.
Renegotiate our silver --> 7gpt deal with Hammy to 9gpt.

Whip monastery in Eboractum for 67 overflow, will go into LB.
Swap Ciceri from courthouse into lighthouse.

Swap Cumae to a LB, it doesn't need a courthouse anyways (only 5gpt maintenance.)

Turn 229
IBTs
We loose several Preats to counterattacking XBows and 'Phants. I decide to retreat across the river to save our promoted Preats as we have no chance to defend Londondinium with our current units. I also bring up all reinforcements (XBow and Preat get cover, one Pike gets medic) from Eboracum leaving it defended by a single Treb. I figure our perfect vision of Churchill makes that safe until it can finish the LB.

Spoiler:

I move two spies towards the iron to pillage it. Yes he's got workers, but at least they won't be chopping for a turn or two that way.

Whip Neap for 1pop to get 67 overflow from a treb finishing this turn. Will pump out a Preat through this.

Turn 230
We loose London obviously.
Islam is founded in Novgorod.
I realise that Churchill has two iron sources, so send one spy to Hastings (it has a Castle so that needs to be sabotaged when attacked) and the other to Coventry.

Turn 231
We take some collateral outside of London, but kill the catapult.
Whip Lighthouse in Ciciry, it is working two grass tiles.
I realise that I've been completely forgetting about the GG outside of Rome, a reminder to all players to not fortify great people, spies or other easily forgotten units.

Turn 232
Whip courthouse in Vandal.
Whip XBow Arretium.
Whip Temple in Rome.

Turn 233
Use overflow in Rome to build Treb in a turn.

Turn 234
Edu is in, start a Uni in Rome, research to 0%, start on Lib.
GS is born, settle as an Academy in Rome, did we not have one before?

Turn 235
London has a horde of WEs sitting inside it, thank goodness for stupid AIs. If those were XBows we'd be doomed. But now the counter offensive can start.
I send the reinforcement stack I've been building towards London.

Spoiler:

I try to renegotiate a dye for 6gpt deal with Cathy, but her gpt dropped to 0 .

Turn 236
Attach the GG to the medic pike and move all units across the river to prepare an attack on London next turn.

Turn 237
Hammy completes the AP, so even more incentive for us to get Hindu buildings up. I vote for Cathy to try to get us to Friendly with her.
London gained a 3% defense bonus this turn, I decide to whack it away since it is building a barracks not a LB.

Turn 238
Ten turns later I start attacking London.
All three Trebs withdraw at 75%+ odds
Then win every single other combat except for one Preat vs a WE (80%odds)!
Churchill has one LB left and I could take London, but it would have virtually no defense so I will take London next turn as the second reinforcement stack has arrived.

Turn 239
Churchill reinforced with an LB and XBow but I recapture Londondinium using some Preats and trebs from the reinforcing stack. And this time we've got some full health LBs and Pikes on hand to keep the city.

Spoiler:

Eboractium suffers an English revolt. Should be OK once London is taken.

Turn 240
Stop here with no units moved.
Current Military Strength, mostly near Londondinium:

Spoiler:

Techs: Gahndi has Nationalism and Marble so he will probably get the Taj.

Spoiler:

Relations:

Spoiler:

[Brian Shanahan]

The turn 228 was my fault, should have played to 230 but I was too drained after the big Londinium battle, so I gave it up to the team. It looks good, a lot better than I left the war anyway.

[Thy_Spellcraft]

As it seems to be me who's up got it so far.
Hopefully I'll find the time for some PPP this evening. In case somebody wants to throw in some ideas feel free nonetheless!

[cripp7]

I'm back, good set regrouping the war effort! Capturing Coventry will be no problem, but Hastings will be reinforcing more xbows/LBs so that might be the first target while our reinforcements go to Coventry.

Ghandi will get Taj oh well. Since Lincoln has Paper, trade Ghandi 200>Paper

I think 10 turns from here on out, if for some unforseen reason it needs to go a couple turns longer then the next person can even it back out.

Oh, would it be worth in Rome to get a castle? that +1 traderoute and 25%(+7 actual) since we're still aways from Economics.

[Brian Shanahan]

On the Roman castle we need a wall first, and looking at the city a harbour/theatre double would be better for now. Harbour for TR income (ok it's only 3g but still) and health, and Theatre for the happy cap (we're about to grow into it).

[Thy_Spellcraft]

I'm sorry for the delay but I couldn't find the time for a PPP yesterday. But I'll get it online today!

[Thy_Spellcraft]

Ok we're still at war with the english but won't be able to take any further cities within the next couple of turns. So first I'd take the peace for his worldmap..
And then once again build up our forces while getting some universities build to unlock oxford!
Techwise I'd go for lib at 100% and stop a turn before so we could try on getting gunpowder and chemistry to take steel from lib. In case somebody gets near lib we still could take astro out of it..
The GG I'd settle in our HE city! Speaking of it: we didn't build it yet. I'd build it in Mediolanum, as it seems to be our best production city for quite a while..
And before I'm going to scew up the workerturns: Any really important improvements to build before I try to start on the incense once again?
Anything else to keep in mind?