SGFN-08: Random AWM Succession Game

[Elephantium]

lurker's comment: I think that's the point where you say "Sorry, I need a skip" instead of "hey guys, do the hard part for me so I can do the fun part"

 

[GamezRule]

I guess I'll skip.

 

[Lanzelot]

Ok, I will take it Saturday or Sunday night. Perhaps I have time to post an action plan tonight. (But perhaps not: we might have visitors for a movie night today.)

Lanzelot

 

[Lanzelot]

Another busy weekend... And then the upcoming ISDG is taking its toll as well. However, here is now my pre-flight analysis:

Population:
CivAssist claims 68%, while F8 says 63%. Just to be on the save side, I'll make sure to join a couple dozen workers to towns in the final turn.

Territory:

and CAII told me 266 tiles are required to win, and there were 142 unclaimed tiles?

Did you perhaps open the wrong .sav? I double checked it now, and I think my previous numbers are right: 115 tiles left, 11 unclaimed according to CivAssist. However, I think CA may not be counting coastal tiles here, because when I count them, I can see much more unclaimed territory then 11 tiles...

In any case, I think we can trust the CAII's number of 1069 currently owned tiles (not counting sea&ocean). This allows a little calculation to double check the "115 tiles to limit":

F8 says we are at 55% territory, so 55% corresponds to 1069 and consequently 66% would correspond to (1069/5) * 6 = 1282.8.
What the heck?! According to this we are 213.8 tiles from dom limit?! I've never before seen CAII beeing wrong on the dom limit, when the entire map is uncovered. I am much more inclined to believe that actually the F8-screen may be wrong... Therefore for the following I'll just ignore F8 and base my strategy on CAII.

A. Tiles to be gained at home
Switch privateer in Stavanger to settler: 5
Rush libraries in Charlottenburg, Rhodes and Eretria: 14
Library in Pharsalos (almost finished, so we might as well take it: 2
Clear swamp near But it's a Dry Heat and rush settler in Zohak: 6
Rush settler in Hamadan: 5
Library in The Immortals are Dead, (but only if it's a close shave): 2
Rush settler in Arbela and settler near Dariush Kabir: 6
Library in Frozen Tundra (almost done): 2
Library in Yukon: 5
Library in Cold, nah, we have furs: 4
Libraries in Witches Breast and Murmansk (if it's close): 4
Libraries in Eat Horse, Alex! and Izibia: 8
Library in Roßbach: 3
Settler near Oslo: 4
Library in Stockholm: 3
Libraries in Copenhagen and Danish Incense: 7

Total: 76 - 80

B. Military campaign:
Objective: Take Tlalmanalco and Cempola asap, then use Armies to block chokepoint until libs in these two towns and Aarhus have expanded. This will gain an additional 44 tiles.
How long will it take? The answer to this question will determine, how long the game will still last. We have 6 Cavs and a couple of Infantry/Artillery currently at Aarhus and can ship-chain 3 more Cavs and an Army in from Scandinavia by the beginning of the next turn. That should be enough to take Tlalmanalco next turn.
If taking Cempola takes too long, an alternative plan may be to sail in two settlers from Scandinavia and settle them near Zariqum for 13 additional tiles. This would also give us 24 tiles from Tlalmanalco plus 13 from those 2 towns plus 4 more coastal tiles by closing the gap between Scandinavia and Zariqum. Definitely enough. The settlers can reach these spots before the new Libs expand, so the question is only: do we have enough Inf to defend them for long enough, and can we bring the other Armies over fast enough to block the choke point?
If everything works out well, it can be done in 5 turns.

Overseer, main question for you: how strong is the resistance up there?

Other points: change all scientists to taxmen for an additional 152 gpt. We'll need all the gold we can get in order to manage all lib rushes on time.

 

[TheOverseer714]

I think the Aztecs are our most dangerous enemy, as their Cavalry are handy for attacks. They can be diminished by creating traps, which is what I did at Aarhus. With the choke blocked and artilllery, that area should be ours in 3 turns, settled in 5 more and victory soon after.

 

[Lanzelot]

One more thought just crossed my mind: I need to rush 14 libs, which I want to do right next turn. Some of them are almost finished, some are still in the beginning, so let's assume on average I have to rush 20 shields per Lib. That would be 1120 gold.

However, even with all scientists changed to taxmen, I will get only ~500 gold next turn. That means I will have to disband units worth of 155 shields. (Hopefully we have enough obsolete units e.g trebs on the rail network.) However, I need to be careful not to disband too much, because of the occasional landings. Can you give me a screenshot of where the AI used to land units in the last 10-20 turns and how many they landed?

Thanks, Lanzelot

 

[splunge the 2nd]

Do we have any imprvemnts we can sell to raise cash? I typically don't do that, but if we're not researching any more, libraries in cities that already have culture expansion might raise a bit of cash?

 

[CKS]

If F8 and CivAssist aren't agreeing on the number of tiles needed, you might check to see what CRpMapStat says. 150 tiles is a big difference.

 

[TheOverseer714]

Heres a novel idea: what does civ 3 say? I was using those percentages in my log. I will try to get that screenie up sometime today.

Here is the mainland landing zone, mostly 1-4 Cossacks, with an Aztec flotilla on the way also.

Here is the Island of Death landing zone, mostly a lone Cossack,

 

[Lanzelot]

Do we have any imprvemnts we can sell to raise cash? I typically don't do that, but if we're not researching any more, libraries in cities that already have culture expansion might raise a bit of cash?

Yep, good idea!

CKS: "Ask two physicians, get three different opinions..."

 

[Lanzelot]

Spoiler :

Preflight:
Changing scientists to taxmen increases gpt from 359 to 511.
Selling a bunch of libraries, universities, courthouses, raxes nets me 315 gold and increases gpt to 570. (I also changed a bunch of things, which are not going to finish within 5 turns and are not planned to be rushed, to Wealth.)
For 168g I rush the Army in Frankfurt and give the productive tiles to the neighboring cities.

Next I set the towns mentioned in my previous post to Library (if they are not already producing one) and hire as many civil engineers as possible.

Used our workers to complete rail lines to those cities that were building a library as well as down to Murmansk so our Armies can move to each AI landing spot if necessary.

Then moved all warriors and spearmen, which were not needed for military police, into the lib towns and disbanded them. Same for most our trebs and a few muskets. This enabled all critical libraries to finish next turn!

On the military site I had to alter my original plans. Instead of concentrating everything in the north around Aarhus, I decided to open a second theater of war in the Vladiwostok area, because General von Zieten and a large force was stranded down there. There was no way to get him up north before the end of the game, so I decided to reinforce von Zieten's force with the troops currently on the island across the Russian shore, including the new Army, which was given under the command of Feldmarschall von Schwerin. Untill their arrival, von Zieten was supposed to pillage all roads to Vladiwostok and then cover the landing of von Schwerin. Their combined forces should then be enough to capture and hold Vladivostok and perhaps one more city.

In the north I shipped the Army from Hans (Scandinavia) over to Aarhus and assigned Genral von Seydlitz as its commander. It looks like we don't have enough Galleys in the north, so I'm going to rush one or two next turn. However, with v. Seydlitz and a rather strong artillery corps assembled in Aarhus, I decide to risk the attack on Tlalmanalco already in the preflight:

5 artillery reduce the three defending rifles to 2/4, 1/4 and 1/3.
Seydlitz attacks and kills two, discovering an additional Longbow in Tlalmanalco.
eCav kills last rifle 3/5 and another defender becomes visible: a 2/4 Aztecan Cav!
This is going to be a really close shave...
The last healed eCav joins the battle and kills the Aztecan Cav, and now a 3/4 warrior appears!
We send our 4/5 eCav in, which kills the warrior and spawns a leader! Yep! Together with the Army I rushed in Frankfurt, we are going to have 3 Armies in the North! (I'm running out of names here...) Generalleutnant von Puttkamer is going to lead the new Army.
There is still the 2/4 Longbow holding out in Tlalmanalco. And we can see 5 Aztecian units (including 2 Muskets) close by, who will certainly reinforce Tlalmanalco in the interturn. We need to take that town now. In a desperate measure von Puttkamer is given our last 1/4 and 2/5 Cavalry and gets the order to take that town!
And he proves successful. Two Infantry then move in to defend the town and consolidate our positions. Press enter and hope for the best.
(This preturn was played in three sessions, about an hour each...!)

IBT:
No landings.
One Aztec warrior attacks Tlalmanalco...
But 22 new units close in on Tlalmanalco! Mainly Longbows and Muskets. And in addition two Babylonian Knights and a LB. I guess we need to retreat and wait for more reinforcements. We'll see.

16 libraries are completed! I set more towns to Wealth and make some engineers to taxmen and we are now making 579gpt.
Our Army in Frankfurt is finished and assigned to Herzog von Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel.

CivAssist says 106 tiles to go.

1. 1405AD:
Found three towns for another 16 tiles.
Von Schwerin and three of his Cavs land at Vladiwostok.

Northern Front: 4 artillery bombard a seven unit stack at Tlalmanalco, bringing all four defending muskets to 2/4 or 1/3. Two more artillery bombard the two Babylonian Knights.
von Seydlitz kills the 4 muskets, loosing 4 hit points due to defensive fire from a cannon and LBs.
Two vCrusader kill two LBs, 1/4, 5/5. A Cav kills the last (3/5) and captures a cannon.

This is completely crazy: I had stopped playing at this point and resumed play now on my laptop. And here CivAssist suddenly says 241 tiles to limit!! It's exactly the same version of CivAssist, the only difference between the two machines is, that on my desktop I have the original Civ3 Conquests, while on my laptop I have Civ3 Complete?!?

Via ship-chain von Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel, two Cavs, an Inf, a Musket and two settlers are shipped into Aarhus. The Musket is upgraded as defender of Aarhus, 3 Infs are moved into Tlalmanalco, the two existing ones attack the two Knights, killing one and driving the other away. Tlalmanalco is now defended by 5 Infs, two are 2/4 and 3/4. Von Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel (8/8) takes out the last Babylonian LB, reducing the attack force around Tlalmanalco to 5 LBs and an MI, which are covered by 7 Muskets. I think we should be able to hold.

I decide to disband our spear Army for 100 shields into the next Army in Frankfurt. Also short-rush a Galleon and 3 Cavs. Rush the library in Aarhus.

IBT:
The Russians land a LB on Death Island, the Aztecs land a Musket at their usual landing zone. Looks like they are running out of steam...

The 5 LBs and the MI attack Tlalmanalco and get quite a few of hit points! Some of our Infs survive by a hair, two get promoted.

2. 1410AD:
Schwerin defeats two Rifles in Vladivostok and goes down to 6/18. Zieten kills another Rifle (15/17) and then a vCav defeats a vCossack (3/5) and takes the city!
Ship-chained 4 Cavs, 3 Arties and a Musket into Vladivostok. The Musket is upgraded to Inf, the Cavs join the attack on Tver':
Zieten: two rRifles (11/17), 1st Cav dies without making a scratch, 2nd retreats 1/4 without making a scratch, 3rd dies, but Rifle goes from 3/3 to 2/4, 4th kills the Rifle and a Cossack appears. eCav attacks and takes Tver'.
Taking these two towns and selling most of their buildings netted us 300g!
(Shorth-)rush three Cavs and the library in Tlalmanalco.

eCrusader kills LB on Death Island, eLB kills Musket and spawns another leader...
Generalleutnant Freiherr von Imhoff takes over this Army. Ship-chaining him, 3 Cavs and 4 workers into Aarhus. Workers start on railways.

Von Puttkamer is filled to full strength now and is sent to Cempoala to pillage th roads on the choke. That should be enought to stop the units from coming in. The other Armies will meanwhile help to take more towns.

Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel is filled to 14/18 and kills two 1/3 muskets (11/18). Crusaders, Cavs, Inf kill a handful of other enemy units. 1 LB, 1 spear and 5 Muskets remain within Tlalmanalco's radius.

IBT:
No landings. The Aztecan units retreat from Tlalmanalco?!
CivAssist claims 210 tiles to limit.

3. 1415AD:
Kill various units around Tlalmanalco. Puttkamer starts pillaging S of Cempoala.

Schwerin digs in in Vladivostok, Zieten kills a Cossack near Tver' and then digs in as well. Supporting LBs, Crusaders and workers to reestablish the road between Vladivostok and Tver' are shipped in from the Island of Death.

IBT:
7 Cossacks appear at the southern front, killing a Crusader and a Cav and taking 4 HPs off Zieten.
An Aztec Cav kills an Inf.
Our borders expand everywhere, CivAssist now says 160 tiles to limit.

4. 1420AD:
Kill 5 remaining Cossacks, another one becomes visible.

Kill 5 stray Muskets on the northern front. Seydlitz defeats rRifle in Chalco (11/17). Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel two 2/4 muskets in Zariqum (11/18), von Imhoff is filled with 4 fresh Cavs ship-chained from Berlin and captures size-1 Zariqum (16/16)! Very strange?! The Babylonians must already have had culture there?! Also the shield box contains two shields upon capture?!?!?

IBT:
Two Cossacks appear and kill a LB and a Crusader.

Two Aztecan Cavs appear, one kills a Crusader and destroys two artillery (darn), the other one dies to a 2/4 Inf, promoting it to 2/5. (Whew, that Inf was covering 6 arties!)

Huexotla flips to the Aztecs! (Darn, 2 turns before the library would have expanded!)

Still CA says 149 tiles to limit. I'm copying the .sav to my desktop to check what CA says there: 81 tiles. Aha?!? According to CA on my English Civ3 installation, I had gone from 266 to 149, that's 117 tiles. So I would have expected that the German installation went from 115 to nearly zero tiles?! I think I know what the problem is: apparently if a non-English Civ3 installation is on the machine, CA does not recognize coastal tiles (neither in the total, nor in the number of tiles left), nor in the unclaimed number. But I never noticed this before, and I've play several dozens of GOTMs and the dom limit was always correctly predicted?!
Well, if I look at the alerts, it gets even stranger...:

Anyway, continue game, 4th session.
5. 1425AD:
Bombard a lot of units on the northern and southern front.
von Imhoff defeats 2 Rifles in Chalco, the 3/5 Cav that killed my Inf last turn, appears as defender. An eCav takes Chalco.

1st Cavalry retakes Huexotla.
Cavs and Cossacks cleaned up. Settled two towns, one in the S and one in the N and brought another combat settler into position near Malinalco for next turn. Zieten protects him.
Rush Cavs again.

IBT:
A Russian Cossack in the S kills a LB and then a Cav in Vladivostok! (Completely forgot they have blitz...)
Another Cossack comes out of Magadan, kills the eCav in Chalco and takes it!
Another Cossack lands an Island of Death. Need to send some units there...

Aztecan Cav kills Cav in Aarhus. 5 more Cavs are spotted by Puttkamer at the choke. Good that the road network is already disrupted there.

6. 1430AD:
Disband 2nd Longbows in Frankfurt and rush Army for 200g. As usually rush a couple of Cavs.

Found two towns in the N and S.

Northern Front:
Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel attacks Magadan and kills a Rifle. (11/18)
Bombard a lot of units along the northern front. An eInf dies trying to kill a 1/4 rifle, a vInf then finishes the job, but goes down to 1/4.
Seydlitz retakes Chalco and kills a 1/4 Babylonian Knight, then moves to protect our 1/4 Inf.

Puttkamer finishes his road disconnecting job and kills two Aztecan Cavs.

Southern Front:
4 artillery bombard Malinalco, reducing two Rifles and a Musket to 1/x. A Cav is now the top defender. Zieten removes it and the two Rifles, a Cav then kills the Musket and takes Malinalco.

Ship 3 eLBs and a Cav to Island of Death, hoping one LB would take out the Cossack, and the other 3 units could be shipped on to Russia. Pustekuchen: two eLBs die, before the third finally succeeds -- and spawns another leader! A desperately needed reinforcement for the Southern front!

Feldmarschall von Kleist sets over to Russia and forms another Cavalry Army (15/18). Together Schwerin and Kleist decide to risk the attack on Yekaterinburg. Both kill a stray Cossack and a rifle in Yekaterinburg, but not enough strength to capture it.

IBT:
6 new Cossacks appear on the southern front. They burn down the combat town near Malinalco with 4 arties (ouch) and capture Tver', where I had just upgraded 2 LBs to Guerrilla for 300g (ouch, ouch).
Tver' goes from 9 to 4?! Can the AI draft below size 7???

On the northern front 6 new Aztecan Cavs cross the road-less choke.

7. 1435AD:
Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel (11/18) defeats two Rifles in Magadan and takes the town (7/18).
Puttkamer destroys 4 Aztecan Cavs.
Seydlitz kills 2 Rifles in Cempoala, but goes down to 5/18! A Cav kills the final defending Cav and takes Cempoala! (Promoting to 2/5).

Another combat town is founded and artillery bombards the remaining 2 Aztecian Cavs and two Rifles in Teayo down to 1/x. An elite Inf and Cav take out the two Cavs and spawn another leader! Generalleutnant von Arnim gets command over an Army, too... Need to ship more Cavs over.

Workers finish some railways to connect the northern towns.
Von Imhoff comes all the way from the northern end and kills a Rifle in Teayo. Von Arnim then takes that town. At least the war in the north is going well...

Ok, switched back to my laptop. Finally CAII spits out numbers that make sense again: 47 tiles to limit.

Meanwhile Generalleutnant von Wedel forms a new Army in Frankfurt. Together with a Cav and two Muskets he is shipped to Russia in order to help fix the disastrous situation there.
von Kleist kills two Cossacks and pillages a bit, von Schwerin does the same and also kills a vRifle in Tver'. Zieten finishes the last Rifle and Cossack and recaptures Tver'.

A *LB from the Island of Death attacks a Cossack, but dies! Cossack reduced to 1/4. A 3/4 Inf finishes the job, but also goes down to 1/4. These Cossacks are tough.

Build another combat town to reestablish contact to Malinalco, and build another railway segment. von Wedel goes to Malinalco to get another 3/4 Cav and at strength 7/8 attacks a rifle and Cossack pair next to Malinalco. Goes down to 1/8 without even making a scratch on the rifle!! Malinalco has to be left to its fate, and von Wedel retreats to the barracks of Tver'.

Situation in Russia is consolidated a bit, but still desperate. We will loose Malinalco, a combat town and 3 workers next turn.

IBT:
As expected, two Cossacks take Malinolco and burn down the combat town. But the workers are left alone, even though lots of other Russian units are running around here?!
The Babylonians land a LB next to Vladivostok. The Aztecs move two Cavs next to Teayo.
CA says: 44 tiles left.

8. 1440AD:
Two towns founded in the N for 15 tiles. Von Arnim defeats the two Aztecan Cavs.
The other Armies need some rest.
Rush the usual Cav and upgrade 3 Muskets to Inf. Also rush a Galleon in Cold Harbor. That should push us over the limit next turn.

IBT:
A Russian Privateer and a Frigate sink a Galley at Cold Harbor!
5 Aztecan Cavs march past Teayo.
CAII says 21 tiles.

9. 1445AD:
Finish rail-line to Magadan.
Found two more towns far north for 10 tiles.

7 artillery take 10 HP off the 5 Cavs, 3 eInf and an eCrusader kill two and drive two away. Another Inf and two Cavs kill the remaining two 1/4 Cavs.

Now 5 Armies are ready to strike southward: Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel, Seydlitz, Puttkamer, Imhof and Arnim, all completely healed except for Arnim (13/17).

Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel takes Tamuin (12 tiles), Seydlitz takes Shuruppak (11 tiles).
Workers are brought south to lay rails to the new border.
Puttkamer and Imhoff take Tzintzuntzen (9 tiles).
More workers and settlers are shipped over and build 3 more towns for 19 tiles.

In the south we have two healed Armies and two at 14 or 15 HP.
First we need to dispatch a handful of units ready to attack us next turn. This is done by Infs and Cavs. Settle another town for 6 tiles.

Zieten and Wedel recapture Malinalco (9 tiles). Kleist dispatches 3 more LBs and MIs and then secures Tver'. Schwerin kills another Rifle next to Malinalco and then digs in in that town. Situation in Russia looks stable now. we have collected 76 tiles this turn, so that should be enough, even if we loose a couple of towns in the interturn. Press enter and ---

IBT:
A Cossack comes out of the fog and takes undefended Vladivostok! Hey, I thought that was unreachable?! Two more Cossacks attack New Cologne, but our Infantry holds.
The Aztecs and the Babylonians snatch a couple undefended workers, but then ---
lots of we love the king day (had raised lux in the last turn...) and then ---

and then finally ---

Nine turns, that was longer than expected. But then: it was indeed 266 tiles to go instead of the expected 115... If I had not commenced on the ill-advised attack on Yekaterinburg in turn 6, it could have been one turn faster. (I was only 21 tiles short at the end of turn 8, which were basically the ones I had lost in the Russian counter-attack. And of course the casualties of that counter-attack stifled any offensive action in Russia for the next 2 turns.) Better would have been to consolidate, deal with incoming Cossacks while the Armies heal, and then land a final blow one turn earlier.

The finish line pictures:

Lanzelot

 

[DWetzel]

!

 

[GamezRule]

Nice! What's our score?

 

[Sparthage]

4054 according to CivAssist. Great game guys for my FIRST SG win!

 

[TheOverseer714]

Excellent work, Sir Lanzelot!

 

[splunge the 2nd]

Yay! My first SG and my first all war game!

Now, where do I sign up for another...

 

[Bucephalus]

lurker's comment:

Congratulations, guys.

Do you still intend to go back and play the game how Lanzelot(?) suggested (a palace jump IIRC)?

Interesting that you were having issues with CAII. We were experiencing similar anomalies during Buce02.

 

[del62]

lurker's comment:
Congratulation on another succesion victory

 

[TheOverseer714]

I think we may just move on, start a new game. No Germans! I've done at least 5 SGs as Germany. Maybe a 20K, I've never done a 20K SG.

 

[DWetzel]

I think we may just move on, start a new game. No Germans! I've done at least 5 SGs as Germany. Maybe a 20K, I've never done a 20K SG.

I'd love to be in for that. Maybe a limited-city game, that would go reasonably quickly. (I'm always up for a pure OCC, but that's got rather limited scope for gameplay -- what about a 0BC game?)