SGOTM 02 - Fifth Element

BrianS · Sep 28, 2006

I completed my turnset tonight. It was all about preparing for war. I started the Golden Age on my 4th turn. I ended in 1628 with 3 turns left in the GA. During that time, I built lots of military and positioned for war with HC.

Our naval force is positioned in 2 fleets --a northern fleet and a southern fleet.

The feint force is positioned in the east:

I'll leave it to Merum to start and fight the war.

We have 3 turns left to steel.

I was following KK's SODs but lost them near Egypt. The Samuarai is on a hill and can see some KK forces, but not the big SODs.

There are a bunch of units gathering at the launch point in west New Japan waiting for the galleons to return and pick them up.

Good luck Merum!

The Save

Turn Log:

Spoiler :

Sweetacshon · Sep 29, 2006

Good one Brian. - it's a pity about Tiflis, but what can you do? KK had 2 stacks? Goodnight, Hatty.

Everythings in position, but we seem a little light on grenadiers. The trouble is that we have no intelligence on HCs cities... isn't there a caravel that can take a look for us? Maybe it's too late, and we just go ahead anyway. So what is the battle plan?

The feint - I know these guys are a decoy, but they need somewhere to hole up initially. Possibly they could run in and rip up that silver mine, or iirc there is iron nearby also. Actually there is a forested hill 2S1W of Cor'china that would make a good defensive position.

The real force - What exactly is the plan here? We can definately ignore Huamanga for now, cutting it off will be enough to neutralise it, ad the reinforcements can raze it. To take or raze Tiawanku, that is the question? It would be easier and quicker to raze it and move straight to Cuzco, but it would make a good port for New Japan transport, so on that strength alone, it's probably worth keeping.

Obviously Cuzco is the target.. once you take out the capital, it's just a matter of time. Although Oll'ambo is the other big target, do we detour to raze tose 2 southern cities first? I guess it depends on the level of defence. It's all looking good, but don't forget about MMs old cities!!

Sorry guys, but I am going on holiday for a week or so, so I'll have to skip. I was hoping that I'd get my turn in before hand, but not to worry. Best of luck, and see you in a week.

Merum · Sep 29, 2006

OK. I think the forces we have arrayed are dangerously short of artillery. The bottom force has no artillery in it at all, and I don't think it can succeed in an attack.

I noticed our cultural borders now extend right up to Andahuaylas, and I know it's a last minute change and all, but I think I'd like to bring the feinting force down and begin the war by razing it. If we do this, it will put a dent in Huayna, and he'll chase our forces back to our borders. We'll also be able to use that stack for the defense of Ex-Mali, if needed. If not, The force will continue to Vitcos and raze that as well.

I've done a markup of my proposed war plan as it stands right now, see the screenies. The move to Andahuaylas will take 3 turns, which will finish our GA. I think delaying the war til then is wise. I see three cats heading toward the embarkation point, but there are no ships to ferry them until we offload. I'll try to figure out a way to bring more artillery online as quickly as possible.

Once we learn steel, I'm going to start building cannon like a mad bastard.

Perugia · Sep 29, 2006

@Merum

You beat me to saying that with our feinting stack in the N were we leaving former Mali rather weak. I like the new plan. Youmight want to bring along a worker or two to complete the gap in the road in the forest NW of Andahuaylas. If this is still in HC borders the one 1W of Andahuaylas would do instead. When the road is complete the workers can see if chopping any of the forests would give hammers to Djenne rather than HCs cities.

As Sweetacshon suggested, do we have any caravels to use on [future] intelligence missions?

We can probably afford to upgrade one or two of the catapults in our feinting stack to cannon for an instant boost to the front line artillery. Thewy must move first as upgrading removes all remaining mps. Another 2 or 3 turns to getting assembly line won't make that much difference.

To upgrade our shipboard cats the galleons would have to return to our own borders. If the bottom force can't succeed it should return to our own waters and save on supply costs or split up and reinforce the other 2 forces. The top force could spend the next 3 turns sailing home and not reinforce the artillery and then go back to Tiwanaku but that might be a mistake.

Actually your screenie have the southern armada landing and attacking Vitcos in phase 2 but as you rightly said this will fail as it lacks artillery so this force could just as easily join the attack on Andahuaylas possibly dropping some units in the forest east of Vitcos to allow one or two galleons to head home to bring in reinforcements. By leaving 1-2 galleons in the area and given that Andahuaylas will get razed on the first turn we can quickly redeploy the unused artillery from the feinting force back onto the galleons and land back in the Vitcos area on the second turn of war. The used artillery can get to Vitcos by boat on the third turn compared to 5 turns overland (If HC had build the road 1W of Andahuaylas this would not be necesarry but that forest blocks our penetration over land).

So the galleons that are to remain in the South should redeploy to the SE side of Vitcos from where they can head to the forest 1E of Vitcos or the tile 1S of Andahuaylas.

Don't forget to pillage the mine and cottage at Andahuaylas given an opportunity.

BrianS · Sep 29, 2006

Merum: OK. I think the forces we have arrayed are dangerously short of artillery

Yes, I completely agree. I tried to make up for this, but as you'll see, most of the cats didn't make it to the galleons in time to catch a ship. They're now either in port or on their way. We really need a couple more ships for this 2 fleet attack. There is a galleon in the inland sea which I thought about bringing back to New Japan to join the attack, but it would take too long to bring home, and I thought we might need it to ferry forces in the inland sea.

I agree with Perugia's suggestion to combine the cats in our feint force with the forces in our southern fleet to press the southern attack.

Merum · Sep 29, 2006

I think I found a way to get some more artillery into the mix fairly quickly. I'm going to change the Mali builds to catapults, all of which will be due in 3 turns. I'm not sure if we will get the cats before steel comes in, or if they will turn into cannon builds. If they turn into cannon and don't build on turn 3 (150 hammers for cannon opposed to 60 for cats), I'll whip them.

Alternatively, I can whip the cats right now, and then start another set, which will (I think) become cannon builds when steel comes in.

This approach, while delaying the infrastructure builds in Mali by a few turns, will put at least 3 more artillery pieces on the eastern front before the war kicks off.

Units that have the pinch promotion available to them will get them.

I have some things to do this morning, but plan to play this afternoon.

Perugia · Sep 29, 2006

@Merum. Forget my suggestion about upgrading catapuls to cannon. This is not good. For city bombardment catapults are more effective than cannon. 2 catapults cost 120 hammers and do -30% bombard damage whereas one cannon costs 150 hammers and only does -20% bombard damage.

Therefore I like your idea of building/whipping some more catapults now and then building the canon later to use as the suicide units. Many times they will survive due to their good combat factor. Keep the catapults back for bombards.

I agree with the switch of the 3 mali cities to catapult straight away. There is a great opportunity here to whip 176 hammers for just 2 pop at Timbuktu.

Since Timbuktu does not have a forge it has 25% pop rush bonus for catapults. I suggest you MM Timbuktu to reduce the no of hammers collected to 15 or less on the first turn (so there are 45-56 left). The moved citizens can collect more food and commerce instead including borrowing the corn farm from Niani.

The on the second turn when you whip the catapult you will receive 88 hammers. MM again to bring in about 30 hammers so on the third turn there is 73/60 or 73/150 towards the catapult/cannon whichever it turns out to be.

In my experience the catapults will not pop on the third turn but turn in to cannon. I would not myself pop rush the cannon in Tiwanaku on the turn we learn steel. A cannon at 73/150 will cost 2 pop points but wait one turn and MM again to be at or just under 105/150 (so there are 45-56 left) will again give you another 88 hammers for one pop.

These numbers do not apply to Djenne and Niani as they have 50% bonus. I have not had time to work out the optimum pop rush for 50% but I think I should now as most of our cities have police state + forges.

I am worried what we might find a Tiwanaku. I think one of the sourthern galleons should reinforce that landing so we have 12 units there rather than 9. Alternatively 2 of the galleons stay offshore so we can evacuate if we take heavy losses.

I am a bit confused - Since we have 3 holy cities why can't we see inside most of the the AI cities, I thought that's what holy cities did or do we have to be the founder?

Have fun!

BrianS · Sep 29, 2006

I am a bit confused - Since we have 3 holy cities why can't we see inside most of the the AI cities, I thought that's what holy cities did or do we have to be the founder?

The religion has to be our state religion for this to work.

Merum · Sep 29, 2006

Well...

So the war didn't go exactly as we planned it to go. Wars can be messy that way...

...but it's not so bad. (had you worried there for a minute, didn't I?) :mischief:

So, anyway. I've played 12 turns, because I lost count. I sure do hope they put the HOF mod and its turncounter and other neat features into the next SGOTM.

Let's get on with it, shall we?

IT
Change the Mali builds to Cats and MM to maximize whipping
Send the feint stack down to the previously discussed attack location
Send one galleon from the south force over to land with the Feint stack, the otherswill bolster the follow-on landing at Tiwanaku. They can move on Cuzco just as well from there.

I hope the Northern Galleons survive the Caravel attacks that will come. *crosses fingers*

I'm going to move the stack of three workers to the front to fill the road gap once they finish the lumbermill they're building (3)

Here we go...

Turn 1
Teotihuacan was captured by the Mongols.
I whip the cats. Somehow the bonus didn't seem to overflow at Timbuktu. I'm not sure how it went wrong, but we only overflowed 15. I pump the overflows into another round of cats.

Turn 2
our GA ends. Cats on the way to the launch point. Lots of cats piled up on our island now. Damn I wish we had more sealift capability!
One more turn to let the straggling cats get to the border. War next turn.

Turn 3
Here we go. I declare war on Huayna.
Our brave grenadiers pwn the rifles at Andahuaylas, and it is razed. I suicided one collateral dmg cat on the attack, and that's all we lost. Gained no cultural territory.
our galleon gets a look at Vitcos on the way by. Uh-oh...

We're going to need upgrade money. I dial research back to 70% to give us positive cash flow. I'm probably going to end up upgrading the defenders at Djenne.

Turn 4
Huayna has decided to hurl his stacks at Djenne, and we are in very big trouble there. I upgrade our two defenders to rifles and hope.
I couldn't stand waiting for the damn ships any longer, and offload on the peninsula.
The peninsula is lightly defended. Should be able to take Tiwanaku next turn.
I'm afraid we've underestimated Huayna. Let's hope we can get away with this...
I turn research off temporarily to gain upgrade money.
I cross my fingers about Djenne and hit enter

turn 5
Djenne is lost. Damn. I move the stack to siege the city.
In a fit of rage, I take Tiwanaku with no losses. I'll march that damn stack all the way to Djenne if I have to.

Turn 6
I crashed so hard I required a reboot in this turn, and I can't load the autosave for it without crashing again. I'm going to have to go back 1. I'll try to duplicate what I'd done.

Here's where I got caught up in the war and my note taking went to hell. There's not much to say besides what's in the turn log... lots of back and forth combat. Huayna had a bunch of units up his sleeve.

I've retaken Djenne, Taken Tiwanaku and Huamanaga. Huamanaga is not the best city site in the world, but I wanted to be sure we have control of the peninsula.

The situation is stable at the moment. Huayna is still dangerous, but we have better GNP, and can out produce him.

The turn log is too big... I'm attaching it in txt instead.

Vilcabamba is very vulnerable. It may be worth a side trip to go grab it with the stack E of Tiwanaku. Otherwise, just march on Cuzco. It may well be just as lightly defended.

I've got frigates bombarding both Vitcos and Vilcabamba.

There's a barracks building in Timbuktu, so that we can get collateral damage on any artillery built there.

The ship chain is a little bit screwed up. Sorry about that, I'm really not that familiar with ship chaining, as I consider it an exploit and don't generally use it.

There are some incan cavalry running around in Ex-Mali. Watch out for them.
It looks as though KK and Hatty might be fighting to a stalemate... not much news from that front now.

Here is the save

BrianS · Sep 29, 2006

Yeehaa! It looks like a wild ride Merum. I want to spend some time with the save to think about what we should do next, but you left us in good shape.

Merum · Sep 30, 2006

If I were still playing, I'd risk the sacrifice of a unit to probe toward Cuzco, and see what's there. If it's not defended well, I'd snatch it. If it is well defended, then I'd head up to Vilcabamba, take that, and turn E towards Ollantayambo.

Huayna has made only a couple of half-assed attacks at the western front, I think he may be close to spent now. Either that, or he's overextended himself in the East, like we thought he would. Djenne was a hell of a battle.

Perugia · Sep 30, 2006

A bit of a rollercoaster for you Merum but we have our bridgehead and I agree it's highly likely HC burnt most of his spare units at Djenne.

HC has a monopoly on Scientific Method (He also has constitution). I think we should take peace any time we can get Scientific Method. It will be a good bargaining chip in getting other AI to DoW on someone. Bismarck is willing if we have the right tech.

The ship chain needs a slight modification - the second sign should be 2 tiles further south in line with Vilcabamba so we maximise use of diagonal movement. From there its exactly 5 tiles into Tiwanaku or 3 hostile tiles on the road to Vilcabamba. Santiago pops another galleon in 4 (sooner if I whip it) and that will remove 3 units from the backlog at Santiago and give us the 6 galleons needed to complete the 15 tile chain. If we later add a 7th galleon we will be able to chain upto Vilcabamba.

I also think that we will actually have to use 4 galleons each trip on the 15 tile round trip because land units cannot disembark or move out of port if the carrying ship had used all its movement points.

~~I have the save and will look around making MM adjustments and seeing what the Diplo situation is but I'll wait for BrianS comments and everyone else's plus post a plan before playing.~~

I plan to start playing tomorrow morning at 8:45GM.

Draft Plan

1) Get HCs stack at Vitcos to attack our balanced counter forces in favorable terrain. Keep probing HCs weakest cities.
2) Make peace if we can get Scientific Method.
3) Defend Tiwanaku and Mali
4) Pillage neutral improvements resulting from KK-Hatty conflict
5) Research Steam Power at 100% then Corporation at evens then start Assembly Line
6) MM cities for their specialisation
7) City xx will get a dry dock
8) Start bank at Toledo but compensate by starting rifles at Kyoto and Surf n Turf
9) Decide if Osaka gets a bank or ironworks and work out how to build without disrupting unit construction too much
10) Chop forests outside fat crosses to assist above
11) Cancel deals with Hatty that are not needed any more thanks to captured resources
12) Renegotiate deals with KK, Mao and Bismarck for +6pt more from our seafood exports
13) Keep checking if any other wars can be started. Bismarck is willing to war with Hatty, KK or Mao but we don't have anything to offer. We might be able to get him to attack whoever is winning between KK and Hatty for Steam Power.
14) Do not trade tech for tech.

Perugia (up)
Blubmuz (on deck)
Doom Train
BrianS
Merum (resting)
Sweetacshon (skipped until 6 October)

Incan War
The ship chain looks OK to ship 2 rifles and a cannon over the first turn and that's good as the force in Tiwanaku looks like it needs them as HC has a couple of cavalry at Vitcos backed up by a Grenadier and a Knight that threaten Tiwanaku if we move on Vilcabamba or Cuzco before reinfiecement. There are a couple of spare galleons to begin a return chain or extend the chain. Vitcos also has a rifle, longbow, pike and cat but I doubt they will leave the city. We have a CD2 rifle in Huamanga that i will move along the isthmus to defend Tiwanaku with that in place and he reinforcemetns - it wil look good to move out the SoD.

I'm glad Merum placed frigates on both flanks not only are they reducing coastal defenses and removing thos pesky caravels but we can see what HC has. As Merum suggests it would be good to take a peek at Cusco to see what forces lie in the interior. I'll advance something to command the hills from where we can see what defense is there. Hopefully it will have not much more than Vilcabamba.

I think I'll put a few turns hammers into rifles at Kyoto and surf n Turf so we can pop rush some reinforcements if necessarry.

Diplomacy and Inter AI Wars
Once the resources of Neo-Japan are secure I will contact Hatty and cancel the Spices for Sugar and Pig for Stone deals as we will have our own and don't want to be helping Egypt more than we have to. I can also snag 6 more gpt from Mao, KK and Bismarck by increasing the price of seafood.

With our stone back we can double production speed of West Point.

KK still has 19 attack units in Egypt and has taken Teoihuacan and Alexandria. There are no Egyptian forces showing so I think KK still has the upper hand for now. We have a samurai watching events. Alexandria will come out of revolt next turn but there is some neutral territory there at the moment so I'm going to take the opportunity to pillage the rice paddy and mine. There's also a big neutral gap between Essen and Cologne wit lots of improvements near where an Egyptian city has been razed. It might be wise to find a unit to pillage there as well.

Mao and Bismarck are ahead of us techwise just by Constitution but we can catch up by trading Steel to Hatty or KK and snag 600 gold and useless Divine Right in the process. KK will still lag by Replaceable Parts after this. The AI likes Democracy which costs the same as Steel so Steel will not be enough to trade for Democracy as 2 AI already have it. As we won't get Democracy for steel and there lead is only in dead end techs I think we are better off not trading.

Economy Research
As inherited Steam Power is due in 4 followed by Corporation at 70% break even spending. I'd like torun 100% science to cut a turn off Steam Power to reveal where the coal is so we can stt if Osaka has Iron & Coal and is ripe for the Ironworks. This will still leave 800+ gold for emergency upgrades eg if HCs cavalry approach Niani we need to upgrade the two samurai defenders there to riflemen for 400gold.

We should try to get a level 5 unit and think about building our West Point also one city should be designated for ship builds and get a dry dock. maybe Tokyo Edo or Madrid

With our workers speed increased by 50% I'd like to chop the 7 or so forests in Japan that are inside our borders but outside city fat crosses.

Then its Corporation (+1 trade rout per city) which will really boost the economy. I had thought of switching to Corporation now but really want to know where the coal is asap.

Madrid is building a bank - I'm not sure this is needed - I'd prefer an observatory (+1 scientist) Christian Cathedral (+2 priests) - both cost 225 hammers if we get our stone back from Hatty. Alternatively just stick with what we have by way of specialists and build units in Madrid.

Toledo/Osaka would be a better places for banks. I'll try and not interfere with military unit production at Osaka while building a bank. A bank in Osaka will be twice as good to us as any other city due to the huge amount of commerce it generates. A few well time chops going into units would free up normal production for the bank.

There are spurious AI generated engineers in many of our cities that could be bringing in food. I'll MM before I start.

BLubmuz · Sep 30, 2006

@Merum
Good TS, with more than a bit of misfortune.
At last you managed to recover.
Good luck for next week .

@Perugia
Your attention to details is something i appreciate, and your posts help me to improve my gameplay.
Pity you don't participate at GotM, you would have good results.
(this means your last post is OK for me)

No more to say, just ... civ is civ, and a samurai can often loose to a cat :mad:

... good luck.

land units cannot disembark or move out of port if the carrying ship had used all its movement points.

NOOO!! just select the ship, then select the units in the ship, and move THEM on port or land.
The only trouble is they can't move on port (but they won't if still in the ship) and, of course nothing changes if not in a city.

BrianS · Sep 30, 2006

Looks like an excellent plan Perugia. Good luck!

Merum · Sep 30, 2006

At minimum, Cuzco and Ollantayambo are keepers. Probably all of the cities in the incan mainland could contribute to the war effort, but of course the impact of cultural pressure from KK has to be considered (at least until we throw down with him).

If we can wrest the mainland away from him and then get SM, that would be pretty cool, but I think at a bare minimum the main war objectives should still be pursued before accepting the tech from HC for peace. The obvious challenges of shipping units across the ocean has convinced me we need a manufacturing base on the ring continent.

BTW, has anybody built Versailles yet?

What would we need more priest specialists in Madrid for at this point? The utility of Great Prophets at this late stage of the game is extremely limited... We'll generate a disproportionate amount of prophet GPPs this way?

Perugia · Oct 1, 2006

Thanks for the comments and vote of confidence. All noted. Ocean shipping is difficult and certainly needs a lot of attention to do well which is tricky in war time.

I just realised that as we have a backlog of units in Santiago instead of just sitting in the city wasting their move these waiting units should move SE along the coast which brings them closer to New Japan. This reduces the distance our empty galleons have to move westwards. Once the backlog clears the starting point can shift slowly back up the coast to Santiago.

BLumbuz. Sometimes I pay too much attention to detail and miss the bigger picture - I try hard not to do this. I'd love to play moe GOTM but I find it takes too much time.

Versailles has not been built yet.

Perugia · Oct 1, 2006

Turn 0 1664AD
Science set to 90% for Steam Power in 3.
Inner sea galleon sent to Surf n Turf to pick up archer that will pillage neutral improvements near Essen.
Healing rifles in Djenne given fortify order.

Barcelona is unhappy and growing in 1 and hammer poor so is a prime candidate for MMing a mega bank whip at exactly 79/300 and 25% bonus whipping just 4 pop will give us 264 hammers!!!!! Need 13 hammers to get there just 2 turns.
Switch Madrid production from Bank to Observatory for +1 scientist.
Start Bank at Toledo.
Start Lighthouse in Tiwanaku and Barracks in Huamanga.

Notice HC has a caravel off Seville stoppng Tokyo working fish and starving it. Rush galleon in Seville to attack it without interrupting ship chain.

Seafood deals renegotiated as planned for +6gpt.

Turn 1 1667AD
Santiago galleon overflow > barracks due in 1!!!!!
Vitcos force does nothing we can now see Cuzco. 3 rifles, 1 crossbow, 3 catapults. I'm worried by the collateral damage and would like to approach from the hill/river side.

Pigs are connected at Timbuktu and one of the marauding cavalry is killed so I cancel the Spices and Pigs deals with Hatty. No more stone and sugar for her!

More KK units head East.

Turn 2 1670AD
HC catapults our units spying on Cuzco and withdraws but our cavalry finishes it off.
Mongols capture Elephantine we send our samurai there to pillage.
Start an explorer in Kyoto fo pillage purposes.
Rush Banco de Barcelona for 4 pop=264 gold!
Lose a rifle removing the last marauding Incan cavalry. Now targetting Ica as we are took weak to advance on Cuzco from the East and defend Mali from the south plus there is a cavalry there I want to kill before it heals

I'm thinking it will be good value to upgrade any city raider obsolete units to grenadiers so we can take out HCs riflemen. Any obsolete units without city raider but just about to earn a promo might be worth taking along to kill damaged enemy and get enough XP for a city raider promo.

Hatty and Bizzy now have Scientific Method. If we need some gold in a hurry can sell Replaceable Parts to KK for 680 Gold and Divine Right. This is starting to feel attractive. The 680 gold will allow us to get to assembly line quicker. While considering this I sell sheep to KK for 2 gpt rather than gifting it.

Turn 3 - 1673AD
Zzzzz from HC except the 2 cats at Cuzco have dissappeared so I can approach but I'm worried where they went.
See a mongol galleon on the inner sea. We need to have a frigate or ironcald there when we go to war with KK.
Hatty wants Steel for Constitution and 40g. We respectfully suggest a map trade instead and give her 10g to make it work. She's glad we accepted her offer.
KK wants us to join his crusade vs Hatty. I'm sorely tempted but we are doing rather well pillaging neutral former Egypt tiles at them moment with weak units besides I don't think KK really needs our help and I'm worried Hatty will send a galleon to Japan which is weakly defended. Take -2 diplo hit for my timidity.
Steam Power is learned and we start Corporation.
Mao and Bismarck now have steel. Hatty has Democracy and adopts Emancipation so we sell steel to KK for constitution and 690 gold so we can aquire Democracy ir we need to. All the AI except KK have Corporation so we set science to 0% for one turn and put the scientist beakers into Railroad to see what happens.

Niani now has barracks and granary so is now on stream for rifle construction.
We prepare to advance on Cuzco and Ica.
Rush University in Kyoto
Rush Lighthouse and Barracks in Tiwanaku for 3 pop - it's starving anyway.
Rush Grenadier in Osaka for 1 pop removing unhappiness because emancimation penalty reduced from +2 to +1. Stagnant.

There is coal near Gaul and ironworks sites SE of gaul and E of Awdaghost but its probably too late in the game to build units there so if we want it I suggest the ironworks may as well go in Osaka. Gaul looks interesting now it has coal, horse & sheep

Turn 4 - 1676AD
Buy corporation from KK for replaceable parts and 120g. What a bargain! Set science to 70% for assembly line due in 16.
Mao and Hatty are Democrats.
Our galleon dies attacking HC galley in inner sea! Caravels finish the job especially after one upgraded to frigate.

I stop here for the night and upload the save for you to look at. Sorry but no screenies until tomorrow but it's not much different to before I started only the ship chain has been working well and the backlog have alllanded in Tiwanaku. We have a couple of SoDs ready to advance on Cuzco + a galleon load of units to reinforce. The bombardment will start next turn.

We are also about to raze Ica but have left the defenses of Mali very thin to do this. It looks like I have just got away with it as only 1 cavalry has showed up and I have blocked its progress with a rifle on a hill.
Audaces Fortuna Iuvat (Virgilio)
Fortune favours the brave

Spoiler turnlog so far :

Hi BLumbuz! Sorry about the nerves. Cuzco will be ours.........I deleted the superfluos post as suggested.

With Scientific Method our there we need to decide what our state religion for Theocracy will be. We can then build one monastery of that religion on each continent so we can easily spread it.

I think it would be good to have Buddhism as State Religion. I play in 12 hours

Perugia · Oct 1, 2006

Turn 4 - 1676AD continued

I thought it had been too quiet around Tiwanaku - HC has been massing this naval force at Vitcos. I wonder where they're headed.

Spoiler :

Turn 5 - 1679AD
HCs fleet makes its move towards Tiwanaku as the bombardment of Cuzco begins. I decided to press our advantage and move the suicide cannons and assault grenadiers up to Cuzco but withdraw some rifles and other units that had just crossed the border for defensive duties. Meanwhile in the east we raze Ica.

Turn 6 - 1682AD
HC lands at Huamanga - I heavily reinforce it with rifles, cannon and anything else around.

Meanwhile we complete our assembled force to attack Cuzco which is defended by just 3 rifles, 1 crossbow & 1 catapult.

Turn 7 - 1685AD
St Augustine is born in Madrid I think I'll add him to Osaka as a super specialist. The next GP will come in about 28 turns also in Madrid.

We now have a level 5 grenadier near Ollantaytambo so can build West Point. Try not to have it killed!

HC attacks but our troops in Huamanga manage to hold on and I ship in fresh units. HCs damaged stack is stuck at the end of the peninsula.

Meanwhile Cuzco falls and the road to Ollantaytambo is open.

The only worry is HCs stack of 4 frigates + 4 galleons that may cause our ship chain to scatter and means we will have to approach Vitcos the long way overland. I hope we can sink them in port. I'm also targetting Gaul so we can snag coal to build ironclads if needed.

Oh and Hatty just sent a naval force past Surf n Turf headed for Mongolia!

Turn 8 - 1688AD
HC attacks Huamanga and again fails but we lose some units. His remaining units are eliminated.

Turn 9 - 1691AD
Advance on Vitcos and Ollantaytambo.

Turn 10 - 1694AD
Bombard Vitcos Vilcabamba and Ollantaytambo.

There's a frigate 5 tiles from Vitcos but it cannot approach for fear of HC ships in port (they should die there soon).

Gaul will fall this turn (Grenadier vs Longbow) and we can then road to the coal.

Vitcos and Ollantaytambo will fall in 2 turns. We are suffering some WW so I put culture at 10% so we can finish the job.

Bismarck will DoW on anyone for steam power. I think we should. Assembly line due in 14.

BLubmuz · Oct 1, 2006

Hey, this installment-report destroys my nervous system :crazyeye:

BTW, why not post in the first spoiler?
Can we charge BrianS for this?

I've seen your last additions to your #377 Perugia, but i'm not convinced theocracy is useful ... 2 XP points are not worth all that anarchy and efforts.

OTOH i agree about momasteries, better build some before SM, you'll never know ...

@ Perugia, your #380
OK, you talk about Theocracy as an eventual choice
anyway we can quickly convert to christianity our cities in the ring continent with some misssionary.
I suggest to build at least 1 monastery for every religion we have, it's cheap at this stage, and can be useful.
In the meantime i'll send a C. missionary in former Mali, to convert 1 city and to build a C. monastery there (better 2, 1 can fail)

Perugia · Oct 2, 2006

@BLumbuz
I'm discussing Theocracy because, up to now, I have thinking we have one or two more anarchies in this game once we learn Assembly Line:
Nationhood
Emancipation
Theocracy
Buddhism

OTOH We would lose the happiness benefit of free religion, the bureaucracy bonus and the ability to pop rush. We would also have to hold 2 revolutions one civil and one religious to become Buddhist Theocrats and spam missionaries. Christian Theocracy would remove one period of anarchy but units trained on the ring continent would not benefit.

Bearing this in mind I'm coming round to the view that this anarchy and effort is no real help and may well delay victory.

@ BLumbuz, your #379 edit
Yes I will establish Christianity in the ring continent and build a monastery but will stay with free religion for now. With this monastery, later in the game when we have no more need for diplomacy we will be able to adopt Christian Theocracy if it seems a good idea at the time. I'm off hoe now to heve some food and then play on.....

.... I'm still here but something just cropped up and I have to stop but it's been really great so far.

Briefly. We got to Cuzco and found just 3 rifles, 1 crossbow & 1 catapult. During the bombardment HC showed up with a huge naval force he had built at Vitcos. We decided to press our advantage and moved the suicide cannons and assault grenadiers up but withdrew the rifles and other units that had just crossed the border for defensive duties.

HC landed next to Huamanga so we heavily reinforced it and managed to hold on. Needless to say. Cuzco is now ours and HCs damaged stack is stuck at the end of the peninsula and will die next turn while the road to Olly is open.

The only worry is HCs stack of 4 frigates + 4 galleons that may cause our ship chain to scatter. I hope we can sink them in port. I'm also targetting Gaul so we can snag coal to build ironclads if needed.

Oh and Hatty just sent a naval force past Surf n Turf headed for Mongolia!

SGOTM 02 - Fifth Element

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In the foetal position

Permanent Jet Lag

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HoF Quattromaster

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