SGOTM 16 - U'nu'sual S'us'pec'ts

[Trystero]

I can play again tomorrow night (in about 26 hours) if desired - I wouldn't mind doing it. I would need a lot of suggestions about how to get the right troops to the right rally points. Then you could take it on the declare war turn.

I approve of this plan. It keeps with the stated goal of having Chris provide set-up and neilmeister the execution ar15. A pause to assess where we are would not hurt either.

edit: x-post

 

[ChrisShaffer]

I'm fine with pausing too, if it's needed to get a good plan together. No hurry at all.

 

[Trystero]

I'm fine with pausing too, if it's needed to get a good plan together. No hurry at all.

I think the current plan and it's execution are fine. I just think that since you need a break, it's better to pause and let you continue, rather than handing off at this point.

I also see no harm in having the pike, especially with all those chariots Brennus has.

 

[ChrisShaffer]

Oh, you meant "pause" as in "Chris plays two mini-sets, with a pause in between" while I thought you meant "pause" as in "let's take 2-3 days to figure out the PPP for the next turnset."

 

[Trystero]

Egads, no. Play on!

Edit: But the break will give us a chance to take a quick look at where we are. I do not foresee any change in plans at this point, but someone might notice something we've overlooked.

Enjoy your dinner!

 

[neilmeister]

Trades
DON'T trade for Feudalism (Brennus just might be able to steal it from us)
Sell Aesthetics to Qin for 70g + switch to Beauro (his favourite civic)
Sell Compass to Hammy for 50g ???

Rally points
Galleon stack rally point is 1 SW of mountain in Bay of Benginal.
Verlamion rally point is the currently roaded grassland, 2NE of Vermilion
Tolosa rally points are any of the 5 tiles north of Brennus' border


t152 (this turn)
- Mace 1, move 2SW, to jungle hill
- Xbow 5, move 2SW, to jungle hill
- Galleon 1, move to the tile 1 NW of West Coast Silk
- Galleon 2 to move to tile 1S of Camulodunum, arrives t155 with 3 movement left
- Galleon 3, move 1W, out of Barb City
- worker 4, cancel
- spy moves to horses, arrives t155
- move trireme 4 towards Brennus

t153
- Start trebs in Paris, Clams, Production
- Start Maces in Commerce & Barb City
- Start Xbow in West Coast Silk
- Start Salon in GP Farm
- Start Buddhist mish in Zhou (for West Fish)
- Start Lib in West Fish
- Whip Granary in Red Fish
- move fogbusting Chariot 12 to Barb City (it will need a garrison)
- move trireme 3 to fogbust north
- worker 5 finishes road on jungle (do this manually first - very important!)
- worker 4, road, finished t154
- worker 7, move to the tile 2S1E of barb City, road, finished t154
- CHariots 6 & 10 (in Ramesses lands) to seek and destroy any road from Brennus' stack to his lands.
- Chariot 7 (promote to Medic I), get on Galleon 1
- Cat 1, get on Galleon 3
- Archer 1 get on Galleon 3
- Cat 2, move towards Tolosa rally point
- Cat 3, move to Verlamion rally point, arrives t155
- Cat 4, move to Tolosa rally point, arrives t155
- Cat 5, move to Tolosa rally point, arrives t155
- Galley move towards rally point and next to the Mace 1 & XBow 5, arrives t156
- Mace 1, board galley
- Xbow 5, board galley
- Chariot 1 (medic), move to Tolosa rally point, arrives t155
- Spearman 2, move to Verlamion rally point, arrives t156
- Xbows 1 & 2, move after road finished, to jungle tile 1SW of Iron
- Mace 2 move after road finished, to jungle tile 1SW of Iron
- New Pikeman (Barb City), get on Galleon 3
- New Mace (West Coast Silk), get on Galleon 1
- New Mace (Production), move to Verlamion rally point, arrives t157 with 1 movement left
- New Mace (Paris), move to Tolosa rally point, arrives t155
- New Mace (GP Farm), move to Tolosa rally point, arrives t157 with 1 movement left
- New Mace (Clams), move to Tolosa rally point, arrives t153
- Galleon 1 to move after Chariot & Mace board, towards the rally point, arrives t156
- Galleon 3 move after Cat, Archer & Pike board, towards the rally point, arrives t157 with 3 movement left

t154
- Start LH in Red Fish
- Whip CH in Fake Humbaba
- Whip trebs in Paris, Clams, Production
- Whip Maces in Commerce & Barb City
- Whip buddhist missionary in Zhou
- worker 5 move to forest 1N of horses in Brennus territory
- Xbows 1 & 2, move to Corn
- Mace 2, move to Corn

t155
- Start LH in Fake Humbaba
- Start trebs in Paris, Production, Barb City & Commerce
- Start Pike in Clams
- Start Buddhist mish in Zhou (for Fake Humbaba)
- worker 5 road
- Xbows 1 & 2, board Galleon 2, 1S of Camulodunum
- Mace 2, board Galleon 2, 1S of Camulodunum
- Galleon 2 move to rally point, arrive t155
- Mace (Barb City) move to Verlamion rally point
- Mace (Commerce) move to Verlamion rally point, arrives t157 with 2 movement left
- Treb (Paris), move to Tolosa rally point, arrives t156
- Treb (Production), move to Tolosa rally point, arrives t158 with 1 movement left
- Treb (Clams), move to Tolosa rally point, arrives t155

t156
- Whip units in Paris, Clams, Production, Commerce & Barb City
- Whip buddhist missionary in Zhou

t157
- sabotage horses
- worker 5 finish road manually before DoW
- send 5 reinforcements down the roads towards Tolosa or Camulodunum
- start another set of reinforcements in Paris, Clams, Production, Commerce & Barb City.
- WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

- 11 units are deposited 2 tiles from Bibracte:
- 5 units are deposited next to Vermilion
- 13 units for Tolosa, with 4 more trebs coming.

Bibracte force:
Mace 1, 2 & New Mace (WCS),
Chariot 7 (medic)
Xbows 1, 2 & 5
Cat 1 & 6,
Pike 1,
Archer 1

Verlamion force:
New Maces (Prod, Barb City & Commerce)
Spearman 2
Cat 3

Tolosa force:
Spearman 1
Chariot 1 (medic)
Cats 2, 4 & 5
Xbow 3 & 4
Pike (Clams)
New Maces (Paris, GP Farm & Clams)
Trebs (Paris & Clams), with Production treb 1 turn later

 

[Revent]

Just some comments. A bit late, but I think we could have perhaps left the trade for Theology and once we declared on Brennus, try to bribe Rams in. This would have been possible because: a) Our power rating would be added to his making the bribe cheaper (and probably possible) and b) Brennus's power rating would fall quite a bit as we killed units and took a lot of cities. But what's done is done.

Keep an eye out for Brennus's exploring archers; we don't want him to take a city! He has a high attack courage (no such thing as attack courage actually exists, it's just that the AI are fooled into thinking they are more likely to win, so on a scale of 1-6, Brennus is a 4 on 'attack courage'.) A lone archer thus may attack a city and possibly even win on low odds!

In two turns, whip the courthouse in fake humbaba. Whip granary in double fish island next turn.

On the fronts that we are creating, the weakest units should (Xbows) should be our 'main' land front and our naval invasion should consist purely of Maces and Cats. Xbows are weaker so can be reinforced with trebs sooner than the maces who will need it at a lower priority.

I still do think we should have one galleon to take Vienne; the culture break will allow all of our units to fly through the land. It's the reason for the crazy dot mapping I did to allow for easier visualisation of what would be left if we took his high culture cities.

The galley could be used to transport a spy we have currently to Thebes. That way when we declare, we will know when and where Brennus moves his stack. Looking into it now, he may not even move his stack (unlikely) because Thebes has a high chance of revolt.

 

[Revent]

Green from me. Let's try not to trade Theology away however.

 

[neilmeister]

Rams is not interested in DoWing Brennus, but you never know.

Agreed regarding whips for Fake Humbaba & Blue Fish.

I did a fair bit of juggling to try get the stacks ready to attack on t157. We could delay it a few more turns to get more maces to the Bibracte force, but I think the XBows should suffice.

Why not trade Theology?

edit: good observation regarding his wandering troops, that is what I am mainly worried about

 

[Benginal]

Just want to make sure that Chris sees Neil's note to use the chariots currently out west to destroy roads in egypt between us and thebes. This opportunity is potentially huge.

Heck, we may even have a chance to use a version of Revent's plan and have our 3 galleon force pick up another bunch of maces and deposit them in west Celtia while Brennus's stack is on the move.

 

[neilmeister]

I will bold it!

Yes, the Galleons will be useful to ferry troops out west.

Revent has made a good point regarding a galleon for Vienne.
Galleons, Treb & Maces all cost 80 hammers. So to fill a galleon from the Tolosa stack will remove 4 of the 12 units. I do not want to do this, but I am happy to modify the reinforcements.

There are 5 units whipped on t156 (Paris, Clams, Production, Commerce & Barb City) which are unallocated. If we make the Clams one a Galleon, then we can have 3 maces/trebs from Commerce, Paris and Production board the galleon 3 turns later and sail down towards Vienne on t159. They would land troops on t161, which is the turn after we take Tolosa.

edit: on reflection, I think I prefer spending the 80 hammers on another mace, and simply sending all reinforcements right down the middle of Tolosa/Bibracte.

 

[SteelHorse]

Good work. We have found the brennus stack.
I don't have access to the save until tomorrow night,
How many turns for him to move his stack to Bib, assuming he heads that direction to get his capital back? I would prefer we get him to war with Rams, then backstab. But if we can't What are the plans to deal with it? 20 units is big but not huge, but assuming he whips he can turn that into 40 fairly quickly. Can we get to Bib quickly enough to hold with the main stack?
Other concern, peace vassal. While Brens and Rams have not made contact with the others, we would prefer no peace vassalling. Therefore I would not give/trade compass and/optics away for a bit longer.

 

[neilmeister]

Good work. We have found the brennus stack.
I don't have access to the save until tomorrow night,
How many turns for him to move his stack to Bib, assuming he heads that direction to get his capital back? I would prefer we get him to war with Rams, then backstab. But if we can't What are the plans to deal with it? 20 units is big but not huge, but assuming he whips he can turn that into 40 fairly quickly. Can we get to Bib quickly enough to hold with the main stack?
Other concern, peace vassal. While Brens and Rams have not made contact with the others, we would prefer no peace vassalling. Therefore I would not give/trade compass and/optics away for a bit longer.

Ramesses and Brennus do not have OB, and we have 2 chariots that can rip up roads.

Worst case is that it will take Brennus 8 turns to get his stack to Isca, 9-10 to get then to Bibracte. Bibracte should fall on t159, 2 turns after the DoW.

Brennus will not be bribed into war, not even with both CS & MC.
Ramesses refuses to even consider it.

Nobody has Machinery yet, which is the pre-req for Optics. We can keep an eye on it though. 3 of the 6 AI already have Compass.

 

[SteelHorse]

Will our main stack reach BIb in 10 turns to defend? I assume the 10 turns is based on 2 tiles per turn movement. Brens has HA, any chance he whips 4-6 Horse Archers or upgrades his chariots to reclaim, or am I being to paranoid?

 

[neilmeister]

Will our main stack reach BIb in 10 turns to defend? I assume the 10 turns is based on 2 tiles per turn movement. Brens has HA, any chance he whips 4-6 Horse Archers or upgrades his chariots to reclaim, or am I being to paranoid?

You aren't being paranoid, but Brennus' stack has a lot of forest to move through first.

We should take:
- Vermilion on t158
- Bibracte on t159
- Tolosa on t160

This will cause a road to be clear all the way to Bibracte. (we finish the road in his territory the turn we DoW).

So reinfrocements should be flowing into Bibracte many turns before his stack will arrive (if he even moves it).

edit: really goood point though, if we bring the chariot from Clams, we can pillage his only horses on t159
edit2: and our Bibracte stack has a Pikeman, who will eat HA's and not even notice Chariots

 

[Trystero]

What is the plan for dealing with Brennus' stack? I realize this depends on what he does, but as SH noted, he has HBR now. Pillaging his horses sounds like it should be a priority. Are we sure that is his only source? (I just got home from work after a looooooooong day [tip for the college students among us, avoid research as a career path], so I haven't looked at the save yet.)

I assume the stack will come to us once we capture Bibracte. Is a single pike sufficient? I would assume so if he doesn't bring much more than the 6 chariots in his current stack, but there might be more lurking about.

I'm not too concerned with the Celtic stack as presently composed, but 10-20 HAs could give us trouble.

 

[neilmeister]

Yes, its his only horses.

By the time his main stack arrives, we will be fully healed up, and in all likelihood have taken Vienne as well.

I do take your point though, the only unit he can build/upgrade that worries us at all are the HA's, so we should maybe slot in another pikeman into the reinforcement queue.

I will edit the plan and put in a Pike in Clams (it can actually join the Tolosa stack on t157)

 

[ChrisShaffer]

On the fronts that we are creating, the weakest units should (Xbows) should be our 'main' land front and our naval invasion should consist purely of Maces and Cats. Xbows are weaker so can be reinforced with trebs sooner than the maces who will need it at a lower priority..

So my "mistake" of concentrating the crossbows at the land rally point was actually good strategy!

And it seems the accidental pike is a great thing too!

Too much wine and good company tonight, off to bed.

 

[Trystero]

Yeah, I'm not really that worried, just considering the worst case scenario.

I do take your point though, the only unit he can build/upgrade that worries us at all are the HA's, so we should maybe slot in another pikeman into the reinforcement queue.

Yes, that is what I was trying to say. I feel like I should make some contribution to the discussion.

I will edit the plan and put in a Pike in Clams.

Sounds good.

 

[neilmeister]

So my "mistake" of concentrating the crossbows at the land rally point was actually good strategy!

Actually, 3 out of the 4 march across Brennus' territory and get on a galleon around there.

We can still vary the mix up of the troops, but it will delay the invasion.