Preturn check, moved some unmoved units and loaded some unloaded units on some ships. It looks pretty messy in the west since there are not enough galleons there. The chain is broken and Chinese troops would probably have to deal on their own. They just need some time to heal. As I’ve written previously, we got to declare on Mali soon, so I’ve tried to prepare for moving 3 groups of samurai + cats to their waters. I also cancelled all trades with Mongols and Mali leaving only open borders. Pressing Enter. Nothing special except Mali founded Islam.
[1] Hamburg captured at a price of one samurai. Also killed wondering German galley with horse archer and catapult of board and killed 2 spearmen escorting a settler. We can declare to Mali within the next turn or may be one more turn. Make cease fire with Bismark (Stuttgart has a longbow and a spear), bombard Cuzco, advancing towards Machu Picchu. Timbuktu has 6 units, mostly longbowmen. Western ship chain is fully disconnected and galleons are being moved to build a new chain taking a few of the units from Egypt on the way. Research towards Guilds started and luxury decreased down to 10%. Poprushing is somewhat messed up due to forest chops and it is hard to figure out. Anyhow, took me slightly more than an hour for this first turn. Hopefully, other turns can be played faster.
[2] Nanjing razed, we can declare to Mongols in about 2 turns after most of Chinese veterans heal. More troops moved, assault on Cuzco ready next turn. Cancelled open borders to Kublai. AI does not counterattack.
[3] Cuzco captured at a price of one cat. Bad news is that Tiwanaki had been captured by barbarians and recaptured by Inca so a few samurai are dispatched to deal with that. Machu Picchu had been razed, lost one cat. Time to declare to Kublai and Mali. Killed a few Mongol units (archers and spearmen) and captured two settlers. Declared to Mali and landed 2 stacks near Timbuktu, Niani, Walata and Gao. It looks a little bit foolhardy though, I’m not sure I did the right thing declaring too early. But the situation looks good and we have an opportunity to raze a few cities. We are up to 68 samurai, that ought to do the job.
[4] Niani and northern Chinese city are both razed. Have to stop for a short brake, will shortly resume playing. Finally, whipped here and there a little bit, increased luxury slider up to 40% and it does not look like we can research guilds before the end of the game.
[5] Walata razed. Vitcos razed, Inca have two wondering knights. Poprushed again, war weariness is ridiculous. I guess all luxuries in the world would not be able to overcome that. We might still be forced to go into anarchy to prevent strike.
[6] Shanghai is razed and China is gone. Troops landed near Ning-hsia. Ollanta razed. IBT we lucked out and Inca lost both knights to samurai.
[7] Kumbi is razed. Huamanga razed. It does not seem we need to rush more troops, it might be OK to finish with what we have.
[8] Aryan finally razed. Turfan razed. Gao razed. Games is getting very trivial. Still logistics is a bit of a problem but we seem to be able to deliver enough troops anyhow.
[9] Ning-hsia razed. Vilkas razed. Another Malinese city Awda-something (north of Djenne) razed.
[10] Timbuktu razed. Tiflis razed. Stuttgart razed and Germany eliminated. OK, I have to stop now, I think I played total of 7 hours. There are a few units unmoved but I’m afraid I will just screw it up.
Notes to the next player:
1. Tiwanaku better be captured, this way we can move ships through it.
2. Samarqand is very reasonably defended, it might need a few extra cats.
3. Delivering troops to Karakorum is a major problem. We need at least 4 turns to get into position onto this city. And there might be more troops needed than are actually moving there.
4. Djenne and Tiwanaku should fall within 2-3 turns apparently. These are the last cities for Mali and Inca.
5. It might be worth trying to extend the ship chain to Samarqand or might be not, hard to tell.
6. Sometimes it is worth to attack from the ship if the chances are OK and losses are not so huge. I've destroyed Tiflis and Stuttgart this way losing only one samurai in each case but saving 2 turns (unloading, attack, and loading) for 2 other samurai on a galleon.
And probably there is no point of doing any kind of micromanagement in the mainland or anywhere actually for that be. We can just revolt and win without leaving the anarchy since we have Pyramids and can change many civics at once. It is neither cheesy nor worth the effort, it just does not matter. We should win within maximum of 6-7 turns, may be even less with some luck. It might be worth to bait a few extra Mongolian defenders with a couple of spare workers we have around there.