OB07 - The First Shall Be Last

[Ozbenno]

I'm not sure there is consensus either.

I think take the two near elven cities and then fight defensive while we see what Thessa brings. I don't think we can attack Einon as he has arquebus, which only Hyborem can attack (our champions can handle Thessa's troops). I don't think we can afford to wait as the others will out-produce and out-research us, we can't add any decent units at any speed that would make an attack in the future any better than now.

Maybe the best is to assemble all our forces into position for attack on either, see what happens while we do this and then we can all have another look at the save and re-asess. It'll mean only 5 or so turns Immy but that may be the best to get over the impasse.

 

[Ozbenno]

How you going Immy?

 

[·Imhotep·]

Sorry, it was CCC weekend. I'll play and report tomorrow .

 

[·Imhotep·]

I played 7 turns. Einon and Thessa have made peace, Rhoanna has failed so far to take a city. Thessa has a lot of troops at the city next to us - I've assembled what we have. I'd say we should strike soon - but maybe she'll move more troops to the East.

Imhotep

 

[Diamondeye]

Okay... I will try to play it tomorrow, if not, I need a skip/swap (my parents are divorced, only got CIV @ dads, he's on vacation far away... Will see if I get time to break in and play some FfH!)

 

[Ozbenno]

I meant to load up the save to have a look but forgot. Will do so today (hopefully).

 

[Ozbenno]

Had a look at the save.

We are in a pickle. Thessa has lots more troops visible than she did 7 turns ago. I still think we should attack. To not attack surely means that the AI will run away with the game. I would delay the attack enough to get the two longbows in the stack to absorb some attacks, otherwise I would stay the course and attack Thessa (who is no longer #1 in score). Einion's multiple arquebus would destroy us in a flash.

Let us know quickly Diamondeye whether you can play or not. A third skip in sucession is not particularly good form

 

[·Imhotep·]

Please make sure you promote Hyborem along the Drill line - we need the Blitz promotion badly, but that requires Drill IV (what the hell did the AI smoke when it gave Hyborem Guerilla I ).

Imhotep

 

[Diamondeye]

Sorry! Couldn't get to it, I'll need a someone to play before me (access saturday, soonest).

I do, ofcourse, realize that I have not been all that an active in this game, sorry

 

[Ozbenno]

OK, I will have some time tonight in all likelihood so got it.

 

[Ozbenno]

I move the two longbows towards the main stack for defense on attacks and switch the two axes for home duty.

Looks like Thessa now sports Arquebus as well . Hopefully it was captured ratyher than built or upgraded.

I start the attack of Spilan by getting rid of said Arquebus. We have the rust spell which gets rid of the copper promotion of Thessa's swords

Our CR promoted champion and axes then do the job on the swords and tigers. There are a lot of troops there and we lose a longbow (which really sucked) to a counter attack by a ranger but we get there in the end.

We pop a GE.

We could blow it on building Heroic Epic, bulb some of Smelting or merge in the capital. That might actually be best.

This city is razed as its too close to Einion and I wan tto see if we get any manes from razing a neutral city

It doesn't look as if we did

We have two stacks (well groups of soldiers more than stacks really) assembled.



The southern Thessa city is defended by a warrior and a mage so we can get it next turn. I'd be inclined to raze it. The northern stack can head towards the choke point city.

Apart from the unlucky loss of the longbow, we haven't lost a soldier and we have 4 CR3 units. Hyborem is up to Drill 3, so 2 promotions from Blitz, which might speed things up a bit.

Do we want to stop at the choke city to reassess (Thessa will already give us the crappy southern city for peace) or continue the attack.

Jet is UP.

Roster
Ozbenno
Jet - UP
Conroe - On Deck
Imhotep

 

[Jet]

Played 9 turns. Razed Kalochy, too hard to defend. From it I got 2 workers and 3 Manes, it which I settled in the capital, along with the Engineer. Built a Temple in the capital, mainly for healing from Savants at this point. But then started the HE.

Einon settled a city 3S of Spilan and culture bombed it, so I started a Monument in Spilan.

Captured the choke city Delouc with no losses.

The main issue is that Einon went into WHEOOHRN. According to the demo screen there are two civs we don't know about besides the Hippus. One of them might be dwarves, since the Kilmorph holy city is on the top cities screen. Einon also hates Thessa. But the target is probably us. Thessa's power is only double ours but Einon's is sextuple. I haven't seen Cannons, but there's no reason they wouldn't be there.

Details I wasn't sure about.
* Sailing, since nobody else seemed to want to escape to barb island. But I finished it, then started Priesthood, for Ritualists and since we're Spiritual. Also a possible trade with Charadon.
* Work boat, which I deleted to save maintenance.
* Library in Poena, 180 hammers for 2 BPT. But it had 40 hammers invested, so I left it.

I'll play another 10 turns after comments. I don't mind betting the game on continuing to push east, leaving our cities undefended. We can't really afford more cities though. But we could put Cartography (10) in front of Priesthood (30).

We might get a tiny bit of information from trading maps with Charadon, but he doesn't have Optics, so I have held off.

 

[Ozbenno]

Priesthood is on the way to Malevelent Designs and Ritualists are good so I think that's a decent choice.

I think Einion is after us. We can either try and get peace from Thessa (would she throw in Priesthood?) and try to hold the hordes off or just keep headed east. If we can get Priesthood for a peace deal, I'd be half inclined to take it and try and hold of Einon but continuing the push on Thessa might be wiser.

I left the library for the same reasons as you. If we settle the manes here we can employ an extra scientist.

 

[Diamondeye]

Uhm, am I definately out of the Roster? If it is a yes, I'll go ahead and delete the .34 patch to free up some space

 

[Ozbenno]

Uhm, am I definately out of the Roster? If it is a yes, I'll go ahead and delete the .34 patch to free up some space

Well with three skips in a row were you in?

Quoting from the DM Succession Games Etiquette:

Charlie: Punctuality is encouraged. Standard time frame is for a player to post a "got it" within 24 hours of the time the previous player posted the save, then play within 48 hours of his "got it" post. Waiting 47 hours to ask for a skip is lame. You might find yourself "skipped" the next time, as well. Skips and swaps are fine, just try to arrange them sooner, rather than later.

If you can cast-iron guarantee it won't happen again I'll stick you back in but otherwise not sorry.

 

[·Imhotep·]

Yes, go for Priesthood. Ritualists are awesome, Ring of Fire rocks.

 

[Jet]

Good idea to get Priesthood for peace. We got it on turn 544 after a few more turns of research. That meant we couldn't trade it to Charadon, of course. Then I researched Cartography until turn 551, when I stopped. Cartography has no short term benefit, but I wanted to get it under our belt and make sure we had it if and when we needed it.

Set research to Optics, zero beakers invested. Caravels would let us meet the rest of the AIs, and understand who is really at war with who. Possibly we could even use Frigates to reduce city defenses. Granted, both kinds of boat are costly. We might also trade Optics to Charadon, to increase his contacts and his chances for war with AIs, which we need. I thought that made it better than another military tech, since we already have Ritualists and Diseased Corpses.

I cast Cure Disease on one of the Diseased Corpses with our first Ritualist. I suspect it's best to have most of our units disease-free. I gated some units back to the western cities for defense, distributing them so that they can be gated around faster, since each city can only gate out one unit per turn. But unless we're attacked in the meantime, I'm for attacking Thessa when the peace treaty runs out, even though it's very risky. Einon's units are not visibly stacked up. Who knows, though.

Dis is in a Ritualist loop. Poena has a monument queued, since it has lost tiles.

 

[Ozbenno]

Good work. Ritualists can help out very nicely.

I can see the reasoning behind Optics. It is that or we keep towards MD (need Code of LAws and Righteousness first).

I find sometimes in FfH, the AI can get stuck in WHEOOH mode for a long time. As we can teleport units around, keep them close to home for a while and then amass for another push in 10 turns.

Conroe is UP!

 

[Conroe]

Looks like Thessa now sports Arquebus as well . Hopefully it was captured ratyher than built or upgraded.

I guess I should have mentioned that in my last report. One of our (well, Thessa's now) Priests captured an Arquebus from Einon. Only the one was captured on my watch ...

Conroe is UP!

Have not downloaded the save and probably won't be able to this weekend. I should be able to have a look at it on Monday evening. Unless Immy has some time for a swap?

 

[Diamondeye]

Okay, sorry for my lack of activity, and since I can't promise it won't happen again, I will simply be lurking. Too bad .

Anyway, good luck with the conquest of Thessa - I think you should keep pushing her, and not settle for peace.