SGOTM 07 - Xteam

[Mad Professor]

You might need to delay Steel by one turn to build the 4th cat.

Noted. If needed, some beakers will go into Physics.

(re GS) And we can use him right now to avoid paying maintenance on him.

Maintenance on GS? Oh I suppose we do pay it. No reason why the GS beakers can't go to physics straight away!

We might be able to get more gold if we wait a few turns to trade techs. We only need the gold when we're getting close to declaring on Washington. When the time comes to upgrade the cats and Choko, you can decide what techs you want to trade away. Liberalism and Education are good ones.

Yes. Noted.

Build theater (at least) during any turns between time our attack force is built and the HE is available.

Good idea. Hopefully the HE will be available very early in the war, but if needed, some hammers can go into that.

There are two trades we should make during the current turn. Lizzie will give us 60 Gold for our Map and Julius will give us 50 for it. No techs needed. Waiting a bit for other trades may be a good idea as some of the civs might build up a bit more?
I hope we can trade for Banking as well.

I also agree that we should ask for Asoka's gold this turn.

Noted.

If we delay signing with Capac, which I think is a good idea, please keep an eye on Asoka's movements. If he is sending a stack that way, sign a cease fire to keep that stack for use against Washington. Let's try not to let Asoka get side tracked anywhere...

I'll be watching him like a hawk in any case. I learned from testing that managing a PA partner in a war requires you watch what he does with his units every turn. I'm happy to delay signing with Capac.

Should be the last one because the previous 3 cats need to be upgraded and ready for attack the turn when the last cat is built and the medic cat can stay in Beijing healing our 9/10 grenadier while the cannons bombard. If we follow my attack idea then 2 cannons get CR1+Accuracy and 1 cannon get CR1. The last cannon is already promoted (Combat 1). If we bombard with the two accuracy cannons and the Combat 1 cannon cultural defenses should go down by 30%+30%+20%=80% i.e. down to 12% (not 6% as I said earlier). The longbow should have a strength of 8.5 against the strength 12 CR1 cannon - an easy win I think and upgrading it next turn should give it reasonable odds for gaining a second win against one of the cats. (The idea is to have two shots for a 10 XP unit).

Sounds good.

Regarding the upgrade timing. Some good points. I think upgrading does take the fortification bonus back to zero - it's the same as "moving" the unit in that regard. That means upgrading the G2 archer should be done ASAP to get it in place and fully fortified before war starts.

 

[Cactus Pete]

"Good idea. Hopefully the HE will be available very early in the war, but if needed, some hammers can go into that." There should be at least two turns between the turn our medic cat is built and we have a veteran for HE.

 

[Frederiksberg]

"Good idea. Hopefully the HE will be available very early in the war, but if needed, some hammers can go into that." There should be at least two turns between the turn our medic cat is built and we have a veteran for HE.

Most likely there will be only one turn between building the medic cat and the turn where we start building the HE. Attack can start the same turn as the medic cat is built (bombarding with 3 cannons and then attacking with one). Next turn we can attack with our two 10 XP candidates and switch to building the HE. This means that we would be able to put a little over 20 base hammers into a Theater. It requires 28 base hammers. Our following cannons will be 1 turn delayed and we save a little over 20 hammers that would be "wasted" on a unit. Theater gives some insurance against a sudden burst of WW due to increased efficiency of the culture slider. Does this justify the delay of units? Hard to say. I won't argue against - only note that this must mean that the plan is to build the Globe at a later stage rather than the market.

 

[Mad Professor]

I'll play a few turns this evening - might not be many. Currently after 9pm already. Tomorrow a busy day but eveining looks good for more play. I'll post again this evening when I've played a few turns with a report.

 

[leif erikson]

I'll play a few turns this evening - might not be many. Currently after 9pm already. Tomorrow a busy day but eveining looks good for more play. I'll post again this evening when I've played a few turns with a report.

Good Luck MP!

The second half of the operation begins.

 

[Frederiksberg]

I'll play a few turns this evening - might not be many. Currently after 9pm already. Tomorrow a busy day but eveining looks good for more play. I'll post again this evening when I've played a few turns with a report.

Good luck!

And be careful with the pre-chopping. The safest way to handle this is to cancel all worker actions before pressing enter to advance to the next turn. Then you will always be alerted when there is only one turn left to chop. What often surprises people is that even if the mouse-over says that the chop will come in 2 turns it will actually come immediately after pressing enter in some cases.

 

[Mad Professor]

OK. I’ve played 4 turns so far. No big surprises, though some events are interesting.

I opened the file, it’s T134, 475AD
I ask Asoka to study Chem, he agrees
I use the GS in Beijing on Physics, 1641 beakers.
Workers come home and start chopping forests
Mace and archers head towards home too
I sign peace treaty with Kublai for 30 gold
War weariness is suddenly at 3!! This means 2 unhappy faces in Beijing. Beijing stagnant and production reduced. No good. So we need peace with Capac too. Sign cease fire with him since he doesn’t have any gold anyway. War weariness disappears.
Ask Asoka for 273 gold. He agrees.
The G2 archer heads north.
Cyrus, Fred and Saladin all refuse map deals
Sell map to Caesar for 50 gold, and to Liz for 60 gold
Revolt to Theocracy
End turn

IBT:
Tokugawa cancels open borders! Asked by Alex maybe?
Asoka adopts free religion – how’s that for fast reaction to getting Liberalism?
Cyrus completes Versailles
We have Chemistry
Washington still sending units towards Cuzco
Alex takes big dip in power, Liz a little dip
Liz and Cyrus both have banking, neither will trade it
Asoka has a WE and Pike heading for Greece

T135 500AD
Ask Asoka to study steel. He agrees
We switch to steel – it says 4 turns to get there
G2 archer arrives on silver hill, upgraded to lbow for 95 gold
Asoka has 4 turns to university in Bombay and 4 turns to Observatory in Delhi
Various unit moves
End turn

IBT:
Mansa asks for a gift of feudalism. I refuse.
Beijing finishes a cat, starts another
Forests now just one turn from chopped, ready to go when HE available
Washington still sending units south
Asoka lost WE and Pike in Greece , another WE heading there

T136 520AD
Hatty gives us 20 gold for our map
I cancel gift of copper to Tokugawa
End Turn

IBT:
Significant English stack next to Athens – will probably capture! Only 2 wounded lbows and phalanx defending!
Asoka has WE near Athens
Liz and Alex both lose significant power
Washington now has musketmen in NY and Wash. Still attacking Cuzco

T137 540AD
CR2 mace reaches Asoka gold hill and is upgraded to gren
Upgrade Chok to gren
End turn

IBT:
Beijing grows to size 18, now using stone tile (nice hammers!)
Beijing finishes cat, starts another
Washington makes peace with Capac. Now has musket + lbow + 2 cats SW of Washington. The Washington stack will be a big one when we get there!
Wash has moved muskets out of cities
Liz captures Athens
Leif Erickson born in Persepolis! (Can't keep you out of the game, leif! )
New cat built in NY
Delhi starves because of 2 greek galleys while a frigate just sits and watches!

T138 560AD
Ask Asoka to change to Physics. He agrees
We switch to Physics (only one turn to Steel, and we want another cat yet)
CR2 gren reaches China
Sell Education to Fred for map and 80 gold
Sell Education to Saladin for 60 gold
Sell Liberalism to Cyrus for map and 100 gold
Sell Liberalism to Liz for 80 gold
Sell Liberalism to Washington for map and 40 gold
Turn not yet ended

So now we’re one turn from the last cat we need (the medic), then after that one turn to steel, then we upgrade the cats (except the medic) to canons, then declare on America and attack NY. After getting Steel, it should be just 6 turns to Physics.

I will play some more tomorrow night, starting about 20 hours from now unless there's an argument raging.

Now let's see about giving you a copy of the save to look at...

View attachment SGOTM07 AD-0560.Civ4SavedGame

Looks like it worked. I'm off to bed...

 

[Cactus Pete]

With all those cats in NY, the odds are high that Wash will attack us or possibly Asoka or both. Certainly our CR2 gren is extremely vulnerable where he stands nowYou need to defend critical tiles and entice him to attack where his cats will be most vulnerable and/or can do the least damage. I don't think the single longbow on the silver is safe either. Move some archers out of city to defend (or be in position to gift to Asoka for that purpose) and fortify them now. If there is extra gold available to upgrade one or two to choks, that would be nice.

I notice that Asoka has 12 gpt available. Should we ask him for that, thinking we will put it to better use than he or would that detract from his higher-rate research?

The theater does not necessarily imply the Globe. It would also work in concert with the market and delay when we would need to build it.

 

[Cactus Pete]

I will be unavailable for the next 36 hours. Good luck!

 

[ShannonCT]

So now we’re one turn from the last cat we need (the medic), then after that one turn to steel, then we upgrade the cats (except the medic) to canons, then declare on America and attack NY. After getting Steel, it should be just 6 turns to Physics.

I thought we wanted 5 cats total. Should we just go for 4 total and upgrade all to cannons? Maybe follow with an explorer Medic? If we still want 5 cats, we need to wait 2 more turns for Steel.

With all those cats in NY, the odds are high that Wash will attack us or possibly Asoka or both. Certainly our CR2 gren is extremely vulnerable where he stands now

But the CR2 gren should stay where he is so he can start healing. On the turn we declare, he can get out of the line of fire.

You need to defend critical tiles and entice him to attack where his cats will be most vulnerable and/or can do the least damage. I don't think the single longbow on the silver is safe either. Move some archers out of city to defend (or be in position to gift to Asoka for that purpose) and fortify them now. If there is extra gold available to upgrade one or two to choks, that would be nice.

Yes, we can put some archers on our borders to bait the cats. Maybe give Asoka 1 or 2 as well. The idiot has put 2 of his grens on a galleon headed for god-knows-where.

We have enough gold to upgrade another archer to a LB so we can defend the silver better. Capac will give 30 gold for map. Cathy has gold if we need it.

I notice that Asoka has 12 gpt available. Should we ask him for that, thinking we will put it to better use than he or would that detract from his higher-rate research?

I guess he's saving up for more upgrades. If we take the 12 GPT, he'll probably further reduce his research rate.

The theater does not necessarily imply the Globe. It would also work in concert with the market and delay when we would need to build it.

Sounds good.

 

[leif erikson]

Nice work thus far MP. Keep it up.

I thought we wanted 5 cats total. Should we just go for 4 total and upgrade all to cannons? Maybe follow with an explorer Medic? If we still want 5 cats, we need to wait 2 more turns for Steel.

Will 4 be enough? Three of Washington's Cats have Barrage 1, +20% Collateral damage. Do we bombard with three Cannons and attack with the fourth to do some damage before he attacks us? Should our fourth Cannon have CR1 and Barrage1. Then we could follow with a medic Explorer as you suggest?

Yes, we can put some archers on our borders to bait the cats. Maybe give Asoka 1 or 2 as well. The idiot has put 2 of his grens on a galleon headed for god-knows-where.

Baiting away some of the Cats, although I'm not sure he'll use more than two, is a good idea. Are we going to defend the Cannons with Grens or leave them to defend themselves?

We have enough gold to upgrade another archer to a LB so we can defend the silver better. Capac will give 30 gold for map. Cathy has gold if we need it.

Another LB would be helpful.

I guess he's saving up for more upgrades. If we take the 12 GPT, he'll probably further reduce his research rate.

I would not be in favor of taking more Gold from him,. His research rate has dropped to 90% now. We need to get to Artillery as quickly as we can! Actually, taking a couple of cities is probably the best way to solve this.

Can we involve Washington with anyone else (doesn't look like it..)? What will we need for forces to lay siege to Washington (the city)? Hope we can get HE quickly as we'll need more units to go after Washington's capital.

 

[Frederiksberg]

Good work and nice write up, MP

I thought we wanted 5 cats total. Should we just go for 4 total and upgrade all to cannons? Maybe follow with an explorer Medic? If we still want 5 cats, we need to wait 2 more turns for Steel.

The plan is 5 cats total. We only need to wait one more turn for Steel and more important it doesn't delay Artillery in any way. We could proceed like this: Research Physics this turn also and Beijing will build the cat. Next turn start a new cat that will finish in one turn (this is the medic!) and switch research to Steel. The last cat is built the same turn as Steel is discovered (CR1 cat leave the 2nd promo for later). Now, upgrade all cats except the medic. Start building Theater or Cannon. Next turn bombard with the accuracy and the combat 1 cannons and attack with the CR1 cannon (Should have reasonable odds of wining and reaching 8 XP). Then next turn use 2nd promo for CR1 canon to partially heal it and attack with everything we have got looking for a favorable battle for our 9 XP gren and the 8XP canon. There should be a good chance of success and we can start the HE this turn.

You need to defend critical tiles and entice him to attack where his cats will be most vulnerable and/or can do the least damage.

I'm not sure that I follow this. The cats are most vulnerable where they are now, inside NY (because we have CR promoted units and cats don't get defensive bonuses) so why would we want to entice them to move away? Sacrificing an archer means one less grenadier later when we have money for upgrades so it seems pretty expensive to do this. If he wants to move some cats into our territory let him do so - we should be able to kill them with the units we have.

EDIT: Fortified archers on hills or in the forest could be worth a try since they will have a decent chance of defeating any cats that attack.

We have enough gold to upgrade another archer to a LB so we can defend the silver better. Capac will give 30 gold for map. Cathy has gold if we need it.

Let's sell the map and upgrade the archer to longbow - that should give us just enough gold when we also do the following: Trade copper for 5 gpt with Cyrus and AFTER the HE is built trade marble for 4 gpt with Cathy. Maybe we also need to ask for a few (10-20) gold from Asoka.

 

[Frederiksberg]

I would like to look a little bit ahead in the game because it might affect planning already now.

Assuming that we can trade for Banking we should discover Artillery in less than 30 turns and maybe that's the end of the line for "fast" research? What I'm contemplating is to transform Beijing into a production city by replacing all towns and villages by work shops and adopt State Property to keep the food level unchanged. Beijing would get 3*7=21 extra base hammers this way or 57 extra hammers per turn when building units. If this is indeed the way to go we should already now think about pre-building work shops on top of our villages and towns so that we can do the transformation fast when Artillery is discovered.

Universal Suffrage is another way to improve production - it requires extra techs and is inferior because 1 hammer costs 3 gold and this hammer does not receive the 2.75 multiplier that a "base hammer" does.

Other ways to improve production?

EDIT: After building the Globe we could also whip down Beijing a little so that we can regrow 1 pop in a couple of turns. Paired with the work shops we should be able to build artillery almost every turn.

 

[Mad Professor]

The plan is 5 cats total. We only need to wait one more turn for Steel and more important it doesn't delay Artillery in any way. We could proceed like this: Research Physics this turn also and Beijing will build the cat. Next turn start a new cat that will finish in one turn (this is the medic!) and switch research to Steel. The last cat is built the same turn as Steel is discovered (CR1 cat leave the 2nd promo for later). Now, upgrade all cats except the medic. Start building Theater or Cannon. Next turn bombard with the accuracy and the combat 1 cannons and attack with the CR1 cannon (Should have reasonable odds of wining and reaching 8 XP). Then next turn use 2nd promo for CR1 canon to partially heal it and attack with everything we have got looking for a favorable battle for our 9 XP gren and the 8XP canon. There should be a good chance of success and we can start the HE this turn.

Right. Seems good.

The cats are most vulnerable where they are now, inside NY (because we have CR promoted units and cats don't get defensive bonuses) so why would we want to entice them to move away? Sacrificing an archer means one less grenadier later when we have money for upgrades so it seems pretty expensive to do this. If he wants to move some cats into our territory let him do so - we should be able to kill them with the units we have.

EDIT: Fortified archers on hills or in the forest could be worth a try since they will have a decent chance of defeating any cats that attack.

Fred has a point. If we could entice one of those longbows, or the musket that will probably return there out of NY, now that would be worth it. It's worth enticing a cat out if we can kill it in the process with a unit that might not otherwise paricipate in assaulting the city ie an archer. I'll have a look at the terrain before ending the turn and look to placing an archer or two with this in mind. Don't have it in front of me right now.

Assuming that we can trade for Banking we should discover Artillery in less than 30 turns and maybe that's the end of the line for "fast" research? What I'm contemplating is to transform Beijing into a production city by replacing all towns and villages by work shops and adopt State Property to keep the food level unchanged. Beijing would get 3*7=21 extra base hammers this way or 57 extra hammers per turn when building units. If this is indeed the way to go we should already now think about pre-building work shops on top of our villages and towns so that we can do the transformation fast when Artillery is discovered.

Ineresting. Any comments? The workers certainly aren't doing anything urgent at the moment and their only job coming up is one turn of chopping each to build the HE. We might find infantry handy before the end if we're not quite quick enough, but we'd continue towards that anyway.

No chance of trading for banking at the moment unfortunately, and I suspect a couple of other civs might have to get it before it becomes generally available - or maybe Cyrus or Liz get economics, then they'll be happy to let banking out of the bag? We'll just have to wait and see what happens in the next 7 turns while we're finishing physics. Obviously we want to trade for it by then if we're going to.

The idiot (Asoka) has put 2 of his grens on a galleon headed for god-knows-where.

An example of just how dumb the AI can be. He's probably sailing them around the bottom of the continent to Greece! He put the grens in a galleon simply because he had a galleon - that's how the AI thinks unfortunately. Just like his frigate is defending the fishing boats, so he'll let Delhi starve while those greek galleys sit there unmolested. This is what we're dealing with for the rest of the game folks - managing the PA partner will be a little "interesting".

We have enough gold to upgrade another archer to a LB so we can defend the silver better. Capac will give 30 gold for map. Cathy has gold if we need it.

The upgrade would cost 95 gold. I can't remember how much the cat to canon upgrades will cost, but I think we have enough. As you point out, we can grab a little more from various people.

 

[ShannonCT]

What I'm contemplating is to transform Beijing into a production city by replacing all towns and villages by work shops and adopt State Property to keep the food level unchanged. Beijing would get 3*7=21 extra base hammers this way or 57 extra hammers per turn when building units. If this is indeed the way to go we should already now think about pre-building work shops on top of our villages and towns so that we can do the transformation fast when Artillery is discovered.

Universal Suffrage is another way to improve production - it requires extra techs and is inferior because 1 hammer costs 3 gold and this hammer does not receive the 2.75 multiplier that a "base hammer" does.

Remember US gives 1 hammer to each town, and we'll have mostly towns in 30 turns. A workshop is worth 2 more base hammers than a town under US, and 9 less gold. Then there's the lost trade route for being in State Property instead of Free Market. Workshops are still more productive, but not by a lot. And towns are more versatile if we decide we need more techs (Assembly Line? Biology?).

 

[Mad Professor]

I'm about to go out for the rest of the day. I will probably begin playing some more in about ten hours from now - or thereabouts.

 

[leif erikson]

Ineresting. Any comments? The workers certainly aren't doing anything urgent at the moment and their only job coming up is one turn of chopping each to build the HE. We might find infantry handy before the end if we're not quite quick enough, but we'd continue towards that anyway.

If the Workers are bored, I see no harm in building, to within 1 turn, Workshops on those tiles. We can make the decision later when we can better see the need.

Experience with testing tells me we shouldn't need to do it as Artillery units seldom die in combat versus Grens or Rifles. I can't see us facing anything else tougher.

I'm hoping in 30 turns we are getting ready to wrap things up...
Well, at least moving into the final phase.

I think we should spend a bit of time discussing military needs for Washington's Capitol? Don't want to delay too long in getting there and once we commit, we need to take it because with the number of units that will be engaged, WW will spike quickly. Besides, if we have a well grounded military, Lizzie should be a snap. The more wins our units get, the more promos and the better, more efficient, they become!

 

[DJMGator13]

Washington only has 2 longbows in NY. I'd attack asap before he can manufacture muskets. He still has the cats but we should be able to handle them easier than the longbows or muskets.

We should be able to trade for another 220 gold (can't get Alex's 40) to help with upgrading a few more archers. His current 2 muskets are closer to Asoka troops and if we send Asoka after the city of Washington that should keep any reinforcements from coming our direction.

It will take our 9/10 gren 5 turns to completely heal without the use of a medic. I wouldn't wait. I'd finish Steel now and upgrade a few cats to cannons. It look like the upgrade cost is 200 per cat, so we won't be able to do too many of them.

Asoka switched the university build in Dehli to a cheaper (and just as effective) observatory. Both his builds will complete next turn also. So, he'll pick up a little beaker help. And giving him a border city to go after might get those 2 gren & cat off the galleon.

--------------------------------------------------------------

I'll be leaving Monday morning for a weeklong conference, as leif has already posted. That is why I went ahead and switched with MP. That way I didn't have to try and rush through a few turns before leaving. Besides I'm not going to have much free time this weekend anyway.

 

[leif erikson]

Graphs are getting interesting!

Murky just played a set and their score and power graph lines look like they are about to cross ours.
They are at 250 BC...

 

[DJMGator13]

Murky's spike on the Power graph mirrors the spike that Unusal Suspects got, a 20 point jump in power point in less than 5 turns. They both must have signed their PA's. Our graph should make the same jump in power points.

Lets hope our larger Beijing and cannons will lead to a faster domination stage then they have.