MRG's Random Game of Randomness

[tjs282]

It's MRG next, not me.

Yeah, sorry, realised that later...

The cities currently building military units will make catapults after finishing said unit.

It's usually a bad idea to spend Barracks-towns' shields on Cats(/Trebs) instead of vet-units, and any Cats you complete now will be too far away to help with Chongfu (though yes, you will definitely need some when you're ready to go after Chonju).

Wang clearly hasn't built (m)any Barracks himself. Nearly every unit I saw out of Korea on my set was a reg (except the ones I promoted ), so building vet-units off the bat will help reduce our losses.

And we do need to keep those vArchers flowing to the front. Even with the 3 Spears and 3 Cats you have, you are likely going to take some Archer-losses against Chongfu. After you take the town, you are going to have to leave some units behind (1-2 Spears, 4-5 Archers, stationed on the Hills NE?) to guard it against attacks — and flips?— so you may/will need to replace (most/all) those units before attacking Chonju, which itself is going to be a much tougher nut (also on a Hill, but Pop8 and likely fully roaded to its neighbours).

Regarding Spears, I was building new ones only when it was clear that I was going to lose one (or, it had already happened ), but now that we have seen (at least one) landing in our core, putting out 5-6 Archers per Spear (and garrisoning every second coastal town with a vSpear, so that they can reinforce each other?) might be reasonable.

Until it can take over some more shields (from Daland?), Alma's still only getting 5 SPT, so it could do 4T-Spears, while our other Barracks-town should continue to pump 2T-Archers.

Erdenet is set to build a catapult, but has only one shield to work with! 16 turns for a catapult is too slow. Going to send a few workers to road/mine the mountains and desert.

Don't mine the Desert, irrigate it! Erdenet needs all the FPT it can get!

And low SPT should not prevent any town from building Cats, because at only 20s, they can also be rushed relatively cheaply (1s in the box = 76g to complete).

So Daland could (also) do Cats once its Lib is finished. For that matter, Mandal should be able to knock out 2T-Cats when the FP is done: we haven't got a Barracks there yet, either...

Barun-urt is building barracks, but I think switching to catapult would be more beneficial. No shields will be lost with the switch and with a little bit of worker help we can have it make a few more cats.

Strong disagree.

Sure, Baruun's SPT is still low, but that's because it was only founded recently. It is 2nd-ring to KK, and (will be) 1st-ring to the FP (not that that makes a huge difference), and can get to Pop7 without a Duct, so productivity will ramp up fairly quickly (and far quicker than Tsets; see below), especially if we join redundant Workers to it (not that this is recommended before Pop6, but still...).

Tsetserleg is building a worker. I think building another and working on the hills so it could pop out faster military units is necessary here.

I'd recommend building/rushing Cats in Tsets, rather than Baruun.

If you insist on building military units in Tstets, put a Barracks in first (= 20s for us, so you could put a few shields in, and then rush it).

Ereen set to build settler, but in 26 turns! It's too corrupt right now to do anything short of workers.

Ereen has a Fish (and potential access to 2 more, IIRC), but none of our other southern Craptowns have "Food-bonuses" apart from irrigated Grass — which gives 1 less commerce than a Coast tile, making the LUX%-cut of a town's income (even) less effective at Pop3.

So Ereen's building a Settler for the Tundra (beyond additional unit-support, Settling this area is not a major priority, so it doesn't really matter if the Settler-build happens at 1SPT; if you want it sooner, Ereen also has nearby Forest which could be chopped to help it along), while all the others build Workers.

Hovd is also going to be Settler-disbanded at some point (once Batsh has built its Lib and popped our borders over those 2x2 Grass tiles?)

Batshireet - continue building library.

Or rush it? @Lanzelot?

Whatever happens with the LBM stack in the interturn,

Now that Taegwon is "safe" (for the moment, har-har!) I think Wang might just ignore our stack, and head for Tsets by the shortest route, i.e. 1S.

If he does, you'll be laughing as your v+eArchers murder those LBMs

Speaking of which, something I should have asked about before I began my set. If MRG is luckier than I was, what should he do with our first MGL?

Finish the FP immediately, or build an Army? If an Army, fill it with (e*)Archers gradually (it will likely be a while before Invention/LBMs), or fill it with vSpears now?

(I think in our current situation, I'd actually prefer a Spear-Army(s): 12HP and effective D=3, plus, if we're using it to cover a 1-move Cat+Archer-stack anyway, it would be able to [pillage and] move and then [pillage and] fortify on the same turn)

 

[Spoonwood]

Finish the FP immediately, or build an Army? If an Army, fill it with (e*)Archers gradually (it will likely be a while before Invention/LBMs), or fill it with vSpears now?

If you stay in the war with Korea for a while, you'll probably want a spear army to protect advancing units (not sure if such would work once cavalry or guerillas show up). An archer army, or longbow army might also be desireable if muskets show up.

If you don't stay in the war with Korea for a while, you'll want to have a better position later. Having the Heroic Epic completed and the Military Academy can help with that. But, for both of those, you need a victorious army.

You can build the FP later, but any MGL that goes to a building means that you have to wait until you can luck out on another army or until you can finish an army via a city with the military academy.

So, I think the better choice is clearly an army over the FP.

 

[Spoonwood]

it will likely be a while before Invention/LBMs

At 70% science right now, it's 4 turns for Feudalism, 7 turns for Theology, and 6 turns for Engineering. 4 tribes already know Invention. Sumeria and Spain are almost surely researching Feudalism. I don't know if Spain ever got Monotheism.

Yes, 70% science would be deficit research. However, Korea has 4319 gold in their treasury. At 0% science, and 30% luxuries you would have +68 gold per turn, and at 0% science and 0% luxuries you would have 138 gold per turn. Wang is Furious with you. In the worst case, the best exchange rate would be 10 gold for 1 gpt. Though I kind of doubt Wang is that angry with you. A better rate is probably possible.

If you could keep taking out a loan every now and then from Wang, you probably could get Invention in less than 20 turns with just self-research. Maybe even 17 turns. I'm not sure, but I would guess that markets enable loans to get taken out for a longer period of time before deficit research is no longer possible.

Also, I think that the AIs do NOT increase their research rate by having gpt go to them. They just have greater ability to acquire techs and other things from each other.

Additionally, and it's hard to know, but with deficit research, you might get some tech that an AI with a luxury or resource available does not have yet. In which case, getting that luxury or resource won't cost you any more commerce than what you're using to spend on deficit research.

It also could be possible that you might someday research some other tech that your client does not have yet. As you might have seen, just because you might lose in a race to Education, that doesn't mean that you will lose in a race to Banking if you learn Education in time, since in the vast majority of cases the AIs will research Astronomy instead of Banking. And in such a case, some gpt you were paying to the AI might get sent back to you via selling that tech.

 

[tjs282]

you'll probably want a spear army to protect advancing units (not sure if such would work once cavalry or guerillas show up).

In my/our Viking-Domination SG a couple of years back, at one point the Byzzie(?) AI attacked a 3-vBerserk Army on a Hill, using ACavs.

IIRC, the Army had taken some damage during its attack on the nearest town on that turn, but not much (maybe 7-8 HP remaining? -- enough that I was surprised that it got attacked, at least).

I don't know if Spain ever got Monotheism.

Yes, they did. I can't remember exactly when it happened, but I'm pretty sure it was before Bella MA'd against us — possibly that's what Henry bribed her with.

(She might have even been researching it already — does the AI take into account that a tech unlocks a trait-matching building?).

 

[Spoonwood]

In my/our Viking-Domination SG a couple of years back, at one point the Byzzie(?) AI attacked a 3-vBerserk Army on a Hill, using ACavs. IIRC, the Army had taken some damage during its attack on the nearest town on that turn, but not much (maybe 7-8 HP remaining? -- enough that I was surprised that it got attacked, at least).

Interesting. So, a spear army needs to stay at maximum hitpoints when advancing into AI territory.

I don't see traits mentioned in Alexman's notes. Spain had extra horses and iron in the save before you played if I recall correctly. I would guess that she traded extra horses or iron for Monotheism with someone. Remember, Feudalism is a government, and the AIs tend to research governments. And it provides a defender, and the AIs have a high value on techs with defenders, much higher than an improvement like a cathedral.

 

[MrRandomGuy]

An army would be more beneficial than finishing the FP.

As for city builds, I'll keep building archers with those that are making units with occasional spearmen. Your points about the other cities make sense and is better than what I originally thought @tjs282.

 

[Lanzelot]

Definitely an Army. The FP is almost finished anyway, no need to waste an MGL on it. (Currently 13 turns left, but can probably be sped up by giving Mandal another mined hill.)

KK can take one of Ta-Tu's tiles. (There are enough unused tiles south of Ta-Tu.) and also switch the irrigated BG to Kazan.
(KK can now quickly be pushed to size 12 and 1-turn archers, I think.) And yes, rush the lib in Batshireet now, we need those tiles soon.

We need more spears at the front. There are only 3, and those might die interturn, as they are opposing 4 LBs... (BTW, what happened there? Why are our units exposed to LB attacks and not even on a hill?)

And I don't like splitting our stack in two. With our luck so far, both stacks will fail by a hair, and we'll have high losses and nothing achieved... Better concentrate everything on one target and finally take one of those towns... As shown by the constant stream of units during my and tjs282's turnsets, Korea is still armed to the teeth (probably cash-rushing units left and right?), so attacking a town with only 5 archers (and no spear cover) will probably not succeed.

Pretty solid turnset, tjs, except for two things which I didn't understand:

• Why did you upgrade our curraghs to galleys? We were not yet ready for any sea-born invasion, were we? And for attacking passing dromons, curraghs are as good as galleys (and less expensive, if they lose)...
• You said that Gil was willing to trade Monotheism for Republic. So why did we have to spend so much gold on buying Monarchy, and then trade Monotheism for Monarchy? We don't need Monarchy for anything (Hanging Gardens have been built ages ago).

Most important during the coming turnset will be to get our first ring to let's say 10 (KK to 12) and then research Invention quickly. Then collect cash again for an archer upgrade and then finally do some real damage to the Korean empire... So after rushing the lib in Batsh, you could burn the rest of our cash for some deficit research towards Feudalism.

 

[tjs282]

We need more spears at the front. There are only 3, and those might die interturn, as they are opposing 4 LBs... (BTW, what happened there? Why are our units exposed to LB attacks and not even on a hill?)

Because there was never a point where our units will not be exposed to LBM attacks!

But now that the 4 LBMs moved SE towards Taegwon, the way to Chongfu is clear(er), so I sent them forwards (for the third time) towards Chongfu. As I noted above, the LBMs may well go after Tsets, or our Archers near Taeg, since those represent much softer targets...

Why did you upgrade our curraghs to galleys? We were not yet ready for any sea-born invasion, were we? And for attacking passing dromons, curraghs are as good as galleys (and less expensive, if they lose)...

But Curraghs have only M=2. If you ignored my suggestion and read the turnlog you will have seen that Dora "knew" there were Curraghs in Erdenet, and stopped just out of reach of them (3 tiles away), even though both Dromons still had 1 move-point left. With Erdenet surrounded by Dromon-accessible Hills and Mountains, and only 1 rArcher stationed there, it's surely preferable if incoming Dromons stop 4 tiles away...

You said that Gil was willing to trade Monotheism for Republic. So why did we have to spend so much gold on buying Monarchy, and then trade Monotheism for Monarchy? We don't need Monarchy for anything (Hanging Gardens have been built ages ago)

Because (1) I would rather he revolts to Monarchy than Republic (wouldn't you?), and (2) Republic is a more expensive tech than Monarchy, and Engineering is more expensive than Monotheism. So if he gets Engineering from someone, we might still be able to trade him Rep + Lit for it.

 

[MrRandomGuy]

I disagree with waiting to attack Taegwon. It was recently founded and the spearmen inside is not fortified right now. Lack of fortification indicates there are little troops inside. The town hasn't even culture popped from it's temple yet. The time to strike it with the smaller stack is now.

 

[tjs282]

Lack of fortification indicates there are little troops inside.

There is 1 Spear and 1 LBM. I know that because I nearly killed everything in there on my Turn 9

 

[Spoonwood]

As shown by the constant stream of units during my and tjs282's turnsets, Korea is still armed to the teeth (probably cash-rushing units left and right?)

I've had the impression lately that the AIs do not cash rush. Or if they do, it's limited. Korea has several thousand gold in it's treasury.

I agree about splitting up the stacks as too risky.

Because (1) I would rather he revolts to Monarchy than Republic (wouldn't you?)

Personally, I'd rather have him get Republic even if it means he researches faster. He cheapens the tech cost of research of something by researching faster. He also might end up with gold in his treasury or some gpt available, though that may be unlikely here. That's an interesting idea about him getting Engineering from someone else! However, he's more likely to get engineering from someone else if his government is a republic rather than a monarchy due to the commerce bonus.

The difficulty with only going to Invention before attacking lies in that you only have spears or an army as defenders. You could have saltpeter, and a musket army seems rather good in this situation. Failing that a rifleman army probably could work rather well.

If you pursued the upper part of the research tree, by going Theology-Education-Banking, you might be able to trade with Spain or Sumeria (which would have been easier if they had had Republic earlier). Or Printing Press might not get researched for a while.

Also, where are the funds for research going to come from if at war with Korea? Sure, the AIs can grow more powerful the later this game goes on. However, remember, if you can make it to Nationalism in time, you can can mobilize which provides a bigger advantage to human players than AIs. And human players are better skilled at using artillery proper. And armies. And denying resources like rubber or oil, but you first have to get in a position to see where the AI has those resources.

 

[Lanzelot]

Because (1) I would rather he revolts to Monarchy than Republic (wouldn't you?)

Personally, I'd rather have him get Republic even if it means he researches faster.

Like Spoonwood, I prefer the AI to be a Republic, because in my experience, a successful Republic is much more difficult to manage for the AI: no military police (so they will hire more clowns, if they have happiness problems), less free units (especially on the higher difficulty levels, they tend to drown in unit upkeep) and sooner or later war weariness (= more clowns...)

Ok, the galleys may have their point. But either way, they are all in Davy Jones' Locker by now, aren't they?
(Though I have never before heard of the AI keeping units "outside" the reach of enemy units on purpose. Are you sure about this? How can you see that the Dromons still had movement points left?! I don't really buy this yet. This would require some real "artificial intelligence"... which I don't think Firaxis programmed into this game...)

@Spoonwood: even though we have a bad start here and had already quite a big share of bad luck and near misses, I still hope this game can be won with Cavalry. So I don't really understand your suggestion of doing the upper tech tree? Quite the contrary: we will avoid the upper part (Theology is useless for this kind of game, and Education is even harmful, as it expires "our"
Temple of Artemis...), and instead beeline to Military Tradition -- with a detour via Chivalry in order to kick off our GA.
(Of course, if we can't make progress against Korea soon, this strategy will not work, as the AI may get to Infantry too soon. But in that case, the game may be lost anyway...)

I disagree with waiting to attack Taegwon. It was recently founded and the spearmen inside is not fortified right now. Lack of fortification indicates there are little troops inside. The town hasn't even culture popped from it's temple yet. The time to strike it with the smaller stack is now.

There is 1 Spear and 1 LBM. I know that because I nearly killed everything in there on my Turn 9

That means, by the time you (MrRandomGuy) get there again, we can expect 3, maybe even 4 units. Assume a spear and two LBs, then the two LBs will kill two of the five archers cleanly, and we are left with three archers vs. three defenders. We would need a 100% success rate. And even if you are very lucky and get it, how do you want to hold it against the incoming stream of units? Remember, we cannot afford losing a town, as our war weariness would go through the roof then.
I would estimate, for a successful raid on Taegwon we need 3-4 spears and 10 archers. An attack with 5 archers will just be a suicide mission.

 

[MrRandomGuy]

That means, by the time you (MrRandomGuy) get there again, we can expect 3, maybe even 4 units. Assume a spear and two LBs, then the two LBs will kill two of the five archers cleanly, and we are left with three archers vs. three defenders. We would need a 100% success rate. And even if you are very lucky and get it, how do you want to hold it against the incoming stream of units? Remember, we cannot afford losing a town, as our war weariness would go through the roof then.
I would estimate, for a successful raid on Taegwon we need 3-4 spears and 10 archers. An attack with 5 archers will just be a suicide mission.

The units will be able to attack the city in 2 turns. Since the spearman is unfortified and @tjs282 confirmed it was nearly cleared on turn 9, attacking now will secure the city with the amount of archers currently present. A few fresh units will need to run to the town to defend it. If there are too few surviving units, I can simply raze the city without having to worry about a retake/flip.

 

[Spoonwood]

The start is poor resource wise and luxury wise. But, I would argue that it's fairly strong commerce wise.

So I don't really understand your suggestion of doing the upper tech tree?

1. The AIs prefer the bottom. So, it's more likely to come up with a trade for a tech or two possible by research on the upper part of the tech tree. Though I think unlikely now, the upper part of the tree can get used to get a unique tech and sell it for gpt more often than the bottom part.

2. Cavalry require horses. All possible trade routes, it seems, to horses go through Korea from this map before Navigation or Magnetism. It seems that both the coastal horses of the Byzantines and the Spanish go through coasts or, if you have Astronomy if I recall correctly, Korean borders. You need Astronomy for either Navigation or Magnetism. Also, if you had either of those, you might trade with Gilgamesh for one of his luxuries.

Quite the contrary: we will avoid the upper part (Theology is useless for this kind of game, and Education is even harmful, as it expires "our"
Temple of Artemis...), and instead beeline to Military Tradition -- with a detour via Chivalry in order to kick off our GA.

Theology could be useful for trading for Engineering. So could Education. They are also both useful, since they are prerequisites for Astronomy.

Kick off your golden age with Chivalry... against whom... Korea? But, then you would be at war with them, and wouldn't have access to horses. Do you see all those cities on the coast with their borders going out to the coast? The trader would be blocked from trading by each of those cities before Astronomy. Your original plan involved Naissus for it's horses. But, you would need control of Nicaea and Heraclea also for those horses to get back to your capital while at war with the Byzantines.

Also, if you had Astronomy, sea squares still fall under the cultural control of most of those cities.

The horses spotted near Spain have an even greater number of cities with cultural borders possibly blocking a trade route.

A land route to horses probably also would run through Korea on this map.

Also, what's the harm in using settlers to get to domination instead of temples? I certainly can't think of any.

If there are too few surviving units, I can simply raze the city without having to worry about a retake/flip.

One can always capture and disband/abandon a city instead of razing a city. Razing a city, according to Bamspeedy for PTW and thus likely Conquests also, incurs a +1 attitude penalty among all AIs which is permanent. The worse the AI attitude, the more likely they are to declare on you, and also it's possible that using gpt to purchase something from them has less value by them having a worse attitude. In other words, by razing, one can end up needing to pay more for things from the AI. I do not believe that capturing and disbanding a city incurs the same penalty. And, if the city has any buildings (not sure if the ones you capture do), one can sell those buildings before disbanding the city. The only upside of razing that I have read about comes as that one can get slaves by doing so, but I think there's a population threshold for such.

 

[Lanzelot]

Do you see all those cities on the coast with their borders going out to the coast? The trader would be blocked from trading by each of those cities before Astronomy.

This problem is my least concern... When the time has come to ship horses back home, we will find a solution. Either these Korean towns are ours by then, or we will simply make peace and trade via the Korean coastal tiles.

Also, what's the harm in using settlers to get to domination instead of temples? I certainly can't think of any.

Well, it takes much longer!
There is certainly not much that went our way in this game... But Artemis being built so close to us is definitely a big stroke of luck that we need to make the most of. Artemis also helps with flips, so we could even consider taking and holding enemy towns, instead of raze&replace, which speeds up the game even more. (I am currently playing a game on Deity, where I didn't have a single culture flip yet, after capturing Artemis!)

One can always capture and disband/abandon a city instead of razing a city. Razing a city, according to Bamspeedy for PTW and thus likely Conquests also, incurs a +1 attitude penalty among all AIs which is permanent.

I am not 100% sure about this, but I think I remember reading somewhere a long time ago, that abandoning a town with foreign population carries the same permanent attitude penalty as razing a town. (Is there any way to test this?) So if we want to avoid that penalty, we would have to wait until cultural assimilation has converted the last citizen to our nationality - which may be a very long time...

 

[tjs282]

(Though I have never before heard of the AI keeping units "outside" the reach of enemy units on purpose. Are you sure about this? How can you see that the Dromons still had movement points left?! I don't really buy this yet. This would require some real "artificial intelligence"... which I don't think Firaxis programmed into this game...)

I right-clicked on the Dromons, which showed both of their A(B).D.M stats as "2(2).1.1" (i.e. M = 1 out of 4).

If they had used all their move-points, they would have shown "2(2).1.0"

An attack with 5 archers will just be a suicide mission.

The only reason the last attack with 5 Archers failed, was that the last one to fight (against the 2/3 LBM) had only 1 HP left.

I threw it at Taegwon in a Hail-Mary, because I knew that if I failed to take it that turn, it would immediately get a cash-rushed Defender next turn. If I had taken the town, I could have rushed a Worker -> Spear, and moved the other 2 vArchers into (or past) it next turn — with more coming up behind them.

 

[Spoonwood]

This problem is my least concern... When the time has come to ship horses back home, we will find a solution. Either these Korean towns are ours by then, or we will simply make peace and trade via the Korean coastal tiles.

It's not just the Korean towns. There are two intermediate Byzantine towns before Naissus; Nicaea and Heraclea.

If you start another war with Korea and then make peace with them again, those cities still remain vulnerable to flips. I remind you that a peace treaty is 20 turns, or if you re-declare before then you take a reputation hit.

Additionally, by going back to war with Korea it appears you would cut off your (potential) access to their treasury, except via captures. But, captures won't be quick since you're moving infantry type units only without rails. Thus your ability to get to advanced technology becomes weaker since you can't take out a loan for research. Also, because you'll be paying for unit support earlier, instead of or delaying infrastructure to support research.

But Artemis being built so close to us is definitely a big stroke of luck that we need to make the most of.

Artemis does not win any military based game that I know of. It merely increases the number of tiles under one's control. You don't have this game won, nor does the team stand in a position to know that it is winnable. And you have two times sounded like you are worried about it being lost, with your talk of needing a miracle, and how it may be lost if the AIs got to infantry. It would by no means be lost if they got to infantry, if you got to Replaceable Parts and Nationalism in time, since mobilization + artillery proper can be very powerful. But, it will be more difficult to get into such a position to get there without quicker research.

I am not 100% sure about this, but I think I remember reading somewhere a long time ago, that abandoning a town with foreign population carries the same permanent attitude penalty as razing a town.

SirPleb writes elsewhere:

"Abandoning a city whose population is 50% or more foreign nationals causes the same attitude hit as razing a city as far as un-involved Civs are concerned. I.e. it seems to cost 1 point with every Civ."

So, my suggestion of abandoning and disbanding immediately doesn't work out well attitude wise.

Your credit rating with Korea is such that Wang would still give you a loan of 16 gold for 1 gpt. But, if you capture one of his cities, that credit rating might go down, at least for a while. Though, I do feel a bit surprised with the number of units you've killed so far that your credit rating is such that you can get that rate.

 

[MrRandomGuy]

Started playing. Taegwon only had two spears defending it. The risk of attacking it paid off. We only lost one archer attacking that city. But now we have a possible problem. The Egyptians have arrived. The stacks are all archers.

What should we do now? Sue for peace with Korea? Try for peace with Egypt? The Byzantines are also bombarding us with their dromon ships and we should discuss peace with them too.

Egypt will give us peace for 140 gold.

Korea will give us peace outright. Interestingly, when I place Engineering as part of the deal our advisor says "I doubt they will accept that proposal." If we decide to keep the war going and continue being successful with Korea, we might be able to get a tech from them out of it.

Byzantines will give us peace for 40 gold. That's a little more reasonable than Egypt. There's two dromons bombarding us now, but more could be on their way. And we don't have the navy we need to counter them.

 

[Spoonwood]

What should we do now?

I think there's no reputation hit in gifting a city away to some other civ.

If you could trade the city for a tech or gold or gold per turn, that would help, but I don't think that they will give you anything for a city... my memory might be faulty on checking that though.

 

[Spoonwood]

If we decide to keep the war going and continue being successful with Korea, we might be able to get a tech from them out of it.

Yes, but how long will that take? If you were taking out loans from Korea (and they still have the same amount of gold that I last saw), you might be able to get that tech more quickly. Do you mind temporarily turn up the science rate to 70% and seeing how long it takes for you to research a tech? If you were still at war with the AIs while taking out loans from Wang, it's not impossible that they might sign Wang back into that war (though maybe not likely). There's also a way to force an AI to declare war on you, if you can import a luxury or resource from them.

No leader from fighting Korea, unfortunately. But, you can still get a leader from killing other AI units though.