Strategy Academy

[Lord Civius]

Here the Master of Arms and the Sr Diplomat along with the general citizenry will discuss our overall strategic plans. These include but are not limited to military readiness, war planning, foreign affairs, intelligence and espionage.

Military Intel
The first order of business is military intel. We have a scout in madrid and he can keep an eye on both cities and alert us to when they found a third city As well as keep us up to speed on their troop levels. We also need to detach a unit to the Babylonian territories for Military Intel. My thoughts are to disband the Prochon Warband as it is costing us 1 gpt. We can then dispatch a HA to scout Babylonia and the rest of the continent to the East.

Unit Organization
The next order of business is the naming of our units. We can go with a generic numeric method (Div. 1,2,3 etc) or name each individual unit. Either way it has to be done. I like a more generic method like numeric and only naming special units. What do you guys think?

Espionage
I suggest putting all EPs on Lincoln. If he is to be our trade partner in the future it will be good to know what he is researching. I must admit I am not the expert on Espionage but I don't see how keeping Hatty's Demo could outweigh a plan to see Lincolns research in the future. Unless we plan on using spies for the war wherein the points could be useful.

Foreign Affairs
I covered in depth in the Citizens Forum. I would suggest we ask Lincoln for Masonry as a token of our friendship. Either go for Sailing soon or build a road to connect a trade route with us and Hatty. I suggest a road as it can be used if we decide to go to war in the future.

 

[dutchfire]

Keep the Prochon Warband, it has got a good medic promotion, it can serve as a doctor for all eternity.

Can we get our Horse Archers + Axes to take that Barbarian city?

I'd like 1 unit to scout our eastern territory.

I prefer generic numbering as it's easier

Agree with espionage against Lincoln


I don't know why there isn't a connection from us to Hatty yet, but I guess it'll come automatically soon. We are connected to Barcalona by river.

 

[Lord Civius]

I don't know why there isn't a connection from us to Hatty yet, but I guess it'll come automatically soon. We are connected to Barcalona by river.

We need sailing before we can trade by river.

 

[dutchfire]

We need sailing before we can trade by river.

Quite right indeed. Normally, the AI will have sailing early, but Hatty doesn't have it yet. I guess we might as well wait for her to research it, our workers have better things to do.

 

[Lord Civius]

I agree, we have more imprortant things to do for now.

 

[DaveShack]

We have: 4 workers, 1 scout, 5 archers, 4 horse archers, 2 warriors, 1 axeman
Spanish units we can see: 1 settler, 3 workers, 1 missionary, 1 archer, 1 axeman
Babylonian units we can see: 2 settlers, 4 workers, 1 great merchant, 4 bowmen, 1 sword, 2 axes

Our production: Arete/Settler/9, NG/Temple/7,Edorai/Archer/3,Arkadia/Library/13

On the power graph, we are significantly behind Lincoln, can't see Hatty
On the demographics, we are in 5th place for soldiers and 7th place for population
We are 3rd in land area, hopefully the 3 settlers we can see won't take all the spots we want

Lincoln has both IW and Construction. Some of his advantage in power comes from techs.

Hatty has copper, does not have horses
Lincoln has horses and iron, does not have copper

We should consider trading horseback riding to Spain for IW. She cannot use it, and we would find out where the iron is. I very carefully determined her willingness to conduct this trade, and it would be accepted. (Note for others: if you want to check a trade which shows resources, zoom in all the way on an ocean square so you won't inadvertently find out where the resource is and get inappropriate advance info, and exit the game immediately)

We need a peek at Barcelona to find out what units are there. If no spearmen, then consider a worker grab and pillage mission. We also need to know the defensive level, expecting it to be 40%.

In a war of elimination, the first objective should be to capture or raze Barcelona. Assuming 40-60% defenses, before we can even consider an attack we need 4 catapults and at least 4 attackers. Type of attacker depends on whether Spain is building spearmen or not. It also depends on the location of iron.

Catapults are 50 and will take 8 turns at present population in Edorai, 7 turns in NG.
Swordsmen (if we have iron) are 40 and will take 6 and 5 turns respectively.
War Elephants are 60 and would take 9 and 8 turns respectively.

4 catapults, 2 swordsmen and 2 war elephants are 400 total and can be produced in 27 turns with the production of 2 cities.

If we have iron and put one city on swordsmen now, there will be 20 turns to produce swordsmen while we wait for construction. We could finish 4 swords in that time. After construction is available, we'll need another 20 turns to produce cats & war elephants.

All durations can be lowered by whipping, but at the cost of slowed research.

The bottom line is that the earliest we can consider a war of conquest is 40 turns from now. That may be delayed by Spanish advancements between now and then. Another 10 or so turns delay can increase our strike force by another catapult and another attacker, which would speed the capture of Barcelona and increase our odds of success.

This estimate does not include additional defenders. A military buildup would affect the treasury, as we are already paying unit upkeep. The economic plan needs to account for this if we are to embark on the plan for conquest.

 

[BCLG100]

If lincoln has construction we should trade math with hatty, lincoln will otherwise.

 

[dutchfire]

We should consider trading horseback riding to Spain for IW. She cannot use it, and we would find out where the iron is. I very carefully determined her willingness to conduct this trade, and it would be accepted. (Note for others: if you want to check a trade which shows resources, zoom in all the way on an ocean square so you won't inadvertently find out where the resource is and get inappropriate advance info, and exit the game immediately)

Just put both techs on the table and ask "what will make this deal work?"


~20 turns after construction sounds good, though I think we should be able to produce these units quicker if we use all our cities and whip a bit. I'd say we need at least 2 catapults, 2 war elephants and some swords/axes/horse archers to take Barcelona. Only the catapults and war elephants have to be produced after construction, so we should be able to get to it quicker.

Still, we're currently doing currency - construction, so getting there might take some time.

 

[dutchfire]

~20 turns after construction sounds good, though I think we should be able to produce these units quicker if we use all our cities.

 

[DaveShack]

If lincoln has construction we should trade math with hatty, lincoln will otherwise.

Ok, she'll take that deal too.

 

[DaveShack]

~20 turns after construction sounds good, though I think we should be able to produce these units quicker if we use all our cities.

True, but I figured we might still be working on economic buildings at that point so better to plan for less and adjust if we can.

 

[Seidrik_The_Gray]

FYI, one of my last official acts going about a week back or so was to make DaveShack the Senior Military Advisor dutchfire, et. all.

You all did see that right?

 

[Cyc]

Yes, of course. DaveShack's report on military ventures is unmatched in accuracy and detail. Articulating events yet to come is a masterful art for a King's Military Advisor.

Congrats DaveShack.

 

[thecommonnate]

Could the position holders of the APR put their titles in their profile signatures? This would help me a lot right now.

 

[Cyc]

Could the position holders of the APR put their titles in their profile signatures? This would help me a lot right now.

Mmmm. Probably not, thecommonnate. But they are all listed in this thread, in the first spoiler.
I might suggest you copy them onto a sticky note and stick it to your monitor.

 

[dutchfire]

My signature has my current position

 

[thecommonnate]

Dutchfire do you also still hold your position in the merchant academy?

 

[dutchfire]

Dutchfire do you also still hold your position in the merchant academy?

Technically, I do, but the position wasn't a very big one. I'll keep the merchant academy updated though.

 

[dutchfire]

We got 3 techs from our Hindu Brothers (and Sisters) in faith this turnset. Lincoln is expanding quickly, while Hatsheput seems to be stuck by our city blockade

 

[thecommonnate]

I heard Barcelona has the Temple of Artimites, whats the news on razing it or not now?