Gator02 - Learning to Walk

[Bezhukov]

Welcome back, Brad - roll SEC! The Gators smoked UCLA like Huyana smackin' Nappy!

 

[Bede]

Turn 200 (1400 AD)
Check out the situation and decide that a short era of acclerated commerce and production will serve us better then giving up Gunpowder to buy Divine Right so we can build Versailles. So the Prophet and the Engineer combine their efforts and the Golden Age begins. The results are impressive as we jump to #1 in all the demographic categories except Approval Rating (must be the slaveholding)

Then set the culture button at Delhi to get the faster border pop and stop the bleeding.

Removing Chartres from the map should open the trade routes into Delhi.

It is going to take a while to regroup and start a march in force at Boston. And it looks like we are a boatload or so short of making a defensible landing at Paris.

Doesn't look like the Little Corporal has moved a single trooper out of town.

Reposition the frigate so we can keep and eye on both Orleans and Paris. Orleans looks like an easier target.



What I am trying to find is a landing spot that will draw the Corporal's siege engines and offensive troops into the open. The catapults in Paris can make a real mess of any landing force. Just enough to make it bloody. If I can find an Omaha Beach that is just out of reach of the cats maybe I can draw them out into a killing zone. And I think I found it in the forest to the north.

I need to check out the defenders at Lyons before committing the troops, though. Not enough to worry about.

A look inside Paris

And Orleans

The forces approaching Boston take some casualties but hit more than they hurt
Grenadier defeats (6.24/12): French Knight
Grenadier defeats (12.00/12): French Knight
Grenadier defeats (12.00/12): French War Elephant
Grenadier loses to: French Knight (5.00/10)

Turn 201 (1410 AD)
Frigate defeats (8.00/8): French Galley
Sink a wandering French galley and bombard Boston.

The battle at Chartres is short and sweet
Grenadier defeats (6.96/12): French Longbowman
Grenadier defeats (5.04/12): French Longbowman
Razed Chartres

Burning Chartres opens up the trade net to Delhi and solves the happiness issuse but the town needs a border pop before the starvation stops.

Discover the killing force on the road into Boston. They had been hiding in the jungle. They are now in position to capture the town.

The landing goes ahead at Omaha and Napolean sends out a crossbow to protect the mine.

My tactical thinking here was that Napolean would commit his strongest forces out of Paris to reducing the troops in the forest. They might do some small damage but would then be exposed for mop-up. Well, he never took the bait until I moved the force right on top of Paris after shelling the town's defenses down to 0 with the frigates. When he did it was a slaughter and left the town vulnerable. We didn't take a single casualty other than some cats in the final assault or on the approach.

The Corporal sacrifices another cat at Boston to no purpose.
Grenadier defeats (10.56/12): French Catapult

And sends a lone knight on a worker stealing mission at Delhi.

Turn 202 (1420 AD)
The Little Corporal has refused the bait at Paris with no troops making a sortie towards Omaha Beach. The troops dig in and wait for reinforcements Decide the best thing to do is to let the knight at Delhi die against the town's defenders.

Time to reduce Boston's defenses.
Use up the cats to bring the defenses down to zero then send in a CRII grenadier against a longbow.
Grenadier defeats (4.80/12): French Longbowman
The bow takes a little killing but that is that.
Going to wait for some healing and some some knights before finishing the job. I don't like the odds and I want to make a few cat strikes before the final assault.

Turn 203 (1430 AD)

The battle for Boston
Catapult loses to: French Crossbowman (6.00/6)
Catapult loses to: French Crossbowman (6.00/6)
Burn two cats at Boston but now the weakened defenders should be easier prey.
Grenadier defeats (1.20/12): French Crossbowman
Grenadier defeats (9.96/12): French Maceman
Grenadier defeats (9.96/12): French Knight
Grenadier defeats (6.96/12): French Longbowman
Knight defeats (8.10/10): French War Elephant
Knight defeats (2.40/10): French Knight
Grenadier defeats (4.32/12): French Longbowman
Grenadier defeats (8.52/12): French Catapult

Captured Boston (Napoleon)

I think I'll keep it

Napolean makes a feeble counter at Boston
Knight defeats (6.10/10): French Catapult
Grenadier defeats (1.92/12): French Catapult
Grenadier defeats (5.16/12): French Knight

Turn 204 (1440 AD)

Kill a knight on the way into Boston and another at Delhi.
Grenadier defeats (3.00/12): French Knight
Grenadier defeats (5.88/12): French Knight

Napolean has another knight and three catapults in the jungles outside Boston but the town is chockful of defense.


The force at Paris has moved south into the nearest forest and Napolean commits his forces
Grenadier defeats (12.00/12): French Catapult
Grenadier defeats (12.00/12): French Catapult
Grenadier defeats (12.00/12): French Catapult
Grenadier defeats (8.88/12): French Catapult
Grenadier defeats (12.00/12): French Knight
Grenadier defeats (10.32/12): French Knight
Grenadier defeats (6.96/12): French Knight
Grenadier defeats (5.28/12): French Knight
Grenadier defeats (4.56/12): French War Elephant
Grenadier defeats (8.76/12): French Maceman
Grenadier defeats (11.16/12): French Pikeman
Grenadier defeats (8.76/12): French Longbowman

The defense at Paris is now but a memory

Turn 205 (1450 AD)
Napolean burned out his forces at Paris attacking Woodsman promoted grenadiers and though he hurt a couple they are promotable. If I can take Paris it will be put to the torch.

There are some CR1 cats just waiting for the opportunity to hurt his remaining longbow defenses.

Paris is on a hill so this could be nasty.
Catapult loses to: French Longbowman (4.44/6)
Catapult loses to: French Longbowman (5.28/6)
Catapult loses to: French Longbowman (1.50/6)
Catapult defeats (2.00/5): French Longbowman

Lose three but one wins and the defense at Paris is done to a turn.

Kill the knight pillaging the food resources at Delhi
Grenadier defeats (8.16/12): French Knight

Paris will burn soon as Nappy commits his last strongest defenders against the grenadiers in the forest at Paris
Grenadier defeats (11.16/12): French Longbowman
Grenadier defeats (8.64/12): French Knight

Turn 206 (1460 AD)
Grenadier defeats (6.60/12): French Longbowman
Grenadier defeats (9.84/12): French Knight

Paris is tinder for the flames, as the last of its offensive units are dead.
And I have a bunch of CR2 grenadiers just itching to throw bombs at wounded pikemen.

Grenadier defeats (10.44/12): French Pikeman
Grenadier defeats (4.80/12): French Knight

Not much left.

Grenadier defeats (12.00/12): French Catapult
Grenadier defeats (12.00/12): French Catapult

Paris is burning

Knight defeats (8.50/10): French Crossbowman protecting the horses outside the rubble of Paris and pillages the fences.


Start a move on New York

And a blockade and bombardment of Tours - the next bolthole on the French continent.

Detach some of the troops from the forces at Paris and add some additional reinforcements from home and move on down the peninsula

The pillaging Knight loses to: French Knight (0.50/10)

Turn 207 (1470 AD)

Grenadier another French Knight at Delhi, again.

Turn 208 (1480 AD)

Since I have managed to overload the shipping network, the biggest home island towns are building markets to cope with the unhappy faces caused by unceasing though successful warfare. There is now an effective ship chain between home and France.


Turn 209 (1490 AD)

Tours is next

Grenadier defeats (4.80/12): French Knight
Knight defeats (8.20/10): French Longbowman
Grenadier defeats (12.00/12): French Crossbowman
Captured Tours (Napoleon) and keep it for the landing space.

Tours was easy, New York may be a little harder

Grenadier defeats (8.16/12): French War Elephant trying to move us out of position at New York.

Turn 210 (1500 AD)
Confucianism has spread to Teotihuacan with a missionary from Tiwanaku

The Battle for New York

Send in the Barrage cats at New York after the bombards are finished
Catapult loses to: French Longbowman (6.00/6)
Catapult loses to: French Longbowman (4.44/6)
Grenadier defeats (9.96/12): French Longbowman
Grenadier defeats (1.20/12): French Longbowman
Grenadier defeats (10.20/12): French Longbowman
Grenadier defeats (10.08/12): French War Elephant
Grenadier defeats (3.00/12): French Pikeman
Knight defeats (10.00/10): French Crossbowman
Knight defeats (10.00/10): French Catapult
Captured New York (Napoleon)

With New York in hand start the march on Marseilles from the NW and NE

There are catapults in those stacks that won't be needed as the frigates are bombing the lights out of Marseilles. And the defense is very, very thin.

There is a large army in the forests near the rubble of Paris. Most of them are wounded and could use a little more healing. I am of two minds about what to do: move them overland to Orleans, or load them on ships and move to Orleans that way, or up the cost to Lyons and Atlanta.

Orleans is, relatively speaking, heavily defended

The towns on the eastern coast rather less. And Marseilles should be a pushover unless it gets reinforced from Orleans.

Mao has been poaching into the old Aztec lands.

Confucianism has spread to Teotihuacan with another missionary from home.

The world as we know it

 

[Bezhukov]

Wow, Bede, beautiful pics and comprehensive report. Thanks for all the time and effort.

 

[leif erikson]

Nice going Bede! Took a nice bite out of Nappy!!

Nice work on the write-up too.

Mao got his settlers moved in pretty quickly...

 

[Bede]

If nothing else this old warhorse can fight a war, still learning how to manage the peace though. And it was fun! Brad had left a nice setup with the boats at Paris and the troops in the jungle at Boston.

Once Marseilles is down (it's a keeper, though) Orleans can be hit from two directions. BTW, pillage the ivory on the eastern coast onthe way to Orleans, that should eliminate the war elephants, and I think I got his horses. The only factor I don't know anything about is what may be hiding in Washington in the center of the continent. Napolean now has guns so when available new promotions should be pinch.

There are lots of CR2 promoted maces converted into grenadiers so training should emphasize pinch promoted knights and combat promoted grenadiers now.

 

[bradleyfeanor]

Great turn report Bede, and nice AI-thumping! I didn't expect you to accomplish so much in your turns.

Personally, I probably wouldn't be building anymore forges/markets/courthouses or anything like that at this point, only military/barrracks, but it doesn't really make much of a difference either way I suppose.

I think we might want to go ahead and switch to caste system/mercantilism now. We can use artists to put an end to starvation in our new aquisitions, plus we can use them to put border pressure on those poached city sites of Mao. The improved borders might get us to dom a few turns earlier via better territory control for moving our military.

There is a little trick to getting the auto border expansions with Artists: you have to manually assign all the citizens to artists while the city is in revolt. That means manually making them artists even if they currently are assigned as artists. If we don't do this, then the governor will reassign them as soon as the city comes out of revolt. This allows us to get automatic border expansions in any city with three or more citizens without losing any population from starvation.

SEC and Florida rock!!! Congrats Gator!

 

[Bezhukov]

Or you can just whip a theater, grow back the pop in four turns, get three cpt from the theater, hire two artists, and save all the CS upkeep.

 

[leif erikson]

leif - On deck and blowing kisses to the UCLA cheerleaders, just like Joakim Noah

Looks like I have it. Once I'm done blowing those kisses I'll get right on it.

I'm thinking of switching to Caste to get some more experience with it. Looks like the task is to take as many of Nappy's cities as possible while producing some troops to go get Mao.

 

[DJMGator13]

Real nice set Bede. I know I didn't have that much time to spend.

I'd like to see the CS and artist action, just to get a feel for how it works.

 

[Bede]

Great turn report Bede, and nice AI-thumping! I didn't expect you to accomplish so much in your turns.

Personally, I probably wouldn't be building anymore forges/markets/courthouses or anything like that at this point, only military/barrracks, but it doesn't really make much of a difference either way I suppose.

Two things made it work: 1) once Boston was in our hands I could move diagonally across the map to the next target New York. A diagonal move is worth 1.5 plots in terms of getting closer to the victim; 2) the frigate force at Paris and Tours took care of the city defenses so in the case of Tours cats were unecessary and at Paris the cats could be used to pulp the garrison. (cf The Sirian Doctrine)

I did lose a move at Paris by landing one north of where I should have but my hope was that Nappy would come out of his capitol with his catapults which would have died on the assault against the troops in the forest and then followed with his offensive garrison, any survivors could have been picked off by the knights in the stack as the grenadiers would have take the brunt of the counter. But he didn't take the bait, leading to the dust up at the gates of Paris before the assault.

 

[bradleyfeanor]

...at Paris the cats could be used to pulp the garrison. (cf The Sirian Doctrine)

I'm not familiar with this. Could you give a bit more info?

 

[Bede]

The Sirian Doctrine is the application of coastal city bombardment to reduce the defensive factor of an enemy city, then making an amphibious attack. Sirian uses destroyers and carrier based aircraft and tanks from transports but the principle here is the same though mechanics are a little different.

The theory behind the Doctrine is protecting the attackers from sorties by the enemy, as would be the case if they are landed first. It clearly works best in Industrial Warfare, but can be extended to cover late Renaissance as well.

 

[leif erikson]

As the AI cities have large cultural radii, it seems to take forever to move troops to the cities to attack. It became a question of time to heal versus time to move to the attack. I chose movement in most cases, so we have an Army that needs healing, except at Rheims, and a population that is very war weary, culture slider is up to 30%.

The turn log:

Turn 210 – 1500 AD
Looking things over, I think we should take Marseilles and, as Bede says, it is thinly defended. The stack near the former Paris can head for Orleans and I think we need to take Washington as there are several resources there, especially Ivory. The units not needed at Marseilles can begin moving there and we can ship units, by ship chain, directly to Washington from home.
One Frigate has a shot left, so I bombard Marseilles, reduce to 24%.
Check out some cities and decide I don’t want to reduce pop with pop rushes, so change civic to Caste. Upkeep will go from 92 to 116 GPT.

IBT
New York’s garrison is attacked by a French Cat, 2 units suffer damage, cat dies.

Turn 211 – 1505 AD
At Marseilles:
Bombard with 5 Frigates, reduce defenses from 24% to 4%.
Bombard with 1 Cat, defenses to 0%.
Grenadier (10.3/12) defeats Longbow.
Grenadier (8.4/12) defeats Pike.
Grenadier (12/12) defeats Cat, we take Marseilles and keep it.

Begin moving Frigates to Nappy’s west coast for Lyons and Atlanta.

Hire some Artists in Boston, New York, Marseilles and Tours.

IBT
Mao comes calling and wants us to stop trading with the vile Malinese. I tell him to go and pray for we are coming for him soon!
Machu Knight => Knight.
Huamanga Galleon => Catapult.
Tlatelolco Musket => Knight.

Turn 212 – 1510 AD
Move troops towards Washington and Orleans.
Move Galleon with troops near Lyons.
Change Boston from Culture to Catapult.

IBT
3 French Cats attack our stack on a hill headed for Orleans, 2 die, one withdraws.
War Elephant attacks New York and dies.
Tlaxcala Pike=> Cat.

Turn 213 – 1515 AD
Promote Pike to City Attack 1 and upgrade to Grenadier.
Set troops to heal outside of Orleans.
Move troops towards Washington.
Land troops near Lyons.

IBT
French retake New York.
Cuzco Mace=> Mace.
Tiawanaku Market => Mace.
Huamanga Cat => Cat.
Texcoco Galleon => Cat.
Delhi Pike => Mace.
Tours starts a Barracks.

Turn 214 – 1520 AD
We take New York back again.
Promote Mace in Cuzco to CR2 and upgrade to Grenadier.
Continue to move on Orleans and Washington.

IBT
Nappy comes out of Lyon and attacks with Cats and Pikes, all die.
Teotihuacan Forge => Knight.

Turn 215 – 1525 AD
Turn culture up to 20% as core is getting restless with war weariness.
Bombard Lyons with Frigates, goes from 40% to 20%.
Bombard to 2% with Cats.
Unfavorable attack odds, wait a turn.
Stack is outside Orleans, but there are 4 cats within Orleans, could be ugly!

IBT
3 Cats attack us at Orleans, 2 die.
Mace attacks a Knight and dies near Washington.
Mao comes calling and wants Chemistry and 190 Gold for Education. I politely tell him to go to hell.
Cuzco Mace => Mace.
Huamanga Cat => Cat.
Tlatelolco Knight => Knight.
Tenochtilan Forge => Knight.
Mao discovers Liberalism.

Turn 216 – 1530 AD
At Orleans.
Bombard with 5 Cats, from 60% to 15%.
Orleans is on a hill, odds really bad, so I will wait to bombard again.

Finally reach Washington.

At Lyons
Bombard with a Frigate, goes from 2% to 0%
Attack city stack with a couple of Cats and lose one, the second withdraws, but damage the defenders.
Grenadier (8.4/12) defeats Longbow.
Grenadier (5.2/12) defeats Knight.
Cat (1.1/5) defeats Maceman.
Grenadier (7.1/12) defeats Musket.
Grenadier dies against War Elephant (0.8/8)
Knight dies against a War Elephant (0.3.8).
Knight (9/10) defeats War Elephant.
Cat (4.5/5) defeats a Cat.
Cat (5/5) defeats a War Elephant and we take Lyons.

IBT
At Orleans
W get attacked by a Cat and kill it.
A Knight is killed by one of our Grenadiers.
A War Elephant kills one of our Knights.
Tiwanaku Mace => Mace.
Cori Market => Knight.
Boston Cat => Cat.
Marseilles starts a Work Boat and expands with culture.

Turn 217 – 1535 AD
At Orleans.
Bombard Orleans from 15% to zero % with 2 Cats.
Attacks Orleans with 2 Cats, both die.
Knight (9.4/10) kills a War Elephant.
Grenadier dies against Longbow (2.2/6).
Grenadier (6.8/12) kills a Longbow.
Grenadier (6.8/12) kills a Musket.
Grenadier 6/12) kills a Pike.
Grenadier (10.7/12) kills a Longbow.
Grenadier (10.3/12) kills a Cat and takes Orleans plus 207 Gold. Install a Governor.

At Washington.
Bombard with 5 Cats and reduce the defenses from 60 % to 0%.
Grenadier dies against a Musketeer (2.8/9).
Grenadier (8.9/12) defeats Longbow.
Grenadier (8.9/12) defeats Longbow.
Grenadier (10.4/12) defeats Pike.
Grenadier (9.7/12) defeats Musket and takes Washington plus 226 Gold. Install a Governor.

At Atlanta
Knight dies to Longbow (2/6).
Knight (2.5/10) kills a Crossbow.
Knight (10/10) kills the Longbow and captures Atlanta plus 73 Gold, install a Governor.

IBT
Cuzco Mace => Mace.
Machu Knight => Knight.
Huamanga Cat => Cat.
Tlaxcala Cat => Cat.

Turn 218 – 1540 AD
Our Army is pretty tattered but we must push on Rheims as it is lightly defended and Nappy’s last city.
War weariness is getting fairly severe, go to 30% on the culture slider.

IBT
Tlatelolco Knight => Knight.
Texcoco Cat => Cat.
Teotihuacán Knight => Barracks.
Delhi Mace => Mace.
Bantu Courthouse => Barracks.

Turn 219 – 1545 AD
Troops headed for Rheims.

IBT
Cuzco Mace => Mace.
Tiawanaku Mace => Mace.
Huamanga Cat => Cat.
Teotihuacan Barracks => Grenadier.
Boston Cat => Barracks.
Tours Barracks => Cat.
Marseilles Work Boat => Barracks.
Lyons expands due to culture and starts a Barracks.

Turn 220 – 1550 AD
At Rheims
Begin Bombardment with 3 weak Cats. Go from 60% to 33%.
Move Army into position to strike Rheims next turn.

After Action Report

Nappy is down to one city that may fall to us next turn.

We are at 51.32% of world population and 36.26% of land area. Taking Mao should give us domination.

The Info Screen curves show significant drops in Gold Production and Mfg. Goods Production. I think this is attributable to the effects of War Weariness? The culture slider is up to 30% and we still have some unhappiness.

 

[Bezhukov]

"I don’t want to reduce pop with pop rushes

Hire some Artists in Boston, New York, Marseilles and Tours."

You did lose pop. A total of 4. As those pop still eat 2 food each, they grow back much more slowly.

"92 to 116 GPT"

8 more. Same as above.

"drops in Gold Production and Mfg. Goods Production. I think this is attributable to the effects of War Weariness?"

That mostly. Also taking financial citizens off the land/coast to work as specialists.

Brad, can you help me with some of your incisive analysis? I'm serious.

 

[leif erikson]

"drops in Gold Production and Mfg. Goods Production. I think this is attributable to the effects of War Weariness?"

That mostly. Also taking financial citizens off the land/coast to work as specialists.

I understand your point but it really didn't happen exactly like that. Once a city is taken, it is in resistance, of course. As citizens come out of resistance, I put them to work as artists, so they weren't working the land, nor could they until resistance was over. On the turn resistance ended, the cities popped due to culture and instead of popping out to 9 tiles, they popped out to 21 tiles unless they were restricted by someone's cultural boundaries. Then I could assign the citizens to work tiles. In most cases, I assigned all of them to do that so the cities would grow.

However, I didn't do a detailed analysis, perhaps I should have tried.

 

[bradleyfeanor]

Nice turns Gator! Although--personally--I would be really unhappy that I wasn't able to pound that last Nappy city. But thank you sincerely for leaving his final destruction to me.

One thing: you should have revolted to Caste/Mercantilism and not just to Caste. Mercantilism makes Caste a much more viable financial decision in a game like this.

In Mercantilism we would lose the more lucrative foreign trade routes, but since we will shortly be declaring on Mao, there won't be many foreign routes available for long (only around 10 to Mansa). Those foreign routes will equate to a loss of around 20 commerce by switching to Merc. We also pay an additional 45 gold or so in order to run the Merc/CS civic combination: a total loss of about 65 gold.

If we assume that we use our "bonus" specialist as a Merchant in all cities (we won’t actually, but it works for the financial comparison), then we would currently be getting 69 extra gold (23 cities x 3 gold per city). So financially, Merc/Caste is a wash vs just running slavery in this game. We will, however, be getting the added benefit of being able to hire artists and/or merchants at will by running Caste/Merc. These civics will help both our economy and our goal of reaching domination quickly in a few ways.

Brad, can you help me with some of your incisive analysis? I'm serious.

Well, I’ll try, but I’m still not entirely sure that Caste is the better way to go in this game. This is how I see it, but I’m still learnin’. It seems to me that Leif made good decisions on switching to Caste and hiring the artists in those cities. I don’t think the difference between slavery and caste will be huge in this game, but I believe caste will be slightly stronger from here out. It will mainly come into play when we take cities that will starve without an immediate border pop (often this is size 7 and larger, but it depends heavily on the surrounding terrain of course).

In Boston and Tours CS didn’t help us much because the cities would not have starved without the expanded borders. The border pop netted us a village in Tours, for an additional +2 commerce over working a coast tile, which is all we could have worked without the expanded borders. In Boston we got +2 food from a sugar plantation and +2 hammers from a copper mine. So we definitely wanted expanded borders in the two cities, but it wasn’t critical. We would not have wanted to use the whip for theaters, however, in either of these cities. In Tours the pop would have dropped to 1 and it would have taken 27 turns to grow back to size 3, and in Boston we would have lost access to 3 lucrative tiles for a similar number of turns. Given how quickly this game will be over, we are only concerned with short term benefits, not long term, and losing out on the short term benefit of commerce/hammers/food of the extra tiles would not be worth the long term culture gain of a theater.

So in those two cities it would have been a choice between expanding borders with artists in Caste System or by “building culture” under Slavery. Either approach is roughly equivalent, I think, which means that slavery would be preferable in these two cities because it is cheaper than Caste and allows us to whip. The other two cities, however, are good examples of why I think Caste is better.

New York would starve without a border pop, so in slavery we would have to immediately whip a theatre for a loss of 3 citizens. We would also lose 1 citizen to starvation on the first turn and another on the second turn (on turn two we would have to hire two artists in order to get the immediate border pop). New York happens to have a granary so it could have grown back relatively quickly, but I prefer the border expansion without the whipping and starvation because of the tiles those whipped/starved citizens could have worked.

As it stands, it will be able to work a banana plantation thanks to the instant border pop, as well as farmed rice, a river hamlet and additional spice and sugar plantations: that is a lot of extra commerce and food. Even if the city could grow back its 5 citizens in around 25 turns, why miss out on working those lucrative tiles if we don’t need to? We don’t really need a theatre, just 10 culture points. I would rather have the 10 culture and the additional food/hammers/commerce than I would want the theatre and all the extra culture. The game will simply be over too soon for the extra culture to pay off. It will be quicker for us to gain the extra domination tiles by building a few settlers near the end.

Mersailles only had access to undeveloped tiles and an ivory without border expansions, so it too would have starved. Our border expansion gave us access to developed clam, iron and cow tiles as well as a hamlet that will grow to a village in 16 turns. Once Nappy’s last city falls, Mersailles will also get another village to work. The city is only size 6 with no granary, so whipping a theater would be undesirable in that city as well: we would lose out on a lot of hammers and commerce while we waited for the city to grow back to size 6. It can be very productive now thanks to the artists and the expanded borders.

The lost commerce/food you mention due to the artists only lasts for 1 turn, while the benefits of being able to work the better tiles from the border expansions are substantial in those two cities. Also—if we want an immediate border expansion—we would still need to run 2 artists for a turn after whipping a theater. If we were going with whipped theatres for expanded borders, we would end up with 8 less citizens after whipping and starvation in these two cities, and every one of those people could have worked productive tiles instead.

The reason I wanted to make the switch to CS/Merc is because we lost a lot of population to starvation in the Aztec cities we conquered and I didn’t want that to continue in the campaigns against Nappy and Mao. I didn’t keep an exact tally, but it was something like 20 citizens lost due to lack of expanded borders in the Aztec cities alone. We lost a bunch more in Nappy’s cities (as you can see from just the comparisons above) but, again, I didn’t keep count.

Most of the cities we will take from here out will be like New York and Mersailles, I think, and will have great tiles available to work: lots of villages and bonus tiles. If we allow our cities to starve then we will lose a ton of money and growth potential, and I am afraid that will put us in financial trouble before we reach the dom limit. We also will not want to whip, because given the timetable of the game, our cities will not be able to grow back their pop by the time we reach domination.

If we use the instant border pops of Caste System, we will not lose any citizens at all in these larger cities and can keep working all those lucrative tiles. Additionally, when a city has more population than useful tiles to work, we will be able to hire merchants and still get benefit out of the captured population.

Of course, sometimes a city doesn’t need the expanded borders to support its population or it is so large that war weariness is a bigger factor in starvation than tile availability. In those situations caste system will not be useful and we would be better off in slavery. That was not the case with the Aztecs (except for Delhi) and Nappy, however, and I don’t think it will be the case with Mao. It basically depends on the map.

I will try to keep good notes on how I MM and utilize CS/Merc during my turns so we can hopefully figure out whether the civic switch worked out to be a good or a bad decision.

In any case, I don’t see how CS would ever pay off for you given the way you prefer to play (ie—take the builder approach and never turn off research). In such games I imagine it would be much better to take the long view on the productivity of cities rather than the short view, which means that most cities would need lots of buildings and slavery would be very helpful. I suppose CS might work out if you were philosophical and/or going for an intensive Great Person approach.

However, in any game where long term civ development is not an issue (the kind of games you find distasteful ), Caste System is something that should be considered. One reason I am having trouble figuring out whether it is best in this game is because we are financial: that makes working a coast tile more valuable than running a merchant, which is not the case for non-financial civs. In this game I think the determining factor is the temporary loss of commerce due to whipping and/or starvation. I think we will need to keep our captured population working as many high commerce tiles and/or merchants as we can in this game in order to remain solvent, and that means no whipping or starving. But I could be wrong.

Edit: I just noticed that we have managed to amass 1400 gold...probably due to having more financial buildings than I normally have, although I would usually have a lot more military. Caste/Merc is more about financial solvency during conquest than about hastening victory. We are pretty far from being in financial difficulty, so now I am wondering if we wouldn't be better off back in slavery for rushing barracks and units and getting this thing over quicker. Sheesh. If I were playing this game solo I think I would risk the financial burden of slavery and whipping in the interests of getting the quickest dom I could, but since this is a cooperative game I think we should stick with the financially safe route of Caste/Merc.

 

[Bezhukov]

Thanks, Brad. I'm used to having access to biology at this point in my games, so gaining back whipped pop is usually a trivial consideration, and I usually make use of theaters for their culture (aka lux) slider doubling, so whipping them is a no brainer. I can see where its a closer call when scorching earth in all possible haste.

There's also the issue of worker turns, but bio leads to me swimming in workers as I use worker builds to hold pop while converting improvements in captured cities that I've farm spammed to get up to pop.

 

[leif erikson]

Nice turns Gator! Although--personally--I would be really unhappy that I wasn't able to pound that last Nappy city. But thank you sincerely for leaving his final destruction to me.

After your illness, I figured you needed some fun. Your last turn set was spent pretty much setting things up, so a gift for you.

What I don't think I did a good job of was getting ready for the next campaign against Mao. However, I didn't want to let Nappy off the ropes, so decided to push him as hard as I could and try to finish him while keeping some troops up in the north after we finished to face Mao. But it seems Mao is everywhere!!

We have so much war weariness. I was wondering if we took some turn to set up for Mao, while at peace, if some of this WW would dissapate? Unfortunately, this takes time away from quick victory. However, most of the gold accumulated was during the early turns, despite unit upgrades. Now, with culture at 30%, we are spending a fair amount trying to keep from revolting. Is there a solution?

One thing: you should have revolted to Caste/Mercantilism and not just to Caste. Mercantilism makes Caste a much more viable financial decision in a game like this.

In Mercantilism we would lose the more lucrative foreign trade routes, but since we will shortly be declaring on Mao, there won't be many foreign routes available for long (only around 10 to Mansa). Those foreign routes will equate to a loss of around 20 commerce by switching to Merc. We also pay an additional 45 gold or so in order to run the Merc/CS civic combination: a total loss of about 65 gold.

Thanks for this discussion. I rarely ever use Mercantilism as I love the income from foreign trade routes. However, now I understand its use better. I thought about changing to it, but saw the income from China and Mali and didn't want to give it up yet. I'll have to rethink my miserly ways!

 

[bradleyfeanor]

We have so much war weariness. I was wondering if we took some turn to set up for Mao, while at peace, if some of this WW would dissipate? Unfortunately, this takes time away from quick victory. However, most of the gold accumulated was during the early turns, despite unit upgrades. Now, with culture at 30%, we are spending a fair amount trying to keep from revolting. Is there a solution?

Thanks to your decision to eliminate Nappy ASAP, War Weariness will only be an issue for 1 more turn. I can't think of a better solution for WW than putting its source to the guillotine! When he is gone our WW drops back to zero, and when we declare on Mao it will start growing again from scratch.

You are right that Mao is everywhere. I think I will have to spend several turns doing a set-up for his elimination before actually declaring war. We currently have a dilemma that I hate: do we go for the elimination of Mao's core or take out his cities mixed in with ours first? We don't currently have enough troops to do both.

I will try to amass as many troops as I can, so that we can take out his peripheral cities while simultaneously marching on 1-2 of his core cities. I think that will lead to the quickest dom in the long run, as it will allow us to use the maximum number of our troops while reducing Mao's ability to poprush Muskets.

 

[leif erikson]

Thanks to your decision to eliminate Nappy ASAP, War Weariness will only be an issue for 1 more turn. I can't think of a better solution for WW than putting its source to the guillotine! When he is gone our WW drops back to zero, and when we declare on Mao it will start growing again from scratch.

This is good news. So war weariness is tallied on a civ by civ basis and doesn't carryover. I like that!!

You are right that Mao is everywhere. I think I will have to spend several turns doing a set-up for his elimination before actually declaring war. We currently have a dilemma that I hate: do we go for the elimination of Mao's core or take out his cities mixed in with ours first? We don't currently have enough troops to do both.

I will try to amass as many troops as I can, so that we can take out his peripheral cities while simultaneously marching on 1-2 of his core cities. I think that will lead to the quickest dom in the long run, as it will allow us to use the maximum number of our troops while reducing Mao's ability to poprush Muskets.

Beijing is vulnerable by sea but no really good defensive tile is available for landing and there is a river to the north. It would be a very nice place to start as our Frigates could help out a lot. I wish I had sent a Caravel up to do a recon?

As I got closer to Nappy's demise, I started leaving units in the old Aztec area to be used against those filler cities Mao dropped. Some are Cats and there are a couple of Knight stacks around, iirc.

Good luck...

EDIT - Perhaps we should send 5 Frigates north to do a recon?