Clive1 - Monarch (Training ?) game

[viper275]

If you give or are being given GPT or resources and you declare war, that trade is cancelled, which is why the LK rules talk about not declaring war just to get out of these kinds of deals (where you are paying GPT.) Well, if the AI is being paid GPT or resources from you they're less likely to declare war because they will lose what you are giving them.

 

[Admiral Kutzov]

OK I don't fully understand the reason for giving gpt (please can someone explain - Bede also mentioned about making sure to give gpt ) but of course I can see the reason for the ROP.

I'll take a shot. Bede can correct whatever I get wrong. By giving gpt the other nation is getting something from us every turn. If they break the agreement, then they lose whatever benefit they are gaining every turn. If you do a gold only trade, the other civ has very little to lose except reputation (Not that the AI cares about that) by breaking the agreement. If I've absorbed Bede's thoughts correctly, then the AI benefits more by not attacking us.

EDIT: xpost with viper

 

[Sir Clive]

Preturn - Egypt and Arabia both have Fascism . Nobody else has anything to sell
us and only Egypt and Mongols have any cash.
Arabia are furious with us and I don't want them attacking us whilst we are at war with
egypt. Offer them incense for a worker + world map which they accept but they are
still furious

Scroll through towns - make a couple of minor alterations.

Almost all of the high shield producing towns are building either factories or infantry

Note that we still have some completely undefended towns - eg New Hattusas which
is close to where all the Arab Horsies are loitering.

1625 AD (1) Carry on assault at Thebes. Capture some egyptian artillery. Move armies
from Copan / Chichen Itza towards southernly Egyptian lands to start pillaging. Start moving
2 infantry from Copan to Chichen Itza so Chichen Itza army can join the others in trashing
the Egyptian landscape.

IT Egypt and Mongols sign peace treaty
Mongols declare war on us
Arabia and Mongols sign peace treaty

Some units are damaged + lost through assault from Egypt near Thebes. Arab Horsies near
New Hattasus retreat into their own land. We get a Palace extension.

Not good news beng at war with the Mongols. They moved loads of troops around near Chichen Itza /
Copan . They surely outnumber the 3 Armies + 4 infantry we have. Guess I will have to move
the armies I sent a-pillaging into Egyptian territory back to defend

Decide to bring Arabia into it . Get ROP and Alliance vs Egypt for 100g + 5gpt

1630 AD (2) Carry on battering Thebes (now down to size 3) and improving land. Notice we seem to have a large
number of conscript Infantry. Where did these come from - did we use drafting somewhere ?
I've never used drafting so normally the only conscripts I ever see come from huts.
Move troops towards Fish Hill to strengthen the assault on Egypt, and move some units back from
the attack on Thebes to Fish Hill to heal. Also move units east to board ships and set
sail from Kolhapur / Bengal to strengthen Chichen Itza. Grass mines founded near Egyptian front
line. Armies start pillaging Egyptian territory near Avaris.

IT Arabia move cavalry through our lands and park themselves near Heliopolis. Maya ask us if we
would like to exchange world maps . I ask if they want an Alliance vs Egypt, Alliance vs Mongols
for 5gpt. They accept .


1635 AD (3) More of the same.

IT Arabia batter Thebes, now down to size 3 . Mongols attack Chichen Itza and surrounds -
destroy a few tile improvements but do not injure any units.

1645 AD (4) Yet more of the same.

IT Egypt found Mendes near Rubber NW of Thebes

1650 AD (5) We destroy Thebes. Armies near Chichen Itza continue to pillage.

IT Egypt attack our stack of Artillery and Infantry which has just destroyed Thebes. Arabs
request an audience and want TM for TM . Get 30g +TM for TM . Arabs want to renew peace
treaty. Accept . Maya ask us to renew peace treaty . Accept . Get loads of messages from
domestic advisor asking if I want to switch size 12 towns to Hospital. Switch a few

Haven't made that much progress but we have a couple of shiploads of Infantry ready to cross from
Kolhapur / Bengal / Jaipur across to Chichen Itza and we are slowly destroying the Egyptians land.

Saved game

 

[scoutsout]

Don't you guys have a Military Academy somewhere?

 

[MSTK]

Don't you guys have a Military Academy somewhere?

I think it's under construction.

 

[Sir Clive]

The Egyptian border and our stack which has just destroyed Thebes

The pillaging of south-eastern Egypt

 

[scoutsout]

@SirClive: That, my friend, is a nicely organized Stack Of Doom.

Sacking the AI capitol is usually the beginning of th end. I think in another turn or two you'll be ready to take another serioius chunk out of Egypt, and Cleopatra will be gassed.

I'd get that stack into neutral territory, let the infantry heal, and augment the stack with about 6-8 Cavalry. Cash-finish some partial Cav builds if you have to. The retreating ability of Cavalry, combined with Artillery shelling and Infantry protection is the most effective way to fight in this early to mid Industrial era.

Gather up any scattered units and consolidate them, or put them in cities as defenders. The game really favors concentrated forces over fancy schemes of maneuver.

You appear to be doing a nice job of taking the war to Cleopatra.

 

[Sir Clive]

@SirClive: That, my friend, is a nicely organized Stack Of Doom.

Thanks scoutsout - you input has been brilliant in this game - much appreciated !!.

Afraid I can't take any credit since the SOD was already
constructed and sitting on the Egyptian border when I took my turn.

We had been concentrating mostly on infantry - I have however switched
a number of the builds to produce a few more Cavalry since I am more
familiar with using those . One thing I am not sure on is should I still be building settlers to fill in the gaps that are now being created between ourselves and the Egyptian lands or should we be leaving these spaces empty ?

 

[Bede]

Keep filling in the lands. One of the most effective things you can do at this stage of a war is keep pushing your cultural borders into enemy territory. Build the towns cxxxc or even cxxc. They make nice staging areas for assaults on the remainig cities. If you push up within two fields of the enemy city you can shell the city down to manageable proportions from a secure base. Then send in the cavalary with infantry cover to finsih them off. If an organized worker force is right behind the advancing troops the railnet can be extended into the new town the same turn you build it.

 

[Sir Clive]

I think it's under construction.

Doh !! We do have Military acadamy (in Greenland) We also have Pentagon and we haven't been building any more armies !!

I should have checked this before I started my turns - my bad

I will switch Greenland to build an army (due in 8)

 

[Sir Clive]

Keep filling in the lands. One of the most effective things you can do at this stage of a war is keep pushing your cultural borders into enemy territory. Build the towns cxxxc or even cxxc

Thanks Bede - sounds like good advice yet again.

Unfortunately I don't think we currently have too many spare settlers
floating about - I will start building some pronto !

 

[scoutsout]

On the Military Academy and Armies: I like to have one single Infantry Army for guarding a stack... after that I load them with Cav if I need armies, or leave them empty and wait for tanks.

Don't forget the extra move you get with C3C Armies... don't outrun your artillery!

 

[viper275]

That's a great SOD, about 25 artillery if i counted correctly. Defend it at all costs, if the defense is lost Egypt has it. Also try to build railroads right up to Egyptian borders so that anything built will be in battle in very few turns. I'm very glad the capital of Egypt is gone.

Thanks scoutsout - you input has been brilliant in this game - much appreciated !!.

Yes, Thanks to the other lurkers too! The advice given made this game great and I think it helped a lot of us (I know it helped me) improve our games.

 

[Sir Clive]

Pre turn - switch a few builds to settlers to fill in the gaps in the Egyptian lands.
Switch some of the infantry builds to cavalry. Science slider can go down a notch and
still get refining in 1 turn.

1655 AD (6) Workers carry on working. Move lots of workers, newly produced Infantry and Cav
up towards border. Ships full of infantry head of towards Chichen Itza. Armies keep on
pillaging northwards. The northernmost Army has now almost joined up with our artillery stack
in the main killing fields.

IT Huge amounts of Egyptian infantry and Mongolian Keshks swarm around the border . We
lose some units , workers and suffer quite a lot of damage to units. We now only have a vet
cav and an elite rifleman protecting our 24 artillery. Will move as many other units as I
can into this stack next turn. Research on refining complete. Switch to Steel due in 6 @ 80%
science losing 18 gpt. We need to build rail into the Egyptian lands so that units
concentrated around the artillery stack can get back to heal quickly and new units
can get there quickly. Unfortunately we don't really have enough units to protect the workers
adequately. Will try to all the units organised into stacks ASAP as they are a bit scattered
at the moment

1660 AD (7) Our Artillery stack redline a huge number of Egyptian troops on the border.
Unfortunately I can't finish them off. Settle Battlelands north of Fish Hill. There are
a fair few infantry defending Battlelands now although Grass Mines is still slightly vulnerable.
There are now a few workers defended by Infantry ready to rail in the war zone

IT - Some of our units get destroyed and workers captured on the borders. Egypt destroy the Maya.
I'm quite surprised (given the amount of fighting that has been going on ) that we haven't
produced another leader yet. I guess most of the attacking from us has been done with Artillery
and Armies. We need to get stacks of workers building rail on the border and these workers
need to be adequately defended . I haven't done very well at this so far I am afraid

1665 AD (8) Arty stack redlines all the Egyptian troops in the battlezone. I don't want to weaken
the stack but there are a few egyptian troops West of our stack so I move four arty back to
Battlelands for defence. This will allow us to use some of the infantry in Battlelands as
worker escorts to keep railing. Settle Carnage Coast immediately on top of where our arty
stack is. Armies pillage more Egyptian territory .Unload 7 infantry from Galleons on hill
NE of Kaminaljuyu.

IT - Some fairly pathetic attacks by the Egyptians - nothing much to worry about

1670 AD (9) Arty stack in Carnage redlines remaining Egyptian troops. Continue to
attack the Egyptians. Finally produce a leader !! . I'll leave him in Carnage Coast for
whoever is next up. Armies keep pillaging. Infantry capture Kaminaljuyu. Rush Harbour for
480g

IT - Arabs destroy Rubber town SW of Buto . Might get a settler in there if I can.
We are losing money - nothing much to worry about but I will have a look at where we
can build banks and stock exchanges.


1675 AD (10) Armies pillage more of Egyptian territory. Artys bomabard Egyptian troops
out in the open . 7 Arty , 2 infantry stack near Heliopolis should be ready to take it
soon .

Now we have the Harbour at Kaminaljuyu is it worth shipping a settler to take the chokepoint
between Tikal , Athribis and Lapaza ?

 

[Sir Clive]

Save game

 

[Admiral Kutzov]

Got it. Have not reviewed yet. Looks like you made good use of the artillery.

 

[Sir Clive]

Got it. Have not reviewed yet. Looks like you made good use of the artillery.

I did split the Arty up into some smaller groups Admiral K.Since the Egyptians are fairly weak I thought this made sense so that we could finish them off more quickly.

There's a stack of 4 or 5 ready to help destroy Heliopolis . MOst of the rest are sitting in Carnage Coast ready to move onto Abydos once we get a few
more rails built.

Difficulty in movng them on further was that I couldn't build rails until I had either reduced the Egyptian numbers or got enough units to defend the workers to the front line. This meant I was in danger of leaving the arty
exposed to enemy capture .

 

[Bede]

:shakehead

with Wild Turkey.

Gentlemen (and I am using this term advisedly),

What's wrong with this picture?

First the lecture on mechanics/technique.

Focus

When the inter-turn ends and build orders come up take the time to consider what the next build should be. Zoom to the city, evaluate the productivity, reassign citizens to increase whatever commodity the city focuses upon, then choose the build based on that evaluation. Every save I look at shows evidence of accepting the advisor's suggestion.

Fortify all military when the turn begins. Make worker moves first, review
completed tasks and reassign the city's citizens to take advantage of the improved fields, then move workers to the new tasks.

Evaluate the domestic, diplomatic and scientific (DDS) information next and make any changes needed.

Fight any battles.

Then go back and re-evaluate DDS screens.

Now for the lecture on tactics.

Move forward slowly

The combat system rewards mass, not daring. The ideal advance force combines artillery (of whatever era), defensive forces to cover the advance, fast attack for recon and skirmishing and heavy attackers. Once the group is assembled move it forward one step at a time. Recon first, then the heavyweights, then defense, then artillery. Don't chase strays, let the singles come to you. If recon encounters enemy forces you have a decision to make: advance or fortify. My personal preference is fortify and let the enemy come within range of the artillery if they are stronger, advance if weaker.

Fight the mission, not the enemy
Now if you look at the last save from my turns you will note cavalry on a mountain with no defenders and no artillery. That group had a specific mission which I should have spelled out in my post. Their first target was the rubber plantation, the next targets were the road network. Defense 3 on a mountain is enough weight to fend off everything but tanks and even if one or two are killed the attackers become leader bait. Once the pillaging mission completed the group was well within range of heavy defenders and could have pulled back to regroup and heal if needed. They were not aimed at the town or any advancing infantry.

Preservation of force
Concentration of mass has another benefit. When the enemy counter attacks a massed force there will be healthy survivors and crippled attackers. That is the time to move forward. Doing it that way rather than going after healthy units means the kill ratio should be in your favor. Absorb whatever they can throw at you then slaughter the wounded.

Sesn, scout, DocT are much better tacticians than I am, so I am going to leave the rest of this discussion to them.

I feel much better now.

 

[Sir Clive]

Some very interesting analysis Bede !!

I enjoy a good rant myself (I do it at work often , although I am not good enough at Civ to do it here , and have not yet had the opportunity to play with anyone below my level so have not had occasion to do it yet )

Re your spreadsheet - although I know I made numerous ****-ups during my turn it seems that from 1625 (t315 )-1675 (t325) everything increased so although I didn't probably do as well as I could I think I did manage to increase both our defensive and attacking capabilities as well as diminshing the Egyptians attacking capabilities

Re accepting the advisors suggestion - A lot of builds were set to infantry when I took over. Infantry seemed to be working OK so I did leave a lot of these to repeat build. However as mentioned in my post I did switch a number to Cavalry and others to workers, Banks, Marketplaces, factories
as I thought appropriate.

I have never in any game I have played gone by the advisors advice (although I must admit if I think we are in deep **** from AI attack I will often repeat build offensive units). I do always build what I think to be right (rather then the advisor) although in most cases I know this may be wrong


I admit my biggest screw up was to move the artillery stack too far into the Egyptian territory. I didn't have enough units to defend it adequately and since I moved too far too quickly we did not have rails to move the units back to a town with barracks I got onto difficulties . Lesson learned !! . However we did not lose any of the arty.


Preservation of force - loks like a very reasonable concept - I will look at and inwardly digest.


Forgot the turn log -

Sir Clive - Just played
Admiral Kutzov - up
Bede - on deck
mtgfreak - Cant play until 25 Aug
Viper275 -
MSTK -

 

[scoutsout]

That "Focus" part is something I plan to re-read... I see a few things there that shed some light on some things and help my game.

In his "Move Forward Slowly" paragraphs, Bede is describing a fouced, decisive, combined arms campaign. Mass (concentration of forces) is paramount to making this work. It is also essential to drive towards an objective, and not allow anything to distract you from that objective.

Though it's fun to take Horses/Ancient Cavalry/Knights/Cavalry/Tanks and simply "Charge!", you may not be fighting (or winning) as quickly as you think you are. Speed alone is of little consequence if the battles are not decisive.

Though combined arms can be applied in any era, it is in this early- to mid- industrial era that combined arms becomes critical. Stop and think about it. Until tanks, there is no unit capable of simply blitzing a fortified infantry in a size 12 city.

Bede also touches on force preservation. If you follow me much at all, you'll see those words again and again. Force preservation is about inflicting maximum damage on the enemy while incurring minumum casualties in your own forces. Combined arms does this two ways:

1) Protecting the force with high-defense units (Infantry) while on the move.

2) Using artillery to severly weaken the enemy so that the attacking units (Cavalry) kill enemy units with minimal losses.

One other thing - Bede touched on the dangers of going after miscellaneous AI units. As a general rule, don't do it. When you do this, you are fighting the way the AI fights - in a piecemeal, uncoordinated fashion. It is the human's ability to direct coordinated, multidimensional campaigns that is the only reason that a human can out-fight an AI that has a production discount.

Here at monarch level, the AI discount is only 10%. At Emperor, it's 20%. At Demigod, the Infantry that costs you 90 shields will cost the AI a mere 63 shields.

Just something to chew on... neither Bede nor I mean to sound like we're putting you guys down... but you guys are reaching a point in this game that you simply can't bludgeon your way through the AI. It'll be a tough lesson to learn, but if you learn it well your next campaign like this will go much better.