[BTS] SGOTM 15 - Unusual Suspects

[Xcalibrator]

T76--All espi back on Japan. 0% research.
Bolly start library; Drona add forest, start axe; Delhi 1-whip granary; Bombay start axe.
Warrior5 NW; axe1 (Woody2 in NW) W to hill--all clear; axe4 (Bombay) toward Vijay; all Drona units fortify, and give 2XP axe2 C1 promo.
FW3 continue wheat farm, FW1&2 finish Delhi cottage, FW4 N to start chop by Drona.
What the heck, gift gold (resource) to Hammy.

IBT--Toku stack onto hill SE of Drona. Barb archer appears NW of Axe4, and barb axe appears 2N of Axe4. On the bright side, Hammy does not DoW.

T77--Delhi granary-->axe, Bolly to pop 6 (add mine), Drona 1-whip axe (lose forest and change farm to vacated unpillaged corn)
FW1&2 2E, start cottage, cancel; Warrior5 N onto road; axe4 reaches Vijay.

Axe1 (on hill west of wheat) has not moved, nor FW3, but the axe4 in Vijay has used its movement for this turn. FW3 could start a road and have it finished in time for the axe(s) to use it, or just continue with the farm, which requires another 3 turns. (I will not finish it while the barb htreat remains because they would pillage it.) We can revolt to Theocracy next turn.

I have stopped to discuss barbs--have not uploaded the save because the screenies explain the situation.

[vra379971]

Hm. In that situation, I'd retreat the Barb Axe into the city, and let the enemy impale themselves. You could attempt to hold your ground, but doing so would surely lose the Axe, and I don't think that's a trade off worth making.

[Trystero]

I also vote for having the axe retreat to Vijay. It is too much of a risk to hope Axe4 would survive an attack from both a barb axe and archer. Even on a hill.

[Deckhand]

Move hill axe NE, hoping barb axe attacks across river?
Then head to town.

Or is this too risky? If barb gets lucky it will be two against one. What is barb axe chance at -25%?

[kcd_swede]

There is no point to retreating to the city. The city has zero culture defense and axes get no city defense bonus, making it the same as defending on flat terrain. Crappy.

Since the axe in VJ has already moved, there is no way to get both axe on the same tile with terrain defense.

I'd fortify on the hill, and finish the road on the wheat so that next turn the axe gets either relieved (or avenged).

[kcd_swede]

Frankly, I don't really see a problem That axe has Woody2... and the barb archer and axe cannot both attack on this turn. The archer attacks and dies, the woody2 can scoot out of the way via forest hill if he is too hurt. Or can retreat to a place where the other axe defends. No problem, unless the barb axe defeat our other axe.

[ChrisShaffer]

I agree with kcd_swede and green light continuing as he describes.

[Xcalibrator]

Originally Posted by kcd_swede

Frankly, I don't really see a problem That axe has Woody2... and the barb archer and axe cannot both attack on this turn. The archer attacks and dies, the woody2 can scoot out of the way via forest hill if he is too hurt. Or can retreat to a place where the other axe defends. No problem, unless the barb axe defeat our other axe.

The problem is the barb axe. If we leave axe1 (woody2) on the hill the barb archer will likely attack and die, since we'll have 25% defense from the hill plus 5% from 1 turn of fortifying. The barb axe will then either move onto the archer's hill (giving us time to escape) or (much more likely I think) onto one of the two grass tiles. In the latter case, axe1 (likely damaged from the archer attack) can only retreat to the wheat, where he is open to attack. We wouldn't want to move him to the archer's hill because that would leave only axe4 to defend Vijay. So if axe1 moves to the wheat, we'll have to defend him with axe4 (otherwise we'll likely lose our wounded axe1, again leaving only axe4 to defend Vijay). After that either the barb attacks us, we attack him, or we move into Vijay and he attacks us there; 50% odds in any case. If we lose we have one surviving axe (probably the wounded axe1) to defend Vijay against a presumably wounded barb axe. We could then assess the situation and decide whether to attack or defend.

If, instead, we move axe1 onto the wheat this turn, we can retreat all the way into Vijay. Axe4 will have 3 turns to fortify (15%) before he can be attacked. Axe1 will have 1 turn (5%) to fortify. We'd be facing both the barb axe and archer. Compared to the scenario where we sit on the the hill and defend against the archer (and assuming the barb axe attacks first) we'll have 15% better defense odds against the axe and 25% worse odds against the archer. Since the bigger threat is from the barb axe, I like the second ploy (retreat to Vijay) better. [Edit: The 15% and 25% are not "real" odds differentials because of the difference in strength between an axe and archer. I guess it's better to think in terms of (estimating) 97% vs 95% against the archer. And maybe that defend-across-the-river idea needs another look. We could move axe1 NE. Barb axe could attack across river at -25% or move next to us, in which case we move SE and then defend in the city. I just hate to put a 6XP unit up against a barb axe where our promos won't do any good.]

In either case, the FW will start a road on the wheat this turn, and then see if he should finish.

[ChrisShaffer]

I prefer this scenario:

1. Woody2 axe fortifies, Vijay axe moves to wheat, barb archer suicides.
2. Barb axe moves onto grass tile.
3. Woody2 axe and Vijay axe attack and kill barb axe sitting on flat land.

Sure, we might lose an axe, but we take care of the threat without any chance of pillaging or (horrors) losing Vijay.

[Xcalibrator]

Originally Posted by ChrisShaffer

1. Woody2 axe fortifies, Vijay axe moves to wheat, barb archer suicides.

Vijay axe (axe4) has no movement left for this turn.

[ChrisShaffer]

Then:

1. Woody2 axe fortifies, Vijay axe sits still, fast worker builds road 1/2
2. Barb archer suicides, barb axe moves to grass.
3. Fast worker builds road 2/2, Vijay axe uses road to attack barb axe, Woody2 axe attacks barb axe if Vijay axe fails.

[Xcalibrator]

Originally Posted by ChrisShaffer

1. Woody2 axe fortifies, Vijay axe sits still, fast worker builds road 1/2
2. Barb archer suicides, barb axe moves to grass.
3. Fast worker builds road 2/2, Vijay axe uses road to attack barb axe, Woody2 axe attacks barb axe if Vijay axe fails.

This has the advantage of not delaying any worker improvements (farm, cottages, roads), and it means we could post a fogbuster axe in the forest a little sooner (giving us sight on Hammy and preventing barb spawn), but it's not optimal in terms of combat odds. I give more weight to improving odds (probably not by a lot), so that we have less chance of dead or badly wounded units. How do others feel about the tradeoffs? Any volunteers to get more quantitative odds on the prospective battles?

[AAA]

WOW things are happening fast. Sorry I disappeared, but every time I tried to tried to get onto civfanatics in the last couple of days my browser said the site was unavailable.

My only thoughts are that Toku is extremely aggressive, and no matter what we do he will only continue to attack. But he is ridiculously reckless, and will often leave himself open for an easy counterattack. He's a fun guy

[Xcalibrator]

What are we going to do about the barbs, gents? I'd like to play tonight. I know this combat article is for old vanilla but it looks like a 15% defensive advantage improves our odds from 50% to around 70% against an evenly matched opponent. Of course, we don't know what the barbs will do, which is a bigger concern if we wait passively for them. The main loss from that is not being able to finish the wheat farm until they're gone or dead.

[ChrisShaffer]

We have fast workers, so hunkering down in the city is fine with me. The worker can always pre-chop that forest 1SW of Vijay while we're waiting for the barbarians to self-destruct. I think we must start fogbusting Hamuragawa's area as soon as possible after this is over though.

[Xcalibrator]

I'd like to play in 1.5 hours. Here are the combat odds I found with testing:

• barb axe vs our axe with 15% fortification bonus: 70.3% for us
• our axe vs barb archer on flatland: 94.8% for us
• barb axe vs our axe attacking across a river: 74.9% for us

Based strictly on odds, enticing the barb axe to attack across the river looks best, but we'd have to do it using our 6XP Woody2 axe, which would be sad to lose. If the barb doesn't go for it we just retreat into the city (where the other axe will have accumulated 15% fortification) and wait for both barbs to attack. It means delaying our scouting of Hammy, but the barbs will themselves be spawn-busting so that helps a little. I'm inclined to do this. What do you think?

[ChrisShaffer]

I would rather chance our Vijay axe at 25% than our Woody axe at 20%. Retreat into the city.

[Yamps]

Here's a PPP to consider:

Spoiler:

kill'em, kill'em all!

[vra379971]

Originally Posted by Yamps

Here's a PPP to consider:

Spoiler:

kill'em, kill'em all!

Why thank you Yamps for that detailed strategic plan of attack

[Xcalibrator]

Originally Posted by ChrisShaffer

I would rather chance our Vijay axe at 25% than our Woody axe at 20%. Retreat into the city.

OK, twist my arm. I'll follow this plan rather than Yamps', which was too complicated for me to understand. Will be playing shortly.