LK154 - CCM - Bablyon

[Northern Pike]

 

[darski]

good going on the war. Always like to see Russia get what they deserve.

 

[tjs282]

NP: Thanks for your considered and polite response. I figured it was something to do with the limited Settlers and Workers, but you've clarified greatly.

And I also agree with Darski's sentiments regarding the kicking you've inflicted on Cathy

So who's next on the bootlist? Ragnar?

 

[Northern Pike]

So who's next on the bootlist? Ragnar?

Almost certainly. That's where our forces will be at the end of the Russian campaign, and the Chinese are still a bad enemy due to the Great Wall.

 

[LKendter]

475 AD (0)
I get quickly reminded how large the CCM maps are. The game is already slow to load.

We have too many mines by Ellipi. To eventually get those hills online is going to require a lot of irrigation.
Assur needs irrigation to the cow.
I cancel the mining actions to switch to irrigation.

I wake up a chariot, and kill a spear by Cathyon. (1-0)
We are way short on stack protection, so I start pushing more warriors.
(IT) A chariot killed our warrior. (1-1)


500 AD (1)
A decent stack shows up by Smolensk.
Catapult sucks, and dies to spear. (1-2)
Sword kills spear, and is now elite. (2-2)
Sword kills spear. (3-2)
Horse kills spear. (4-2)
Enslaver barely kills archer. (5-2)
Catapult kills catapult. (6-2)
Bowman kills warrior. (7-2)
Catapult kills archer. (8-2)
I don't understand why the catapult has zero movement left. It was a 2 movement unit, and should have had a point left to return to the city.

By Cathyon a chariot kills a chariot. (9-2)
Horseman dies to a spear. (9-3)
Chariot barely kills the same super spear. (10-3)
(IT) The great iron mine is completed.
We lost a warrior to an archer. (10-4)

 

[LKendter]

525 AD (2)
I took a nap.


550 AD (3)
I established an embassy with Scandinavia, and they are not are war with Russia. I would love to know why all their troops are moving that way.
The stack toward one Russian city has crossed into their borders.
The other stack is waiting for road damage to be repaired.
(IT) We get a free embassy from Canada.
We suffer a riot in Uruk due to a propaganda campaign.


575 AD (4)
The golden mosque is rushed.

Samara is founded at the fur / deer site.

The second stack starts to cross Russian borders.

Chariot kills an annoying spear by Cathyon. (11-4)

Enslaver kills an annoying chariot by our borders gaining a worker. (12-4)

Sword kills a spear by Smolensk. (13-4)
Enslaver kills an archer. (14-4)
Sword kills a spear by Smolensk. (15-4)
Bowman kills archer by Smolensk. (16-4)
Enslaver dies to a warrior. (16-5)
Enslaver kills an archer. (17-5)
There is another small stack, but I don't have enough units left to deal with that one.

I dial up Mongolia, and get monarchy, $93 and $2/turn from religion.

 

[LKendter]

We are at an ugly decision point. We could NOT get republic.
Russia is willing to give it to us in a peace treaty. However, that opens another set of problems. We are in pure war footing dying from troop cost. We are next to one city, crossing a border to second, and Yakutsk is suddenly Russian again. Getting republic will kill our expansion. We couldn't even think about Scandinavia without Yakutsk in our hands, and you know the AI won't give up resource city easily.

The earliest I can play again is Sunday. After we decide as a team on a plan, we can either have JJ pick up this weekend, or wait for me on Sunday.
My vote is to continue attacking Russia. As painful as tech behind is, Civ is a game about empire size. Those cities will take a while to get useful with all the plains, but it is still more cities.

ROSTER:

LKendter
Greebley (computer issues)
Jersey Joe (up)
Elephantium (on deck)
Northern Pike

 

[Elephantium]

Keep at it When Russia is down to her last city, then we can think about letting her buy peace with Republic. Until then, we're winning - no need to call off the assault.

 

[Northern Pike]

Our being unable to trade for Republic--normally the easiest part of the triple bottleneck--is terrible luck. I'll have comments in an hour or so.

Catapults are road-bound fast units, and lose all their movement as soon as they move off roads.

I agree with you about catapult suckiness. I've played a lot of CCM by now, and they just do not seem to win and survive as much as attack-factor-four units with enhanced retreat should. I'm going to try minimizing the catapult attacks I make while reserving them for defensive fire, in which role they're excellent.

 

[LKendter]

FYI - I am NOT revolting to monarchy. I think we would go into negative cash flow. We need towns generating more income before we can think about that govt.

 

[Northern Pike]

We can buy Republic from the Aztecs as long as we include our horses in the deal, along with 889 gold and 49 gpt, after we temporarily set the sliders to 10-0-0. Losing the use of our horses for twenty turns shouldn't be too painful, when we're fighting a beaten enemy and we have plenty of autoproduced fast units.* Obviously the financial position will become delicate after we return to 7-0-3, at around -20 gpt with 116 gold in the treasury, but I think we'll have various resources to get through the twenty turns: every Russian city we take will reduce our deficit by 8 gpt**; we can hook up our new furs at Samarra and soon the phants at Yakutsk and sell them for whatever they fetch; we can stop most unit production and put cities on wealth (not as weird a choice in CCM as in C3C); and so forth. So I'm confident we can manage the situation and I think we should make the trade.

*As long as we use them carefully and let swordsmen take most of the risks.

**So just by taking Vladivostok, as we're about to do, and Yakutsk, which is close, we'll be almost out of the red.

This plan will require us to be careful about our source of horses at Akkad, which is still close to the front.

Given this, I of course agree with LK and Tusker that we should carry on against the Russians until complete victory. The tech position may be terrible, but as long as we're grinding our neighbours beneath our iron heel, we're winning.

LK, yes, I agree that we wouldn't be revolting immediately, or possibly for some time.

 

[Northern Pike]

Civinator, looking ahead a little, it appears that it's going to be hard for us to start our Golden Age, because industrious is one of our qualities and there are very few industrious Wonders. Will capturing the Great Wall and then triggering it with a self-built Wonder satisfy our industrious requirement, or would that not work because the Great Wall is Chinese-only?

 

[Jersey Joe]

I am not sure how CMM compares to C3C, so I do not know the risk reward involved. What about stealing Republic from the Vikings? If we are out the gold whether or not the steal is successful, then forget I mentioned it.

Second question about CMM mechanics. What about demanding Republic from someone like Nubia whose army is weak compared to ours?

Another alternative (though a bad one in my opinion) is to get peace + 3 cities from Russia (Vladivostok, Yakutsk, and Rostov). Then trade with Russia for Republic (Russia needs both Religion and Monarchy). Big downside is Moscow, St Pete and Novograd have 20 turns to rebuild the Russian Army. Better to capture those cities now.

 

[Jersey Joe]

We can buy Republic from the Aztecs as long as we include our horses in the deal, along with 889 gold and 49 gpt, after we temporarily set the sliders to 10-0-0. <snip>

If we include furs we can buy it for 883 gold, 36gpt, horses and furs. The fur at our new city can be hooked up in 4 turns.

We that is if the workers on the road between Assur and Babylon are available.

 

[Northern Pike]

We would lose the gold if the steal attempt failed. Also, this would be a bad time to get distracted by a war with the Vikings, when we have the Russians at our mercy.

The idea of just demanding Republic from a weakling is very interesting. I suspect they would neither declare war nor give us the tech, but I'd be glad to hear what others think.

Yes, this is no time for peace with Russia.

Better still, we can make the deal just giving the Aztecs furs, not including our horses, and then hook up our second furs as quickly as possible. This way we can start building two-turn ancient cav in Babylon.

 

[LKendter]

@Jersey Joe - I saw a post, but no got it. Are you planning to pick this up, or are you waiting for me to get back on it Sunday?

Russia is already decided -

 

[Civinator]

I don't understand why the catapult has zero movement left. It was a 2 movement unit, and should have had a point left to return to the city.)

In addition to Northern Pike´s explanation: All artillery units in CCM have a movement of 2, but a movement penalty on each terrain as if they would climb a mountain. Therefore when moving into any terrain without roads they will go only into the next tile. The sense of this setting is, that the high attack should allow these units to "soften up" defenders, that normally only have 1 MV-point. So if the artillery units are tending to lose the combat, they have a chance to retreat from combat as they are 2-MV units. You can read more about it in the CCM civilopedia. The catapults are better attackers than swordsmen, so your unluckyness in some combats here lets you get a wrong opinion.

Civinator, looking ahead a little, it appears that it's going to be hard for us to start our Golden Age, because industrious is one of our qualities and there are very few industrious Wonders. Will capturing the Great Wall and then triggering it with a self-built Wonder satisfy our industrious requirement, or would that not work because the Great Wall is Chinese-only?

I´m looking here frequently to see how you and the AI are performing and may be to improve the gameplay of CCM. Your question shows, that I have to improve the civilopedia of CCM about the concept of Golden Age as it gives no advice about conquered GWs. As far as I remember, the traits of conquered GWs count for achieving a Golden Age. It doesn´t matter that only one civ can build the conquered GW when you actually posses that GW and (may be) other needed GWs in the same turn.

Don´t forget, that all civs in CCM also have the religious trait (so they simply can switch governments in 2 turns) and therefore you need a GW with the trait "religious", too (what you are still possessing with the GW "Worldreligion Islam").

 

[Northern Pike]

That's good to know. So we're actually very lucky to be so close to the Chinese, and since commercial Wonders are far commoner than industrious, we should be able to trigger our GA before it's too late to matter. Thanks for your quick and full reply.

 

[Northern Pike]

Still on the subject of triggering our Golden Age, the relatively near Dutch have built the Colossus, which is commercial, so putting ourselves in a position where any Wonder we're able to build ourselves will start our GA should be simple.

OTOH, the Canadians are probably going to beat us to Dome of the Rock, which ought to be our property as the most advanced Muslim civ. They've already completed Hagia Sophia, so they've got Islamic communities and were able to build the prerequisite mosque in Toronto.

 

[Jersey Joe]

@Jersey Joe - I saw a post, but no got it. Are you planning to pick this up, or are you waiting for me to get back on it Sunday?

Russia is already decided -

This is my offical got it.