JAR03: Portugal, DG, Space Race

CKS · Oct 26, 2019

Good job!

I'm in favor of trading for military tradition and making a cavalry army. I also would make peace with the Germans and pull them into an alliance with us against the Byzantines. Then let's take as much of the Byzantine lands as we can comfortably take. However, we should raze and replace any cities we take (except Adrianople and Constantinople), as the flip risk will be huge and they Byzantines won't be destroyed any time soon.

tjs282 · Oct 26, 2019

Well done @jarred!

I've got the save

jarred! said:
Persia declares on the koreans

Ah-hahaha! The Jerk isn't even out of the Ancient Age yet, what does he imagine he'll get for doing this?!?

And what's Wang done to annoy everyone, suddenly? Worth brokering MilTrad to him, in the hope of ensuring his survival (and possibly even getting his GA, if he's smart enough to build some Hwach'a)? Or just leave him to sink, and buy his Luxes from the winner(s) instead?

And wow, Hammu's got a lot of gold that ought to be ours! I think we should make peace ASAP, and sell him something relatively 'harmless', like ToG (if we've got a lock on Newtons and no-one's building another GWonder)?

jarred! said:
Byz and Russians sign MA against us. (After Byz turn)

Well dammit, Dora, you traitorous, backstabbing wench! What did Cathy offer you that we couldn't? (Could they have signed a MAPT-deal?)

jarred! said:
Speaking of, how do we deal with the war with the byzantines? Their land all the way south to caesarea is mostly grassland and could hold a high population for beaker farms if we wanted to go that route.

That's true, but we would need to take all of that land to ensure that our beaker-farms weren't flipping (back) to Dora every other turn. And even then, we'd be left with a very long front to defend against the Germans (who I'd forgotten we were still at war with), so we might find ourselves 'forced' to eliminate them as well.

So I didn't/don't really want to fight the Byzzies into their heartlands unless/until we have MilTrad and substantial numbers of Cavs to throw at them. That said, I'd rather not go that route at all if we can avoid it. Because I also don't really want to stay on a war-footing for much longer. Now that we have our GA going, rather than using the GA-SPT to pump out masses of Knights (or Cavs) -- which we won't need in huge numbers once our homeland (plus the former Greek and Russian territory) is secured -- I would prefer to use those shields to get (Courthouses, Ducts, Libs, Markets, and) Unis up everywhere we can expect to get a reasonable beaker-return from them, and that doesn't already have them.

My vote would therefore be to (destroy Russia,) push the Byzzies back to the choke at Yaroslavl', fortify everything there, bomb+kill everything that comes through, and make peace once Dora's lost enough units fighting us that we can obtain favourable terms from her. (The choke near Caeasarea might be a better negotiation point, but all the towns in that inter-choke section will be really flip-prone, unless we also manage to take Constantinople and force Dora to Palace-jump). Getting Bismark onside, e.g. with a MAPT-deal (which we would then wait for him to break, giving us WH again), also seems like a good idea.

We should have enough gold to upgrade all our Trebs and Cats to Cannon, and possibly most/all of our injured vKnights to Cavs (which instantly replenishes all their HP as well), and then I'll march on Moscow. Once Moscow is ours, the Russians should be broken, and taking out Yekaterinburg and StPetes should be, erm, "super-easy, barely an inconvenience".

Also, now we're (first!) into the Industrial :goodjob:

are we intending gift some allies in as well (if we have any left?) to try and harvest their freebies? Or just take off and run?

After SteamPower, are we all cool with going the 'classic' science-game research route of Electricity -> RepParts (speeds up Slaves for mass-railing) -> SciMethod (start prebuilds for ToE and Hoover Dam) -> AtomTheory + Electronics (for free!) -> Industrialization, etc.?

CKS · Oct 26, 2019

I'm concerned because the Byzantines have rather a lot of power. I'd rather not fight them ourselves. However, putting our two armies south of Yaroslavl would keep them from invading by land. We could again block them by Caesarea, and raze everything to the north of there.

The research plan sounds fine, unless we are far enough ahead that saving ToE for modern techs seems feasible.

tjs282 · Oct 26, 2019

CKS said:
However, putting our two armies south of Yaroslavl would keep them from invading by land.

But, but, but ... I wanted Dora to invade by land!

If there's a land-route open, then she will use it: so by fortifying all our units near Yaroslavl', but not closing the choke completely, we know exactly where to expect (Byzzie) incursions. We can then filter her stacks into fast and slow units to some degree, use our Cannon (and later Arty)-stack to injure the fast ones, then our slow units can attack their injured while they're still stacked, and our fast units can pick off stragglers. Doing this, we should be able to chop down Dora's military power relatively efficiently.

This tactic worked really well in one of my pRNGods-games (Emp, Small 60% Archi-map: as the Koreans, vs. the Summies and Russians). Well, right up until Cathy managed to drop off a Rifle right next to my nearly unguarded capital, anyway...

tjs282 said:
Fortunately the town directly ~~east~~ west of Moscow is on a sort-of choke-point. By stacking all my obsolete units there behind Walls, and pillaging the eastern roads, I trapped the Summie Cavs before they could attack, and then killed them using bombardment (with a few Hwachas and a captured Russian Cannon) followed by Cav/ LBM/ Mace-attacks. Once the follow-up foot-units (Rifles+LBMs) appeared, that town was a much less attractive target than the un(der)defended towns behind it -- which they couldn't reach in 1T, allowing me to ping their troops as they advanced, and then use Cavs and Maces to knock them out piecemeal as they retreated.

Also fortunate, was that I got Steam as my Industrial-Age freebie, and had a spare Settler (built in anticipation of imminent Russian colonisation) to found a Coal-town on an ex-Sumerian/Russian 2-tile island just offshore of my ex-core. And I had a stack of about 18 Slaves sitting idle (retreated to Pusan when I got Steam), so once I'd rushed a Harbour there, I could get Rails to the front reasonably fast.

Here's the world at 1610AD:

I only just noticed that I made a mistake when I wrote that post, so have edited the quote accordingly :blush:

Conversely, if we close the choke completely, they come by sea, and then who knows where Dora will decide to drop her units off? In that case, to ensure that I/we can respond to unit-drops on the same turn they happen, we have to shadow their boats around our shores -- but may then suffer unexpected invasions in an unguarded area.

Not to mention that if she can't invade by land, she will build more Dromons (until she has Magnetism/Galleons, but then she also gets Frigates instead), so even if we're successfully repelling her invasions, our coastal improvements will be getting flamed/bombed...

CKS said:
We could again block them by Caesarea, and raze everything to the north of there.

Ooh, you're brutal... :lol:

CKS · Oct 26, 2019

Where did all those dromons go that I saw sailing around the north, anyway? They could be a nasty surprise, coming back.
If you want them to invade by land, you are welcome to leave the choke open. It won't be convenient to close it for a while, either. Actually, intermittently closing and opening the choke may cause the Byzantines to wander in confusion, if that isn't too much of a cheat.
Anyway, Dora can't build more dromons because she knows astronomy and has had her golden age already. (Dromons obsolete with astronomy, not magnetism.) Frigates will bomb us regardless of whether they have a land route, once they have them.

jarred! · Oct 27, 2019

The (approx. 10) dromons ended up dropping a total of 4 units at Vladivostok. As long as Lisbon is undefended, the AI should attempt to land units there, and not at our other towns.

I'm ok with either knocking the byzzies back to Yaroslavl' or continuing south, but I think it would be best to raze and replace their old towns.

tjs282 · Oct 28, 2019

Turn 6 so far, and the Russians are gone.

It would have been Turn 5, but Yakutsk flipped on the IBT before I took StPetes, and I didn't have any units immediately available to backtrack and recapture it. This was partly because I'd switched a lot of our core to building infra while we had the GA-SPT going (so there were no new Cavs coming through) -- but also partly because every damn road into Russia had been pillaged (which also made quelling captured towns more difficult, because they got no Lux-shipments). Pillaging roads that will be ours very shortly is fairly non-optimal play, IMHO -- not least because we then have to rebuild them all.

Anyway, I razed Yakutsk and have started Settling new towns in ex-Russia to fit in with our existing placement (rather than Cathy's), with the intent of eventually Slave/Settler-disbanding Novgorod (and maybe also Moscow: it has no Wonders, so we don't need to keep it).

The Russian war was over just in time, because Dromon-flaming of Yekaterinburg on the IBT after I took it (from Dora) seemed to cause a jump in WW which sent just about every one of our large towns into a riot (I signed a MAPT-deal with Germany, losing that source of WH, but we'll get it back as soon as Bismarck and Dora make peace). I got everything back under control next turn by bumping LUX% a(nother) notch, but we lost a turn on the Newtons-build -- it should have been done last turn, but will finish this IBT instead. (Almost immediately after I sold ToG to Hammi at the beginning of the set -- for MilTrad + 1050 g + 92 GPT -- several of the other AI-Civs also got it, and then started Newtons themselves).

We've suffered very few losses to the Byzzies so far (but were still rated as 'Weak' against them, last time I checked). Looking at the map, once we've drained their mil-surplus at Yaroslav, it may be worth trying to push south at least as far as Constantinople. Even if we had to call a halt to hostilities at that point, and give it back when we sign a PT, Dora would already have been forced to relocate her Palace way to the south (Heraclea, I think?) -- which would in turn reduce the flip-risks in Russia and the interchoke area.

We have Steam, and 1 Coal-source so far (near Smolensk's ruins). I'll start laying rails as Slave-gangs finish their current Forestry-ops. Economics is now also known -- do we want it (several AIs are building Smiths already as well)?

Mid-set save is below if you're interested. I'll aim to finish up tonight.

CKS · Oct 28, 2019

Great job on the Russians!

I pillaged a bunch of the roads, when victory against the Russians was not looking very close - I was making no progress, and we had Russian knights popping up in our territory. Plus, we needed to not face more muskets - knights vs muskets in cities is not so fun. I figured we had plenty of workers in the vicinity to road up again once we had the towns. Given the speed that jarred! and I were progressing through the Russians, I think this was a reasonable choice. Had we had cavalry and a cavalry army 20 turns ago, I'd probably have chosen differently.

I'm in favor of taking as much of the Byzantine lands as is easy, so keep right on going.

I'd like Economics, but only if it's cheap. Smith's would save us a bunch of money, but it isn't worth trying to build by hand.

tjs282 · Oct 29, 2019

Sorry it took a little longer than I thought: I didn't get to play yesterday after all. But here it is:

Spoiler TurnLog DR :

Handover

Here's the world as of 900 AD:

Our core infrastructure is now almost all done, and then the shield-rich towns can go (back) to building Cavs; the shield-poor (coastal) towns could build Frigates, to chase away Byzzie-boats.

Various Slave-stacks have already started railing from Greece/Russia back towards the core, but more can still be done! I mostly stopped Foresting additional tiles after we got Steam (exceptions near Argos, since that town was food-rich but shield-poor), but did not cancel any jobs still in progress. Instead, I added Slaves to the Forest-crews as they became available, to get those jobs finished quicker. Once the trees are planted, I'd suggest adding/converting those Slaves to rail-crews (6-packs to rail a flat tile in 2T), since we can get extra shields from railed mines: we can chop/plant more tiles after the GA is over, and a thin rail-net is in place.

A Settler(Russian) has just arrived in Vladivostock. It could found a town on the Floodplains 2NW of Moscow, or the coastal Forest 3SW (claims more tiles = better?). Another Settler will be 2/3 finished in StPetes this IBT (Slaves will finish chopping 1T, the remaining 10-11 shields could be rushed), and could/should found a town on the riverside-Jungle WSW of StPetes:

Spoiler Russia's glorious future :

I'm thinking that Novogorod and Rostov (and maybe Moscow) should be Settler/ Worker-disbanded. But I don't think we should start ICS-ing in Russia/Greece yet: it would be better to see how the corruption-picture looks once Novgorod is gone (and also useless Orique, and Thermopylae). As for Yaroslav... its Volcano is smoking and may erupt soon, so I removed our garrisoned Cavs + Cannon from harm's way, just in case. Unfortunately, I didn't notice the smoke before I moved the Pike+Mace into the vicinity: hope they'll survive!

As you can (sorta) see in the spoiler'd screenie, there are multiple Byzzie boat-convoys heading NW past Vladivostock et al., possibly going for Lisbon. So I left the Cav-Army stationed in Novgorod, in case of Byzzie landings. The vCavs in Lagos were just built last turn, and can head south or stay put as you choose, but it would seem seem sensible to retain a substantial fast-response force in/near the core until we know where those boats are going -- or until we have a full rail-net in place.

Ohrid just fell, and I left a couple of (Slave-grabbing) Cavs exposed south of the town: these may be attacked on the IBT. But even if they die, there are some more Cavs incoming from Russia, which can attack Rhodes and/or Smyrna over the next couple of turns (and grab all those additional Slaves!). I would keep the Cannons in former Russia until we have a fully-roaded (or better, fully railed!) route to the next chokepoint, though.

Some more good news: We are now AVERAGE vs Byzantium! I have not seen more than a couple of Byzzie units per turn (Knights and LBMs) for the past couple of turns, so it could be that they have spent their excess already (the Germans also seem to be holding their border successfully). Of course, Dora's Knights may all be on the boat-convoys. And she may also be furiously researching MilTrad right now...

Our GA ends in a couple of turns, and at that point we will need to raise LUX% (or import 1-2 more Luxes) to keep our cities happy.

I have not done much (tech-)trading since the beginning of my set, because no-one (else) had any cash for most of it -- plus we're currently still at war with half the world! Bismarck MA'd with Ozzie against us (and Ozzie recruited the Jerk), just before I signed a MAPT with Bismarck vs. Dora. So Bismarck's trade-rep is busted fer sure, and if/when he signs a PT with Dora, he'll be forced to DoW us again (free WH!).

We are second in tech behind the Babs, and also the Ottos (they both know Medicine and we cannot sell them Steam). Probably my fault: I did not see in CAII when Hammi entered the Industrial, so failed to trade him Steam for Medicine before he'd already acquired both (I think he may have got Steam himself, and then almost immediately traded for Med with Ozzie; whose tech-status was fogged for most of my set).

That said, we need Med to be able to start on SciMeth in 3T time. So we should consider making peace with Ozzie and/or gifting Wang into the Industrial, and see what he gets? If we're lucky, maybe Wang gets Med as well, which we can trade him for Steam -- or Nationalism, which we could trade to both Ozzie and Hammi...

I started building MilAcad in Emerita as a prebuild for ToE, but it would be good to get started on a prebuild for Hoovers as well. It might be worth considering to switch the current MilAcad-build to Palace (for Hoovers), and re-start MilAcad (for ToE) in e.g. Lisbon or Coimbra.

Save is below. Have fun hammering Dora some more... :queen:

CKS · Oct 29, 2019

Sounds great!
I'll continue the war with Theodora, work on railing, and see what trades we can manage. Are we okay with trading Korea and/or Germany into the industrial age? Both are up some optional techs but down some required techs, so my feeling is that they aren't backward civs and so the trade should be okay. Jarred!, what are your thoughts?

jarred! · Oct 29, 2019

Nice job with the Russians! Seems like we're faring quite well on demigod!

If they're able to give us goods for our techs, go for it.

CKS · Nov 2, 2019

The war is going well. We are about ready to attack Constantinople, which I'd raze, since it has no good wonders. We have a rail line that connects most of our empire. We learn Replaceable Parts in 2 turns and Leiria will be able to finish ToE in 16 turns or less, which will give us plenty of time to learn Scientific Method. Emerita will then be able to finish Hoover Dam shortly thereafter. We are at peace with the Ottomans - they landed a big stack that I couldn't reach.

Babylon wants to trade us Nationalism for Electricity. I'm ambivalent about this.

Note that I have not optimized working citizens since we came out of our golden age, since railed tiles are changing things, too, and I'm lazy. Sorry.

Turn Log:
Turn 0 – 900 AD
Trade magnetism and ToG to Germany for Economics + Democracy. They get medicine. Trade them to Korea for Free Artistry, 29 gpt, 3g. They get steam power. Trade steam power + free artistry to Germany for medicine.
Plan: Emerita builds Hoover, Leiria builds ToE.
Swap Evora to worker, as it can't grow.
IBT: Ottomans ask to talk, I don't. Boats travel around. Lisbon worker > cav, Guim harbor > frigate, Argos settler > library, Evora worker > cav,

Turn 1, 910 AD
Bomb Byzantine and Ottoman caravels, rail. A bunch of units are on gotos.
Collected a couple of workers. Advanced on Smyrna and Rhodes.
IBT Ottomans land a bunch of units, Ohrid flips.

Turn 2, 920 AD
Retake Ohrid. Kill the sipahi, then make peace with Ottomans. Trade wines + gpt for incense.
IBT Boats move along.

Turn 3, 930 AD
Take Rhodes and 5 workers.
IBT: 2 longbows die to cavs, boats move. Learn electricity.

Turn 4, 940 AD
Pillage Byzantine saltpeter, take Iconium.
Build Obidos.
IBT: Boats move, longbow dies to cav, promoting it to elite. Oporto market > cavalry, Vladivostok frigate > settler, Evora cav > cav, Krasnoyarsk harbor > frigate.

Turn 5, 950 AD
Kill musket at Smyrna, taking town, treb, and 2 workers. Kill 2 muskets at Trebizond, taking town and 3 workers.
IBT: boats move, Sumeria signs peace with Korea. Moscow worker > worker, Sagres frigate > frigate, Coimbra cav > cav.

Turn6, 960 AD
3 cavs retreat, 2 die at Caesaria, leaving 1 redlined musket.

IBT: Boats move, Guim frigate > frigate,Rio Janeiro cav > cav.

Turn 7, 970 AD
First cav kills musket and razes Caesaria, gaining 2 workers.Build Nazare.
IBT: St Pete settler > settler, Pharsalos cannon > cannon, Vladivostok settler > settler, Braga university > market

Turn 8, 980 AD
Kill 2 muskets, a knight on a boat, and 2 longbows destroying Naissus?
IBT Boats move, trade maps with Germans, Novgorod settler > settler, Smyrna flips taking a warrior and a pike with it, Evora cav > cav, Rhodes worker > library (to get fish).

Turn 9, 990 AD
Retake Smyrna – cav dies to pike, 2nd cav takes town. Frigates kill a caravel.
IBT: Trade maps with Babylon, Byzantines land a knight near Delphi, Lisbon cav > cav, Oporto cav > cav, Sao Mamede library > market.

Turn 10, 1000 AD
Frigate kills caravel. Raze Varna, capturing a treb and 2 workers. Advance on Constantinople.

jarred! · Nov 4, 2019

Got it, and good job!
I'll run the byzzies off the continent and continue railing!

tjs282 · Nov 7, 2019

CKS said:
Bomb Byzantine and Ottoman caravels, rail. A bunch of units are on gotos.

Sorry about that. In my solo-games, I do tend to use some of the unit-automation-options more liberally than is probably sensible, but for SGs I'm usually more careful than this about (not!) automating units — or at least, not across turnsets. I haven't looked back at my last save to check, but I hope that my lapse in this case was at least limited to Worker-stacks doing 'RailTo's in former Greece, and didn't cause you any problems otherwise?

Nonetheless, I should have posted an apology for my faux pas much earlier, when I first read your post.

@Jarred:

Any news?

CKS · Nov 7, 2019

No biggie. It turned out not to be a problem, but it did freak me out a little bit. Nobody was still moving after the first turn.

jarred! · Nov 7, 2019

Turn 0, 1000 AD:
Move around some citizens, change some builds

IBT:
lots of byz boat movements
Persians want peace, I decline
Re-up peace with babylon

Turn 1, 1010 AD:
Rio: cav>cav
Viseu: Courthouse>market
Ourique: settler>settler

Drop sci slider to 70%. We lose a per turn deal, but there aren't any trades to make, save trading away electricity.

Siege of Constainople:
Army scores a victoy
retreat a cav and lose a cav. More units can attack next turn

I sink one and bombard a few byz caravels

IBT:
Byz ships largely retreat
Hammurabi wants to renegotiate the lux trade. we give saltpeter and wines for furs, silks, world map, 21gpt and 5 gold.

Turn 2, 1020 AD:
We complete Replaceable Parts, queue up scimethod, due in 7T@70%sci. Treasury 190g@+1gpt

Moscow: worker>worker
Delphi:courthouse>market
Lagos:uni>frigate
coimbra:cav>cav
ohrid:worker>worker

Siege of Constantinople:
cavs go 5-3 with one retreat, and the army razes Constantinople!
We capture 5 workers and a cannon

IBT:
germans and byz sign a peace treaty
germans declare on us
sumerians land 3 horsemen on eretria

Turn 3, 1030 AD:
Thermopylae: Settler>courthouse
Rostov: settler>worker
Guimaraes: frigate>frigate
Evora: cav>cav

Defeat 2/3 of the sumerian invaders

war happiness allows me to put some citizens back to work around the core. Most of our army is healing at the front.

IBT:
sumerian horse defeats a fortified 5/5 cav in a town

Turn 4, 1040 AD:
Sparta: uni>harbor
Iconium: worker>worker

Defeat sumerian caravel and last horseman
Captured by worker spots 2 german muskets near . I hit them with cannons then defeat them with elites, no leaders.

IBT:
Lose a slave worker to the byzantines
Another sumerian caravel appears

Turn 5, 1050 AD:
Oporto: cav>cav
sao paulo: uni>market
Trebizond: worker>worker
Braga: market>cav
rio: cav>cav
Luanda: market>cav

Sink sumerian caravel before it can land units

defeat 2 byzantine units north of adrianople, spot german units heading north from Brusa

IBT:
defend against, and retreat from, byz LBMs
Germans send more cavs north and kill some of our cavs

Turn 6, 1060 AD:
Argos: lib>market
sagres: frigate>frigate

defeat byz LBM and musket
attack the german stack, losing an eknight, but gaining an MGL.
send the mgl to alteiros to form another army

IBT:
lose 2 cavs to german attacks
get the pentagon popup
babs finish smith's

Turn 7, 1070 AD:
Lisbon: cav>cav
Sparta: Harbor>cav
Evora: cav>cav
Badajoz: uni>cav

I can't lower sci% with sci method due next turn, so I turn the scientists to taxmen (most have already been turned to engineers)
babs learn electricity. I trade them spices for a world map, 310 gold and 36 gpt.
trade the ottomans spices for a world map, 255 gold and 18gpt

kill another 6 german units in byz territory with no losses. Then lose and eknight and vcav before defeating an emusket with a vcav.
defeat a dromon, and then lose 2 frigates to a dromon and sumerian caravel

IBT:
more germans flood north

Turn 8, 1080 AD:
learn Sci method, queue up Atomic Theory @0%sci. Treasury: 850g @+637gpt
Get an SGL! send him to Leiria and rush ToE
moscow: worker>worker
coimbra: cav>cav

cav army defeats 2 muskets and a cav at Heraclea, leaving the army red, and raze the city!
Defeat another 9 german and 1 byz units north of adrianople

IBT:
byz capture 3 cannons
byz defeat our injured cav army (oops!)
sumerians land a enkidu on thessalonica that I can't defend

Turn 9, 1090 AD:
moscow: worker>worker
Guim: frigate>cav
smyrna:worker>courthouse
Leiria: ToE>cav
rio: cav>cav
swap emerita to Hoover, due in 9T
ToE finishes and I grab Atomic theory and Electronics
Set research to Industrialization due in 7T with sci@70%. Treasury: 1455g @+63gpt

gift thessalonica to the koreans
defeat 4 more germans and 2 byz
capture our cannons back

IBT:
Sumerians land 6 units at eretria
Castelo Branco riots

Turn 10, 1100 AD:
Novgorod: settler>courthouse
oporto: cav>cav
Lagos:frigate>cav
Guarda: uni>marketplace
Braga: cav>cav
Goa: courthouse>market

trade eretria to the koreans, and defeat one of their landed units.
retreat some units in byz to heal, and move to adrianople

CKS · Nov 8, 2019

An SGL and an MGL make me very happy!

tjs282 · Nov 8, 2019

Excellent work (both)! :goodjob:

With Hoovers locked, I think this game's already pretty much won! Nothing left for the AI-Civs to do now, but wail and gnash their teeth as they inhale our ~~dust~~ rocket fumes! :thumbsup:

Haven't gottit yet, but will grab the save this evening. In the meantime, here's my thoughts/plans (TLDR in bold!

):

With both the Byzzies and Germans now having (re)declared on us, and our troops already so deeply into Byzzie territory, I don't think there's any good reason to leave Dora any holdings on the mainland (OK, maybe she can keep that crappy Tundra-island SE of Germany — for now :trouble:

).

So my set will consist of continuing (y)our punishment of the Byzzies (and repelling the Germans), and railing into Byz for instant troop-travel to the war-fronts. Now that we can put massed Cavs into play, I'd also rather not raze (m)any more Byz-towns if I can avoid it — just press on as far and fast as possible, recapturing any back-flippers with fresh troops incoming from our core. I'd aim to sweep south, then swing eastwards, while (if possible) also simultaneously trying to set up a decent defensive line/killzone along the Hills/Mountains between Byz and Germany. I probably won't have enough troops/turns during my set to start pushing into Germany itself, but in the unlikely event that I do manage to exile Dora (make peace with her at that point?), then why stop there (just when he's hating it!)?

Redundant brainfarted para deleted here (we already have RepParts!)

Since we are researching Industry (now due in 6T?), I think our core-towns should start/switch to prebuilding Factories, so that we can leverage that research as soon as possible. So I'll have look at the current (and likely future) SPT across the core, and start/switch where practical.

But what to build? Our core-towns should all either have a Uni (200s) already, or be building one! So any current Uni-build which is due to finish in 5T or less should be left alone (switching to Palace or an SWonder would likely waste a lot of shields); any Uni-build which would complete after Industry comes in, can be switched to a Factory at that point (a Hoover-boosted Factory can then build a Uni in 5-6T). That leaves us with a Bank (160s) as the most-expensive-but-non-essential-generic-building currently available, so the critical SPT cut-off for a prebuild-from-scratch is 160/6 = 26 (and a bit) SPT, and any towns getting 22–26SPT can likely start on/switch to a Bank-prebuild now. Any towns which already have enough shields in their box that they'd finish a Bank in 5T or less if they switched now, can prebuild using [Uni,] Palace (1000s yet?), MilAcad (400s) or Pentagon (400s — if we still have 3 Armies?) instead. That logic also applies to any towns already getting (or soon likely to get) >26 SPT (if we have any?).

More edits made here

But we also need Cavs/Infs/Arty to keep the wars going. So after prebuilds have all been assigned, any (other) towns getting 20-21 SPT can start/carry on building Cavs (also applies to towns getting 8-10, 12, 14, and 16-17 SPT, which all allow fairly efficient Cav-builds with minimal MM); towns making less Cav-convenient SPT-values <20 SPT, can build vInfs or Artillery (or short-rush Cavs via Workers, Explorers or Settlers).

Once Industrialization comes in, we'll only have the choice of Corporation (non-optional), Sanitation (optional, and not really useful unless we're going to start building Hospitals and disbanding intermediate core-towns) or Nationalism (optional and, apart from Policemen, utterly useless to us). So I'll start on Corp, full-bore.

I'll sell off any profitless infra* in my/our (new) conquests, and turn them over to chopping/building Slaves and Settlers out of their excess (Geeked) population, with a view to starting to ICS the western parts of Byz for beaker-farms (if feasible). Standard ICS Settlement-priorities: 0-1 FPT-tiles for preference, avoid food-bonuses where possible, prioritise freshwater sites; found at distance 3, CxxC along rivers, on lakeshores, or near 'Ducted towns, to allow those towns to reach Pop11-12 (= 5-6 Geeks); found at CxXxC along coasts to close them off quickly, then later backfill to CxCxC, as the intermediate 'X-tiles' get planted/chopped (where still possible).

Spoiler * :

Conquests will be Worker/Settler-shrunk down as far as possible, but I would certainly prefer that there are less than 50% foreign citz at most (still) in residence when I/we let the town start regrowing, so that we end up with more native than foreign citz at maxPop (i.e. potential Pop11-12-ers should be reduced 5 or fewer foreigners, Pop5-6-ers should have no more than 2 foreign). Minimally productive Greek and Russian conquests (back) at maxPop can build Settlers/Workers as well (if they're not already doing that), to get the farms founded, the farmlands railed+irrigated, and up to maxPop ASAP. Once that's done, I'll use Cav/Cannon-disbands initially, and/or CivEngs, to get any needed** farm-infra (re)built quickly, then Geek everyone.

Spoiler ** :

CKS · Nov 9, 2019

Sounds like a good plan.
If we want nationalism (for drafting, more than police officers, as we can draft when we stop growing to get a bunch of free shields when we disband the unit), we can probably still trade for it.
I don't generally build hospitals, for two reasons. First is that my size 12 cities can easily build the spaceship parts quickly enough that research is the limiting factor in when I launch. Second is that cities growing past 12 cause more annoying pollution.

tjs282 · Nov 10, 2019

Hi folks,

I'm done with my turns, but it's late, I have to work tomorrow, so I'll prep and post turnlog, screenies, handoff and 1200 AD save tomorrow evening, OK?

TLDR:

We have a complete rail-link all the way to our current borders, and our core is now almost completely railed (I irrigated some BGrasses near the Mountain-towns to allow our miners full employment: Making Portugal Great[er] Again!). Our Slaves have already moved into ex-Greece neatly stacked in 6-packs to continue expanding the rails+mines outwards as far as it's worth doing. We also already have several Hoover-boosted Factories taking advantage of the extra shields, with several more due to come online in the next couple of turns (and we have the cash to rush some of those if we want to).

But because I was (pre)building those Factories throughout our core for most of my set, I haven't had nearly as many Cavs to play with as I would have needed to advance, so I haven't made as much progress in the wars as I'd hoped. Though our borders have expanded somewhat, it's been touchy work fighting on 2 fronts (and WW is also becoming an issue, I assume from both hot wars).

I've also lost several Infs (mostly upgrades) and some Cannon to back-flips, most damagingly in Amorim (which I probably should have just razed on capture, but I was hoping to get more Slaves out of it than razing would have given us). Adrianople has flipped twice during my set, but it has Leos, so I didn't/don't want to raze it; this problem should ease off a little once we've got it surrounded by some farm-towns (combat-Settlers are already in place).

Although Dora can now throw the occasional Cav at us (I don't know who she's buying Horses from, nor how she can even afford them, but some Embargos may be in order), the Byzzies do now seem pretty much gassed, and her remaining towns (including her Cap) are vulnerable -- or will be very shortly. Once we have a goodly stack of Cavs available, Amorim should fall to us again quickly, and we can get to Chalcedon easily from there (so long as the Germans don't interfere).

The flow of German units has been pretty much constant (their Cavs have caused me some headaches, though not as many losses as I feared), and their core still remains almost completely intact (may be worth buying in the Babs and/or the Ottos, to give Bismarck a pain in his rear-echelons).

Nighty-night :sleep:

JAR03: Portugal, DG, Space Race

Deity

Stone \ Cold / Fish

Deity

Stone \ Cold / Fish

Deity

King

Stone \ Cold / Fish

Attachments

Deity

Stone \ Cold / Fish

Attachments

Deity

King

Deity

Attachments

King

Stone \ Cold / Fish

Deity

King

Attachments

Deity

Stone \ Cold / Fish

Deity

Stone \ Cold / Fish

Similar threads