SGOTM 23 - Unallocated

[Sun Tzu Wu]

We also need at least one Galley to get to Hatshepsut through Joao II.

 

[haphazard1]

OK, my internet service is finally working again. Now to get caught up on the thread, and get the scribe stuff on the first page updated.

Good points about crossbows as defenders, ikotomi. They are strength 6, but since we are not attacking with melee units they will be much less dangerous to us. With a decent stack of catapults we should be able to hammer our way into Hatty's cities, for a price. As long as we don't have to deal with another AI at the same time it should be workable.

 

[marbe166]

Who is up and on deck now?

It's me, but I am in the middle of moving right now, and I will probably not be able to play until next weekend at the earliest. So if ikotomi (or anyone else for that matter) can take some turns I would be grateful.

 

[ikotomi]

If someone can play for me, that would be good. It will be a while before I can take a look at the save.

 

[haphazard1]

I can play some turns, if no one else wants to grab the save. My last turn set was cut short, so mybe I can make that up now.

Took a look at the save. Hmmmm, lot going on. Some thoughts:

- How much more of Germany do we want to try to conquer? Do we know where Frankfurt (Frederick's third city) is? Or what he has in his two visible cities? I am a bit concerned about Berlin having only an axe to defend it, we could get counter-attacked there since we have no cultural control to block movement.
- Stalin is also at war with Germany; any info on his forces?
- Mehmed is showing the clenched fist -- no idea who his target could be, since he has no worst enemy right now. I would not think it would be us, given our current military strength.
- We have a lot of injured units and no medic. I suggest we take one of our two horse archers with two promotions available and turn them into a medic I. Later we can attach a great general (we are well along towards generating one) for a fast moving super medic. With all the warring we will be doing, we will definitely want a super medic.
- Tech trades: Priesthood is available, but is really really cheap. Do we want to trade for it and cost a point towards WFYABTA? Also, Frederick has Metal Casting which would be very nice to get. I wonder if we could get it in a peace deal?
- Poor Double Fish has been whipped into the ground. We need some more happiness there and in a couple other cities. Monarchy would be a really good tech for us, get into HR and improve our wines for a significant happiness boost. We are rushing towards musketeers but our empire needs to be able to sustain itself economically as well; right now we can hardly afford to build more military even if we had the tech ready. We are paying quite a bit in unit costs, partly due to our reduced population from whipping. Some time to consolidate our gains and regrow our cities would be helpful.

What does the team think we should do? Continue war with Germany for another couple cities? Make peace and let Stalin keep Frederick busy while we consolidate and head for musketeers? Other? I think we are in a strong position, but we are pretty badly stretched right now economically.

Good luck with the move, marbe166! Moving is always so disruptive, it seems to take forever to get everything back organized again.

 

[Sun Tzu Wu]

One good option for reducing whip anger is to give the city to an AI just before we DoW it. The gifted city can be recaptured the same turn, minus all its whip anger. Any normal building that generates culture would be lost, but if our own culture is dominant, no other buildings are lost.

 

[Sun Tzu Wu]

I'm in favor of taking a few more cities from Frederick. We can even cease fire with him, give him double fish and DoW and retake it to zero out its Whip Anger.

 

[haphazard1]

Interesting idea on whip anger, I have never tried that tactic. Double Fish has 60+ turns of whip anger, so getting rid of all of it would be a very big boost to getting the city productive again.

Any thoughts on Germany's third city or available forces? I am thinking it must be to the east of his other two, south of Russian territory. Unless Frederick managed to plant a colony on an island or something...that would be annoying if he managed that.

We can continue the war, but I think we need the medic unit and a couple turns in place to get our forces back into battle readiness. Our army is seriously beat up right now. But after those couple turns we could advance again.

 

[Sun Tzu Wu]

I agree we need a medic unit.

As I suggested, I favor a cease fire, give Double Fish to Frederick, DoW and immediately recapture Double Fish. Note that recapturing Double Fish (capturing any city for that matter) gives us 10 war success. Frederick will become unwilling to talk again after the second DoW, but I believe that war suiccess will speed up talking process. I also believe that 40 war success over an AI may be enough to offer capitulation, but would need to recheck that to be sure.

We should check to see how our diplomancy might be damaged by declaring war on a friend (Frederick), but that is only -1 per AI, except Gandhi -2, if I'm not mistaken.

 

[Sun Tzu Wu]

Since out military needs healing, I suggest we cease fire immediately, after optionally regrouping, so our forces teleport to the same place the medic goes or the medic can get there in 1 turn.

After fully healed, we give Bouble Fish, DoW and immediately recapture Double Fish and proceed to capture Frederick's remaining cities, razing those with poor food/hammers/commerce.

 

[haphazard1]

Sounds like a solid plan. I am not very familiar with cease fire as I tend not to be much of a war monger in my personal games, and when I do fight it is almost always until destruction of the enemy. How does it differ from an outright peace deal? If I am recalling correctly, it does not prevent us from re-declaring for 10 turns like peace would. What other differences are there? Can anything else be included in a cease fire deal, or is it only the cease fire on both sides?

 

[Sun Tzu Wu]

If you cease fire, you can declare war again later in the same turn; there is no period of enforced peace as in the 10 turns of enforced peace of a peace treaty.

(Also, the player can not ask for anything when he proposes a cease fire. As typical, the AI can give you things as part of a cease fire, if it proposes a cease fire when the player asks for terms.)

 

[Packers5280]

Cease fire plan is fine with me. Never heard of the gift city with large whip anger and take it back before.

I posted Russia's stack earlier. It was like 4 units, nothing too serious.

 

[Sun Tzu Wu]

Cease fire plan is fine with me. Never heard of the gift city with large whip anger and take it back before.

I learned this from my old SGOTM team, Kakumeika, in SGOTM-15 or there abouts. You can learn a lot more from the top three finishing SGOTM team threads.

 

[Sun Tzu Wu]

How are we doing with Great People?

After Gunpowder, we will probably beeline Chemistry -> Steel -> Steam Power -> Railroad.

It would be nice to vassal Hatshepsut. She could research the technology beeline to Steam Power for us.

 

[Sun Tzu Wu]

If we keep working scientists, we could double bulb Chemistry after we double bulb Education. We will need to trade for Engineering first though.

 

[haphazard1]

Apologies for the delay in getting this up. The last couple days have been unpleasantly exciting, with my aunt spending most of it in the hospital. Fortunately she is now doing better, but she is going to need surgery once she recovers a bit and is strong enough.

It looks like we favor the cease fire plan Sun Tzu Wu proposed (interesting tactic from previous champions), and then finishing off Frederick completely. So the updated plan would look like:

- Cease fire with Frederick immediately
- Regroup our units, promote an HA as a medic I, heal up our numerous injured units (should be only a couple turns with the Medic assisting)
- Gift Double Fish to Frederick, then immediately DOW and retake the city from him (clearing the 60+ turns of whip anger we have stacked there)
- Complete conquest of Germany, keeping desirable cities

During this we continue researching towards Gunpowder for musketeers. When do we want to use our GS? Education seems like the best bet to get full value from the bulb. We should generate another GS from Paris after a handful more turns -- how best to use it? One option would be to double bulb Education, but I will have to check the exact timing. We might need to run a couple turns of cash to avoid wasting research, if we decide to do that.

Any other diplo we want to pursue? We should hopefully complete the Hanging Gardens as well, if no one beats us to it. EP will remain on Hatshepsut. Keep an eye on the trade screens for possible tech trades or resource deals. No civic or religion changes planned.

Anything I am missing? Suggested additions? Other stuff?

 

[haphazard1]

No comments? I don't want to hold up the game, but I also do not want to proceed without some feedback from the team.

 

[Packers5280]

Plan looks good to me.

I'm fine with double bulbing education.

 

[Sun Tzu Wu]

PPP looks great, haphazard!

Yes, double bulb Education; run 00% research as needed to generate 2nd GS for Education.