MB4 - GOTM24 Redux [civ3] Roster A

[cracker]

Except for the little matter of several waves of historic intervention and a 1950's police action, it is not that unlikely that the Han or Sung would have totally controlled the Korean Peninsula just as you now find it. The Japanese invasions of Korea and Manchuria were not too unlike your current challenge.

Notice also that your "orange route" is very Inchon-esque by design.

 

[Karasu]

Nice to see you popping up from time to time, Cracker.
BTW, I think that the success of your GOTMs -even replayed as SG- speaks by itself...

Alan, I heartily agree with your points on taxmen vs. wealth. I'll keep that in mind for the future.

But why is it all so quiet today?

 

[AlanH]

Originally posted by Karasu
Nice to see you popping up from time to time, Cracker.
BTW, I think that the success of your GOTMs -even replayed as SG- speaks by itself...

Well said!

But why is it all so quiet today?

'Cos Bugsy is at church, and I posted way more than my ration yesterday . But I'm sure I can think of some more to say if you like

 

[Karasu]

Well, I did too
But I am enjoying an uncommonly quite weekend, so I let the enthusiasm get the best of me...

Maybe we had better wait for someone else to post, or we'll turn this thread into a private conversation

 

[smackster]

I'm listening, And playing GOTM 27, which is another great cracker GOTM, no spoilers here however. Of course in that game I have the Governor turned on and all workers automated, there comes a time in these games when I just don't want to spend the time hand crafting them anymore.

Smackster

 

[Sir Bugsy]

Pre-flight 1500 AD – There still is a spot in former Baejke lands where we could wedge in a city. We have two settlers, but they’re up in Shimazu lands. Oh, what I would give for one of those settlers I ferried over to the Beachhead during my last set of turns.

Smackster has done a fine job managing our cities. After an hour of MM’ing I manage to squeeze an extra 6 gpt out of our cities, by using smacksters technique of hiring tax collectors.

So after two hours of study, let’s see if we can get one turn in before sleep.

IBT – Shimazu wants to extend our peace treaty. Sure, but we’re illiterate and have never been able to figure out what a peace treaty has ever said. It will probably take us at least another 20 turns until our first marines roll off the assembly line.

Han wants one too. OK, but don’t say I didn’t warn you.

1. 1505 AD – I’ve been workin’ on the railroad. Load a settler and some defense and start to sail across to found a second beachhead city.

2. 1510 AD – We’ve now got enough surplus that I bump science up to get Combustion in 5. Han still doesn’t have steel. Maybe we’ll be lucky and they’ll go for espionage instead of steel. Actually it is kind of fun searching out the tile or two in a city that hasn’t been improved, or finding a tile to improve that will put a city at a nice number like 40 or 50 spt.

IBT – Battlefield Med comes in.

3. 1515 AD – Found Baejke Beachhead just about where Korean Beachhead used to be.

IBT – Income doubles from +26 to +52 as a bunch of banks and exchanges are completed. The people add some little section to the palace. If you people really loved me, you bring me Mao’s head on a platter.

4. 1520 AD – Ferried an empty army over to the Beachhead and built an infantry army.

IBT – Han build Shakespeake’s in Kaesong. Hey Mao, did we mention that we hate the theatre.
Income jumps another 20G as more banks complete.

5. 1525 AD – Getting a bunch of cities producing a lot of shields in nice multiples. We now have the FP city at exactly 50 shields. Drop science down 10%. We’ll have income of 194G next turn. Just realized that the Han leader isn’t Mao Well, hey you whatever your name is, we don’t like you!! And you’re a dope too!!

Because I think we can afford it, I upgrade two cannons.

6. 1530 AD – More tweaking.

IBT – Combustion comes in . Select Mass Production in 5 turns at -57gpt.

7. 1535 AD – Continue the smacksterification of our corrupt cities. Reduce our deficit to -19 gpt. Han still do not have steel. So we are up two techs on them. We should have a very good window of opportunity to launch our invasion. Since I got the deficit down I feel we can afford the upgrade of two Kublai to transports.

IBT – We get the Pentagon message. I start it in Azuchi.

8. 1540 AD – Get our income up to +28gpt Upgrade a few more cannon.

9. 1545 AD – The Han have researched the Radio. Upgrade two more transports. I am sending these early transports to Utsunoiya for the pillaging task force. We now have 260 tax collectors.

10. 1550 AD – Science gets knocked back 10%. MP in 2.

Score - 5768

After Action Report – Setting up a staging point at Utsunoiya and at Baejke Beachhead.
I’ve started chopping a couple of forest for the shields.

We’re 136 tiles from domination.

Tech-wise we are two ahead of the Han on the way to Motor Transport. Our income and science infrastructure should allow us to get MT in 5 with something left over. I had forgotten that cracker made the best science rate 5 turns, so we can’t get much faster than that. Once we get MT, we should be able to crank out some tanks. I’d estimate that we will be ready for war late in karasu’s turns. Good luck Alan.

Bugs.
>>SAVE - 1550 AD <<

Here's a plain text address: http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads6/MB4A-1550_AD.zip

 

[Sir Bugsy]

I wish I had come back here last night before completing my turns.


@ cracker, thanks for the screen shot and explanation. I think the only thing that is missing is Hokkaido. Your tilting the map makes it very obvious. I agree with the Inchon comparision, I just hope we don’t run into a Chosan situation.

Most of our cities are now maxed out on population unless we build aqueducts or hospitals.

I was also studying Han territories at pillaging routes and once again, I feel Alan read my mind. I was thinking that we could use naval aviation (carrier based bombers) and or naval bombardment to take care of some of the coastal disconnects.

Let’s not turn off research until we have Flight and Amphibious Assualt

 

[Sir Bugsy]

@ Alan if you want to rename our beachhead town - Han Beachhead i won't offended

 

[Sir Bugsy]

Oh, another BTW - I forgot to short rush. Mostly because we didn't have a lot of cash. But we have several cities that are producing 40, 50, or 60 spt. Depending on what you are building, they can be effectively short rushed.

 

[Karasu]

Hhhhmmm.... I can smell the end zone...

It will not be that easy, though... We still have to manage the large invasion force (a lot of units), and balance that with the needs of the ongoing research in a shaky Democracy -room for lots of fascinating discussions!

 

[AlanH]

Karasu On deck
Smackster
Sir Bugsy Off duty
AlanH UP

Firaxis score at 1550 AD = 5768

Nice work, Sir Bugsy. Let's see what kind of a mess I can get us into this time. What the heck! Karasu enjoys a challenge!

This is not a Got It yet. I might download it before retiring for the night, but I'll probably not tempt fate by trying to get started within 15 minutes of midnight

 

[AlanH]

OK, I've GOT IT. I'll have a good look around. First priority is to work out how to max out the economy:

1. Production:
We have a number of core cities that are maxed out either because they need Aqueducts or Hopitals, or because they are using all their tiles. I'll look at when we can upgrade them and join workers. Also, cities with only temple and market + 6 lux for happiness can get to 14 productive citizens without lux tax. Above that they produce entertainers or 1 gpt per citizen from taxman, so they need cathedrals to get to higher productivity. With a catheral we can get to pop 20 with zero lux. That's six more producing citizens per city for a maintenance cost of 2 gpt and shield cost of 80.

Some highly corrupt cities are producing 1 gpt wealth instead of 1 spt. 1 spt is worth 4 gpt in rush costs, so we should be producing the shields if we think we are going to need low cost units like explorers, settlers, kamikaze or workers. It may hurt our immediate gpt but it saves in the medium term. We need high gold efficiency when we get to the big production push in about 8 turns time.

2. Research:
We have 2 more turns to Mass Production. After that we at least need Motorised Transport and Flight - maybe ten more turns with a high science slider. We possibly need Amphibious Warfare as well, depending on what Kamikaze's turn out to be capable of, but we can probably research that while we are producing our tanks and defeating the Han, so it can proceed at a relatively low research rate.

We have several high-beaker cities that don't have universities, but is a university cost effective at this stage? Example: Hamamatsu has no university. If we change its production from an Army now it will take 2 more turns and then be useful for 8 turns. During those 8 turns it will produce an extra 13 beakers per turn, a total of 104 beakers. It will have cost 200 shields. As this is probably the most favorable example we have I judge it's now too late to build any more universities, so I'll switch any in build now to other projects.

3. Military Build Up:
I'm not too worried about producing land units right now, as we really need lots of tanks that we can't build yet, and infrastructure is vital. We also need to get our treasury up to 1000 gold coins to get the full benefit from Wall Street. I think we should probably avoid rushing or upgrading until we turn off research and get into the big production push.

We have 91 cannon, upgrade cost 3640 gold, and 19 muskets, upgrade cost 570 gold. We also have 17 Infantry, 7 Artillery and 37 cavalry. So before we start building tanks we already have well over 100 units that we may need to ship into Han territory.

We have 4 Transports plus 19 Kublai. After upgrades (cost = 760 gold) each ship can take 8 units. Using these ships a single assault can be launched with up to 200 units. Alternatively we can set up relays and get about 30 units per turn from mainland to mainland. Question: Do we need more Transports?

We have 9 frigates and 3 ironclads for escort or bombardment. I don't think that's enough, and we should probably start producing Battleships as well as Carriers when we have Mass Production.

Our military build capacity in the core is approximately 8-10 units per turn depending on mix. With short rushing a la Cracker we may be able to increase that by 10% to 20% once we switch off research, though I'm not sure what repeated short rushing does to happiness - we'll need those Cathedrals and maybe some lux tax.

Question on short rushing:
If you have a city producing 60 shields per turn then it is probably better to short rush the first 20/30/40 shields for an Artillery/Infantry/Tank in one turn than to take two turns and waste 40/30/20 shields. If you short rush using a single unit it costs 8 gold/shield i.e. 160/240/320 gold respectively. I assume the trick is to short rush 10 shields with a worker first for 80 gold, then short rush the balance with the appropriate unit at 4 gold per shield? If that works, then the cost reduces to 120/160/200 gold.

 

[Sir Bugsy]

Very good evaluation Alan. Hamamatsu is a good example of a city needing a cathedral. It is at pop 15 and is carrying a tax collector to stay happy. I didn't feel that a cathedral was the best use of shields yet, so I stuck with building armies there.

I think we will eventually need Amphibious Assault. Even if the Kamikazi has lethal attack, it probably won't survive to capture a city. You will still need one marine to waltz into an undefended city. Although we can probably research that at a much slower pace.

The next round of turns from the four of us will be very interesting.

Bugs

 

[Karasu]

I am really looking forward to the final chapter in Han history...

Yes, I think it is good to revert some cities from wealth to (just as an example) Explorers, to build while we wait for MT and possibly rush later on.
I would consider slowing down a bit the tech pace right after MT, or maybe spending one or two turns at max tax while researching Flight -we will need cash at that point.

I wouldn't build more Transports. Setting up relays seems a good idea, allowing for a shorter turnaround between the pillaging group and the first assault. I would start prebuilding for Battleships (or Destroyers) -I haven't seen many Han naval units around, so we might not need too many.

I agree that it is probably too late now for more Universities. Cathedrals? I don't know -besides, I don't know whether we will be able to stay in Democracy or not once we start the Big War.

Ops. Need to go back to work...

 

[AlanH]

Originally posted by Sir Bugsy
I think we will eventually need Amphibious Assault. Even if the Kamikazi has lethal attack, it probably won't survive to capture a city. You will still need one marine to waltz into an undefended city. Although we can probably research that at a much slower pace.

You're right. The Kamikaze will undoubtedly self-destruct on impact, but I had forgotten that even wiping out their defenders still leaves the city to be taken. Kamikaze's can't destroy the city itself I guess, so capture will only be possible with marines.

 

[Karasu]

Alan? Everything ok?
Not putting pressure, of course -just a gentle nudge, as Space would say... but you knid of spoiled me last weekend with our super-activity in the forum... Besides, I am eager to start SG GOTM25!

Let's wipe the Han

 

[Sir Bugsy]

Originally posted by Karasu
... Besides, I am eager to start SG GOTM25!

That would be cool. Maybe Gotm 26 would be better given how long this is taking.

 

[smackster]

I'll be up for GOTM 25 even though it did take me 79 hours of play time to finish.

 

[AlanH]

Sorry for the silence. It wasn't an exciting set of turns, but very time consuming.

Here's the Save

Prefilight
Major review of the economy and the state of our cities. I decided there was nowhere left where a University made any sense, given that we'll probably turn down research by the time any of them could make a difference. I decided to focus on getting maximum population and production in our core cities, with banks and stock exchanges everywhere that made sense, adn some courthouses. It also seemed like a good idea to fill in some rali gaps in old Shimazu, and to put a few more defenders in there just in case the Han decided to do anything rash.

I checked out the culture flip formula and discovered that if you have no foreigners and no citizens working tiles in the AI's 21 tile radius then flip probablility is zero. So I made sure this was the case in our key locations, like Baekje Beachhead.

I also decided to close down Ogake to give the other cities in our old core a bit more breathing space.

IBT
Hangchow (Han) expands. WuTi complains about our lurking troops. We agree to back off ... for now.
Buildings complete, and Wall Street is finished. We need to get our treasury up to 1000 gold to get hte maximum interest of 50 gpt, so no upgrades or rushes for a few turns.

Turn 1. 1555 AD
Slider to 4.6.0. Mass production next turn, 304 gpt
Han still doesn't have Steel.
I decide to break my rule about no rushes, and rush a temple in Baekje Beachhead to try to ensure a clear path to the sea. 88 gold.

IBT
More units and buildings complete. We can build Ports of Entry, but looking around we have only a couple of cities on the coast that are not totally corrupt. Hmmm, a possible problem for naval production!
Mass Production complete. Start Motor Transport.

Turn 2. 1560 AD
Diplo - no change.
Slider 2.8.0 for MT in 5 turns at 56 gpt.

IBT
Skome Stovck Exchanges complete.

Turn 3. 1565 AD
Slider to 3.7.0 for MT in 4 turns, with the extra income at 183 gpt.
Shipped some units to Beachhead.

IBT
Units and building complete, and some cities are set to Coal Plant as Tank prebuilds.

Turn 4. 1570 AD
Han now has Steel.
Sell Wmap to Shimazu for 36 gold. Swap Wmap with Han to keep up to date on his rail network, which seem pretty comprehensive.
Shimoda to pop 19. Set to Courthouse, as I think that will get it to 100 spt at pop 20. Max out pop in some other cities, joining our own workers. This increases our revenue and reduces our unit costs.

IBT
Hamamatsu completes an Army. Start Cathedral so I can increase its pop.
Azuchi completes Pentagon.

Turn 5. 1575 AD
We are now at 1000+ so upgrades can start. 4 Cannon Kublai first for 160.
Clear 2 pollution. Shimoda gets to pop 20 and 100 spt - one tank per turn. Slider 4.6.0 for 378 gpt. MT in 2 turns. More tank pre-builds start. Lots of rearrangement of mines and irrigation, and a lot of new work on mountains.
Han still needs Combustion.

IBT
Palace extends. More completions. Han excercises his fleet and his horses.

Turn 6. 1580 AD
More Kublai upgrades.
Slider still at 4.6.0, 392 gpt.
Han still need Combustion. Do another Wmap swap.

IBT
Han culture expands and he complains. This time it's an auto eject.
Motor Transport completes. Start Flight. Now where are those tanks?

Turn 7. 1585 AD
Sell off the assets in Ogake for 99 gold and shut up shop - it even had a Barracks! Can't see the Aqueduct, though.
Upgrade some muskets in Shazu-land, and some cannons. Move some of the big stack there to the smaller island and some to the mainland, as it seems disproportionate. Move 4 Infantry to Shimazu-land to beef up the city defences.
Han still doesn't have Combustion.
Slider 2.8.0. Flight in 6 turns, 78 gpt. Rush a Barracks in Baekje Beachhead to help with healing when the time comes.

IBT
7 tanks roll off the production lines. [dance]

Turn 8. 1590 AD
Upgrade more cannons. Han still doesn't know Combustion. Slider 3.7.0 Flight in 5 turns at 228 gpt.

IBT
Han offers Enlightenment for Combustion. Up yours, Wu Ti!

Turn 9. 1595 AD
Han has combustion, so I guess he wanted to turn the research slider to zero for a turn?
Hamamatsu reaches pop 20 and produces over 90 spt. We can short rush a worker each turn for 80 gold and get a tank each turn.

IBT
Palace gets some fancy plinths out front. I knew that "some day my plinths would come"

Turn 10. 1600 AD
Tidied up some pollution and carried on business as usual.

Situation Report
Karasu will have to make the call on when we go to war. I think it will be easy to get Han to declare at the start of our turn, as he's always trespassing, so we probably only need to ask him to get out or declare. That way we get some war happiness for a few turns, delaying the time when we have to switch to Monarchy.

We are turning out about 6 or 7 tanks per turn currently. We have a lot of corrupt cities with shields accumulated, including some forest chops. These can be used to rush some cheaper units when needed - Explorers, Kamikaze, settlers etc. I haven't built many to speak of yet, as I figured they can be rushed on demand.

We are not in a good position to make ships. Our coastal cities are mostly corrupt. I did wonder at one point whether to jump the Palace nearer the west coast - Hamamatsu is an obvious choice, but it would take 10 turns or more. One or two carrier groups would be able to provide additional bombardment, but it will take time to build them, so perhaps we should rely on rebasing bombers to captured cities as we go.

I've adjusted the positions of the ships on our two invasion routes, and I'll edit in a screenshot real soon now to show the current dispositions of our invasion forces, with suggested transport movements.

Edit: Whoops: Firaxis Score at 1600 AD = 6119

As promised, here's a screenshot showing our troops at the two invasion points. The southern invaders are still at the embarkation port, the northern group are assempled in Baikje Beachhead on the Han's continent.

Click the image for a full size version in another window.

 

[Sir Bugsy]

I'm feeling dumb about my choice of Palce jump. If I'd listened to Alan about a thousand years ago, and settle Hamamatsu, we'd have some Naval production right now.

Sounds like Karasu just need to complete the set up and pull the trigger himslef or have smackster pull it.

Alan - Madbax is going to ask for the score. Some sound decision making.