We left off last time with the second golden age expiring, and on the way to rifling while building cuirassier* There was some question of whether or not to pop the GS+GA for another golden age to help war prep+civic switch. I decided to do it because
1) If I go for domination, it's unlikely I will need another golden age (next one would be expensive at 3 GPeeps)
2) I'd like to get a GM before I get medicine, and he will cost 800 GPP, so another philo+GA boost will help.
3) war prep etc, and
4) This trade + other civic changes.
I waited one turn between golden ages to trigger the third one, so that I could take more advantage of the whip before revolting back to caste. I went into rep+caste+philo, and also:
this situation made me go into merc as well. Since Willem is in Mercantilism, I will lose basically all my foreign trade routes when I declare on Qin anyway. Merc will also help my war prep (Engineers) and also my GP popping.
I get rifling at somewhere around 1050 AD and have enough cash around to upgrade all my cavalry. I send a stack of 12 to the opposite side of Qin's land in order to set up a pincer war.
Here's a shot of some standard cav* action. Ho hum, how often do we see this in Imm games?
Note: Hari is starving itself for a GM (took something like 8-9 turns of 9ish merchants top pop him, and the odds were around 85% phew that woulda sucked). This probably lost me 5-6 cavalry. Definitely not something I would have done if I was concerned about being in a good spot for the war--the GM is a strictly postwar guy (likely post multiple wars). Also worth mentioning is that my techrate has ceased to be great (in comparison to myself in other games at similar dates) since I am mainly using constant-beaker teching stuff (not cottages). The goal of a strategy like this is to get the techs you need when it counts (mili trad + rifling, obv) and then conquer to up the GNP more. From what I've seen, this to some degree is the ubiquitous strat on deity maps. The way I think of it is, higher difficulty levels have a MUCH higher discounting rate on beakers (a beaker today on noble? similar in value to a beaker tomorrow. On deity? beaker today>>>beaker tomorrow) and this is why snowballing strategies like "cottage everything" are less optimal.
The staying power of the SME--"sell map economy":
And from a future war target! How is knowing geography going to help you defend against may cavs Qin??
Gilgamesh also comes through again to provide me some tech:
So Merc at this point might have been less than optimal, but hindsight is 20/20. This shot makes me realize actually that I should probably revolt back to whatever it's called - the+1 trade route civic. I should have done it long ago actually. Man, reporting on a turnset after you play it is an eye-opener.
I pop the GM and am able to ramp up the cavs effort in Hari.
Note that chemistry is in, and we are still in caste (MM has dem at this point but has not revolted to emancipation thankfully - I want to vassal him and get him out of it before I ever go in if I can).
Some more trades. My GNP is falling rapidly relative the rest of the world, but I am managing to trade away mostly nonmilitary stuff to stay in it. Willem doesn't have RP or Gunpowder so he's still in Cav range.
At the end of my golden age, I am ready to declare war on Qin. I have ~35 cavs at this point so it should be a Blitzkrieg. Here's are the stacks:
I revolted Nanjing here. There were only 3 defenders, and I only had one city to revolt, but here was my logic:
1) This is my stack coming from the opposite side - it will not get reinforcements so I wnt to minimize casualties
2) Want to minimize early casualties/damage in the war as well so my stack can move on to take at least one more city.
3) It was on a hill, hill+protective LBs give <50% odds against cavs sometimes depending on promotions... ridiculous.
I also had a "stack" of two cuirassiers to take Qin's island city that has been such a debaucle this game (galley w/ settler eaten - see above). It is defended by a LB and a knight so that should be enough.
I took pretty decent notes on the war, so here goes
Turn 175 DOW on Qin (T1 of war)
Nanjing is revolted before DOW---> take it with 0 losses (iirc the first battle was ~75% odds?)
Macau---> take with no losses (similar odds ~80% on first hit)
Xian, 3N of Macau, with one of the larger garrisons ---> hit it with ~8 guys. One withdraws, no losses, but not enough guys to take it.
Turn 176 (T2 of war)
SOD appears near Xian:
anyone know how to get it so the unit descriptions don't shoot off the top of the screen like that? It drives me crazy!!! Since the stack that attacked Xian is small and heavily damaged, I have it retreat into my city to await his SOD while healing a bit.
Take Hangzhou with one loss (no screenshot but this was with my main stack. I put a decent garrison in Hangzhou and sent a bunch more cavs through to threaten Shanhai next turn - see below.
Take the island city of Shandong
finally those crabs are miiiine!
At some point around here I pot my first GG and have him teach a cav in the stack that will be facing the SOD in the art of field surgery.
Turn 177 (T3 of war)
unhappiness is already a problem! Damn SoZ!
Shanghai ---> take with one loss. Runnin' hot!
Qin moves his SOD into my lands and starts bombarding defenses with his cats+trebs--err I only have one defender who actually benefits from city defenses... and he's a warrior! OKOK to be fair I upgraded him to a rifle for insurance. This "SOD" is not exactly diety-like, but I still fear it! Baby steps...
He gives me the time to amputate some limbs and such with my GG and have the cavs start shooting with their left hands next turn to wipe out the SOD.
Turn 178 (T4 of war)
take out SOD --- two losses (one at 95%, so now that double zero has come up it should be smooth sailing! harhar)
heal troops - move troops
Turn 179 (T5 of war)
events ftw, baby
Scrolls and tablets with explanations of Lagrangian mechanics or something? I think it would make more sense if it said "Scientists unearth a dinosaur in a lab coat - receive +975 beakers for physics". The other option was +1 modifier from all leaders for a bunch of cash. But, I don't think I'll be very diplomatic in this game from here on...
Etruscan --- take with one loss. no picture, but it's up north, taken by my stack that started from the other side. That splinter stack essentially took only those two cities, so maybe it would have been better just to have it start from home---> take out SOD earlier.
I think Qin long sice would have capped, but I want him gone.
Turn 180 (T6 of war)
MM gets physics first
I switch to bio for some reason. Probably thinking bio will come in postwar at this point so I can handle the extra pop without getting unhappy citizens. Researching at a snails pace anyway.
Xian --- looks like he left half his SOD in the city. 1 cav withdraws, I kill a bunch of dudes, but there's still a treb hanging on by a thread in there.
more healing + moving elsewhere
Turn 181 (T7 of war)
Take Tianjin with no losses. This was the city in the former jungles East of my northern most city.
Give into this demand *shrug*
182 (T8 of war)
Two cities left, cap (Beijing) and crap on SW corner bordering MM (can't remember name)
F*ck up and misclick and move a big stack that was forking Beijing and crapo city, so that it can only attack crapo. Prolong war by one turn because I don't have enough attackers for Beijing anymore
. Anyway, I overkill crappo city (which had all the workers + some navy hiding in it) and also throw everything at Beijing to no avail (3 losses, ~1 treb left defending).
183 (T9 of war, the end)
Take Beijing, end of war. Slapped Qin right in the copious jowl.
here's a shot of the effects of SoZ in a 9 turn war:
It's annoying how the anger stays there even when the guy you are fighting dies mid-turn.
I will stop the update on turn 184 when my cities are back to normal. Here's some state of the world posts.
Tech:
I had a before-war tech shot somewhere. It went from great to meh. That's a crucial measure of war effectiveness. In this game I didn't get a thing researched during the war (even with that event!) since I was at - gold even at 0 slider. During the 9 turn war, MM got like 3-4 expensive techs - Sci Meth, Communism, Physics, something else. Lucky for me he decided to stay off the rifling path. Don't get me wrong airships are amazing (I've really come around to them recently) but they only help on even-ish battles numbers-wise and str-wise. I think I can cap MM before he can get too many rifles.
I really needed to go to war here though; was maxing at 500-600 bpt, while the AI were shooting up to ~1500 GNP! (MM in golden age I think). Anyone know roughly how to convert GNP to bpt? I would guess 1500 GNP for MM (who has a lot of island cities) is probably around 1k bpt.
Sooo, all this talk about MM because he is the clear next target. I could easily take out Willem (9 cities, doesn't have RP, at war with Gilgamesh). BTW I sold Willem Gunpowder for like 700 gold. I need some reserves to get research back online after wars -- I'm still at - gold when at 0% slider. Gunpowder on its own doesn't change the odds vs cavs all that much -- a pinch cav does better against a musket than a LB, and much better when LB is on hill, and even if Willem gets to rifling by the time his number comes up, I should have a huge number of airships and a huge number of cities on his borders to hold them.
As for Mansa, he's researching fast, yes, but let's see what defenses he's packing
All the garrisons are like this - I can't even find what I'd call a SoD. Maybe there's one out on his islands just in case? I think a Cav war can cap him. He could get rifling in ~4-5 turns probably, but who knows if he'll do that. Depending on what happens, I might try to sweep him off the continent so I don't need to worry about cultural pressure. Like so:
Some questions for me:
1) trade mili trad to MM for physics before the war? I'm thinking not:
Reason for:
- Airship reinforcements come super quick
Reasons against:
- MM will get cuirassiers (maybe this is actually a reason for, because he will build them instead of muskets to upgrade)
- Cavs actually reinforce essentially instantly too. All my city garrisons in chinese lands are cavs, so I can 'chain' one cav at a time like water through a hose and pop a fresh attacker out the other side on MM's border ASAP.
- Airships may be somewhat useless until he gets to rifling - if a battles odds are high anyway, Airship is not gonna do much.
I have to consider this carefully bc it's going to be crucial in war success. I am confident in capping MM, but unsure of wiping him off my continent. This leads to
2) Try to kick MM off continent, or cap him asap, then cap Willem asap, then sail overseas and cap until victory?
For anyone who is still reading
I would like some input. I think the game is a lock, but does anyone have a preference for VC? Since it has been pretty cookie-cutter so far, I am (like I mentioned) thinking of trying to go for a non-sloppy space race. Typically space race is a slipshod "I failed domination" affair for me and I'd like to try to get an early launch for once.
If no interest, probably domination/conquest to get it over with is in order. If interest, I really need help in spacerace tactics.
Finally,
Land:
Demographics:
If you look at save/empire pics: I need to make some major changes probably to builds etc. Don't consider my current configuration me ready to end turn. Suggestions are welcome!
P.S. how did Bismark come out of nowhere to get steel on the world!?
P.P.S. I really botched civics this round. Forgot to get out of philo at the end of the GA, forgot to get out of merc after astro. During war revolt would ahve been alright bc reinforcements were not crucial.