SGOTM 14 - Unusual Suspects

Xcalibrator · Nov 13, 2011

Misc
The Great Wall is in Timbuktu.
Judging from what we can see in our map, it looks like the Zulu map might have a view on the interior of the SE mountain ring. I'll try to get it if the price is right.
We have 542 EPs on the Easties. City revolt requires >1200 but we're right on the edge of being able to steal a tech. Shall we use our spies for defensive espi or send them on a mission? ~~Probably best to just post in frontier cities.~~
I'd like to build a settler for our nearest mountain ring. It'll pop the 100-culture borders after 25 turns running an artist and building culture--we need to see what's inside. The 10-culture pop might be enough.
It'll take 25 turns for our western exploring galley to return. Scouts will not be much faster. I'd like to delete them to save on costs.
Our English fogbusting archer is no longer needed given our current cultural borders. Move him toward the hub after finding new English city. He can garrison our future city by the mountain ring.

Promotions
Combat 1 and 2 for cuirs for the hard cases. Hold off on other cuirs unless it's likely they'll be attacked, in which case use one promo (or two). Axes, pikes, etc. will use situation-appropriate promos mostly for defense (e.g., in the forest 1N2W of Indra).

Civics
Whip the cuir in LA and then revolt to Caste. Stay in Free Religion for now, but plan to spread Confusion where necessary and run Pacifism and Theocracy in the future. In particular, LA, Philly, and PortXcal need infection--Wash will build a monastery (in part for the AP hammers) and (maybe later) missionaries.

Research
Bulb Printing Press, finish it off if necessary
Guilds
Banking
Economics if the AI are breathing down our neck to get the free Great Merchant?
Replaceable Parts, Rifling...

Great People and specialists
I wasn't able to figure out what's going to pop where and when but will try to have Houston pop a Merchant before Washington if it's close--will be hard with limited post-whipping population. If I don't whip Houston and run 4 or 5 specs it'll pop in 8 turns and beat Wash even with Wash running 2 (plus 2 Great Lib) specs.

Have PortXcal and LA concentrate on growing--save the running of specialists there until later, when we know exactly what we want (i.e., Merchants or Artists). After Houston pops, let it grow before running more specs for the same reason.

Workers
Gather ~3 workers to accompany our forces as they advance south, laying roads to speed movement. [color](I see SH has already done this.

)[/color] This will probably be most important at the start and not needed later. Road to Seattle (not very urgent). Build a few workshops around some production cities such as Boston, Atlanta, and Chicago. Chop useless forests, etc. If safe, lay some roads to connect to Zululand to speed our future Great Merchant. Find which cities give us the best trade routes and pick one for the GM that isn't too far away.

City builds (turns are for GA--things will take around 1.5x longer than listed)
Wash: spy(1), Confusion monastery(2), ~~3 C missionaries, treb(3)~~ cuirs, maybe a cat to soften Asoka's counterattack stack
NY: cuir(8)
Boston: *Run an engineer*, cuir(1), cuirs..., Heroic Epic as soon as available
Philly: cuir(1), settler, cuirs...
Atlanta: trireme(5) and send galley south, cuir(7), treb
Chicago: Taj(8)
Seattle: spy(1), galley, run merchants
SF: pike(2), xbow(2), mace(2), treb(2)-- Archers and/or cats can be slotted in here as needed.
LA: whip cuir, ~~wealth~~ archer, focus on growth without running any specs
Houston: cuir(slow build). Try to run mer's to beat Washington GP pop. Yes, can pop in 8.
Xcal: granary(2), Chouse--grow for future specs
Portland: granary
We'll need some archers or other cheap unit to garrison newly captured cities--stick a few in somewhere.

Attack plan
Send spies to the front when ready--scout ahead in Norseland and India--destroy key improvements?
T+0: Position units to attack next turn. Cancel actions of workers near the front--they will lay roads as we need them.
T+1: Raze Taxila, move to Ujjain and raze. Advance triremes near Indra. Move some cuirs and defensive units (axes, etc.) to forest 1N2W of Indra. See if we can bribe other AIs into war for a reasonable price.
T+2: Attack any units on ivory, pillage ivory, check Strategic Advantages to see if that knocks out the India war elephants. Depending on how many units I have I may advance the remainder of the stack or sacrifice the pillaging unit to counterattack while leaving the rest in the forest (or withdrawing into our borders to save on maintenance). Prepare for Indian counterattack but do not advance--concentrate on Vikings. Pillage roads connecting Asoka and Ragnar so that Asoka must come through us, and slowly.
T+3: Build roads as needed, then advance into Vikingland.
T+...: Raze junk cities, pillage junk city improvements if convenient. Capture city(ies) with GLH and Parthenon. Hear the lamentation of the women. Arrange for the birth of a Great General in a convenient city.

kcd_swede · Nov 14, 2011

I still haven't opened the save, so I can't comment on the plan. I hope others find times to look things over. Sorry... but at least I'll try to check in here daily and cheer you on. :lol:

Xcalibrator · Nov 14, 2011

I know it's too much to ask that people provide comments and/or green lights in time for me to play tonight, but I'd really like to play on Tuesday evening. We're down to 26 days.

SteelHorse · Nov 14, 2011

I will provide some comments tonight.

Xcalibrator · Nov 14, 2011

If you need to catch up, I've updated the Report post.

I'm leaning more and more toward the culture bomb approach, but want to see what's inside our nearby mountain ring before committing. I think a 10-culture border pop would do the trick. In case we go that direction I'm deliberately holding off on running specs in some cities (LA, Houston after it pops, Xcal) until they've grown and can run a lot. This buys us time before we need to commit to Artists and will keep the gene pool pure. I figure we can get one (or 2) Artist from Wash if we want.

On the other hand, or maybe the same (?), we can put Great Scientists to good use if we want to get airships to check things out in the other mountains. The bulbing path is Printing Press (2496 beakers), then Chemistry unless we get Optics (936) in which case we would then bulb Astro (3120), SciMeth (3744), and Physics (6240) before the path goes back to pick up Chemistry (2808). I believe SH said a Great Sci will currently give us about 1800 beakers.

What would it take to go with Paratroopers? Flight needs 14 more techs, and Fascism adds another 6 or so (sorry, I was lazy and didn't do the Venn diagram

). Nukes would need Rocketry (13 techs) plus Fission (a couple more) and we'd have to build the Manhattan Project. Again, I'm lazy and didn't write down which techs, how much they cost, and which are bulbable. But either way it's a pretty big investment. My gut suggests that culture might be faster. But one would also have to think about how we get access to the barbs inside the mountains (if indeed that's what we need to do): with the cultural approach we might be able to settle the required cities in locations that haven't yet been claimed by the AI because they're so junky--but maybe there wouldn't be room and we'd have to attack the AIs. With the kill 'em all approach we could launch nukes or paratroopers from nearby cities without distressing the natives (although if we're going for Domination we'll need to break some eggs anyway). Something to think about.

SteelHorse · Nov 14, 2011

a couple of thoughts.

on the spies, may want to see if we can sabotage the iron. otherwise parking in the hub cities would be best. stealing tech would likely be Mono which is not a big win.

on indra, i would keep. it has sheep ivory and some forest, but more importantly it stops the zulu from from expanding even further.

after next turn and caste houston should be able to run 4-5 merchants which should allow it to get the GM if we ramp down the sci's in wash.

Confu has been spreading fine w/o any effort. Not sure it is worth it for us to help. Would prefer miltary instead from Wash. This can wait till will agree switching to a religion is worth the diplo hit.

one thought is to take taxila, not raze but leave empty and see if asoka sends his stack to retake. then attack the stack in the open. after that asoka sould be easy pickins.

Good luck!

Deckhand · Nov 15, 2011

In interest of time, green light from me.

Some comments on SteelHorse's comments:

SteelHorse said:
a couple of thoughts.

on the spies, may want to see if we can sabotage the iron. otherwise parking in the hub cities would be best. stealing tech would likely be Mono which is not a big win.
I wouldn't bother sabotaging iron. I expect they (like us) have more or it in their terriory

on indra, i would keep. it has sheep ivory and some forest, but more importantly it stops the zulu from from expanding even further.
If goal is to stop Zuu from expanding up spokes into territory we raze, then may want to found a city on ice by clams and rice for Ragnar spoke.
Keep Indra or raze and found city on ice where you wanted earlier.
If keep Indra, chop forests (safely) as soon as possible, so Asoka doesn't park stack in them.

after next turn and caste houston should be able to run 4-5 merchants which should allow it to get the GM if we ramp down the sci's in wash.

Confu has been spreading fine w/o any effort. Not sure it is worth it for us to help. Would prefer miltary instead from Wash. This can wait till will agree switching to a religion is worth the diplo hit.
yes, an extra cuir is more critical than a missionary right now

one thought is to take taxila, not raze but leave empty and see if asoka sends his stack to retake. then attack the stack in the open. after that asoka sould be easy pickins.
Good idea. don't leave much money in our "bank" if you do this as they will plunder us
What is mechanism that determines whether 1 tile cities raze automatically or not?

We are still going after Ragnar, after killing Asoka's stack, right?
Be cautious - Ragnar probably has an equiavlent or better stack somewhere.

Good luck!

Do we want to bribe AIs to join us in war? Easier once war has started, see what they want.

kcd_swede · Nov 15, 2011

Green from me.

Let the fun begin! :ar15:

Xcalibrator · Nov 15, 2011

1-pop cities autoraze if they have not popped borders, but do not autoraze if they ever pop their borders, regardless of population. I'm not sure about captured city plunder but I don't think it has much to do with how much gold the former owner has; in any case, it's dominated by population so if the AI recapture Taxila or similar junk city from us they won't get much. My worry is that Asoka would not retake it and we'd be stuck with a useless city. I'm sure he has more units that will be sent to the front, so why not just wait for them? We can attack them then, and probably under more favorable conditions. If Asoka doesn't attack us, then great--we can concentrate more fully on Ragnar. We only have about 13 cuirs for the opening attack--doesn't seem like a lot to me. We'll get a few more quickly to pillage/post near Indra but after that it's only around 1 additional cuir per turn on average, which is probably not even adequate to keep up with losses--I don't want to attack Asoka's cities or stacks unless necessary. Boston will be able to build the Heroic Epic soon, which will help significantly, but we're not there yet.

On the Confusion spread, how about I build the monastery in Wash (giving us 3 extra hammers because of the Bureau bonus) but then hold off on missionaries? My thinking was that we'll finish Taj in roughly 13 turns and want to have Confusion in cities where we're trying to get GPs. But we can wait awhile longer and see--I'm probably only going to play 5 or so turns tonight.

I think I'd like to send one spy ahead into Norseland to see what Ragnar is sending to the front, and also to find the GLH and Parthenon (hopefully in the same city). I'm hoping that our trireme(s) on India's coast will let us see what Asoka is sending our way but maybe I'll send the other spy into India, and sabotage iron if it looks worthwhile. I think that intelligence is probably more valuable to us than protecting against sabotage--the AI seem to like poisoning wells but we have pretty good health reserves. Of course, our spies will probably get caught pretty quickly. :rolleyes:

Do we care if Shaka expands into the hub and founds junky cities? They won't do him much good. Is the concern that it'll take longer to get to his core cities if/when the time comes to attack him? We'll have that settler in awhile and we could use it to block Shaka if we want, settling in a better spot than what Asoka's chosen.

Bribing other AIs into war is a good idea. I assume we want either the North or the South, but not the West. PPP now amended.

Edit: I note that on the Progress page, the latest saves from 5th Element and OSS date from 10/24 and 10/26! Their scores and power are very low so obviously haven't/didn't go on a big military buildup. I wonder if they used some clever ploy and have already finished (dates are 150AD and 325BC). Hard to believe, unless the Wizard really is in the nearest mountain ring and can't fly away when ...??? I can't envision how they could have won yet. If not, I hope they aren't stuck from, ahem, lack of participation. TNT has a save at 1710AD with some big gaps before that (around 60 and 80 turns), presumably indicating only one or two people playing. Salutations and sympathies, dudes.

SteelHorse · Nov 15, 2011

good point on 1 the 1-pop. obviously nothing to do there if they auto raze. yes, worried about having to take the same land twice and the time and effort to do that. I am ok with settling better sites to block ourselves.

I would use scouts for looking through where we have open borders. Save the spies. Worry about techs being stolen.

Green light from me.

ChrisShaffer · Nov 15, 2011

No time, looks good, green.

I only worry when PD stop uploading saves...

Xcalibrator · Nov 15, 2011

T158/960 AD: Western galley would take 22 turns to reach our borders--delete, saving 2 gpt. Northern and southern explorers would take 17 and 14--delete, saving 2 gpt. Also delete archer by Timbuktu, saving 3 gpt. Huh, archer5 in NE England does need to stay where he is to fogbust the coast--OK, will move him back next turn. Bulb PP, turn research to 100% (heh heh--costs 177 gpt, and we have 177 in the bank). I do not whip the cuir in LA--doesn't make sense to whip away good tiles. Adjust a few tiles and specs, change Atlanta build to trireme, revolt to Caste (and Bureau + Free Religion). Oh, right, check spec assignments again--run 5 mer's in Houston. Move another ~dozen units to the front. Nobody can be bribed into war. Hit enter.

T159: GA is over. Wash finishes spy, starts Confusion monastery. Spy done in Seattle, starts galley. We get 176 failure gold from Parthenon. Boston finishes cuir, starts another (ahead of Chouse). Philly done with cuir, starts a settler(5) (ahead of Sistine). Now that GA is over I readjust a few tiles. PP done, Guilds in 2 more turns at 100%.

I laugh!

Asoka has thoughtfully moved 1HA, 4 cats, and 4 chariots onto the forest 1N2W of Indra! He also has a HA, LB, and settler SW of there, 2 workers W of there, and a sword and HA in Taxila. I think we'll have just enough cuirs to wipe them all out! The war horn sounds! Release the hounds! Hmm, let's click that "Quick combat animation" button.

The sword and HA die, Taxila autorazes. We clear out the forest with no losses. 3 workers advance to lay a road on the ice 2NE of Ujjain, which has only 1 HA. There's another chariot nearby, too, and a worker blocking our way. We capture the worker, revealing another worker, spear, and LB N of Ujjain. We take Ujjain, which autorazes. Kill spear and LB, capture another worker (our 3rd). Kill the chariot (ooh, down to 1.1/12). I move all axes into the forest near Indra along with 5 cuirs with partial movement. Xcal's warrior captures 2 more workers. :lol:

We have 23/30 GG points. While checking to see if anyone wants to join our little war I notice that Mansa/Shaka can research Economics--hadn't seen before. Eh, we'd need Guilds and Banking before starting Eco--maybe we have a shot.

T160: No retaliation by Easties. Pike done in SF, start xbow(4). Hah, the Easties will sign a peace treaty! I think not. Still just a mace, LB, and axe in Indra--I can't resist. 80% odds vs mace--we lose. 90% vs LB--win. 97.5% vs axe--win. And we finish off the mace. All Indra has is a granary--I don't like the location and raze it. I move an axe forward and a spear is in the forest NW of Ayodhya. Odds only 64% so I promote a cuir and attack with 90% and win. The cuir was from SF but the GG is born in Wash--so much for that myth. [Edit: Log says the cuir was from Wash--I'll have to check tomorrow.] Ayodh has a mace, sword, settler, and 3 LBs. We can camp out in this nice forest with a few axes and effectively block Asoka.

I promote a cuir to Level4 from last turn and start Boston on the Heroic Epic(4). Eh, getting late and I don't want to make a mistake. Save and upload.

Save is here.

Spoiler Log :

Deckhand · Nov 16, 2011

^ nice report. looking good so far
Be careful out there.

If you use a spy for sabotage, it returns to our capital (as you know). So, wait to do this until you have finished scouting. That will also give you the information you need to judge which resources to sabotage.
If our spies should live so long.

SteelHorse · Nov 16, 2011

Let the beatings begin.
How nice of him to move his stack into the open for us.
Looking forward to the rest.

kcd_swede · Nov 16, 2011

So far so good! :goodjob:

Keep making cuirs; the more the merrier.

BTW: as for the other teams, you should watch the dates of posting in their threads to decide if their lack of uplaods is a participation problem. More likely, imo, is that those teams have entered a stage where their curves would give away what they are up to, and therefore will not upload until they have played far enough to disguise it (or wait for their competitors to reach same point first before exposing their hand). I don't think we need to worry so much about it, but it is good to look now and then to maybe stimulate our own ideas on how things can be handled.

As for Econ... are there trades available for banking/guilds? Without that it is probably unlikely we'd get to econ first while in war mode. But I can't really judge that without looking at the save. :eek:

Xcalibrator · Nov 16, 2011

Having not relied on lightning horse war before, can a more experienced player offer advice on how hard to push? As a rough guideline, I'd rather not put any cuir under strength 10 in harm's way, unless they can attack at good odds and have decent protection from an IBT counterattack by the AI. I suspect that means I'll have to pretty much stop and heal everything after taking the next Indian city (on the spoke leading to Norseland) for a turn or two. Am I being too conservative? Also, how do you feel about razing that city? The only reason I'd keep it is to increase the rate of unit healing.

I forgot to move the triremes. Will do it this turn, using them to scope out the coast for advancing Indian units and to find cities. I won't go beyond the first coastal city so Asoka can't sneak a galley toward our coast.

From memory, only the Southies can research Econ, and they won't trade Guilds. I need to check previous saves and see when they could research Econ. We're due to pop a Merchant in Houston in about 6 turns. He could be used to bulb Econ after we have Banking. It's a little risky--we don't want to bulb it and lose to the Southies--but if we beat them it would get us the free Merchant in exchange and keep it out of the hands of the Southies. We could also revolt to Free Market during the Taj Golden Age. On the other hand, once we have Banking we could run Merc'lism for free specs--I guess it depends on what the AIs run. The Taj can be completed in around 8 turns from what I recall.

Looking forward to getting the Heroic Epic and a chariot supermedic. If I'm careful to always keep several highly promoted cuirs with the medic, would it be OK to upgrade the chariot (once he's a Warlord) to a cuir? Every cuir helps, and the chariot just doesn't have enough strength to attack anybody and get up to the next Level for the Sentry (visibility) promotion.

SteelHorse · Nov 16, 2011

Will there be a save tonight to take a look at the save tonight. Could look and offer more advice.
Agree with a healing rest period if cuirs are in need. Add some defensive units to stack if needed. Mace v Pikes or pike v ha/we. My experiences with promoting the medic have generally been poor. They seem to be picked as an early target in the stack. I will defer to the crowd but would vote no.

Xcalibrator · Nov 16, 2011

I said I would "Save and upload" but didn't bother with an attachment. Here's the link. Yeah, I'd like to have more--some--defensive units with the cuirs. We don't have many such units available--maybe 3 axes, and 2 are blocking Asoka's path in a forest--but there are a pike and a mace on the way and SF is working on a crossbow. I'm tempted to build a musket or two since they're all-around defenders. If I see an enemy stack we can't handle with just cuirs I will not hesitate to bravely run away until we're in better shape. I tend to err on the side of preserving units when in doubt, so if anyone wants me to be bold you'll have to work on it.

SteelHorse · Nov 16, 2011

May be worth upgrading an axe to mace. One way to get the medic promotion is to use on cleanup duty for gravely injured enemies.
Thanks for the link will look later.

SteelHorse · Nov 16, 2011

ok. looked at save a few comments. good job but the troops are scattered, need to regroup and heal up. upgrade at least one of the axes in the defense to a mace. need a pillage stack to take out the iron. that should leave asoka defenseless. then walk through his territory destroying roads and resources.

boston is working a plains tile swap to a sci/mer.

i would prioritize cuirs over monastery in wash.

rest looks good - keep it up!

edit: and move the triremes as you suggested.

SGOTM 14 - Unusual Suspects

Ultraviolet Catastrophe

Jag är Viking!½

Ultraviolet Catastrophe

Deity

Ultraviolet Catastrophe

Deity

Procrastination at its finest

Jag är Viking!½

Ultraviolet Catastrophe

Deity

Board gamer

Ultraviolet Catastrophe

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Deity

Jag är Viking!½

Ultraviolet Catastrophe

Deity

Ultraviolet Catastrophe

Deity

Deity

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