Five Take On The World (Conquests, Deity)

[Aggie]

I decided to start with this one. It's a straightforward game that won't take too much time atm (no micro management etc...)

IHT: I renew the Silks for Gems deal with India. And get 12 gpt on top of that. Bursa switched to Carrier.

Turn 1 (1405 AD) I try to sabotage production in a small Iroquois town and succeed

Turn 2 (1410 AD) India knows Motorized Transport! I try to expose a spy and when that fails plant a spy in the Iroquois capital. No war.

Turn 3 (1415 AD) My last spy attempt vs the Iroquois, and otherwise I just have to wait! Same result as last turn!

IT: Babylon failed to plant a spy in our capital.

Turn 4 (1420 AD) Waiting...

IT: Russia demands Iron and I refuse. We are at war with Russia now. War hapiness is never bad. They won't be able to reach us, but this is good practise for our bombers.

Turn 5 (1425 AD) Tver' and Bryansk have no units or improvements anymore after a visit of our bombers.

Turn 6 (1430 AD) I end our Alliance with India vs the Babylonians and get 35 gpt back.

IT: Russia and India sign peace. India refuses to renew our oil deal with them. They only have 1 source

Turn 7 (1435 AD) We can't build bombers or other strong units anymore. All we can get is knights, infantry and artillery. I switch our cities to artillery then
But we have 53 bombers, 3 carriers and 4 destroyers. And a battleship and destroyer on the way.

I end the last deal with the Iroquois and declare war.

Phocaea is redlined by artillery and then destroyed by two Sipahi who don't lose HP's.
Goigouen and Pharsalos get the same treatement.There are no cities to the north of us anymore.
Bombers first take out the radar tower and after that the defense of Kawauka. A Sipahi razes the city.

IT: India doesn't want to pay for Ivory anymore.

Turn 8 (1440 AD) Bombers remove all defense from Gewauga and our Sipahi army razes the city. I create an airfiled on the borders of the Iroquois lands.

IT: Babylon failed to plant a spy...agin

Turn 9 (1445 AD) A newly founded Iroquois city falls after artillery fire and attack of our Sipahi army. That army is now standing next to Salamanca. 28 bombers are moved to the airfield. Others take of 5 infantry that were redlined by artillery.

Turn 10 (1450 AD) Nad says that bombers are overpowered?????? I destroy the radar tower, kill all five defenders of Salamanca and then raze the city with our Sipahi army.
The Iroquois have sent one or two stacks of infantry with settlers every round. But the bombers that we don't have to use for cities easily kill them.

Our bombers can reach 4 cities from the airfield. It's a simple tactic to use bombers and the army to the max: place the army close to a city and next turn bombard the radar towers and then all defenses out of the city. The army can just walk in. We now also have a mini SoD north of Niagara Falls.

India has Motorized Transport. Only reason for us to get it is the free tech. But India appears to be broke. I think there's no urgent need for a steal. We can't risk a failure and war. Or do we have to get the UN? CAN we build a wonder in Mobilization???

The red arrow points to 36 bombers. We also have 10 bombers in carriers north of Kente. Antalya has 4 bombers.
The blue arrow points to the Sipahi army. Simply destroy the radar tower NW of that city, kill the defense and then move in.
The black arrow points to our SoD. This one has Sipahi that can reach Niagara falls in a turn. So this town should also be emptied by bombers imho.
The green arrow points to a stack of artillery. This one was used to kill Iroquois troops that dared to move to our lands. They redlined the infantry and bombers finished the job.

Missing in the picture is the fleet, which I moved north of Kente at the end of the turn.

We are at war with Babylon, Russia and the Iroquois. Russia is a non issue, being on that island. It gives us war hapiness. We have no war weariness from Babylon. I would not end this war unless they have oil. Iroquois are as good as dead India can build tanks. (EDIT: Scratch that! They don't have rubber ) They are the toughest oppenent in the near future. We probably should draw Babylon in once we declare on them. Which might be pretty soon, after the killing of the Iroquois. OTOH we have a deal with them which lasts another 12 turns. But something tells me that a failed espionage attempt WILL trigger a war vs them (they are the mighiest power on the world with the tanks).

EDIT: I'm wondering if radar towers defend vs bombings. If so then we should take them out. Otherwise we just as well can ignore them.

EDI2: Once we have razed the cities in the east we should build a new airfield. We CAN build it on a mountain

 

[Aggie]

And here is the save:

 

[Nad]

Way to go Aggie You got the fun that I missed out on

I feel so stupid about one thing though: I never realized bombers could be moved onto an airfield . Thinking about it now it seems obvious. But I wasted a load of turns where we could have bombed our opponents by building an airfield and moving the bombers there to get in range, but I didn't. Bleh...I'm always learning.

Superb progress on the attack though. I agree that it is refreshing to play a high level game at the end of the industrial age with massive wars and not have any micromanagement to do...it makes the game so much more enjoyable, because you can concentrate on the strategic combat rather than have to spend 20 mins every turn checking happiness and tile use in 40 cities...

gozpel....auto-skip until reconfirms availability
Nad
Greebley...UP NOW
Aggie...just played
hotrod...ON DECK

Enjoy the wars Greebley . Let's clear out the Iroquois and prepare for the next foe.

On a side note, in future games I'm going to do the same as Arathorn and disable lethal bombard for bombers in SGs that I host. It's just too sickeningly powerful. That does not mean, however, that we should not make the most of them in this game .

 

[Greebley]

Excellent progress. I just recently learned the airfield trick in Meli's AW 5CC.

One use of our workers is outposts. It can tell us about landings that are not in our lands. I also like the radius 3 visibility from a mountain. It can see further than even an army.

I think when an AI is really outclassed (in terms of power) it cannot be goaded into war (though they sometimes declare wars themselves for reasons unknown. and will join MA's against you and join MPP's.

Ok, I got it. I will play today or tomorrow.

 

[Greebley]

I got up to the sixth turn so far. Iroquois are almost dead. Do we want to eliminate them?

 

[Aggie]

That's an interesting question. They are now so weak that they won't be a real threat anymore, but we can use them to disturb the next foe (which I assume will be India). I would leave them with cities on the Indian front, so that we don't have a big war zone vs India. But I don't know if that still is possible

 

[Nad]

I don't think it matters much whether we exterminate now or leave them with a couple of cities. Either way they have no role left to play.

Leaving them with a couple of cities to ally them against India would help distract some Indian forces. But the Iroquois, in typical AI fashion, might just get in our way as we try to take India.

I don't think there is much in it one way or another. I think the deciding factor may just be how many turns we have left on deals with India...if we have a few more turns then keep going at the Iroquois. If we are ready to attack India in a couple of turns then maybe make peace. Whatever you decide Greebley, is fine.

 

[Greebley]

Preturn:
My oil plan:
1) build a boat
2) put workers on boat
3) Drop workers on Greek island to connect their oil (only works if no units are fortified on square)
4) Gift them refining. They now have 2 oil on our turn giving us first dibs.
5) Trade for their second oil.

I do 1 by switching Antalya to a Galleon. I move some artillery into Iroquois territory.

IBT: Minor Iroquois movement in the Darkness

1455 AD: I bomb and then step the army into the city it was next to (forgot to note name). Army continues on toward Tyendaga, a size 16 core city.
Artillery gets within range of Niagra falls.

1460 AD: Bombard Niagra Falls with artillery and use bombers and Sapahi to finish killing the troops. Niagra Falls destroyed (and statue of Zeus).
Use artillery on Kioheo followed by bombers. City is destroyed. Kente gets the same treatment and is destroyed. Our bombers also soften up Tygenda. Iroquois are 6CC and really not liking this war. They would give us two major cities for peace. (Only pity saved them this round from death - it is a pity I ran out of bombers).

Note to self: Pillage that rubber before taking out the city near it. Otherwise the Indians get it.

1465 AD: Tyenga takes lots of bombardment but is destroyed with help from the army. Destroy another minor town and Iroquois have 4 towns remaining.

IBT: Babylons destroy our galleon. I have another, but it clearly will need an escort (I had Iroquois under control by sinking its boats with bombers but Babylon came from another direction.

1470 AD: Heading to more Iroquois towns. Move a good number of planes more toward Iroquois lands.

1475 AD: Kahnawake destroyed. Allegheny (I think) destroyed. Attempt to take Tonawanda; the artillery and bombers redline the infantry, but then the Sapahi lose attempting to kill the 1 hp defenders (stop when a defender goes to 2 hp).

1480 AD: Tonawanda has been razed. Babylons finally have Motorized transport. We try to carefully steal it but fail.

1485 AD: Destroy the Iroquois.

1490 AD: Still working on oil idea. That island is covered in babylon and russian troops. I build an incense and saltpeter colony. Switch to Sapahi colosseum and commercial docks.

IBT: Argh!! Babylon destroys all my boats with destroyers and we are back to square one. Those things range it just too far.

1495 AD: At least the bombers are able to clear the greek island of troops. I should have done that a while ago. I didn't realize I could see the oil itself to get to the russian troops but some of our land is within 2.

Ok things look secure and Indian forces are weak. I am going to try the following. I hope it works out. Babylon will give use Motorized transport for very cheap if we switch sides.
So:
MPP, Peace, Alliance vs India, and 89 gpt gets us Motorized transport. Note that if Babylon declares peace with India or india is destroyed we are instantly at war with babylon. We also get our 89 gpt back however. So We need to be aware Babylon could be at war at any time and take precautions. We may also be at war with the Greeks, but Babylon and Greeks are at peace at the moment, so I am hoping that they are kept busy by the indians.

I look and there is Uranium visible in our territory. I guess I know which tech we got for the freebie. Babylons got Ecology but they won't trade. I will finish the commercial dock before starting the UN. I suggest we don't hold elections

IBT: The dread greek attack: A marine moves

1500 AD: Kill one marine as he was hard to spot.

Notes:
I didn't move any units to allow the next player to decide how to run the war. The greek troop are pathetic though. He had 1 tank and 70 odd infantry. Babylon seems to be winning the war.

The Greek oil: Good idea - poor execution. Sorry about that guys. You might as well just grab the greek oil and build a colony at this point

I am going to let the next player move almost all the units (giving him an extra turn). That way he can plan out the war as he desires.

 

[Greebley]

Here is a picture of the main front. Similar to Nad, I cut the roads so we have a single square choke (one city is isolated behind it.

There is a Sapahi in the mountains near Indian land. Its purpose is to scare workers away from the Indian rubbber (that used to be Iroquois). That way they won't build tanks.

You can see our primary goal (oil) at the very bottom center of the picture.

Remember the weird deal with Babylon. It can have unexpected consequences with alliance, peace, and MPP combined. Hope it works!

 

[Nad]

great stuff

Hotrod...UP NOW
gozpel...ON DECK (if reconfirms availability)
Nad...ON DECK 2
Greebley...just played
Aggie...on holiday until June 5th

I think we do need to consider our options here...the deal Greebley made is fine, we're now going to be at war until the last drop of blood is spilt, and during that time we will always be at war with either Babylon or India or both.
However, I am not sure we want to spend all our effort taking out India and then have to face the full might of Babylon single-handedly. Certainly we want to get as far as taking out the oil, but after restricting India to less than 10 cities we might want to switch sides again and ally with India against Babylon, so we can take out a number of Babylon cities and weaken both powers one at a time rather than face Babylon 1-on-1. It will be much easier to finish off two civs with 10 cities each than 1 civ with 20 cities.

In terms of our rep (not that it matters much now ), and certainly for war weariness, we would prefer Babylon to break the deal. To this end we should certainly not be afraid to steal techs from them (already they have Ecology, so it might be worth saving up for a careful steal...).

Also remember: please do NOT remobilize until ALL peaceful builds have fully completed (esp the commercial docks)...in my last turn the colosseum got auto-changed to a flak because of mobilization, so it might be some sort of Conquests change. Once everything is complete then we can mobilize again.

Thoughts? Opinions?

 

[Aggie]

I agree with switching sides one or more times. I think that -just as in AG8- we should keep the main forces at war. I would only start stealing from Babylon when India is really starting to get hurt. Now is too early. We could face two big foes if a steal fails (although Babylon is far away).

 

[Nad]

After gaining access to the oil, the next aim is to raze a couple of Indian cities along the north coast, to allow us a route to Babylon that does not pass through Indian territory...we do not want to cripple India permanently just yet, we want to deny them access to rubber (and oil if possible) but we would like them to have plenty of units left after this skirmish to pose [roblems for Babylon when we switch sides.

One tiny point: I like the way Greebley bombed some rails to give us choke-points, but such choke points are best on high terrain, and if they are going to be permanent holdings then our idle slaves could also build forts/barricades on there.

 

[Greebley]

I think India may crumble under our combined forces. If it wasn't for our need for oil, I think I would have gone for Babylon instead. I was a bit shocked at just how weak india's military was.

I didn't check Babylon. If anyone has access to the game, it might be worth checking their forces and listing what each has. Is Babylon far ahead of India?

We need that Indian oil though. We STILL have a leader waiting to become a tank army. I also wouldn't have Babylon declare war until we can make peace with India. No point in fighting them both.

 

[Nad]

Here we are.

Babylon is much stronger in terms of quantity of units.

We are the strongest (by miles) in quality/type of units.

 

[Greebley]

Doing some real damage to India before they get loads of TOW seems attractive to me. I would at least want to knock them down so they will be easy to destroy later.

One advantage to destroying them all the way is that there will be one less civ attempting to settle empty land.

 

[hotrod0823]

I am up but will have no way of playing until late Sunday the eariliest. Sorry but I will have to a skip. Busy this holiday weekend.

Hotrod

 

[Nad]

gozpel...UP NOW
Nad...ON DECK

I'll give gozpel some time to claim it in case his comp problems are fixed...otherwise I'll be playing this weekend .

 

[gozpel]

I think I finally sorted out all the problems and can continue play.

I need to read up how you guys went about the last few turns-sets, so I don't mess things up.

I got it? Can you confirm Nad, so we don't play simultaneously

 

[Nad]

go ahead and play gozpel

 

[gozpel]

Ok I got it