How to kill a Juggernaut?

[DMW]

Hi ladies and gentlemen,

In my current game I find myself in the situation that Im all alone on the biggest continent facing the number one AI together with his 4 vassals. My question is, how to kill him? Let me explain the situation for those who care

During the ages the Juggernaut has attacked all of my neighbors one by one and made them capitulate. I myself quickly expanded in the classical times by means of conquest to the point where my army went on strike )) and I was forced to cool down. At that point I conquered half my neighbour the khmer and finished them of a little later. From then on I rebuilded my economy a bit but quickly I found myself in almost continuous war. I had/have Shaka and Ragnar as neighbors and with Aggressive AI turned on you can imagine they were quite a nuisance from time to time. Mix that up with regular naval invasions from overseas AI's and you see why my power line has been low ever since.

What save me through all these years is that Ive been the best friends with the Juggernaut (Joao II) from the beginning on. Ive been able to conquer Ragnar after two wars, the first he started the second I started. But all this at a high price as I lost all my gains from the Zulu's. Shaka invaded me from the east with more than 50 cavalry while I was fighting Ragnar in the west, ouch. I made a tactical retreat and gave up two cities to make a stand in a third one, where I massacred his army but still lost the city. After making peace with Ragnar and gathering forces in the east Joao made a crappy move. In the mean while he attacked Shaka and made him capitulade, just when I was about to take back my first city ......

So the situation is as follows, Its me against Joao and his four capable vassals. At the moment he is at war with the #3, but that one is on another continent so theres not many casualties. Joao hes over 3 times the power I have and 1.5 times my GNP. I only have a slight production lead. Im tech leader together with another civ who is my trading partner. How to kill him? Hes got a huge army, way bigger than mine, not even taking into account his vassals. Ive got a slight tech lead and am making one tank per turn in my capital with 15 exp and got militairy acadamies all over my country so my army output is fine, but I cant seem to keep up with his production.

I got some strategies Im thinking of but I think they'll all fail.

1. I attack him soon with a sh*tload of tanks (which he doesnt have yet) and bomb the cr*p out of him while I still have the tech lead and while hes still at war with the other AI. But this prolly wont work, even if I take 3,4,5 cities he'll prolly smush my army under his feet with his counter stacks.

2. I make him declare war on me by messing up our relation and than try to massacre his invading armies with advanced weaponry like tanks and bombers.

3. I go espionage and poison all his cities and forment unhappiness everywhere, try to cripple him and attack at the opportune moment.

4. Try to build op a huge arsenal of nukes and nuke him into oblivion, can this succeed? How do other AI's react on me nuking? Ive no experience with nukes.

Any tips and suggestions are welcome, note that the difficulty setting is immortal and that the space race victory is turned off. Cultural victories are highly unlikely, actually domination will prolly be the victory as Joao is already at 30% and 33% percent. Diplo is also unlikely als Joao has bad relations with other big civs. The save game is attached.

Thanks and cheers!

 

[madscientist]

1. I attack him soon with a sh*tload of tanks (which he doesnt have yet) and bomb the cr*p out of him while I still have the tech lead and while hes still at war with the other AI. But this prolly wont work, even if I take 3,4,5 cities he'll prolly smush my army under his feet with his counter stacks.

Yes, build lots and lots of tanks. Build enough of them and the power numbers will shift. He may still declare war at any time regardless of you diplomatic standing (he's a snake). If you like simply send alot of tanks, they are quite effective against cavalry but you will probably lose if you do not capture a city early on. Make sure you have airports to air-transport some CG II promoted marines or machine guns early on.

2. I make him declare war on me by messing up our relation and than try to massacre his invading armies with advanced weaponry like tanks and bombers.

Posible, not usually worht it.

3. I go espionage and poison all his cities and forment unhappiness everywhere, try to cripple him and attack at the opportune moment.

I would forget the forment unhappiness and poisoned water. Keep spies by his oil reserves and keep sabotaging them. AT all costs keep oil out of his hands, he'll eventually get the techs to produce tansk but will not be able to without oul. Also tech plastics and found the great ethanol corp just to keep that out of his hands.

4. Try to build op a huge arsenal of nukes and nuke him into oblivion, can this succeed? How do other AI's react on me nuking? Ive no experience with nukes.

Well, they work!!! Understand he can get them also once you build teh Manhatten project. I have heard that the AIs really abuse nukes once they get them but I have never let them get that far.

Any tips and suggestions are welcome, note that the difficulty setting is immortal and that the space race victory is turned off. Cultural victories are highly unlikely, actually domination will prolly be the victory as Joao is already at 30% and 33% percent. Diplo is also unlikely als Joao has bad relations with other big civs. The save game is attached.

Thanks and cheers!

Well I am a BTS monarch playing struggling to stay somewhat competitive with Emperor, so you probably know more than myself.

 

[MrCynical]

Looking at the game, he may have the advantage on the power graph, but you have vast technological superiority over Joao. You've got aircraft, infantry, artillery and tanks. He's got rifles, cavalry and machine guns - you should have little trouble slaughtering these.

Judging from his power rating he does have stacks (probably of a hundred or so cavalry and rifles) somewhere, but they're nowhere near you. As he's at war with Saladin, it's a fair bet they're either in his cities nearest Saladin, or beign shipped over to Saladin's island. While he has a few bits of railroad, there isn't a coherent link between or to the cities along your border, so you should have several turns to grab cities before his counterstacks can reach you.

As to his vassals, Shaka is the only major problem. He has fighters, though not bombers, and infantry. I wouldn't look to make gains on that front, just hold him off. It doesn't look from the power graph like he has that much in the way of forces to spare. Kublai Khan may get some troops to you eventually, but since you don't have a border with him, and he's already at war, the AI is unlikely to prioritise it. Churchill could conceivably send a naval force, but if he has one it will already be headed for Saladin. Tokuwaga is irrelevant.

My advice would be, build up your airforce (bombers in particular - Joao has absolutely no anti air defences, and they're great for softening up cities and doing collateral damage to stacks. Have stacks of tanks poised to take Evora, Tomar and Braga (supported by bombers and with city garrison infatry following or ready to airlift) on the first turn of war. Have troops in place to grab Lagos and Faro on turn 2. There are also vulnerable cities on the side with the Zulus, but Shaka could throw a spanner in the works of an attack there.

Rifles and machine guns should present no difficulty to tanks supported by bombers, and those five cities should give a reasonably cohesive lump of land to defend. Also (maybe) it you can rip enough land off portugal fast enough, you may cut his land area to the point where his vassals (at least Shaka and Churchill) break free, and may be open to a quick peace treaty.

So basically strategy 1) Hit him with tanks and bombers now (or at least in the next few turns) before he gets flight. Try and get enough land before his stacks show up to set his vassals free.

2)Is not going to be effective, he's at war already, he's not looking for another fight yet, and he isn't far from flight, which is your main edge over him. You can't afford to hang around waiting for him to attack you.

3)Espionage isn't going to be enough to have a significant impact at this stage.

4)Nukes, while effective, are not likely to be an option here. You have neither of the techs you need to build them, and Joao already has fission. I doubt you can get both fission and rocketry before Joao gets the latter, and in any guess you'll make every AI hate you. Also, even if you're first to nukes, you'll end up on the receiving end of them as well, and cleaning up from them is really messy.

 

[Scaphism]

Not having looked at the save myself, I do have a question:

Why do you have to go to war with him? If he's a military juggernaut with 4 vasslas, and you've had good relations with him all game, why not sign a defensive pact and beat him to space?
Having a technological edge and a production edge means you can pursue either a military or space race win. If your diplomatic situation is good and ou're facing a military superpower with vassals, picking a fight with him sounds like you're trying to fit a round peg into a square hole.

If you turned Space Race victories off, or you're playing this game just to war, that may change the situation. But if you're trying to find which victory path to pursue, Space seems like the better option.

 

[madscientist]

Not having looked at the save myself, I do have a question:

Why do you have to go to war with him? If he's a military juggernaut with 4 vasslas, and you've had good relations with him all game, why not sign a defensive pact and beat him to space?
Having a technological edge and a production edge means you can pursue either a military or space race win. If your diplomatic situation is good and ou're facing a military superpower with vassals, picking a fight with him sounds like you're trying to fit a round peg into a square hole.

If you turned Space Race victories off, or you're playing this game just to war, that may change the situation. But if you're trying to find which victory path to pursue, Space seems like the better option.

The original poster has space victory turned off. I started to reply the same way as you until I found at the end of the post.

 

[Giaur]

One word. Blitz.

Tank attack. Promoting for healing. Another tank attack.

 

[Scaphism]

The original poster has space victory turned off. I started to reply the same way as you until I found at the end of the post.

My mistake.

 

[Tennyson]

If you attack, try free his vassal's cities. It might prompt them to declare independance.

 

[monolith94]

Frankly, when I face huge and nasty empires, I often decide to raze rather than capture. It's easier to bring him down when you're not having to worry about all of a sudden protecting a brand new city...

 

[PericlesOfAthen]

I couldn't look at the save but from what others have said your tech lead and advanced units should be able to handle him. If you take enough of his land his vassals may desert him and then you can make peace with them. I've taken on a monster like this and as I conquered more and more his vassals deserted him and it ended up working out really well.

 

[DMW]

Thanks for all the replies and making some good points here!

You and especially Mr Cynical convinced me of trying #1. Ill try to use my tech lead as much as I can as quick as I can to build a massive amount of tanks and bombers and go blitzkrieg style. I'll let you guys know if I pulled it off or if I messed it up, to be continued....

 

[sylvanllewelyn]

Raze his cities, don't capture any. The cities may be defensible, but they won't have infrastructure for a long time and "we yearn to join the motherland" will last ages during the modern age. Hell no - just build enough air force to take down his defenses and deal a small amount of collateral damage, and focus on tanks to basically pound his cities out of existance. It's touch-and-go city razing. The idea is once his empire is small enough, his vassals will become independent again.

Another approach will be to declare war on him and let him and his vassals come to you. Meanwhile, send in stacks of 3-tanks and pillage him back to stone age, making sure you target the hapiness resources first. Stack harassment and city defenses could hold out against massive AI invasion stacks. Make sure you don't declare peace, and see to it that war wariness combined with hapiness resources "disappearing" will quickly reduce his empire to nothingness. This is especially potent because keeping vassals cost a lot of money.

I prefer the city razing though. Removing his cities but keeping the towns and mines intact means you could settle on the land yourself once you force a peace treaty out of him.

Above all, don't give up. Very often I feel I've lost the game, and engage in a murderous rampage, only to come out victorious. Don't under-estimate the human player's war capabilities.

 

[CIVPhilzilla]

Frankly, when I face huge and nasty empires, I often decide to raze rather than capture. It's easier to bring him down when you're not having to worry about all of a sudden protecting a brand new city...

The one thing is the pretty frequent "random" event in BTS of citizens fleeing and arming themselves to fight the invaders when you raise can be devastating to an invasion. I've seen my stack of praetorians, which just easily destroyed a city get decimated because of the axeman that just spawned from the razed city.

 

[L4zXX0r]

Frankly, when I face huge and nasty empires, I often decide to raze rather than capture. It's easier to bring him down when you're not having to worry about all of a sudden protecting a brand new city...

This works great!

 

[MrFelony]

it may help to keep one city just so you can plop your bombers in there so they can continue with your tanks.

 

[DMW]

Here's the update and we got some very bad news ......

I tried the blitz thing you all advised but it failed miserably, dont know if I suck at warfare or if Joao just was to mighty but in any case it failed (Shaka also had tons of units too btw..). Although Im against loading I did so anyway and just continued playing as I would have played it on.

Catherine and Churchill both attacked me, so I decided to capture England and I did. It went very smooth and I hardly lost any military power doing so. I continued trying to increase my military more until that very unfortunate moment in time..... I got nuked to the stone age

Basically Joao and Shaka launched their full nuclear arsenal on my cities and moved some massive stacks over the borders. I used my nuclear arsenal to bring great blows to their stacks with success, only after very severe casualties they took just one city from me. I saw some opportunities to raze two quite undefended cities at the western front and took a third one with some troops I shipped back from my English conquests.

The situation now is as follows; I killed almost all of Shakas troops, nuked and wiped out Genghis stack and destroyed most of Joao’s forces. Problem is now that all my enemies have almost completely intact empires and mine is severely damaged. I lost most my productive power, lost lots and lots of population, got a very large underdeveloped expensive continent overseas and got no army worth mentioning what so ever. Unhappiness is everywhere and I don’t have environmentalism so I cant even remove the fallout. Catherine is likely to attack me soon, she hates me already and every nuke I launched back made it worse, she got an intact army a vassal and is right around the corner. Basically I’m in very very bad shape. Oh and I almost forgot, I really need to change my civics so I guess there will be some 4-6 turns of no production coming up too….. oh crap this all sucks so bad

If anyone cares to give some constructive criticism, tips, is willing to teach some modern warfare skills and got any idea how to save my unfortunate ass out of this tangible situation I would appreciate it a lot. From to moment I got nuked I played some really bad Civ (I never got nuked like this before) but still managed to cause a lot of AI casualties so maybe not all is lost....

Anyway, heres the save, cheers!

 

[tmarcl]

Um. Wow. You have my sympathies. And my congratulations for winning. I'm not a frequent player on anything other than Chieftan, so I really can't offer any advice. Good luck, though.

Marc

 

[sveint]

To bad this comes too late:

5. Build a HUGE navy, sinks his ships before he can land troops. One dead transport is five dead units total.

If your navy is better than his it doesn't matter how big his army is (when he is on a different continent). Meanwhile you could take over your own continent (zulu?).

 

[sveint]

Haha just saw read your update - nuclear war sucks.

Only thing I could think of is work on diplomacy more? Nothing better than AIs nuking each other to death. With Aggressive AI on I always have at least one friendly AI that I consider my permanent partner. Helps in wars and gives the enemies other things to attack/nuke than your cities.

 

[DMW]

Uhm? You probably haven't opened the savegame attached as you would see theres a landwar going on.....

I spent too much hammers on my nave I guess, cause all I have left is a navy lol.

Edit: yes nuclear war sucks indeed

Problem is, I got only just 2 friends that dont want to wage war as Joao and his vassals are very powerful and most importantly, on a different continent ("we would have nothing to gain"). Im just cornered all alone against a big mean man with his friends.