SGOTM 12 - One Short Straw

[babybluepants]

If we do this I think we are going to have far too many trebs. If we build a courthouse and intelligence agency in Moscow are treb situation after 10 turns will be as follows:

Current trebs: 16
Trebs built in Moscow 3
Trebs built elsewhere:1

Total 20.

My worldbuilder tests indicate that even if China whips an extra longbow in every city our expected treb losses in taking Guangzhou, Chengdu, Huangdcho and Lyons are about 8 (unless there is an unexpectedly large stack in Lyons).

This leaves us with 12 trebs which is enough to start the Churchill campaign without slowing down, especially as we will want to use cannons as much as possible, and we should be able to start building them after T+10.

If we delay the Churchill war slightly to enable an attack by galley (a good idea in my opinion if we can do it) on London then we would want cannons on the galleys, not trebs as much as possible-another argument against overbuilding trebs.

In principle I agree with not overbuilding trebs just ahead of Steel. That's in a typical game where we'd spam cannons like mad after Steel - not really the case here. It's hard to imagine having too much siege.

LC wants IA only with Bureau, which doesn't work. We could run Bureau from now to start of next GA, as that roughly coincides with completion of GT, but we can't build the IA before we switch back out of Bureau. Even without Bureau, it's useful, ofc, as we'll be running some espionage slider after Steel and Moscow has lots of commerce.

Seems trebs are consensus. If you can convince others by the time I start playing tonight, you can have it.

Edit: xpost w bcool

Lastly I think the numbers LC used to compare cannon to treb chance of losing against protective longbow on flat ground were wrong or at least misleading. We will occasionally face CGIII longbows and longbows without all the fortification bonus and in those cases the cannon has a much better survival chance.

Does seem misleading. Not sure why. Maybe also 'cause the first cannon tends to inflict way more damage in my experience, so the second often has 90+ odds. They also beat down cultural defenses better, I would think.

 

[LowtherCastle]

South of Rheims via some forts, I thought. We can do it in 2t as it is, without further English border. We could also get circumnavigation by then.

Well, it woldn't be the first time I was proven to be blind, but the best I can do--with circumnavigation--is 3t.

Even if we settled a city south of Rheims, it wouldn't take away York ocean culture.

 

[babybluepants]

Apparently, I'm blind... Forget it, I guess.

 

[babybluepants]

BTW, I think I'll bribe Churchill next turn, after all, unless someone objects.

 

[babybluepants]

We can also runs lots of merchants and scientists in various cities, rather than growing right now. Our cities will have plenty of food and hammers soon enough.

I'll keep this in mind. For both mature and new cities. I think it's important to plan for a CH in each city pre-Sushi, but we probably don't need to go nuts on infra (beyond Granary-(LH)-CH, I think bcool pointed this out this morning, too). Research pace to Sushi should be our next intermediate goal, moreso than further growth/development.

 

[LowtherCastle]

Does seem misleading. Not sure why. Maybe also 'cause the first cannon tends to inflict way more damage in my experience, so the second often has 90+ odds.

Now that's constructive criticism I can work with!

This time is did it with BUFFY. Oddly, for the treb, it says the defense bonus is -50%, which I got, but then it gives the lb strength as 4. How BUFFY gets from 6*.5 to = 4, I have no idea. For the cannon, we agree: defense bonus +50%--> 6*1.5=9.

So here's what BUFFY says:

    treb   cannon
    ----   ------
lb1  53%    80%
lb2  71%    96%
lb3  85%    98%
lb4  89%    99%
lb5  91%   100%

So what this tells us is that the cannons are invincible and the trebs are very effective.

I noticed something else interesting, but I'm not sure I believe it. CHichen Itsa had no effect after I brought down the walls. Anyone ever notice this or was this perhaps an artifact of WB?

By the way, Why would we wait 20t to start our war against CHruchill? That's when I thought we'd be wrapping CHruchill up and going down on Roosy.

-----------

On the Moscow IA--if we get Communism in 3t, then we can start building it immediately in Mosocw, right? And if we're already in Bureau, then it works. Anyway, my thinking was to build up enough overflow in those 3t to get the IA in 3t. But I still prefer non-stop trebs and DoW CHurchill asap.

 

[babybluepants]

So, you meant Bureau for the extra hammers, not for extra commerce under 100% espionage? I misunderstood. Yes, I prefer building up for Churchill right now, as well. 15-20t depending on how the build-up and the China war go was my guess. Not super sure...

    treb   cannon
    ----   ------
lb1  53%    80%
lb2  71%    96%
lb3  85%    98%
lb4  89%    99%
lb5  91%   100%

So what this tells us is that the cannons are invincible and the trebs are very effective.

What about culture-defense beatdown? Or cannon/treb sustained damage / healing time after withdrawal? (I'm just curious).

Against anything but PRO-hill, I wouldn't really expect cannon losses, except for the occasional freak. What the above numbers lead to is the ability to move a smaller stack and/or bombard-hit on the same turn. Faster and cheaper warfare, basically, since WW is both turn-based and number-of-battles, and unit maintenance/supply can skyrocket.

Not that I need to argue this any further, since we're teching Steel now anyway...

 

[bcool]

We do need to come to some understanding of when the churchill war begins it seems.

I think LC is suggesting
China finished in ~8 turns?

So Churchill can start with healthy/spare macemen from China war, a few drafted muskets and new treb built by Moscow in ~10 turns?

Steel finished in ~12 turns, use galleys to chain cannons over to Rosey land to start that war ~22 turns?

Rosey has a good chance to tech military tradition in ~22 turns (and make a war with him unpleasant)

At the end of the galley chaining, might want to send the galleys over to Rosey for a faster strike on New York and the statue of zeus...

 

[babybluepants]

China finished in ~8 turns?

How do we do that?

 

[bcool]

I don't know.

Does LC mean start churchill war with muskets and treb we build/draft in the next 10 turns? While fighting China too?

Because China will take a decent amount of time.

Also reminds me, what do you plan to do with the GG, bbp? Did you see The Medic III and Forest III suggestion I made a while back?

 

[LowtherCastle]

Also reminds me, what do you plan to do with the GG, bbp? Did you see The Medic III and Forest III suggestion I made a while back?

Are we going to have two wars at once or consecutive wars. If consecutive, then it makes far more sense to attach the GG to a chariot so it can rapidly move from Mao to Churchill and back to Roosy. It also moves from captured city to captured city faster, in some cases.

Does LC mean start churchill war with muskets and treb we build/draft in the next 10 turns? While fighting China too?

Asap. If we have a steady inflow of units and enought to start, why not start?

Sequence:
1. Guangzhou-Cgengdu+Hangzhou-(Nanjing) Sword army Build fort at Shanghai-SW for galleys to Hastings
2. (Nanjing)-Lyons Musket army
3. Marseiles-Tours-Hastings Musket army Build fort at Hastings-NW for galleys to York-London
4. York-London Musket army
5. Roosy Sword army

We don't even need to worry about Churchill after London. We can capture Canterbury-Newcastle or whatever at our leisure.

Galleys
1. We need 7 for cannon transport to Chengdu.
2. We need ~5 for transporting our trebs/cannons/muskets from Hastings to York to London to speed up the conquest.

 

[LowtherCastle]

Let me summarize it another way.

1. We have two fronts: Mao+Roosy and Lyons+Churchill. Nanjing is somewhere in the middle.
2. So we need two SoDs, composed of seige+terminators.
2.a. We have a stack of swords at Mao which will finish off Mao using the existing trebs. Then it will need cannons to take on Roosy.
2.b. Meanwhile, we're building another stack of trebs+muskets to deal with Lyons+ Churchill. Moscow/trebs are farther away, so they need to be built a bit earlier, so we start immediately. Then one or more turns before we finish Globe, we start drafting muskets from GP Farm and we have a SoD for this second front.

So, it doesn't make sense to me to wait for Steel to produce cannons instead of producing trebs now, because then we need to send cannons from one place--Moscow--to two fronts. That means one, the other, or both SoDs wait. We don't want to wait because that costs us unit costs under Pacifism, but even worse, it delays our domination of the planet which delays our victory date.

 

[bcool]

When LC says swords he means maces.

 

[babybluepants]

Nanjing is kind of a PITA logistically. If we didn't need to settle Hammer City, I'd just leave Mao there for now. I think it makes most sense to have the England SOD take it out before attacking Tours, but that's a significant delay.

We currently have 4 trailing trebs, which will take Lyons. That's the start of our English SOD. Moscow can do a treb per turn, and it takes trebs about 6-7t (off the top of my head) to get to Tours, even without them making a Nanjing detour. That means something like 7 siege tops in 10 turns (without production from elsewhere, that is).

Alternatively, we just use the trebs from China in Nanjing/England, along with newly built ones. Then delay the American front until we've built up the cannons. The China campaign won't be done in T+10, though.

In any case, my intent is to build only siege in Moscow, one treb in Fish, then also some siege in Paris most likely. I'd also draft from a few cities other than GP (Rheims, Bananas, Cuba, maybe Bahamas/Bermuda, if that doesn't delay wonders). We'll see where we stand in T+10, T+15...

When LC says swords he means maces.

I got that, thx.

 

[LowtherCastle]

bbp, I don't quite understand while you plan to use the 4 trailing trebs for Lyons, when MOscow and FIsh are anyways going to be churing them out right away. Surely you'll need more than 12 trebs to capture Guang, Cheng and Hang?

 

[babybluepants]

bbp, I don't quite understand while you plan to use the 4 trailing trebs for Lyons, when MOscow and FIsh are anyways going to be churing them out right away. Surely you'll need more than 12 trebs to capture Guang, Cheng and Hang?

Because Churchill could redeclare right away. I assumed the China stack would be enough. Guess I was wrong. I could send them to China, after all?

 

[LowtherCastle]

Redeclare on dG? Not for 10t.

 

[babybluepants]

Redeclare on dG? Not for 10t.

Yes, if he's bribed out of war. They can redeclare next turn.

 

[LowtherCastle]

I've never heard that. You sure?

 

[babybluepants]

I've never heard that. You sure?

Almost - never entirely sure about anything in this game.

Busy at work right now. You can dig through the 'Cause I'm the Taxman thread for Silu's/bestsss' post on it, if you like. It would be circa 1300-1600 AD, when we were conquering Joao.

Edit: I did quickly look through that thread. I may indeed have completely mis-remembered this. And I was really damn sure...

Edit2: Anyway, no huge rush to take Lyons then, but I still should by the time we wanna settle Kam-3S. Maybe the current 4 Trebs go to China and I get the next 3-4 to Lyons depending on DG's garrison.