Goz7 - The Squeeze

[Greebley]

A quiet turn. I built military, walls, and Markets. A few cities were already building something else.

Notes:
FP will be in 8 turns.

We are breaking even at 100% gold. We have 40 gpt outstanding in deals and making 0 tech progress.

I don't like our situation at all. We need more land.

Good luck Microbe. Change around any builds if you have any ideas on how to improve things.

 

[Sir Bugsy]

This is pretty lousy. Military is our only choice at the moment.

 

[microbe]

Got it. Maybe I'll commit suicide in my turns?

 

[Greebley]

I would definitely try to get the Byantines in the war as well. We will still be hit by the brunt but if we can survive the initial assault with minimal city loss, we can build up and take out the cities that Sumeria cannot easily defend because it has to get through our territory to do so.

With the Byzantines help, I suspect we can handle things after the initial assault. They will be a thorn in the Sumerian's side and draw off units.

For this reason, I would wait until we get back some of our 40 gpt before declaring war.

We could even sell one of our Lux to get a deal (I don't think Byz wants them, but we can sell to another civ and use the cash to get the Alliance) if need be.

 

[microbe]

I looked at the game, and here is a summary:

We have 13 pikemen, 10 bowmen, 20 MDI and 4 trebs. We have 23 cities to defend. We can at most gather one stack of MDIs with a few pikes.
There are a lot of Sumerian units in the south (19 of combo of MDI/pike/longbow). Do we go north or south? If we go south we'd be facing those units, if we go north we'd be facing Sumerian's core. And it has knights, so our cities with one pike or two will fall much faster one another. Our stack will diminish pretty fast after taking a couple of cities too.

I just don't think we can make it. I have had similar situation in LK78 and it was a total disaster. Certainly not something I want to try again, at least not during holidays.

I'll just do everyone a favor and declare and let Sumeria finish us off, OK?
I'll do this tomorrow though. Consider the game dead.

Think twice for anyone that wants to play a deity culture game.

 

[Greebley]

I don't think we played it quite right. Too much concentration on culture cripples you.

I wouldn't necessarily commit suicide. I rarely like to give up. Spend your turn going full bore on military and we can see where we are at the end. If Sumeria still doesn't have Cavalry and Rifles we may have a chance with Byzantine help.

I would try treating it as an AW game. Concentrate on getting enough Pikes in border cities (can be reached in 1 turn by a knight (or cav?)) so the city isn't attacked. I think 3 pikes and an MDI should do it. Some more Trebs too. We can try playing it defensively - only attacking units after bombardment. Keep our rate at 0 gpt at all times by selling off buildings and lowering our maintanance. I realize this is a bit odd in a cultural game, but we can try to make up for it later when we are in a better position.

This is the best plan I can think of.

The other option that might work is to simply try to survive until we get artillery and go on the offensive. Biggest problem is that our cities will have started to flip to Sumeria by then We would probably want to disband contested cities.

Or Sumeria might attack us and get the drop and slaughter us. Who knows?

 

[microbe]

I wouldn't necessarily commit suicide. I rarely like to give up. Spend your turn going full bore on military and we can see where we are at the end. If Sumeria still doesn't have Cavalry and Rifles we may have a chance with Byzantine help.

Greebley, you are really an optimist.

Build more military? One more unit and we'll go negative.

I am a pragmatist. I've played many difficult games but this situation just looks dead.

I will still die as a soldier though. I'll leave some towns empty so we can defend other towns a bit better, and see what happens. The good thing is even if we lose some towns, our territory might not shrink in this game.

 

[Greebley]

You can sell buildings to bring our gold to 0. Also we have an outstanding 40 gpt deal. When that expires we get more troops (we want to save some for a Byz Alliance).

Don't get me wrong. Things are grim. Are they dead? I am not positive so would like to do our best and see.

 

[gozpel]

I don't think we played it quite right. Too much concentration on culture cripples you.

Amen to that, Greebley.

Two things that I can think of:

Landgrabbing couldn't be done better than how we did it and we didn't really need all those culture buildings after border-expansions. I will keep that in mind for another time. When I won my 100k games, I did focus on military more in the beginning.
(We might want a re-match, because I still like the concept?)

The most unfortunate thing was to get those pesky Sumerians as neighbours. They seem to be the monster civ above all and I lost to them more than once.

microbe, you can sort this out as good as anyone, so give it your best shot!

 

[microbe]

Preturn: We have 13 pikemen, 10 bowmen, 20 MDI and 4 trebs. We have 23 cities to defend.

I think we should attack Umma, which has iron and horses.

(1)560AD: movement.

IBT Germany and Inca start Shakespear.

(2)570AD: more movement.

IBT: Hmm, I guess Sumeria is planning a sneak attack..toward Byzantines! Lots of units move to that city, including several knights. I see a Sumerian galley gets sunk, but don't know by whom. Sumeria starts Smith's.

(3)580AD: Sell a library to make even. Apparently Sumeria is already at war with Byzantines. But those units in our territory will not make it any easier for us..our core will be exposed to the knights.

I try to redirect them to not trespassing our core..

IBT Mongols demand TM and sure. And yes, Byzantine and Sumeria fight.

(4)590AD: I must either have been completely wrong, or the iron at Umma just got depleted. Guess the former..

Umma is on a hill, hmm..not the best kind of target, but it wouldn't matter.

Still too many units around it, so wait.

Have to sell another temple.

IBT we finish a market and now have +3gpt.

(5)600AD: Sumeria completes Shakespear and starts Newton. I guess it has no saltpeter as I do not see any musketmen or cavalry.

(6)610AD: I ask Sumeria to leave and it actually does so! This sucks. Too many units at the border and if I declare it's surely a suicide. I can count totally 49 units.

No way we can win it. OK I'll just take Umma and call it a virtual victory. However there is one big stack next to it so I'll let it step into our territory first.

(7)620AD: I decide to wait one more turn.

IBT we complete FP.

(8)630AD: I demand Gunpowder from Sumeria to make it furious and ask it to leave, and it declares.

Our payment is also back so we are making +22gpt.

Some towns are definitely going to fall so I sell all improvements, and gift to Zulu.

MDI retreats a knight and a bowman kills it, and we enter GA.

I establish embassy with Byzantines and sign RoP. It's at war with Mongols too.

Our stack of 14 MDI, 3 pike, 5 trebs are next to Umma.

IBT the RoP pays as Byz longbow kills a knight for us. Apparently Sumeria is already at war with Zulus so it took all the gifted towns except one. Sumeria razed Uruk and captured Carchemish.

(9)640AD: trebs take one hp off each of the 3 pikes in Umma, we lost two MDI and raze it! We get 7 slaves and a treb.

We kill two knights and an MDI in our territory.

I gift another town to Japan. We are making +130gpt so I buy Gunpowder from Mongols by WM+48gpt+15g. Mongols are likely to MA with Sumeria as it's at war with Byzantine too.

And we do have saltpeter at the border. I upgrade one pike.

We can even make a 2-fer! I buy Chemistry from Germany by 66gpt+WM. Chemistry can get us Astronomy or Chivalry from Zulu but not both. I go for Astronomy as we do not have horses (oh we do have, after razing Umma) and knights are too expensive for us. And it doesn't matter anyway.

I loan 162g from Byzantines and pay 9gpt, and upgrade two more pikes. We have 3g with +4gpt.

IBT Japan declares on Byzantines, and we lose no towns!

(10)650AD:

I keep most units unmoved, including our stack at ex-Umma. You can choose to move to Sumer, but it's size-13 and will be very tough to get. So we probably just want to move it south to take back Carchemish and Eulbar. Or you can go for Sumer.

Zamua will fall next turn as there are probably 30 units around it. I'd probably move units from both Zamua and Nimud into Samarra and gift Zamua to Japan.

Izibia will probably fall too soon, but we can gift to Inca (Japan is at war with Byzantine and Izilia is too close to Byz).

Our north is probably OK except some pillaging. All Sumerian attack force is at south.

I'm glad I'm done with my turns. Heck, I even got 3 techs. I could have saved the gold to rush units, but I'd rather see us die sooner. You'd better not make peace.

Now good luck with this hot potato.

 

[gozpel]

Down the drain we go

Roster:

1 - Bedhead -> UP
2 - Kaiser Berger -> lurking
3 - gozpel
4 - Sir Bugsy
5 - Greebley
6 - microbe -> Just played

I think I read somewhere that Bedhead had some educational catching up to do, so if he doesn't show up, it's KB's turn.

 

[bed_head7]

That is correct, although this brings me to two skips in four opportunities. Some contribution, huh? Sorry all, just bad timing.

 

[Kaiser_Berger]

Well, I managed to have another civ devour me in one turnset in LK80, will see if I can make it two

Got it.

 

[gozpel]

No worries Bedhead, your time of excellence will come

Good luck KB.

 

[Kaiser_Berger]

Preturn-

IT- Zamua and Ahshur fall.

T1 660

Bombard a bit. Not much to due. We're running a -26gpt deficit now.

IT- Samarra, Nimrud and Ellipi fall. Then I just have to laugh as all our culture buildings pay off

We accept, naturally.

T2 670

No tmuch to do.

IT- Izibia and Ashur fall. Sumerians go Industrial.

T3 680

Nothing to do.

IT- We actually hold our ground.

T4 690

Nothing to do.

IT- Doom creeps closer.

T5 700

Nada.

IT- Akkad, Nineveh, Mari all fall.

T6 710

Let us die please.

IT- Larsa, Nippur, Zariqum, Eridu

The RNG shows its sinical side as we get a leader on defense

T7 720

I go to make an army, but since only have three cities, I can't

IT- Babylon falls.

T8 730

We have one city remaining. I found a second one with a settler we had left guarded by a hefty stack. With some luck I can hand this off

IT- We hold!

T9 740

Well, let's see how we do.

IT- Shuruppak falls, but our new capitol holds

T10 750

As a reward for surviving 10 turns, I'm going to pass this on to the next unlucky soul. Have fun

 

[microbe]

Cool, so this is what we have achieved:
1. razed a big Sumerian city.
2. had a city flip to us! Although the city was ours before.
3. had a leader! Although not enough to create an army.

I don't feel that bad now.

 

[gozpel]

Nice KB, letting me take the dagger

 

[gozpel]

Second turn:

Anyone interested in a rematch?

This time we build our culture to expand borders only and then concentrate on military. And no Sumeria as nextdoor neighbour.

Plus that I think an early GA is needed.

Geez, the last couplr of turnsets were hilarious

 

[bed_head7]

I'm in, and I actually want to play this time.

 

[microbe]

I guess I've had enough. I'll have to pass.