SGOTM 9 - Bede

[classical_hero]

@CH: We need to 'make room' for our Indian friends first. Otherwise they will never catch up. Celts and/or Spain can be dealt with after we reach navigation.

My solution is to get off this island with a force that is able to protect the Indians and yet still be able to not lose any cities to the Indians. That is why we should be going for Navigation ASAP. Once we can defeat the two nations of Celts and Spainish, then we can start to move off the first Continent.

 

[crazybeard]

Problem has come up, so I stopped for guidance. After 7 Turns, war with Carthage is doing very well. They're down to 1 city - Carthage.
But the Mongols have declared war on us. I know there are team members who will rejoice and say "just roll right over them" (which would seem possible to do), but I don't think we want to take the Mongols out just yet.
The biggest problem war with the Mongols will give us is the loss of one of our Luxuries, Spices. The Ottomans have Spices and will sell it, but they don't have a Harbor and the road routes all go through Mongol territory.

So ... How agressively should I deal with Genghis? Take a city or two and see if he yells "Uncle"? Drive a wedge into Mongol territory abd grab the Spices away? Family commitments may keep me from completing these turns today. But I will finish them ASAP after getting advice.

[EDIT: Save attached for those who want to give specific suggestions.]

 

[Crakie]

Yes, in order to get a decent peace treaty in a couple of turns, it's best that you take a few Mongol cities. If at all possible, I would encourage you or the next turnplayer to finish them off, but not at too big a cost of course. I am at work so cannot assess our strategic situation, but we're in a GA, have a strong offensive UU and if Carthage was that easy....

If necessary, make peace with Carthage, if they're down to one city we can always finish them later.

Didn't we get another lux from the Carthage war? We can afford to up the lux slider a few turns though.

 

[Bede]

The war machine is rolling along nicely, so don't stop now. Cartago delenda est!!!!

Mongols whole nother problem. They won't talk and porbably won't until we gice them a trimming. The city at the top of the Inland Sea is a good candidate for conversion to the Viking cause.

Cut a deal with Isabella for Theology, then set a course for Printing Press just as fast as the budget can take it and don't be afraid to spend.....

After Printing press we want to make as ,any contact trades as we can, then head straight for Navigation. Skip any parts of the tech tree that don't get us to Navigation. Once Carthage and the Mongols are dealt with we won't need guns for defense....so Gunpowder is not a high value for us. Buy it from the other guys when we think we need it to advance into the next era.

Keep the Mongol alive until we get to contact trading.

 

[crazybeard]

Turnset complete. Sorry, I couldn't take Carthage.

0 650 AD Did some "window shopping", all 3 techs can be had, but expensive. Moved Luxury slider to 10% and put some clowns to work.
IBT: Carthage sends units through Mongol territory towards CM #1 - we nearly lose slave.

1 660 AD Beseige Carthage, but let it be as it is isolated while other cities are not.

2 670 AD Catthage troops try to cut cross-country to help bail out capitol. I show them the error of their ways.
IBT: Celts are at it again:

3 680 AD Harbor complete in East Isle Iron, giving us another Iron, which I sell to the Ottomans.
IBT: Gandhi comes calling. Pitiful. Give him a good meal and send him home.

4 690 AD Regroup & Heal
IBT: Carthage lands troops on East Island.

5 700 AD: Yay Zerks. East Island invasion force destroyed.

IBT: Celts building Smith's - they have Economics.

6 710 AD Two more tenpins topple. Only Carthage itself remains.
IBT: Carthage ships flitter about East Island. No further troops unloaded.

7 720 AD: Shuffling troops
IBT: Mongols declare war. Only a few troops in our territory. Stop for instructions.

8 730 AD: Carthage survives first major assault. Should have waited for more troops. Galley exploring other continent reports Musketmen guarding some Celt cities.

9 740 AD Buy Theology from Spain for 448 gold and 24 gpt. 10% Lux, 70% Science. Printing Press in 6
IBT: Busy little Celts

10 750 AD Assault on Carthage and Amphib assualt on Kazan fail for insufficient numbers.

What is survival worth to Hannibal?:

If you want postion pics, let me know, or just fire up the save:

http://gotm.civfanatics.net/saves/sgotm9/Bede_SG009_AD0750_01.SAV

I suspect that one of the two Carthaginian Galley that are flittering about the East Island has a Settler on it.
One of the units guarding Kazan was a Musketman. Zerk took him out.

 

[madviking]

Crakie -
madviking -
crazybeard - just played
Bede - UP!
Marc Aurel - on deck
Bahzel - in the hole
classical_hero -

 

[Bede]

Got my hands on it, play after retail madness ends!

Looks like time to whack a Genghis. Concentrate and crush!

 

[Marc Aurel]

Sorry, I won't be at home over the weekend, so I have to skip.

 

[crazybeard]

Since we are way ahead of the other teams in terms of turns played (the only other team into AD years is Team Klarius), I see no problem in waiting until Monday for Mason to play his turns.

 

[classical_hero]

So far we have not formulated a plan to get the Indians to the Alpha Centuri. This is my plan to do that.
Step one. Clear this continent for the Indians to use.
Step two. We clear the other continent for our use leaving only the Americans.
Step three. We start to move off the other continent.
Step four, we start gifting America some techs so that they can start to trade them to India. This will only happen once the Indians are starting to grow on there empty continent for them to grow to. That would mean that eventually we would need to give the American the knowledge of our countact with the Indians.
Step five. We build the UN so that no other nation can win via diplomatic means.
Step six. Once India has all the techs for spaceships we remove the Americans.
Step seven, Victory.

 

[Bede]

Your plan makes sense. That's why we need to get our hands on Printing Press and Navigation above all things else. We need to trade India out to everybody so they join the Cartel. Then we need to get across the water in numbers and to do that we need boats and maps and good sailing instructions.

 

[Bede]

The Empire at 850AD

Here we go again.

The first principle of warfare is concentrate, the second is move in a cordinated fashion. What I find on the map is a mess. Troops are spread all over the place, with land units on board galleys and amphibious zerks trekking overland. Not enough boats to make an effective assault on the Mongols, nor enough zerks in the right place.

What I want to accomplish here is finish the Phoenicians, then put enough hurt on the Mongols to get a peace deal along with some technology. I just hope Chivalry has not made it into the Mongol arsenal as Keshiks on the attack against AC and zerks is just plain ugly.


760AD

Assault on Hovd is inconclusive but demonstrates that there is more than one defender and one of them is a longbow.

Spend the rest of the turn doing a volte face of the forces to try and gather strength for the push on Kazan and Carthage.

Mongol LB kills the mace covering the wounded zerk at Hovd and a Mongol archer and pike move on Sabratha while the Punic galley cruises the east coast.

770AD


Moving into position

770AD

And here comes the end of Carthage.

The Zerk is less than effective, dying at the gates of Hannibal's capitol. I only hope the AC's can make up for it, but they fail. One is lost and the others promote. The last NuMerc is crippled but standing and the AC's are wounded. I am a less than happy camper and have to strip the garrison at CM 1 to finish the war. The good nes is that in 790AD the Mongol is going to take a beating.

But first we take a pasting at Sabratha losing a zerk to an archer and another to a sword.

And then

Printing Press comes in so before the warfare it is time to play The Dating Game.

But first I get to knock the Mongols off the high ground at Sabratha. And then burn down Leptis as I won't be able to hold it.

And now for some trading around

This deal nets us Education

And contact with the Ottomans gets us his gold. But it turns out he also holds Astronomy.

It turns out that the Ottoman doesn't know the Indian but will pay 29g for a date with a guy in a dhoti, and 43g for a chaperone in a tall hat (Lincoln).

Printing Press and Contacts with our island gets us Chivalry as we are going to need more than Berzerks to deal with the Mongols

And Lincoln gets Currency for his 13g and let's hope he sells somehting to the Indians.

Then Brennus tries to hold us up for Astronomy so, recalling a previous plan, declare war on him and invite Isabella to play. She wants contact with the Mongols and 275g. DOne.

It seems that the Mongol attack did break our deal with Osman so now our trading reputation is shot. We can deal with this, however.



And now for the war against the Khan

Zerks on boats are in position.

-More-

 

[Bede]

Mongolhammer is built in the place of Kazan. And now he'll talk..

And then the Golden Age ends and the Economy goes in the bucket...

In 830AD the Celts land a single archer at East Iron, they must know Navigation

The archer attacks at East iron and soon dies. Start the process of repositioning to get troops at East Iron and prepare a fleet to invade the Celts.

And in 830

So much for Hannibal.

The boats are sailing to Mongolhammer to pick up 'zerks. Ship them to the eastern canal town. There is also a settler on the way to the west. Use her to fill in around Carthage.

Move ground troops into position on the northern flank and start a build up of zerks and muskets for coverage at East Iron with every boat we can spare.

Try to set miltary training in towns so it can complete in 5 turns or less. Build trebs or boats everywhere else.

The research is set to Astronomy just as fast as the treasury can stand it. If by putting the cheapest MP you can find in towns that have grown past nine you may be able to reduce the luxury bill, but do not neglect the Expeditionary Force. We will be building caravels in about ten turns or so, which with the added naval movement just may be able to get across from East Iron to the Celtic shores. DO not neglect defenders in the force. Two zerks and a defender to a boat is a good ratio in the fleet. And have some settlers ready to go along for the ride.

India remains ignorant and poor. I don't know what to do about that. As soon as he gets Map Making open up the door to the western arm. We are going to need to keep the east for some time to come yet. Even to the extent of building the FP somewhere.

Roster check:


Marc Aurel - UP and get us ready to launch for the Celtic island
Bahzel - on deck
Crakie -
madviking -
crazybeard - just played
Bede - wrapped up Carthage and hurt the Mongol

 

[Marc Aurel]

Thank you for your patience, I've got the save and am just examining the situation. Any further suggestions, before I start?

 

[crazybeard]

I think Capt Bede has it covered. On the home front, exploit the area around Carthage. It has Silks and Saltpeter, both of which are useful to us. As soon as you're sure we won't be flanked, get the Workers up there.

 

[Marc Aurel]

After examination I saw two possible ways to move on:

1. Strike at the Mongols and get the great leader
2. Go immediately to invade Celtic lands

850 AD : Considering the tremendeous power and riches of Brennus land, I decided to invade Celtia!
My turns are therefore gathering an army for the invasion of the Celtic lands.
What was I building?
I’m not too much a fan of arty in the early stages, cause you can capture them from the enemy. So in my first private games I ended up supporting too much of them in the end, but that also depends on the AI army composition. So I turned production to Settlers, Zerks and Muskets. In the end I started also a couple of knights. I reduced building any imrovements, cause the Indians may destroy them during capture and the time left of use for us seemed too short. Consequence is that now we have a high military upkeep and need to use our military asap on the Celts. So I concentrated on making money after getting to Astronomy asap. I hope the conflict with Brennus is decisively won, when they get to Nationalism. They are a democracy and are researching very fast, so we are quite in a hurry.
What was happening?

870 AD : After having chosen the peaceful way to deal with the Mongols I export luxes to them to help them keep our treaty and getting money. I cannot afford losing all that money we have for science.- I will need this for galley upgrading, since every unit will cost 30g. Assuming 10 galleys at least, that’s 300g!

880 AD Surprise - Spain made peace with Celtia – quite early I think and a little waste of our money since they cannot have fought very much.

Brennus offers peace also to us and I accept, since he has declared, getting 57g. That is no change in our politics. We keep preparing the revenge attack at full speed!

Additionally Falun is founded this year NE of Carthage.



890 AD : Brennus completes Bachs Cathedral and Smith TC also. I’m getting really envious now and am sure to keep the plan to strike at Celtia first.


900 AD … and it continues! Brennus completes Magellans Exped. Now I am completely convinced. Entremont must become ours. The Problem is that this city (and a few others also) will flip back due to culture after capture. So our forces must leave the city at once after restoring order to let it flip and reconquer afterwards.

 

[Marc Aurel]

920 AD : Our territory also has grown a little. Helsinki is founded. I kept founding cities to increase our unit upkeep. We have a dire need of money for upgrade purposes.


930 AD : We research Astronomy and start immediately upgrading our fleet.

I reduced science to 10%. I think we should get our next techs from the Celts. Our capital is invested in the military. So lets use it to get what we need.

950 AD : So this is our expeditionary force.

There is one further Caravel moving up to the starting point next turn. So, Bahz, you have 27 units available for the first strike at D-Day. There are 6 further units closing in. Afterwards you have 2 settlers and a lot of workers at the moment clearing jungle at Sarpsborg foressen to support our invasion forces in the second wave. There are only 4 Muskets visible, but 2 others are amongst the units keeping up.
Good news is that our military is strong compared to the Celtic (They were building too much wonders, haha!)


I’m not sure about the order in which we attack the Celtic cities. Personally I tend to attack as much as possible cities in the first blow to cripple the AI decisively at a high risk of not getting all targets due to the limited forces assigned to a single city. I think we should at least address two cities, since I often saw that AI cities are defended by two units only (except the capitol, that often has more than 4 units defending) The crusader producing city (Richborough) is far away from the coast, so no option to reduce this threat to us first and get the crusaders ourselves. Brennus has enough iron and horses, so that also won’t be an option to yield for in the first turns of war. However he has only one source of Saltpeter at Burdigala that is far from our landing point. Maybe if we land one partition force at Verulamium beach we can get there by ROP with America, who maybe a useful help in this war as an ally. So that’s it so far. Now we get to the decisive turns of the game …. Let me mention at this point concluding my turnset: India still cannot read maps!

So here is the save:
View attachment 105696

 

[Marc Aurel]

Only for discussion, since this a risky war. What do you think is best? I just didn't make up my mind yet.

 

[madviking]

My idea:
Make a city on the hill Westish of Alesia, let teh units gets killed. then assult.

 

[madviking]

Better plan-


Let's begin...
1- split armada into four groups A, B, C, D
2-
A- muskets land on hill N of Entre to serve as decoy, berserks attack Entre
B- lands on hill near Alesia and march and burn Alesia
C- Burns AugustoD
D- burns Georgia
3-
A- couple zerks go to island city and burns it, go outside of Lugdunum
B- remaining zerks and muskets to go to the mount
C- ships sail, burn Ebora
D- Groups B & C converge and burn RichBoro
4-
A- burn Agencium
B- burn Lugdunum
C- burn Camolodumun
5-
A- burn Vermulium
B- burn Burdigala with Camolo group
6-
A- burn Catacorum
B- go to island city N of mainland
7-
A- burn that city
B- burn Nemasus