S-05 Beat the Clock

Friday evening is fine - it's easily inside the 48 hours.

Didn't know the Saladin war is so soon - he will be annoying because of his protective trait. I'm pleasantly surprised to see Ragnar's capital falling so quickly - good work Sweetacshon. I was going to suggest military tradition but you came to the same conclusion :goodjob:.

Swiss Pauli
Sweetacshon
Immaculate - UP
stuge - On Deck
sooooo
 
How are we going to use the GS? Are there any academy-worthy cities?
 
Carthage doesn't have an Academy, so it's the obvious choice, but if Rome is given all the FPs to work, and those FPs are cottaged (stop those workers building a watermill!) then Rome will possibly give better long term returns because Carthage will lose commerce when Colossus is obsolete.

If Utica's citizens are reassigned to get some hammers into NE and finish it, then it should generate a second scientist for Rome's Academy at a handy time.
 
Hey, i am up my two other SGs, can i get a swap.
 
Sorry about that... i WILL play tonight- i want to play under the 48hour limit.
 
1190-1214

Inherited Turn
I do as suggested and use the great scientist to build an academy in Rome. We are going to be stretched very thin to fight a two-front war even with a sizable army due to the length of our supply lines and the distances involved.
Currently we have philosophy and nationalism on everyone except for Vicky who has nationalism, so I’ll have to watch and be careful that she doesn’t trade it around before I get the opportunity to do so.
Soon it will be time to go to war with Arabia.

Buids
I wrote little signs on the cities to help me remember how to use them properly, so those cities with commerce specialties mostly built libraries etc, with some longbows for defence, while production cities focused on offensive army components.
I started the Forbidden Palace in Pisae.

Research
Watch out for trades for nationalism. I didn’t pull the trigger but we could easily get guilds. IN the coming turns we may be able to get gunpowder.

Civics
I made no changes to civics.

Diplomacy
War with Saladin!

War
In 1202AD, we declare war on Saladin.
In 1202AD, we burn the Aryan barbarian village an d re-open our route to the Viking lands.
We razed Oslo to the ground (it was small and we couldn’t afford the man-power to garrison it).
We also burn Haithibatou to the ground (It was one tile from the coast and again, there were no spare troops for a garrison).

Economy
I had to whip a few builds in unhappy cities, but otherwise cities were left to develop cottages and mature.

Foreign Powers
Roosevelt builds the Notre Dame. Ragnor got a great engineer.



I wasn’t able to play a complete turn-set… but here is the save for 1214. This is a fun variant, but I got caught with my pants down. I am in 4 succession games, of which my turns are due in three. Simultaneously I am planning a wedding, so things are kind of tight.
 
This wasn't an exactly succesful round, all things considered.

On the Viking front, Ragnar gave me a start by landing this stack next to Nidaros.



That berserker had already killed our crossbow in the city. I began moving every unit in the area towards the city, fearing for the worst. Next turn, Ragnar kills our Numidian with the 5/8 berserker and then kills our fortified, combat 2 pike with a city garrison longbow! Sometimes the RNG gods just turn their backs...

Despite his successes, Ragnar, showing typical AI weedness, failed to take the city, guarded at that point only by a badly wounded mace. Next turn, reinforcements arrived and the threat was sorted out. Unfortunately, that front stagnated further when Ragnar sent a similiar stack a few turns later and I was forced to hunker down. Success was only met in the north, where our mace/pike pair managed to raze a newly founded city guarded by a couple of swords.

Here is the current situation.



Our stack is moving out, but beware of that berserker. I left the stack unmoved so the city can be reinforced if felt necessary.

On the Arabian front, things went little better. Our stack managed to raze Anjar, the little iceball city, but when I saw this, my heart sank.



Yep, that's a city garrison 3 musket. I pressed on nevertheless. After a couple of turns bombing Baghdad, I started to withdraw because of this.



But it was probably five turns too late. Our stack there got annihilated by a wave of catapults and camel archers. The situation now looks like this.



Saladin has a settler there with a mace and a camel. We have nothing to corral them with, since all our pikes in that front are pushing up daisies. I suggest that we try to sneak our stack into the Viking front, where they'd do more good, and let our cavalry handle Saladin.

Ah, yes, the cavalry. When MT finished, I traded nationalism to Roosevelt for Guilds, his map and a couple hundred gold. That shaved a turn off of Gunpowder and when it finished, I went forth to earn myself the moniker "bloody hand." Thousands of people died to put men on horseback and equip them with boom-sticks. So much for building up our economy, but at least soooo will have a nice stack of toys ready. In Utica the NE was whipped as well.

Research is set into printing press, as I figured that it would be a good tech to have in any situation.

That's it, this is for soooo.
 
Hokay, I played 10 turns this round. That's probably a better number at this stage of the game and with our wars.

On the inherited turn I whipped the forbidden palace in Pisae for 5 pop. Other whipping and MM, and also told Bjorgvin to build culture. This is much more efficient that waiting to whip a theatre with no granary. Consider revolting to mercantilism because we only have foreign routes with Izzy (english route blocked, roos in mercantilism), but decide to wait until we want to go nationalism too.

I gave liberalism to Roosevelt in return for 930 gold, banking, WM and war with Ragnar (for the mutual struggle).



I set us on a course for a rifle-draft strategy. After PP we started replaceable parts and I started theatres. We need to globe theatre somewhere, though not sure where. Started Heroic Epic in Carthage. GG born, builds Military Academy in Neapolis.

Then Roosevelt asks us to change to mercantilism - I agree.

Wars went ... slowly. Razed Bagdad - hard to defend and should be 1 tile north. Not many losses - 1 treb and 1 cav I believe. I started a settler to replace it.



In Viking lands I didn't take a single city. A lack of siege meant it took 4 turns to bombard Uppsala. Then I sent in the guys - lost only a mace but reinforcements meant I could only halve the garrison. Troops are healing and waited to be reinforced by 2 cavalry.

The Save, rifling next please :).

Swiss Pauli - UP
Sweetacshon - On Deck
Immaculate
stuge
sooooo
 
My CD/DVD-player is down then (friday) i am going out of country for 2 weeks, so i will need to be skipped for awhile.
 
Hit enter, then thought, "what the devil do I do here, with all these target cities, and a now 'spare' settler", so I thought I'd post up the save for people to fire up and check out the keep/raze signs. Tried to be disciplined and only keep strong food cities.

Also, I'm worried about our stack at Uppsala: a C1 LB got upgraded to a Musket on the inter-turn and it's two more before our nearest Cav gets there: should I hold, or retreat?

I'll play this out tomorrow evening CET.

PS: I hit 'e' instead of 'w' so one of our Cavs pillaged in Sal's lands, but I don't think that's a reload worthy cock-up.
 
At Uppsala, I think we can hold there, but there would be no penalty in retreating to more defensible territory because we have to wait for the cavs anyway.

The Spare settler was for the desert spot 1N of Bagdad's ruins. Canal city, good food etc.
 
Oh well, I guess everyone else is busy as no-one has looked at the save.

My plan is to pull out of Arabia, leaving only a sentry stack in case Sal counters, and to try to polish off Ragnar (aside from Lödsoe) before we have to declare on Izzy. A two front war is not much fun, but three fronts would be madness.
 
Your raze/keep signs look reasonable. Should raze the northeastern Viking city. I think it's just too far away.

And it definetly makes sense to concentrate on finishing Ragnar off proper. Perhaps capture Muscat and hold it as a bastion while killing Ragnar off.
 
We found Hippo with the spare settler. You'll be pleased to hear that it now has a garrison...



Gimme happy:



Yes, Izzy take my gold, but I'll be wanting it back at some point...around AD 1500, perhaps.



For those without superhero vision, she's now pleased with us.

We took Uppsala without loss, but it took four rounds of safe(ish) attacks to claim it. Units have/are healing for the attack on Birka, whilst a small party has gone ahead to bombard.



Coco! I had to send her to Madrid for a cash bomb as Sal's stack was blocking safe passage to America. She'll give us 1650g.



Now for a military sit-rep:

We've started to bomb Birka. The siege engines in Nidaros should be moved first next turn to meet the Cavs just inside Birka's borders:



The galley at Bjorgvin is Sal's and could hold nasties, so we have two Cavs nearby to deal with any threat.



Our blocking stack at Muscat:



And what's left of Sal's western stack:



On loading, note that Coco can (and should IMO) conduct her trade mission before hitting enter. Cash can speed Rifling. After that, I'd recommend Chemistry.

I think Ragnar made something of a last stand at Uppsala, but war with Spain is only 17 turns away...
 
Cool, nice turns Swiss Pauli and detailed report too :goodjob:. Sorry for not replaying to your raze/keep signs. Been busy recently - got engaged yesterday :love:.

Sweetacshon is up - looks like we will need a civics change to Nationalism.

Swiss Pauli
Sweetacshon - UP
Immaculate
stuge - On Deck
sooooo
 
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