SGOTM 14 - One Short Straw

[mdy]

I can think of much worse scenarios than the ones that are currently being tested e.g.:

The Wizard is an unpromoted warrior on a city is a 1 tile island (so we can't use siege to bombard down the 200% defences due to a wall +castle+dun+citadel, and we have a worse amphibious penalty)................................. and also defending this city there is a stack of 3 rifles with all possible promotions.

If the map designer wanted to create a scenario that couldn't be won by pre astro units it would be very easy, and I am almost certain (s)he has done so. If it could be destroyed that easily it would make the wizards presence fairly pointless after all.


For our first war I think war elephants+cats will probably be the way to go, though that would not be for a while. (Though we might try bulbing/teching engineering again so we could use trebs + cats)

 

[ZPV]

Note: in that test, Gandhi has stone and is building Screw You Pyramids, due ~900BC.

The advanced alternative to Flanking II Elephants is Guided Missiles. They are dead cheap once you have Radio+Rocketry, and can transport into range near-instantly. It takes 4 to kill the unit I created. The question is, how slow is this sort of domination, compared with classical/medieval units and then some lag building and transporting elephants?

 

[Mitchum]

Proposed PPP through Sailing

T47 - Washington continues to build Worker 3. Research 100% on Sailing. Warrior 2 (spawn buster in SW) moves 1S to defog a few tiles. Warrior 3 (spawn buster in SE) moves 1NE on his way toward marble - he will step on forests or an oasis all the way there to not mess up forest growth opportunities. Settler 3 moves to forest 1S of corn where Warrior 3 was standing, spawn busting the peninsula this IBT. Worker 1 continues wheat farm. Worker 2 continues PHill mine.

T48 - Settler 3 founds Marble 1W of the marble resource, sets build to library, and steals the corn from Washington. Washington works the PHill mine (just finished) instead of the corn. Warrior 2 moves back 1N. Gems grows to 2 pops and works the gem mine and deer.

T49 - Warrior 2 moves 1W. Worker 2 moves to the marble resource (2T).

T50 - Set research to 0%. Warrior 2 moves back 1E. Warrior 3 is now on the oasis. Gems citizen moves from deer to just completed wheat farm.

T51 - Set research to 100% (Sailing in 2T). Washington finishes Worker 3 and starts a library working the sheep, cow, PHill mine, spice and silk. Warrior 2 moves 1N. Warrior 2 moves 1N. Warrior 3 moves 1NE. Worker 1 moves toward PHill Forest at Washingtion-1NW (2T). Worker 2 starts mine on marble hill. Worker 3 moves to forest at Washington-S+SW (1W of the cow).

T52 - Gems City completes WB and starts on a Library. WB heads for Marble's crab. Warrior 2 moves back 1S. Warrior 3 moves 1N. Worker 3 chops forest at Washington-S+SW.

T53 - Sailing -> ???. Marble switches from partial Library to LH with citizens on the corn and GFor (2F,1H).

Attached is a save of where we are on T53 (1880 BC), which is the turn ZPV revolts to Slavery (I will not do this yet). Again, I will stop if any barbs start bothering our two spawn busting warriors for feedback.

EDIT: I can play in 18ish hours from now if everyone agrees.

 

[shyuhe]

Note: in that test, Gandhi has stone and is building Screw You Pyramids, due ~900BC.

The advanced alternative to Flanking II Elephants is Guided Missiles. They are dead cheap once you have Radio+Rocketry, and can transport into range near-instantly. It takes 4 to kill the unit I created. The question is, how slow is this sort of domination, compared with classical/medieval units and then some lag building and transporting elephants?

Are you suggesting that we use amphibious elephants if the wizard is in the situation that mdy described?

PPP looks good.

 

[ZPV]

Are you suggesting that we use amphibious elephants if the wizard is in the situation that mdy described?

Hmmm. Wasn't there a thread in S&T about that?

 

[Dhoomstriker]

The Wizard Talk and Astronomy

I can think of much worse scenarios than the ones that are currently being tested e.g.:

The Wizard is an unpromoted warrior on a city is a 1 tile island (so we can't use siege to bombard down the 200% defences due to a wall +castle+dun+citadel, and we have a worse amphibious penalty)................................. and also defending this city there is a stack of 3 rifles with all possible promotions.

If the City is an island that must be assaulted amphibiously, then Astronomy + Engineering + Gunpowder (all are techs that we are likely to get even if we perform an Astro beeline) + one more tech (Chemistry) = a solution to the City Defences: Frigates for Bombarding. Actually, if we are shuttling a lot of units there, then we only need 1 Frigate but a lot of Galleys or Galleons. Once again, Astronomy is better than no Astronomy, since it's an island in this scenario, right?


I agree that it is possible that there is more than one unit there and your theory of a Warrior Wizard is an interesting one. However, one possible flaw is that Barbs will upgrade a Warrior. So, if neilmeister really thought it through and played it out, he is not likely to have put a Warrior there, since that unit would not remain a Warrior.


While Cuirassiers are not exactly "pre-Astronomy" units, I think that it is fair to believe that we can safely tech to them before the end of the game, right? I mean, Nationalism for the Taj... a possible Liberalism on Nationalism or Military Tradition... taking Gunpowder in trade or as part of a peace deal... all are feasible and self-teching these techs would also be feasible.


Now, if we're going to build War Elephants, chances are that they will be promoted up the Combat line, right? All that we need are some War Elephants with 10 XP. As long as we don't use up that third promo then BAM, we have Amphibious War Elephants. Unfortunately, Amphibious War Elephants don't ignore First Strikes.

However, Cuirrasiers ignore First Strikes. War Elephants upgrade to Cuirassiers. Boom ba-da-BAM! Any War Elephants with Combat II and an unused promotion become instant uber attackers that can ingore the City Defences (via building just 1 Frigate), can ignore the Amphibious penalty, and can ignore First Strikes, all the while having base 12 strength with Combat II. We won't need very many of those, even if there is a stack of 3 Riflmen plus a Grenadier (the Grenadier being the upgraded Barb Warrior).

Again, we can win without very advanced tech (Chemistry and Military Tradition are not all that advanced for the end of the game, if you ask me).


I think that an even worse-case scenario is that the Wizard is in the middle of the continent and is SURROUNDED by Peaks.

Now, one possibility would be to settle a nearby City, Culture Bomb it, and thereby have the Barb units inside DIE when the City flips to us. Hahaha, pwned you.

If the Barb City is "not Atlantis" due to it staying at Size 1, then this possibility may apply, since a City that is surrounded by Peaks (maybe with some empty spaces next to the City for Paratroopers to land) is not likely to grow past Size 1, since there will be few or no squares for citizens to work.

Of course, neilmeister might have wanted to prevent THAT idea, so he might have made the Peaks too thick for Cultural Borders to reach the Barb City... requiring us to use either Paratroopers or Cruise Missiles.

Now, the question becomes: if we need Cruise Missiles and if we beeline them, will we really be better off by leaving the AIs alone until that time? Or will be we better off spending a good portion of that time razing AI Cities?


If the Barb City really is an isolated island, then we might need Astronomy to reach it.


Also, Physics is only a little bit further... Astronomy + Printing Press + Scientific Method lead to Physics, which would open up Airships... those would take the sting out of EACH defender, no matter how many Riflemen were stacked there.


So, in the end, we'll probably want Astro anyway. Why not leverage an early Astro to go razing at least SOME of these multiple AI Coastal Cities?


EDIT: Maybe there is only one Wizard unit but if he is in a Barb City, the Barbs might build more units between now and then. So, the earlier in the game that we strike, the greater the chances are that those Barb-built units will only be Archers or Longbowmen, instead of Riflemen.


EDIT 2: Also, we are Charismatic, right? So, Barracks + Stable + Vassalage + Theocracy = 3 + 2 + 2 + 2 = 9 XP = enough promos for Amphibious War Elephants/Cuirassiers (if there is a Horse Resource on the map) right out of the gate.

 

[ZPV]

Proposed PPP through Sailing

T49 - Warrior 2 moves 1W. Worker 2 moves to the marble resource (2T).

T51 - Set research to 100% (Sailing in 2T). Washington finishes Worker 3 and starts a library working the sheep, cow, PHill mine, spice and silk. Warrior 2 moves 1N. Warrior 2 moves 1N. Warrior 3 moves 1NE. Worker 1 moves toward PHill Forest at Washingtion-1NW (2T). Worker 2 starts mine on marble hill. Worker 3 moves to forest at Washington-S+SW (1W of the cow).

I'd mine the grass hill first, not the marble. (If marble first works, then fine, but I haven't tested it that way.)

If you can, save the SSW forest for either the bridge city or else for a worker from Gems to chop. I've been sending worker 3 1E->chop->3E->chop->towards stone.

 

[babybluepants]

We have 2 AIs in the south. Or at least the scout came from the south.

Ok. Too many posts to read in the last couple of days.

We're at a point in the game where exploring units are just too expensive. We can spawnbust, or else we can send our warriors out to explore, but not expect them to survive.

Simply untrue. I tested a 1040 BC GLH, building 3 warriors and an archer by just after 2000 BC. You're saying whip on T73, which is the same date. I don't mind if you guys don't wanna build units, but all this talk about how they're too expensive is BS. It's just a matter of balancing priorities.

It's simply too early to test the endgame, IMHO. We're not even exactly sure of the map type, don't know the AI personalities yet, and have no idea what the Wizard will entail. Domination on Hub is pretty painful, though, and even more so if we really can't get horses.

Interesting testing, Dhoom. I tried the same thing back in the QT thread and couldn't hurt a Machine Gun past 11.something, regardless of how may hits I throw at it. Must be that I was using GP units then (don't remember what it was).

If the Wiz is a unit, is there a super-defender that could hurt it a bit when he attacks? Super-LB on a forested hill, for instance? Trail an archer/LB with siege and take HP with some easy battles with CHA, attach some GG... Probably too complicated and won't even work.

 

[Dhoomstriker]

Simply untrue. I tested a 1040 BC GLH, building 3 warriors and an archer by just after 2000 BC. You're saying whip on T73, which is the same date. I don't mind if you guys don't wanna build units, but all this talk about how they're too expensive is BS. It's just a matter of balancing priorities.

My preference of priorities is:
1. If it is possible, ensure that our area gets fully-spawn busted
2. Complete The Great Lighthouse
3. Get an exploring Work Boat out
4. Complete The Pyramids
5. Get a second exploring Work Boat out

It's simply too early to test the endgame, IMHO. We're not even exactly sure of the map type, don't know the AI personalities yet, and have no idea what the Wizard will entail. Domination on Hub is pretty painful, though, and even more so if we really can't get horses.

I am personally not ready to assume for certain that the AIs are all in teams of two. However, regardless of whether they are or not, Diplomacy will almost certainly be harder than a non-team game. We have a strong team, so it's nowhere an impossible goal, just more challenging than a non-team game.

Interesting testing, Dhoom. I tried the same thing back in the QT thread and couldn't hurt a Machine Gun past 11.something, regardless of how may hits I throw at it. Must be that I was using GP units then (don't remember what it was).

Well, so far, I have only attacked with units that ignore First Strikes. LC went with non-First-Strike-ignoring Grenadiers and apparently got owned. So, that's probably our biggest key, with units that get "ignore First Strikes" for free all being Horse-based units.

If the Wizard is not promoted, it won't be an issue. If he is promoted, then on a Horseless map, our best bet will be Flanking II War Elephants, since, out of all of the promotions and defenses possible, it is the First Strikes from Drill that hurt us the most, by a wide margin.

If the Wiz is a unit, is there a super-defender that could hurt it a bit when he attacks? Super-LB on a forested hill, for instance? Trail an archer/LB with siege and take HP with some easy battles... Probably too complicated and won't even work.

It is possible that a lure could work. It really depends upon what Mission Type neilmeister set the unit to. Most defensive units (Archery units, Riflemen, Machine Guns, etc) start with the City Defence Mission. I'm pretty sure that someone said that Barb units will not switch away from the City Defence Mission if they are given it to begin with. Even if neilmeister didn't explicitly set that Mission Type, it gets chosen by default by most of the units that you would have defending a City when you place them using the World Builder. A Barb unit with that Mission Type, if what I read is true about Barbs not changing it, would therefore not come out to attack us.

Nothing stops us from bringing along a weak unit (a left over Warrior, maybe?) to see if we can lure the Wizard to move. Obviously, if he's trapped 100% by Peaks or is on a 1-square island, then he can't move, regardless of what his Mission Type is set to.

For all that we know, the "tough Wizard" isn't even a Barb. We don't even know if it is maybe relatively easy to kill like the Barbs in SGOTM 11 were, such that the world's tech level will determine the strength of the Wizard and any accompanying defending units. We do know that there is a Barb City on the map, though, so that's the clincher for me that the Wizard is a Barb.

I just tried to focus on the worst-case scenarios so that we'd be prepared for the worst and if things weren't that bad, we'd still be okay.

 

[Mitchum]

If the wizard is anything other than an ancient unit (e.g. Axe, sword, etc.) it can't be an AI unit or the starting power demographics would have pointed to this obvious fact. ZPV has estimated that there is a unit in our game with a power rating of a rifle based on the length of our health bars. Therefore, the Wizard must be a barb. Am I missing something?

 

[Mitchum]

I'd mine the grass hill first, not the marble. (If marble first works, then fine, but I haven't tested it that way.)

If you can, save the SSW forest for either the bridge city or else for a worker from Gems to chop. I've been sending worker 3 1E->chop->3E->chop->towards stone.

Since you whipped four pops in your test, the extra food from the grass mine could prove critical. I'll mine the grass hill first.

I'll chop the forest 1E as well.

 

[Dhoomstriker]

If the wizard is anything other than an ancient unit (e.g. Axe, sword, etc.) it can't be an AI unit or the starting power demographics would have pointed to this obvious fact. ZPV has estimated that there is a unit in our game with a power rating of a rifle based on the length of our health bars. Therefore, the Wizard must be a barb. Am I missing something?

Well, someone said that if an advanced unit was added and removed from the game that the Health Bars would remain fudged-up. Someone also said that the Power level of at least one AI was weird. Still, it would be pretty silly to put a Barb City on the map and make the Wizard an AI unit.

 

[shyuhe]

While all the musings about the Wizard are good, I think bbp's point is right here. It's simply too early to start thinking about how we're going to kill it (whatever it is). Although I think it does suggest that scouting should be emphasized a bit more than usual so that we can figure out what exactly our endgame entails. I haven't done enough testing to know how many hammers we have to spare for scouting units though. I think it has to be an archer at a minimum (or a WB) as it'll die to barbs too easily otherwise.

 

[LowtherCastle]

Simply untrue. I tested a 1040 BC GLH, building 3 warriors and an archer by just after 2000 BC. You're saying whip on T73, which is the same date. I don't mind if you guys don't wanna build units, but all this talk about how they're too expensive is BS. It's just a matter of balancing priorities.

If this is with teh new test save (after the bear sh!t in the woods), I'd like to see it. I'm trying out an idea with GLH in Gems City and got 1040/1000BC, with the math completion holding me up a turn. I'm going to try again with some adjustments. The main thrust of this variant is to have our empire more improved, tile-wise, at 1000BC. My adjustments will get the Pigs settler and the fifth worker done sooner. Not sure how that will play out. One detail youd like though, is that I build a somewhat early archer in Gems City. Here's a look at the preliminary test:

 

[babybluepants]

bear sh!t in the woods means Toto's untimely demise? Then yes, but before Mitchum's set. I didn't build a WB in Gems, and went for another worker before the current settler, so it's no longer applicable. No more time to test for me this week.

Your save looks solid. I like the tile improvements and the archer. I haven't been able to improve that many tiles with these wonder dates. Why are you settling Marble, if you're not using it? Because it's easier to get worker turns there than in Pig? Can you cut any turns off GLH? Is Stone settled third still potentially faster (I don't know at this point)?

Can we agree on a date convention for GLH? I thought we had already agreed on in-game rather than event log. It gets confusing.

 

[Mitchum]

... I think bbp's point is right here.

I guess Hell just froze over...

 

[Mitchum]

@ LC

Hmm... We've looked at many test runs where the GLH was built in Gem City but dropped that idea because building it in Marble was faster (and safer) and opened up a culture bridge to the south. I'm not opposed to trying for Gems City again if we can come up with a good option that meets all of our needs.

EDIT: I guess the WB in Gems City could be an explorer or used for Stone City. I'd prefer to settle Pigs over Marble if we're not buildling the GLH there.

 

[LowtherCastle]

@ LC

Hmm... We've looked at many test runs where the GLH was built in Gem City but dropped that idea because building it in Marble was faster (and safer) and opened up a culture bridge to the south. I'm not opposed to trying for Gems City again if we can come up with a good option that meets all of our needs.

EDIT: I guess the WB in Gems City could be an explorer or used for Stone City. I'd prefer to settle Pigs over Marble if we're not buildling the GLH there.

My problem with ZPV's 1000BC save, after pondering playing it forward yesterday, is that it's a barren wasteland, with most of the workers lumped over in one corner. It just doesn't seem conducive to continuing empire-building.

THe problem with Marble is that it got screwed by the bear and it has very little variation for a pre-1000BC GLH. What you see is what you get and it's a bit desolate.

I'm open to any tests or proposals.

 

[Mitchum]

I agree that we need to be willing to switch course if it makes sense. Major advantages of the GLH in Gems city are:

1. A possible early exploring WB
2. An earlyish archer
3. Not having to settle Marble too early, which is kind of a weak city other than the culture bridge, which may not even be needed to soon if there is a land route to that land mass.
4. Being able to settle Pigs as a fourth city... or even third!
5. Better tile development.

I'll play around with it today if I have time.

 

[Dhoomstriker]

When we talk about settling Pig City, do we have a particular location in mind?