SGOTM 07 - Xteam

[Cactus Pete]

"I forgot about the wounded longbow. If we attack with the 4/5 gren as CP suggests it can be promoted and have one turn for healing before the canon on the silver catches up. Then hopefully it's close to full strength and can move in a mini stack with the two canons." Much as I'd like to hasten Liz's demise, I question whether the risk is worth the reward should we advance with just one gren and two cannons. I'd prefer we wait until we have two healthy grens, which we may get in two turns by promoting the unpromoted gren to gunpowder (and letting him heal) and presuming the gren that attacks the longbow is not badly wounded.
An option to consider is to sue for peace after London, if we can get Economics. That will give the option of Free Market and provide another tech for trade. An isolated Athens would not be much of threat.

 

[Frederiksberg]

What I'm more worried about is Lizzy's 3 frigates getting to Beijing. We are getting 16 food from the coast right now, plus 6 health from seafood. If Beijing were to suddenly lose 22 food per turn, it would be devastating. If we build a single frigate right now, we can block access to Beijing with 2 frigates so that Lizzy would have to attack to break through and we'd be getting the defensive bonus.

We can always block access with one frigate and at the same time build one to counterattack if Lizzie should attack so loosing 22 food is unrealistic. Another thing is that we probably don't need the extra cannon for London. As far as I can see we can have 11 units outside London in 6 turns and that should be enough against 4 (and maybe increasing to 6) defenders there. So building frigate first seems to be the best choice.

Much as I'd like to hasten Liz's demise, I question whether the risk is worth the reward should we advance with just one gren and two cannons. I'd prefer we wait until we have two healthy grens, which we may get in two turns by promoting the unpromoted gren to gunpowder (and letting him heal) and presuming the gren that attacks the longbow is not badly wounded.

This is actually the same pace of attack as I have suggested - I just didn't realize that we would have an extra grenadier available due to the available promotion. Actually there is also an extra cannon that will heal in two turns so the stack that gathers on the iron tile in T157 should be composed of 3 cannons and 2 grens.

 

[Mad Professor]

An option to consider is to sue for peace after London, if we can get Economics. That will give the option of Free Market and provide another tech for trade. An isolated Athens would not be much of threat.

If she would indeed give Economics for peace (by no means guaranteed!) this would be very tempting. It would mean essentially getting economics for free which would be very nice. The down side would be using the seven or eight extra turns of peace with Liz constructively. Could we use them to get Asoka to take out Tokugawa, or Cuzco? Seems messy to me trying to lead his units a merry dance, and I hate the idea of setting the clock back by those extra turns. Find a way to use them constructively though, and this becomes very tempting.

 

[leif erikson]

I thought we are going to need State Property to maintain enough food for the conversion of Beijing to a production powerhouse?

 

[Mad Professor]

I thought we are going to need State Property to maintain enough food for the conversion of Beijing to a production powerhouse?

Mmmm. A minor detail sir. The need to use State property does decarease the value of economics somewhat.

Still, if we could use those extra seven of eight turns of peace with Liz well, then something for nothing (eg economics) might be worth considering, though not quite as tempting as I was thinking when I wrote that last post. The difficulty of finding a really good use for those turns makes the prospect a little difficult though.

 

[leif erikson]

Mmmm. A minor detail sir. The need to use State property does decrease the value of economics somewhat.

Sometimes there are too many details and I forget where we're going. At those times, lots of things sound good...

Still, if we could use those extra seven of eight turns of peace with Liz well, then something for nothing (eg economics) might be worth considering, though not quite as tempting as I was thinking when I wrote that last post. The difficulty of finding a really good use for those turns makes the prospect a little difficult though.

Once we have London, Cuzco is sort of on the way to Athens...
And, iirc, Sparta isn't that far out of the way either...

 

[rrau]

I plan to put together an action plan by tomorrow night and play Friday night.

 

[leif erikson]

I plan to put together an action plan by tomorrow night and play Friday night.

 

[Frederiksberg]

I thought we are going to need State Property to maintain enough food for the conversion of Beijing to a production powerhouse?

That's right, we can't use Free Market so Economy has no value to us in our current situation.

 

[rrau]

Pregame plan:

Change Beijing to frigate and MM for one turn production, then just spam cannons.

Move our frigate to our waters out of reach of Lizzie's frigates. Since we're not going to be attacking soon, won't bombard as the city will regain the little that I'd bombard away by the time we are ready to attack and we need to get our frigate protected and out of range.

Attack the longbow with the CBT1 promoted grenadier - cover with cannon if hurt bad.

Assemble ministack of 2gren and 3 cannon and then send it to London.

Continue preconversion to workhouses around Beijing.

Play to Artillary, using culture slider if needed to keep WW in check, then pause for further input.

 

[Frederiksberg]

Change Beijing to frigate and MM for one turn production, then just spam cannons.

Beijing can produce 101 hpt loosing 3 food per turn. When the granary is empty whip one pop and MM to avoid further starvation.

Move our frigate to our waters out of reach of Lizzie's frigates. Since we're not going to be attacking soon, won't bombard as the city will regain the little that I'd bombard away by the time we are ready to attack and we need to get our frigate protected and out of range.

I suggest we put the 2 frigates on the clam and fish to prevent pillaging and at the same time blocking the access to Beijing.

Assemble ministack of 2gren and 3 cannon and then send it to London.

This is the first stack that leaves for London and we need more units there so a second stack should move out from York one turn later and there should also be a cannon and a grenadier (upgraded from archer) moving in from London. This stack can move via the western silver to arrive faster.

Continue preconversion to workhouses around Beijing.

Be careful not to finish the work shops before Artillery! Cancelling all worker actions before pressing enter is the safest way.

Play to Artillary, using culture slider if needed to keep WW in check, then pause for further input.

Consider a cease fire after London is captured by Asoka. Even if it's only for 2-3 turns it can give us the time we need to regroup and heal our units and finish research of Artillery.

I think we should bribe Fred into war against HC - he will do this for Divine Right and give us some gold too. We can also sell Drama to Mansa for a little gold. Ask Asoka for his ivory - this will allow us to move an upgraded archer -> grenadier out of Beijing. Fastest way is to move archer two steps and then upgrade before all movement points are gone.

 

[Mad Professor]

Ask Asoka for his ivory - this will allow us to move an upgraded archer -> grenadier out of Beijing. Fastest way is to move archer two steps and then upgrade before all movement points are gone.

Either that or allow us to be less heavy handed in our use of the culture slider. And that cease fire after taking London is a good thing to consider. WW may be reaching the "here be monsters" regions by then... Getting Artillery without WW killing us, and healing and repositioning troops might be a good activity for a cease fire and may actually speed up our conquest rather than slow it down.

 

[leif erikson]

I think we should bribe Fred into war against HC - he will do this for Divine Right and give us some gold too.

Not sure we want to give Fred another city?
He has three now and Cuzco would make four. Fred has Chemistry while GC doesn't even have Gunpowder and his Iron is disconnected. Not sure what units Fred has but it would seem that by sending him to war with HC, we are giving him Cuzco?

We'll have to see how things develop in our waters and how our naval RNG goes. I hope we don't have to build too many Frigates, delaying our Cannon builds. But we do need to protect our sea resources.

 

[ShannonCT]

Not sure we want to give Fred another city?
He has three now and Cuzco would make four. Fred has Chemistry while GC doesn't even have Gunpowder and his Iron is disconnected. Not sure what units Fred has but it would seem that by sending him to war with HC, we are giving him Cuzco?

On the other hand, if Fred captures Cuzco, we could declare on Fred right away, and we'd be able to get to Cuzco sooner while it's in revolt.

 

[leif erikson]

On the other hand, if Fred captures Cuzco, we could declare on Fred right away, and we'd be able to get to Cuzco sooner while it's in revolt.

Interesting thought!

What if we wait until we take London and then try to catch Fred with wounded units in Cuzco so we have an easier time taking them out? His power rating is similar to Lizzie currently. Or would trying to time it be an effort in futility?

I was also thinking that we should try over the next 8 turns to stockpile a little gold in order to boost out ability to upgrade Cannon to Artillery.
What is the upgrade cost, about 170 Gold each?
Of course, if we are going to production upon discovery of Artillery, we could allow Asoka to research for us while we go to zero research in order to gain Gold for upgrades?

 

[ShannonCT]

I was also thinking that we should try over the next 8 turns to stockpile a little gold in order to boost out ability to upgrade Cannon to Artillery.
What is the upgrade cost, about 170 Gold each?
Of course, if we are going to production upon discovery of Artillery, we could allow Asoka to research for us while we go to zero research in order to gain Gold for upgrades?

Remember that it's more efficient for us to stay at 100% research and milk Asoka for gold, since we have a 200% beaker bonus. If we keep asking Asoka for gold every few turns, he should keep stockpiling more. That, and the booty from London, should be good for quite a few cannon upgrades.

 

[leif erikson]

Remember that it's more efficient for us to stay at 100% research and milk Asoka for gold, since we have a 200% beaker bonus. If we keep asking Asoka for gold every few turns, he should keep stockpiling more. That, and the booty from London, should be good for quite a few cannon upgrades.

Whatever is best to maximize our upgrade and output of Artillery units as I think this is what will get us to domination fastest.

We should probably also upgrade 3 or 4 more Archers (EDIT - After we get through with Lizzie, of course) to use as escorts for the Artillery and, depending upon what survives London, try to form two groups to take on Fred. As we have seen, too much time will cause us WW problems. And Fred's capital is his city furthest away from us.

 

[Cactus Pete]

Looked at the save again and want to add my two cents worth to the plan, which, as modified in the thread, sound good.

We may have trouble taking London quickly without more grens (depending on what gets built there and whether any units move up from the south). Urge that we risk WW and move out and upgrade two archers right away to reinforce our second wave of cannons. If it becomes too costly to mitigate WW with the culture slider, revolt to State Property (matters little whether we do that before or after Artillery, as it will delay an artillery piece for a turn in any case).

I like idea of putting Fred at war with HC, but let's not do it until we've a reasonable chance of being in position to take advantage of his weakness after recovering from the attack on London.

 

[rrau]

Hm.....Just a quick update......Started playing and the grenadier won against the LB but ended against a Sod. (1 gren, 4 we, 1 lb, 1 cat)

 

[leif erikson]

Hm.....Just a quick update......Started playing and the grenadier won against the LB but ended against a Sod. (1 gren, 4 we, 1 lb, 1 cat)

Hope he took someone else with him?