SGOTM3 Rome - Team Smackster

[dmanakho]

Smakster, youv'e made quite a progress...

Do we have few extra caravels???
We have bunch of cannons, I suggest we sent them to across the ocean and sell them in our new city to rush units...
We probably will benefit more from having cavalry and muskets than cannons at this point...
I suggest as soon as Tarkeel builds new city, rush port and then barracks so we can rush units locally, and we can sell some if not all of our cannons for this purpose.
I suspect in next few turns AIs will throw at us everything they have...
So good luck Tarkeel... show them the remake of The Battle of Thermopylae.

 

[smackster]

There are enough Caravels, to get everything else over in a turn, we could do the Wotan Caravel shuffling.

I had intended to send all the way back, only half the Caravels so that we can hop them, not sure how many I did that to.

 

[smackster]

Tarkeel,

I'm pretty sure I messed up moving the bulk of our Caravels back, I think I slept them and didn't wake them. So look out for the big stack and start them moving back.

Feel free to play only 5 as those turns are taking a long time. It might be easier to just post when you have done, even if its only 5, or 6.

smackster

 

[Tarkeel]

I suggest we go to 5 from here, as quite a lot can happen in 10 turns and it's good to get some input. It's not like we're behind the other teams in turns played

I mentioned 6 to include the fighting on your last turn

 

[smackster]

I suggest we go to 5 from here, as quite a lot can happen in 10 turns and it's good to get some input. It's not like we're behind the other teams in turns played

Agreed, then everyone may get a hand in these final stages. However there is quite a lot of settling that needs to be done. Also I was not settling based on your maps, as it was taking too much time already, I just settled in what appeared to be the best space for culture. Note that if you look at the mini-map it looks like we have little culture gaps, but on the actual map, it is not there, I wonder if this is a bug.

I would expect the AI to have ROP with each other, so we might get some of India's friends joining in the attack. Also there must be a lot more Indian troops somewhere.

edit : The army is in the stack, and there is an elite* Cavalry ready to join it.

 

[dmanakho]

Do we want to send a caravel with troops to that American island up north???
Because it might take 10+ turns just to get there... plus we need couple of settlers to settle that island.. That will take 2 caravels

 

[smackster]

Do we want to send a caravel with troops to that American island up north???
Because it might take 10+ turns just to get there... plus we need couple of settlers to settle that island.. That will take 2 caravels

There is a Caravel already on its way there, another note to Tarkeel to look out for that one, it has nothing in it, was going to load it from our northern troops.

On a related subject watch out for the Japanese stack on the north of our Island, there are two Cavalry near, but the army is far to the east. They have at least 2 Samurai in that stack.

 

[dmanakho]

And we probably need to move few more units to the barb continent... I reckong Japanese will keep landin samurais over there...
With their defence values and mountains we should expect moderate losses

 

[Wotan]

We have bunch of cannons, I suggest we sent them to across the ocean and sell them in our new city to rush units...
We probably will benefit more from having cavalry and muskets than cannons at this point...
I suggest as soon as Tarkeel builds new city, rush port and then barracks so we can rush units locally, and we can sell some if not all of our cannons for this purpose.

Good thinking, re. use of Cannons. Maybe not use them to "rush" units with but to disband one in each new city and rush temple immediately (the cost is lower if some shields are already in the build than if you rush from 0 shields), maybe even rush library the turn after when we are extremely close to domination. The number of settlers we are able to send to new continent might be lower than we would like so using cultural expansion there might help us get to domination quicker.

On Muskets, would very much doubt we need any during the final turns of this game. Only build Cav and Settlers now... And maybe a Caravel or two in the north to take the island. and populate Hadrian north. Switch inland cities and cities far from areas of real interest to generate gold instead of building units. Only build units in cities that will be able to produce a cavalry in less than 10 (maybe even 5) turns. They will not be usefull if that is not possible. We are in the last 20 turns of the game now, and the closer we come to the end the more we need gold to rush units just behind the frontline. Joining workers to cities where we rush settler on the new continent is also an option.

Edit: We also need to rush temples for cultural expansion on Hadrians.

 

[smackster]

Joining workers to cities where we rush settler on the new continent is also an option.

Edit: We also need to rush temples for cultural expansion on Hadrians.

Both points are good, we should send some workers over to the new continent, simply so that we can join to cities and use them to rush settlers. Really there is no value for our workers putting irrigation in a some far off city. I suggest we cease all improvement activities with workers (apart from roads on Hadrians, to help our defence), and either add them to cities or get them over to the other continent. We have more than enough Caravels.

Note that I did rush a couple of temples on Hadrians, the ones that would give us the most culture expansion. We get about +470GPT, so use it wisely, can you get more culture expansion from a rushed settler, than a rushed temple.

 

[Wotan]

50 "max corruption" cities shifted to produce gold will add 50 gold to the gpt stockpile, not something we should disregard. And I guess we should be able to come close to 100 gpt in extra income by doing this on a massive scale. With game end within 20 turns from now we need to "ramp down" production to what we can actually have use for during that period. Since a rushed Cavalry (in a city with at least 1 shield already produced) cost 316 gold we can only rush cavalry in 1 or max two cities next to the front per turn, not taking temple rushing into account. When we hit domination not a single city should produce anything but gold (maybe a few forward cities producing rushed cavalry and settlers could be allowed)

So all cities not able to produce cavalry in a decent number of turns should revert to gold production now. Settlers exempted though. Rushing in cities near New Smackster so we do not need to build barracks on new continent. Cavalry can move 9 tiles over road so after shiphopping across they will not have lost any substantial movement capability anyway. And we only need a maximum of 4 cities to do this with two cities rushing every other turn in pairs if we have the funds else in one city. Settler should be rushed on new continent though if possible due to movement restrictions (3 tiles on road), so send workers there to speed the process.

Finally: Do not pillage tiles on new continent that would hinder us moving on roads. We need the speed to end this game.

 

[smackster]

50 "max corruption" cities shifted to produce gold will add 50 gold to the gpt stockpile, not something we should disregard.

....stuff deleted.....

Finally: Do not pillage tiles on new continent that would hinder us moving on roads. We need the speed to end this game.

More good ideas, Wotan is now officially the ideas man of the team.

Agree with producing wealth in certain totally corrupt cities. We might want to start it with all those that produce something in the coming turns, plus those that are below size 2, and those that are so far from the front their settler would not get there before the end of the game. Will have to make judgement calls on those that already have some invested shields.

I think we should build a barracks on the new continent, purely for healing our Cavalry, I would image that we'll get a number of red-lined and that barracks will get them back to the front quickly.

We might want to consider pillaging their last iron, saltpetr and horses. Saltpetr the most useful. If we see any on coasts for any of the civs, send a spare Caravel that way.

 

[dmanakho]

Remember, that domination is not just a land, but also 66% of total population..
I have no idea how much we have now, Smackster only reports about land we owe.
But if we far from having 66% pop, we probably should let cities (some cities) to grow and not to convert all extra citizens into taxmen therefore preventing population grow... I know we can join workers into cities later to add some population but we don't have that many workers after all, and my concerns only apply if we are far from that magic number of 66%.

 

[smackster]

Remember, that domination is not just a land, but also 66% of total population..
I have no idea how much we have now, Smackster only reports about land we owe.
But if we far from having 66% pop, we probably should let cities (some cities) to grow and not to convert all extra citizens into taxmen therefore preventing population grow... I know we can join workers into cities later to add some population but we don't have that many workers after all, and my concerns only apply if we are far from that magic number of 66%.

Yes I forget about that as usually its so easy to get over the pop limit. Actually Dianthus' utility does not report that for some reason. The old MapStat program says we require 684 total, and we have 519, therfore on the face of it require 165, but as this is a % of the world pop, we don't really need that much more as the world poplulation total is about to take a dramatic dive.

 

[smackster]

Just looked back and see that our territory % went from 34.8%->40% over my turns, that an addition of 7%, at that rate we'll need at least 30 more turns (I was pumping them pretty hard). Getting it in less than 20 might be too much of a challenge.

 

[Wotan]

Will have to make judgement calls on those that already have some invested shields.

I think you should look at when the unit produced will finish, if later than say 10 turns from now, either cut the losses and drop the production or finish it by rushing if close enough to front/port of embarcation. All the time remembering to build culture buildings in coastal cities with tiles not yet within our cultural borders....

I think we should build a barracks on the new continent, purely for healing our Cavalry, I would image that we'll get a number of red-lined and that barracks will get them back to the front quickly.

Of course! Didn't think of that... Must be done to have them heal fast...

 

[Wotan]

Just looked back and see that our territory % went from 34.8%->40% over my turns, that an addition of 7%, at that rate we'll need at least 30 more turns (I was pumping them pretty hard). Getting it in less than 20 might be too much of a challenge.

That's the name of the game... Just expand our borders now. Rush culture on new continent to allow for less number of settlers for territory gained. Settle, disband a unit and rush temple (+library on next turn when less than 5 turns from finish line... Settlers cost population temples/libraries only gold...

 

[smackster]

That's the name of the game... Just expand our borders now. Rush culture on new continent to allow for less number of settlers for territory gained. Settle, disband a unit and rush temple (+library on next turn when less than 5 turns from finish line... Settlers cost population temples/libraries only gold...

While there is space available, its still better to rush settlers rather than temples as they are much cheaper, often give more tiles, and the effect is immediate. Once the majority of space is gone, then start rushing the temples.

Now we should be able to calculate how many settlers are needed for our continent, and then the barb continet. Maybe we already have enough on there way, so one job we need to do is make those calculations. From a look at the mini-map, maybe 12-13 settlers for our continent.

 

[Tarkeel]

I'm swamped in stuff to do around the house, so won't have time to finish this upp till tomorrow I'm afraid. I don't want to play this with less then 100% concentration.

I guess I'll have to make a new dotmap to count how many settlers are needed

 

[Wotan]

Yes, settlers are cheaper in gold but they do take population to build so we either have to get enough workers across to help rushing settlers or move settler quite far for them to be able to settle so my point was that in those circumstances spreading locations and getting culture might be faster even though it will take a city with temple 5 turns to expand, library 4 turns and a combo of them both 3 turns if built wisely (disbanding and paying normal rush 4gps) might even do the 8gps from scratch rush if gold is not an issue.

Edit: @Tarkeel: Good decision, take your time to make the most out of every turn... Good luck and surprise us by finishing the game.