ALC Game 18, Take 2: Spain/Isabella

[Guardian_PL]

But he can eradicate Joao and that would finish ownership of AP, and new election will come with Sisiutil with majority of votes...

Engineering would give You Citadels, increased espionage and movement. Machinery is necessary to thwart Praetorians, so I'd say go for it!

 

[DarkFyre99]

With the Apostolic Palace in play, the good news is that you currently have the plurality of votes and once you take two of Joao's cities, you'll have the majority of the votes. Once that happens, you'll control the Palace vote and vote yourself into the seat once it becomes eligable again.

The bad news is that until you take that second city, Joao can make your war miserable if he can maintain Rome's supprt. If, on the other hand, you can persuade Rome that it's better to support you, then you don't have to worry about Joao using the AP against you. After all, you just have to keep Rome's good will until you take that second city, because that's when more than half of the Jewish world lives under your banner.

 

[Bast]

I had an experience with the AP where I declared war its owner and resident Pacal. I took the AP city and he was still the resident!! I think this is unrealistic. An election should be called immediately. And he did try to end the war and get it to be handed back but they call failed luckily. And I didn't have to defy.

He remained the resident until I finally finished him off and all that time I had the AP in my hands.

 

[Jet]

Researching two military techs and then not using them is bad. If you had started with the Temple of Solomon and Currency or Literature you'd be farther along. You might have even put off Mathematics. Researching Code of Laws for the purpose of avoiding slave revolts is likewise bad.

On the other hand, I'm digging the turn counts in the report headers.

 

[Indibil]

From a realistic POV, even if you take the AP by brute force, the Pope would be able to run away and rule from the distance, so it makes sense.

It'd be funnier though if there were two Popes at the same time struggling to get recognition.

 

[Scarredroman]

Machinery for the Xbows and Engineering for the UB. It's what Izzy would do. She'd create three Christian missionaries to spread the faith to Rome's cities. Then when you're ready for war against Joao you can convert Augustus and yourself.

 

[Winston Hughes]

Uh-oh.

We're in a very tough position, imo.

It's 640ad, and we've got only six cities, two of them newly settled and thus-far unimproved. We've got two neighbours still to be dealt with, both riding high on the power graph. And we've (almost) nowhere to expand except by violence. Plus, we don't have a huge tech lead - Caesar has Calendar and Machinery (as mentioned, a very expensive tech).

By delaying the start of war, we've let Joao get within one tech of Longbows. By the time we have a force ready to take down his now considerable armies (a power graph like that with no metals must surely mean a whole lot of units), he may well have some of those badboys waiting for us. If we wait for Crossbows and Trebs, I'd expect his cities to be well stocked with Longbows, Cats and HAs.

Up north, we face a dangerously powerful Caesar. We won't have Crossbows in place to counter his Praets for another 20-odd turns. Even then, guarding the backdoor (which, given the AP situation, looks wise) will pull units away from the war against Joao (who, again thanks to the AP, must surely be our first target - should he get to his UU, all bets are off).

On the positive side, our economy is looking quite strong, the two new sites we've claimed to the north will eventually become excellent commerce cities, and we have the techs in place to support a major expansion.

However, what really concerns me is the other continent(s). Taking down our neighbours will be hard work, but, provided we don't end up fighting both at once, I have no doubt we can defeat them. Nevertheless, as Porphyrius pointed out, our continent is very small for three civs - this means we may find some truly monstrous empires overseas.

Hopefully, thanks to religious differences or separation on different continents, our unseen rivals haven't been able to trade their way to a strong tech position. But we have to assume that they're at least level with our neighbours. While we divert our efforts to defeating and absorbing Portugal and Rome, they may well pull quite a distance ahead of us.

All of this adds up to a very tricky situation. My advice? Not sure yet. This one will take some time to figure out...

 

[Winston Hughes]

Okay. On reflection, I can see six possible strategies at this point:

1) Continue on our current course. Tech normally through Machinery and Engineering while building a stack of Swords + Cats to take on Joao, adding a few Trebs (and maybe Pikes) at the last minute, and sending an X-Bow or three to the north in case Caesar joins the war against us.

2) Prioritise troop production. Work hammer/food tiles instead of specialists and make good use of the whip. Bust out an army to take down Joao asap - hopefully before he gets Longbows. Tech slowly through Machinery and Engineering, so as to have these ready for a subsequent war against Rome (no Trebs for Joao, though).

3) Prioritise research. Work coastal tiles and scientists instead of mines and engineers. Tech fast through Machinery and CS, while chopping forests to get some Cats and X-Bows built. Then switch to production (and Bureaucracy, of course) and bust out a load of Maces to destroy Portugal, while teching to Engineering for UB-boosted Trebs to help in killing Caesar.

4) Target Rome. Tech fast through Machinery, chopping a few Cats on the way. Then switch to production and bust out a load of X-Bows. Attack Caesar before he has a chance to become any more powerful. Meanwhile, tech slowly to Engineering to help finish off the Romans and to prepare for war against Joao.

5) One War. The same as any of the above, but with the intention being to conquer only one of our two neighbours. As soon as we have the techs needed to achieve that, then we can pursue Optics to seek out new opportunities elsewhere in the world.

6) Jewish Solidarity. Make peaceful with both our neighbours, taking full advantage of trading opportunities. Fill in the remaining city, and concentrate on maximising our commerce. Tech swiftly to Optics to spy out new lands, and then shoot for Astronomy from Liberalism to begin our colonial adventures. (This is roughly the plan Porphyrius suggested before the last round).

All of the plans include significant weaknesses and dangers, but I'm leaning towards #3 at the moment.

Since finishing Machinery is a given (I assume - anyone disagree?), we can get to CS quicker than Engineering. The boost from Bureaucracy would be considerable, speeding up further research and troop production. And Maces will make the conquest of Portugal much easier, whilst giving us another unit that can duff up Caesar's legions (and which, unlike X-Bows, can get CR promos).

ps. Sorry for the double post, but this lot seemed way too much for an edit.

 

[Kev]

Since I'm still getting used to BTS, this is more of a question than a suggestion really:

Would Joao be more of a pest with the AP if we went after Augustus first? I'm thinking that Joao seems the weaker of our two neighbors, and probably more likely to stay that way. I don't know how he is with regard to backstabbing, but I'm wondering if we get x-bows and macemen on board they should be plenty good to throw at Augustus who, if I recall, does not have horses (no need for spears/pikes). If we can hamstring him - not necessarily eliminate him right away - we can possibly get a tech for stopping the war (love to get calendar) and then go after Joao. It would mean Augustus could NOT jump into a war for 10 turns even if requested, but even if he did he'd be quite weak. Trick would be to be sure he can't get his iron back. Nice to get the calendar happiness resources in his territory!

Of course, the caveats are what Joao might do with the AP and, of course, the possibility of Augustus giving some techs to bring Joao into the fray. Still, that being said, given the fact that Joao would only have cats, HA's and archery units, we can likely defend better against that 'back-door' attack (though pillaging would likely be a pain).

Further, if we take enough population from Augustus, we can probably vote ourselves the new head of the AP even as we target Joao.

Again, don't know the likelihood or the full effects of the caveats (nor if there are some I'm missing), so I'm sure others can chime in on that.

One other item - how do things look in the Colossus city with great people? Running some extra merchants under Caste could get us a Great Merchant quickly - and a GM can lightbulb Civil Service if I recall.

 

[Scaphism]

One major advantage of getting Civil Service first is the location of Madrid. It's very close to Portugal, which means under Bureacracy it will be able to get troops and reinforcements to the front very quickly. I don't know if that's a good enough reason to prioritize CS over Engineering at the moment, but it should certainly be considered.

On the flip side, if you get Engineering first, you'll get improved movement speed on roads, so your troops produced elsewhere will have an easier time reaching the front.

I need to go and take a look at how productive each city is, but I believe Madrid is already your most productive city, or if not it's very close. So the question is whether Madrid under Bureacracy will get troops to the front more quickly than the 4 northern cities with engineering.

At this point I don't think Pikes, Trebs and Citadels are going to make a key difference in the war with Joao. You have Barracks and Theocracy, so you can build Combat 2 Spears, a few accuracy catapaults and the rest suicide cats. Until you have Stone hooked up I don't think it's a good idea to divert production into Citadels when they could go into Swords and Cats.

For the gear up to the war with Caesar you should have Citadels ready to crank out 10xp Trebuchets.

 

[madscientist]

Congrats so far, you had less problems with the AIs than I expected. I would suggest engineering next followed by Civil service.

Engineering provides the UB for highly promoted Trebs plus the best counter to Joao's horse units.

I would watch that Joao doesn't get optics, he can settle an islands real fast, dropping a city on an iron resource and you won't be able to touch it.

 

[Winston Hughes]

I was just having a look at the diplomatic options available with Rome...

It seems that there's a slight chance we can get them to join us against Portugal, if we can find (and are prepared to part with) a suitable bribe. At the moment Caesar won't attack Joao because "We don't like you enough" - not "We couldn't betray our close friends" - meaning that once we've DoW'd Joao the Roman might be more willing.

On the other hand, the fact that he'd be prepared to DoW on Joao (no "We couldn't betray.."), means he'd be equally willing to stab us in the back.

More importantly though, while I was checking this out I noticed that Caesar has nine cities!!

Now, after we count the four we can see already, plus one in the southwest given away by its culture, that leaves another four Roman cities out there.

Looking at his land, I can't see Caesar having settled another four cities in that area. So, unless I'm missing something obvious, there must be at least one or two Roman cities settled north of those mountains.

Is it just a small outcropping on which he's planted one or two fishing villages because we cut him off to the west? Or has Caesar started settling a new hemi-continent? Or might he even have found a secret path to the New World?

I haven't yet considered how this may affect our strategy. But, suffice to say, we should keep a close eye on the number of cities he owns until we find out the truth.

 

[johnny_rico]

Question regarding researching code of laws: If you weren't planning on building courthouses and have little need of the specialists, why not research something else and just back switch to decentralization if you were looking to avoid the potential slave revolts.

I think you're between a rock and a hard place. Two testy neighbors wtih nowhere to expand. If you remain at peace, you'd probably be subject to demands by both of them. Even worse, they could gang up on you and DoW at the same time. Fighting them on both fronts would be a tough war.

If Joao is close to feudalism and you're going to invade, you'll need maces so I'd prefer civil service over engineering.

If you stay at peace, you could research engineering, get the stone online, and crank out quick walls and castles. The extra trade route is nice but if you're planning for war, you'd need optics to go out and find more civs. The defensive bonus of the walls and castles will also help should joao or auggie declare war.

This will be interesting to see how it plays out. It's not too often you're on an uphill battle but I suppose you're now playing emperor.

 

[madscientist]

If Joao is close to feudalism and you're going to invade, you'll need maces so I'd prefer civil service over engineering.

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I would take Maces and Cats if I were an agressive leader, but Isabella has that UB. I think Swords/trebs are preferable, plus he will have Pikes rather than spears.

 

[Kev]

Again, as I mentioned in my post above, it would be great if we can check to see how long it would take to generate a Great Merchant in the Colossus city. If we stay in Caste, we can run merchants to speed it up greatly. If we can see that it will come soon after Machinery, then perhaps it might be best to go right to Civil Service and use the GM. If it will take longer, then why not go Engineering and when the GM pops we can possibly find ourselves with Engineering AND Civil Service coming in at around the same time.

This all works under the assumption that CS would be the bulb of choice for the merchant. Someone better skilled can verify that.

Also with regard to my post earlier, with AC at 9 cities and possibly more land to use that we cannot see, perhaps it would make sense to hit him first to hamstring him early. The problem would be whatever strategic resources he might have in the land area we cannot see...

 

[slobberinbear]

I like the round. Being with two Imperialistic neighbors, I can see the sense of getting the land grab done.

It seems to me the best plan at this point would be to get your UB and UU in place, ramp up the economy, and then go for a full Conquistador onslaught on Joao -- mainly because he can start colonizing overseas with just Optics and is an easier target earlier than later. Maybe the best way to manage all this without warring with Rome is to convert Augie to Christianity.

 

[slaze]

Looking good. I'm in agreement with everyone who says we should tech Machinery & Engineering and attack Joao. However, since that's three tasks away (Machinery, Engineering and Citadels) and unit costs are already at 9 , we're still in a builder phase for the immediate time being. I see you have a handful of Axes on the que in various cities, but power graph be damned, I think you need to wait a just a little bit more.

Joao may have more directly warlike immidiate plans however, judging by his visible cats.

Ahh, looks like standard AI peripheral troop movements to me, I think we're safe and sound on this jewish continent.

So in the mean time there's still a couple errands you could run. A few Jewish missionaries could be sent to Caesar to convert those hidden (and probably Christian) cities he's got. I see you've done a good job of going hammer heavy in Toledo, but after the forge you could build a lighthouse and then switch of to work the coast and grow into its happy cap while accelerating your tech. Seville could also be put on growth while it slow builds something. Barcelona could surely use a market to compound the shrine with. You could spatter religious buildings here and there as they give you 2 and on and on. Maybe a Courthouse. Maybe...

But halfway through Engineering I think you start the build up.

At this point I don't think Pikes, Trebs and Citadels are going to make a key difference in the war with Joao.

False. Citadel Trebs will make ALL the difference. He will have longbows (at 640 AD, I'm surprised he doesnt have any already), but "green" CR3 Trebs will cut through anything. With 10 or so of those, you could have a motley army of axes and swords (and maybe even warriors for crying out loud) and still take cities. So on the build up you could start with those motley troops (with some xbows and pikes - you'll need some form of 6 troops to defend cats) and after citadels finish off the build up with the 8-12 Trebs.

If you go to war, make sure the first city you take is the one with the palace.

That looks like that's the path as it's two quick tiles away from your border. With the right army you could have Lisbon on the 4th turn.

Be warned, in a recent game of mine I took the city with the AP in it and a couple of turns later an AP proposal popped up for vote to return the AP city to it's original owner.

Yeah this could be a problem with 2 defied votes, but all your cities are 7-10 pop away from the happy cap, plenty of room to absorb a defied resolution.

The one thing I'm worried about is how the BTS AI responds to a build up. Both Caesar and Joao's espionage is double yours, and surely they can "see" into all your cities. I've heard stories of AIs declaring right before the human was, as the human brought a SoD right up to the border and was gonna attack anyway. It'll be interesting to see how it plays out.

 

[Porphyrius]

Not true. In my current game I control the AP and Ragnar is of the same religion, and I used an AP vote to stop him when he declared war on me, so being the same religion as the AP doesn't make you immune. Count on Joao to do the same to try and stop the war. I'm pretty sure he can also use the AP to try to return Lisbon to him once Sisiutil takes it. ...

I stand correted about AP forcing peace. Apparently as long as one full member is in war with a full/voting member it can be used. I most likely assumed the opposite because despite almost quranteed war with the AP owner in most games it hasnt been used to halt me even once. Maybe my usually very short wars are to blame, maybe the AI refrains from such an option when loosing cities or has to many units in reserve (usually both true). Cant say i would mind if the AI did use so long as we ve taken a couple of cities though, even if he practically will have no chances to win a vote then.
The same thing definitely isnt true for asigning cities. You have to be a voting member then.

Defying resolutions is not such a bright idea in our situation. Though the happiness can be handled with HR easily, demoting to vote member status will fuel further resolution againtst us. Heep in mind as well that getting the AP city doesnt switch control of the AP. Making Joao fail to pass a resolution and then getting ourselves voted in his place does.

More importantly though, while I was checking this out I noticed that Caesar has nine cities!!
[...]
I haven't yet considered how this may affect our strategy. But, suffice to say, we should keep a close eye on the number of cities he owns until we find out the truth.

There's clearly 4 cities visible, plus 2 pressumed via culture (one N of Rome obviously). That still leaves 3 beyond the mountains. As i said before we really have to do some naval exploration to solidify our plans.
Its more than a solitary small island or peninsula, but how much more and how good?
I for one would like to know before commiting to a war this late.


Augustus in any case is a far tougher nut to crack and between enough land and rich calendar resources he could become a threat. Not so much militarily but by developing into a solid empire with good tech rate. The choke point guards as well againts him till astronomy, but greatly inhibits our offensive efforts as well.


BTW, Sisiutil are you using all those specialists for a reason? And all the rich tiles? I mean you are growing slowly and Colosus goes mostly wasted. You do need some GS out of Moscow for the lib race, but otherwise...
This way Madrid will see less benefit from bureaucracy as well.

As for aiming GM that makes more sense for upgrades just before a war. We could fund a research at a deficit, though while most our cities arent starving they depend on a single food resource to grow. So running specialists anywhere comes at a serious cost.

 

[patagonia]

Whenever you declare against either neighbour, you'll get spy-spammed and your cities will suffer. It's well worth parking a couple of spies in your target's cities and running a counter-espionage mission the turn you declare to reduce the suffering.

 

[uncarved block]

I don't have much to add, because I've been checking the WB every round to see what the AI is doing with Workers. It's been interesting, but not anything to discuss until after the game is over. Would note, though, that Augustus doesn't seem to have used the Great Spy on you, unless those EPs are so secret that they don't even show up on the Espionage screen. As far as using the Great Spy for a GA goes . . well, the AI has always had trouble with settling GPs, so I can't say it's a surprise. Hopefully the new patch will address this somewhat, as well as the general ineffectiveness of the AI when it comes to espionage in general.

OTOH, ff Rome had showed up with a stack of 20-30 Praetorians at the end of the GA, we'd be celebrating how good the new AI is, right?