Competing VC's

[Habitus]

Willem and SB are still warring iirc, luckly were they are stationed its easy enough to hit Willem, or go thru his lands to hit SB (kept our army inside our culture to keep costs down)

*edit*

Our Peace Treaty with SB from gold demand only has afew turns left (or may even be over now as it was near start of turn set when i got the demand)

 

[Dhoomstriker]

If we captured Willem's north-east-most City, would our Cultural Borders expand over top of his Stone? If we haven't built Oxford yet, then that possibility may be of use.

 

[Habitus]

Its built in Capitol, not sure on if we'd gain the Stone.

 

[mystyfly]

Hi guys

Was checking the save. Some comments:

- I don't think augsburg would revolt without units as the culture hover text doesnt say anything about it

- IMO we would be better off bashing willem and snatching those two border cities. They're more weakly defended, we can revolt both, and hatty isnt likely to get out of her hole.

- More difficult question is how to get out of the tech hole and how to cut down ham. I must say techs dont look that bad overall except for ham. As we don't seem to have a terribly specialized eco and aren't allowed to trade I can't really offer any way out there right now let's focus on tying down ham and slowing overall techpace while trying to catch up with our big empire.

- As to taking down ham, he can tech rifling now. So there is the more immediate way of teching straight to assembly line or the slightly longer way trough industrialism, oil and tanks. I think we should limit our wars so we can focus on the tech goal we pick, smallish wars with weak non-factor AIs will only slow us down. None of us profits from having an uber-AI.

- I think assembly line is a bit too soon, we probably will have lots of trouble teching trough there in time to launch an effective war and get the production in place to get those units out. Most of our army is mounted so we can't count on useful upgrades. OTOH we could use the draft but infantry is 2pop drafts which is not likely to be too popular with you guys I think tanks is the safer bet.


I think shyuhe is up, is that correct?

 

[Dhoomstriker]

- I don't think augsburg would revolt without units as the culture hover text doesnt say anything about it

I'm not sure of the City's current status, but it is easy enough to move a few units out of the City on a Road, check the City's Cultural bar, and see if a revolt percentage appeared. If a revolt percentage appeared after moving some units out, move units one-by-one back into the City until the revolt percentage disappears. Any of the other units that are still outside of the City can safely proceed to the front lines.

- IMO we would be better off bashing willem and snatching those two border cities. They're more weakly defended

I am fully in support of attacking one of the two western AIs. If we want it to be Willem, that's fine by me. We do need to watch out for our City captured from the Barbs in the far south-west. I am assuming (without looking) that the City could probably whip a defender or two, particularly if you put at least 1 turn worth of Hammers into said unit first, just in case it is needed.

- More difficult question is how to get out of the tech hole and how to cut down ham. I must say techs dont look that bad overall except for ham. As we don't seem to have a terribly specialized eco and aren't allowed to trade I can't really offer any way out there right now let's focus on tying down ham and slowing overall techpace while trying to catch up with our big empire.

The simplest answer to dealing with Hammurabi is that we just won't.

The most challenging part about AIs running away with the tech is when multiple AIs do so. A sole AI leader isn't much of a bother. He's also Friendly toward us and won't attack if Pleased or Friendly. Let sleeping dogs lie.

We can take over the world and leave him for last. As long as he doesn't have trading partners, he's unlikely to completely run away with the game all by himself. He will let us be if we let him be, which is good enough for me.

- As to taking down ham, he can tech rifling now. So there is the more immediate way of teching straight to assembly line or the slightly longer way trough industrialism, oil and tanks. I think we should limit our wars so we can focus on the tech goal we pick, smallish wars with weak non-factor AIs will only slow us down. None of us profits from having an uber-AI.

Again, leave him be. Let him be the sole AI with Rifling. Rather than dragging ourselves into a tough-to-win war, let's focus on taking down the other opponents that are easier to chew. The eastern AIs are relatively marginalized, thanks to their mutual hatred, earlier warring, and general lack of territory.

If we can take down one, or preferably both of the western AIs, then Hammurabi will have no one to trade with and him being advanced but unable to attack us won't hurt us one bit.

- I think assembly line is a bit too soon, we probably will have lots of trouble teching trough there in time to launch an effective war and get the production in place to get those units out. Most of our army is mounted so we can't count on useful upgrades. OTOH we could use the draft but infantry is 2pop drafts which is not likely to be too popular with you guys I think tanks is the safer bet.

Again, why even bother? Since we are not playing for Domination Victory, there is no need to ever attack Hammurabi except until after we have all of the other AIs as Vassals. With the world declaring on him all at once, he'll be out of Trade Routes and will have to face multiple units from all sides. Even advanced units from 1 single AI won't be able to defeat us at that point.

I think shyuhe is up, is that correct?

Correct.

 

[shyuhe]

Yes. I'll try moving the ball tonight.

 

[shyuhe]

Sorry for the long delay guys. Finally played my set! I think I've dug us deeper into a hole

I get this disturbing news during my set:


Yeah, emancipation

Here's Hatty getting some stupid ideas:



Yeah, she's not winning by the AP (and nor are we...).

We got an event:

No, I didn't take that option We got 260 beakers in Divine Right instead

See if you can guess what is so disturbing about this screenshot:


Here's a hint:


Yes, we're playing Monty style!

Anyways, on to the fun. Since we have a nice stack formed and Willem is busy in a war already, I think it's an excellent time to


The war starts smoothly:


I conquered another city and I thought I took a screenshot but I can't find it

I think we can easily roll him over as we have a HUGE (but outdated) army. I've set some cities to build grocers and banks so that we can up the slider a bit. We're not exactly finishing this game with maces/trebs

The AI got busy during my set too:




I declared on Hatty for diplo. She's no threat whereas Justinian *may* actually be a threat.


Roster:
-----------
Dhoom (played)
rolo (played)
Habitus (played)
shyuhe (played)
mysty - UP

I'm starting to think that not allowing tech trading may have been a mistake with our game "settings" Then again, if tech trading were on, this game would be a bit of a cake walk. As it is, Hammy is the only AI who can win this game other than us so it's just a matter of whether we can eek out a VC before Hammy goes space/culture.

 

[Dhoomstriker]

It seems that our marginalized Vassal is teching better than we are.


So... do you mean that you couldn't find a screenshot of capturing a second City from Willem perhaps because you didn't actually capture a second one?


From your last screenshot, Willem has one huge stack in Amsterdam.


Let's hope that your move to declare war on Hatty doesn't backfire... she doesn't have Astronomy yet, does she?

 

[mystyfly]

I doubt hatty will have the spare units to set on a trip around the world anyway, we should be fine IN THAT REGARD

Monty style indeed...

Due to the delay caused by shyuhe I couldn't play this week and since I'm off for the weekend, I guess we'll have some more delay. I hope you're fine with me playing early next week. It's not like we're all clear on what to do, so use the time for some discussion

 

[Dhoomstriker]

Well, it seems like we are committed to going after Willem.

Since we can't trade, economic buildings like Grocers and Banks are a decent idea, since we don't want to end up in a Strike situation. In a normal tech-trading game, you can often skip these buildings, but I don't see us skipping them here.

Since we're Spiritual, consider flipping between Religious Civics as appropriate.

Expect Willem to become Sitting Bull's Vassal. Normally, I would suggest that we bribe Sitting Bull to make Peace, so that the capitulation can become ours. However, we lack the tech to trade and we aren't allowed to trade away techs anyway.

Thus, my suggestion would be to take down Willem's capital and one other City... if he isn't willing to capitulate, make Peace and then heal up our troops in preparation to attack Sitting Bull.

That way, we can weaken both of those enemies, so that neither will feel weak enough to want to capitulate to the other.

As long as Willem and Sitting Bull are still at war with each other, then this plan will work, as Willem will immediately give us Open Borders for sharing a war with him.


The idea is to take down the western AIs a notch, to avoid them getting to Riflemen.


There is always the possibility that if you make peace with Willem, he will Peace Vassal to Hammurabi. If that were to happen, at least we'd have Willem's capital and another decent City to our names and we'd get another war ally for the war against Sitting Bull.


I see no reason to go after Hatty anytime soon--she's trapped and is relatively small... I'm more concerned about one of the western AIs, particularly Protective Sitting Bull, with all of his land, making it to Rifling.


If you take Peace or Capitulation from Willem, try to ask him to switch to your current Religious Civic, so that he switches back to Hinduism.


We probably seriously want to consider Democracy. Being Spiritual, Representation would help us temporarily deal with Emancipation unhappiness while at war (i.e. we don't have enough troops guarding out Cities to make Hereditary Rule a superior option), while Emancipation itself would get rid of our Unhappiness issues. We can't count on being able to build The Statue of Liberty, but at least we'd get our Unique Building (Mausolleums in place of Jails) by following this tech path.

Errr, oh yeah, before one or both of Representation and Democracy, we may want Military Tradition. It'll depend upon our Happiness issues as to whether or not we can afford to go straight for Military Tradition or not.


Obviously, when taking Peace or Capitulation, if you can get an AI to switch out of Emancipation, all the power to you.


It wouldn't hurt to speak with Charle and ask him "We would like you to attack..." and pick a random City of Willem's, just to see if you can get Charle to push out some units to help out.

 

[shyuhe]

I think SB has rifling already. So we should just try to take as much land from Willem as possible for now and shoot for a capitulation. Our current army is more than capable of stomping him (although it's mostly made of horse archers and longbows ). In hindsight, we should have just declared on Hammy as he took forever to tech up to rifling But I think that window has closed since he's at least through steam power now (and probably close to assembly line).

Hatty and Justinian will go at it for a while. As long as Hatty doesn't capitulate (a bit of a crap shoot), that front will be fine. Hammy is starting to really culture press our borders though - we lost the gems. It might be worth setting up the globe theater and/or hermitage in the gems border city to push him back a bit.

 

[shyuhe]

 

[mystyfly]

Got it for tomorrow.

 

[mystyfly]

Played a very interesting 15 turns that took forever. I was rather in "just win it"-mode than playing to my VC but I think we're in good shape now. I don't have time or the means to put up a report now (posting from my cell) but if you're curious I have a short summary.

Spoiler :

Teched Gunpowder > Nat > Music > MT > RP (due in 1), not too shabby. Helped a lot by all the money from capturing cities. Willem capped far sooner than expected. SB has tons of rifles and I saw just was still fighting hatty (as do we :d) and he didn't have rifling so I DOW'd him, he's down to one proper byzantine city as well as Hatty's capital. Knights cut through him like butter. Still refuses to talk though I captured 2 cities only the last turn. We have a GA and GP hanging around, probably to start a few GAs and push towards some tech. More to follow (like save and plenty of pics :d) later..

 

[shyuhe]

It'd help if you posted a save

I'm surprised that you capped Willem and almost finished Justinian in 15 turns. Although I guess we did have a pretty large army when I handed the save over.

 

[Dhoomstriker]

@shyuhe
Do you want to roll next round's roster, so that whoever is up can start looking at the game as soon as the saved game surfaces?

 

[mystyfly]

@Shyuhe: Hard to post a savegame from the cellphone...

Anyway, here goes:

IHT:
I crack the whip in several cities, typically in such that are working coastal tiles and have 2-3 pop whips available. Set charly to attack Gepid. Set slider to 100% to complete gunpowder. Check F7 and switch to OR as we have our SR in nearly every city Time for a spell of infra building (we're paying enough for units as it is). Mark cities with MIs. Aachen has MI+HE so stays on knight duty. Sell sugar to just for 5gpt.

(1)
Hatty doesn't win AP diplo (shockingly unexpected news):



Amsterdam gets revolted and captured at the expense of 2 suicide cats and a knight



Set research to Nat at 0%.

(2)-(3)
Unit movement, whip two spies for gepid in the hope to get the discount to afford the revolt before our horsies get there

Cities that have all buildings they need and make sense get set to wealth. Turn 3 set research back to 100%.

(4)
Rotterdam captured



I did lose another 2-3 units IIRC, all at good odds (75% >=). Also note the ready spies and the 2 knights charly kindly mobilized against willem



Move all available units towards Gepid, especially a stack of maces and siege which turned out to be a mistake...

... Since AFTER moving I decide to call up willem and see whether he would capitulate... he would as a matter of fact (it's still turn 4):



Adopting OR means he becomes hindu again (he's pleased now) but I don't know how soon he'll switch back to his fav civic FR. I think we're allowed to trade for his map but not for anything else...?

Resource deal with our new vassal:



(5)-(8)
Moving units towards just with the 1-MP-units being the restricting factor here. Decide to strike at 3 cities simultaneously, with constantinople being one. I mapped out his territory and didn't find more than 5 units in any city and his stack(s) are up north. Turn 6 Nationalism > Music and a GP is born. That's what I found in SB's border cities; I left the spies there to keep an eye on him:






(9)
Units are finally in place, so...



First to fall is Antioch



Since there was no siege or spy support I opted to first send in some HAs with that retreat promo of which I can't remember the name right now. Their job of course is to knock down the top defenders while they have a better chance of survival but it's not too bad if they die since they'll cost a fortune to upgrade.

(10)
Bombardment of thessa begins, more 1-MP units on the way. It's the only city that is somewhat properly defended, with more coming in every turn. But meanwhile, down south at constantinople...



Those defences are a joke, especially for a capital... so:



Same tactics again, some suicide HAs then finish up with knights.

(11)
GA is born in bombay, Music > MT. All 1-MP units catched up and now move across the river. Our only phant is killed IBT.

(12)
Some knights from antioch catched up as well and help capturing thessa



Funny how we got our first UB even though we don't even know what it is yet

Switch to representation and theocracy as we're closing in on cavalry and it has lower upkeep than OR and rep gives a nice boost to teching as there are several cities running some specs. Oh and sometime, we got another GG which I settled in Delhi. I have 3 cities IIRC on knight/cuirassier duty, others on infra - or if already done - on wealth. There aren't many on infra so OR doesn't help much anyway.

(13)
I find out where just's units are and what they're doing



(14)
Unit movement. MT > RP.

(15)
Elephantine is lightly defended and has next to no cultural defences so it falls easily



Adrianople is a bit trickier but doesn't withstand either



-------------

I left most units unmoved, only those involved in capturing those cities to see whether just would cap already but he doesn't talk yet.

Again, we have a GA and GP in capital, I suggest using them on golden ages.

Nicana had around 5 units (only lbows and muskets) so I didn't touch it. 2 units suicided against constantinople though. I think we should capture that city, take a moment to heal, and start capturing egyptian cities to cap hatty (faster than capturing each city) but capture thebes to finish off just. He as our vassal would only piss off others.

Techwise I'd go straight towards rifling, set the slider to zero for a few turns and upgrade everything to cav and move against SB. Unit movement shouldn't be a big problem, hammurabi kindly built a railroad highway for us which proved extremely helpful when moving towards just (new units from Aachen got to the frontline in 2t). I am gathering newly-built units in Rotterdam now.

Empire overview:

 

[Dhoomstriker]

Sounds like we are perfectly on track... for a Domination Victory.

Remember, we ALL lose if we trigger Domination.

You also lose if you bring someone else too close to their own victory condition. Think about what those kinds of factors might be and try to avoid getting too close to them.

Some Victory Conditions are still a long ways off while others are potentially just around the corner. Also, in trying to achieve your own Victory Condition, think long and hard about what your actions might do to enable someone else to win. Just because you think that your Victory Condition is close doesn't mean that you should make it easy for someone else to win. Choose your moves carefully from here on in.

 

[mystyfly]

I did think about that, Dhoomstriker. But I figured I'd rather win some VC that isn't mine so "I" lose but "our civ" wins at least. Worst case we could still agree to a tie and take domination as long as we don't lose... I had enough of that recently...
We are/were in a huge hole techwise and the only way out of it I saw was to go to the attack, and do that seriously. I'm aware that this might profit pretty much every VC (except culture maybe) but wth. We somehow need the pop to be competitive.

 

[r_rolo1]

Well, I must say that how the game is going, the culture and diplo VC players are seriously screwed up

Anyway, I do not think we are close of a Dom win ... yet, that is. But I agree with mysty: we are in a tech hole and have a army, so the best thing to do is to equalize things via use of army, and this regardless of the VC you want.

Anyway, I think the sensible thing to do now it to finish the Byzantines and the Egyptians. This will help every VC ( less the culture one, obviously, but more land->more slider output as well ).

BTW who is up ?