What preperations do we need for the next war?

While we have not yet officially identified our next target we should never the less begin planning what we need for the next war. Two related discussions are:

Who is our next target?
Pikes or muskets?

Background:
We are currently researching chemistry (which no other country knows) on our way towards our long term goal of military tradition. After chemistry we will still need metalurgy. Our science rate is at zero percent. We are currently making no progress towards chemistry though if we hire a scientists we will be 38 turns away from getting that tech. So this war will be fought with knights against either musketmen or pikemen.
We have 611g in the treasury and have a surplus of 78gpt.
We have one city producing 15 shields per turn (spt) and 6 making 9 spt. Another 6 make 7 spt and 3 make 6spt. The rest produce 5spt or less.
Knights cost 70 shields. Musketsmen are 60 shields and pikemen are 30.
We currently have 17 knights, 3 horsemen, 6 catapults and 8 swordsmen (3 of which are in an army). We also have 61 pikemen and 9 spearmen to guard our 46 cities.

We basically have three fronts: the east, south and west. No matter who our next target is we will have two flanks to guard. We must decide what is needed to guard these flanks and what is needed for our upcoming offensive. Once these are identified we can estimate how long it will take to prepare for the war.

General Falcon's estimates we need to build at least 10 to 15 knights.

DFZ #32 which details how fast we can build 15 knights using 7 cities. http://

Any thougts on whether 15 more knights is enough? Anyone see a way to build a fighting force faster?

Of course to be able to prepare properly we must know the objectives of our next war...

If our opponent has muskets, then 15 additional Knights may well be barely enough, assuming they fail to upgrade existing defenders.

The problem I see with that number is that we would need to commit those forces in total to battle, leaving no mobile reserve to counter attack a stack that another enemy might bring against another flank.

Two defenders per city minimum for the two idle fronts, but also, we should build a reserve force of Knights to deploy to those two fronts if an ally is brought into the conflict.

We should fortify our Border cities with 3-4 Musketmen (Arquebuses) and some Knights

Good post donsig. It will depend heavily on just who our next target is, but let me do some research and come up with some figures pertaining to the East/West debate.

I think 4 muskets may be a little much, of course I think 2 would be bare minimum.... so I'd go for about 3 muskets.

Also, that number estimate was with the assumption we'd upgrade them to Cavalry before launching an attack.

Edit: on closer examination I found that I didn't have the intent to upgrade them all by that point, however this has become my desire recently, I feel it would be best to stock up on Knights and gold and then upgrade them all to Cavalries to send to our next target, perferably Abe's backyard

We are quite a ways from getting cavalry and I think our next war must be fought with knights. Hopefully we will be victorious in our next war and will have many knights left over to upgrade to cavalry for the war after the next one.

I didn't mean to put General Falcon on the spot about how amny knights we will need for the upcoming war. Until we decide who we are going to attack and what our goals are even the legendary General Falcon cannot divine what forces we will need. But we need a starting point for the discussion and the General's estimate is as good a starting point as any.
Let's say we decide we need 30 knights for the offensive and 10 for each of the two flanks we must cover. We'd have to build 30 knights then. Whatever figures we decide on we can then calculate how long it will take to get those knights. We'd also have an idea of how many cities we need to devote to military production. We must get on the ball here since we have three chats per week scheduled. We should begin serious preperations this week so the war can begin next week.
One thing we may want to consider is concentrating our current knights near our target and filling out that force with whatever else we deem we need to fight the war. Then we can continue to recruit knights for the flanks that need defending. We did this in the war with Japan and it seemed successful.

I agree that a military buildup should depend on our target. We don't want our knight's armor to be pierced by bullets.

We also should base a buildup on the extent of the war. I've heard cries for taking just a few Babylonian cities. In this case, we don't want 30 knights.

I've put together a plan for Military Production that will give us a good idea of how long this build up should take. I made this plan with the assumption that we would connect the Saltpeter immediately if not sooner. I based our border defense on the Musketman. I've based the offensive force as Knights.

By using 28% of our cities for strictly Military Production, we will (if we use the cities listed below...) dedicate 52% of our shields to the cause. At the end of 32 turns we will have 17 Muskets and 24 Knights.

First thing we have to do is make these changes during pre-turn:
Leningrado to Barracks
Nara to Barracks
Valhalla to Barracks
Tlaxcala to Knights
Octavinium to Knights
Tokyo to Temple (not part of the plan, just common sense.)

Then let everything run its present course, completing what is queued up. As the cities listed below complete their current task, switch them to the following queue:

Bremershaven--->musket, musket, musket, musket, musket,
.............................musket, knight, knight
Kyoto-------------->musket, musket, knight
Naerva------------> " " "
The Burrows-----> " " "
Kells---------------> " " "
Valhalla-----------> " " "
Bavaria-----------> " " "
Kuhkaff------------>knight, knight, knight
Nara----------------> " " "
Tlaxcala------------> " " "
Octavinium--------> " " "
New Falcon's N.--> " " "
Morgana-----------> " " "

We have 16 border towns. This plan will give us a musket in each of those and one to send with the front troops in the attack. This is with no upgrades, so the approximate 2600g we earn during this time would not be affected. But we must re-connect the Saltpeter immediately.

20 turns would be enough for a city with 6 shields to build a Colosseum. In 32 turns you could build a Temple in the same city. These 32 turns, again, would give us 17 Musketmen and 24 Knights. This should be enough power to take pretty much all of America OR begin our attack on Babylon. The quick surgical strike on the two Russian hamlets shouldn't even slow us up or put a dent in our current armor.

As a side note, some of the break points are:
14 turns.........9 muskets, 5 knights
22 turns........17 muskets, 10 knights
32 turns........17 muskets, 24 Knights

@Octavian - Personally, I wouldn't try to take the first three cities of Babylon without the 24 Knights in the plan above. And if you're only going to take a couple of cities from the Babs, are you planning to give them back as a gift, or will you wait for them to Culture Flip?

I don't think knights will be preeminent in 32 turns. 14 or 22 turns would need to be our target start. We do not need to be at our full mobilized target in order to initiate hostilities.

You are probably right Shaitan. With the 22 turns you've mentioned, we would have our Musketmen for defense of our borders and the 10 Knights produced combined with the 17 Knights we have now (upgrading the Horses would be good), we would pretty much have satisfied a target attack force. Do you believe we can secure Military Tradition within 32 turns?

[oracle]Military Tradition will be secured well before 32 turns. I'd place it at around the 22 turn area. Babylon and Russia will have it first and then all the nations will know of the mighty cavalry. Fanatika must plan to purchase this necessary technology.[/oracle]

* Cyc leans his longrifle against an oak tree and kneels before the Oracle. *

Please, let is be so...

Originally posted by Shaitan
[oracle]Military Tradition will be secured well before 32 turns. I'd place it at around the 22 turn area. Babylon and Russia will have it first and then all the nations will know of the mighty cavalry. Fanatika must plan to purchase this necessary technology.[/oracle]

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No one even has chemistry yet so I think military tradition is farther off. If the Oracle is correct though then Cyc's plan (modified by Shaitan) where we can attack Russia in 22 turns means we have a good chance of getting military tradition from Catherine at the peace table - if we are wise enough to target Russia first!

I agree with the opinions that attacking the Babs for only a few cities would be a unwise plan. Any assault on the Babs needs to be with intent to knock them down to third world status, or out of the game completely.

Atleast that's the same of my other estimate of about 20 turns or so. (in a poll thread)... Did Shaitan take a peek at the C3MT?

Originally posted by Chieftess
Did Shaitan take a peek at the C3MT?

Click to expand...

Nope, I'm still all natural.

The AI Civs will be starting to take full advantage of their tech research bonuses and the techs will be flying in quickly from this point. The AI tends to target techs required for wonders and UU's and this tech has both. With the preponderance of AI tech trading and the discounts they get to do so, the techs between us and Military Tradition will be "handled" by the AI extremely quickly.

So how are we going to get this thing under way? The plan I've outlined involves Build Queue changes. If the Governors over those cities don't pledge their support, it will take a Council Vote to make the changes. The Military Leader can't over ride any decision, as we're not at war nor do we have an enemy on our lands. Will this just be something that we talked about and then watch as it disappears into thin air? Will we kinda maybe follow some sort of Military path in our build queues. Can we still put together a valid poll that will sanctify this plan as "the approved course"? Or what?

Some of the provinces don't even have governors yet so the domestic department may have to be lobbied as well.

We should have a full new set of governors in about 48 hours.

Also, Cyc's plan seems excellent to me.