SGOTM6 - Team Bede

[Minute Man]

I think 100 turns is too long to wait - Babylon is going to be building spaceship parts by then. And now, while Hammurabi is at war with the rest of the world, is probably as good a time to take him on as we're going to have. Our tech hole is just going to get deeper and deeper, since we're spending our entire economy on culture buildings.

 

[Tubby Rower]

looking at the cultcha graph on the gotm page, we are the first to pass the 100k mark. Although we are almost 500 years behind the rest of the pack.

On the wait or declare issue, Looking at the map, it looks like America and France are making inroads to babylon. I notice that Ashur (Babylon's 2nd or 3rd city) was razed by the French and Hammi and Abe is taking some of his old cities back. We might be able to wait this one out. Escpecially if the core Babylonian cities are being captured/razed by Joan.

I'm content to wait 20 turns or so and see what this outcome is. Meanwhile building up some defense and some arties.

EDIT::: what is our financial situation?? Should we be hiring taxmen and scientists? Or is that already done?

 

[eldar]

My rough calculations (wish I had Offa's nice City Capture Simulator available here at work...) indicate:

3 Vet Cavalry per Vet Infantry fortified in a Town on flat land.
4 Vet Cavalry per Vet Infantry fortified in a City on flat land.
5 Vet Cavalry per Vet Infantry fortified in a Metro on flat land.

Expect less than 1 retreat per Infantry killed.

Obviously this gets worse with Rivers, Hills, etc., and don't forget counter-attacks in between.
It also doesn't take into account Defender promotion.

It gets better facing only Regs, with bombardment (little use Cannons may be, though), and use of Elites and Armies.

Unless we get whipping away to rush some serious numbers, we're not going to make much of a dent.

(c) 2005 Bored-at-Work Inc....

 

[Tubby Rower]

So basically wait on the war. OK

 

[mabellino]

Don't underestimate the power of pillaging. We have 7 armies! Send them to Babylon and cut off their resources. We have a few cannons, they're not totally useless for bombardment, make them earn their wages for once.
The Babs are already fighting a 6 front war, lets join in whilst we still can.
I was too chicken to start a war in my turns but i now see that war vs Babs is our only option.
Down with hammi!

 

[Tubby Rower]

I was too chicken to start a war in my turns but i now see that war vs Babs is our only option.

I like the way that you passed the buck there. Those armies are a good deterent too. I just don't think that we have the defensive force right now to hold them off. I'd be worried Hammi would run right over us.

What is the likelihood of Hammi turning forces our way when he's having trouble with Abe & Joan? A lot of his resources are in the distant north anyway. No way we'd get there without taking hits.

Any other votes?

 

[Tubby Rower]

OK. I'm gonna declare on Hammi on turn 1 if I don't hear back from someone otherwise. I'm not wanting to do it, but I don't see the point of playing this game until the end of SGOTM7. We've probably got the wooden spoon wrapped up by now. Barring no team losing.

 

[Bede]

Easy TR. I think your notion of holding fast a couple of turns and checking out the opposition is a sound one. Meantime move the cannons into a stack somewhere clsoe to a soft Babylonian underbelly.

We can't afford research right now but we can afford a bigger military. Before calling charge, though, spend the coin to invesitgate a few towns on the target list and make sure that there are enough cannon to hurt the defenders in the attacking stack. Get an infantryman down to 1hp and they are easy meat for a cavalry grinder. The trick is going to be holding the captured towns. Prefereably we want to prioritize towns with culture...then just raze 'em.

 

[Tubby Rower]

Ok. I was worried that I was the only one not wanting to go after the Military machine of this age. I didn't want to go against the team. Should sometime declare during my turns or just wait and let the next poor sap (I mean teammate) take on Hammi.


I'm gonna go dance with Idiots and then come back here for an answer. Then I'll play in about 1 1/2 hours from now.

 

[Tubby Rower]

Sorry I'll have to get to this tomorrow. nighty night

 

[mabellino]

I like the way that you passed the buck there. Those armies are a good deterent too. I just don't think that we have the defensive force right now to hold them off. I'd be worried Hammi would run right over us.

What is the likelihood of Hammi turning forces our way when he's having trouble with Abe & Joan? A lot of his resources are in the distant north anyway. No way we'd get there without taking hits.

Any other votes?

I didn't mean war straight away! I just meant we're not up the proverbial creek yet. Bede's advice about investigating cities is sound, not sure if the cash flow'll allow it for a couple of turns or so. Am I right in thinking the bigger/more improvements a city has the more it costs to investigate? If that's true then we can get a rough idea of target cities just by checking how much it costs to investigate them IYSWIM?
One obvious contender is babylon's capital though!

As for the wooden spoon... there's always another team with a sudden defeat! 100k is a hard victory to pull off, there's always the danger of an unfriendly UN vote or a sneaky spaceship getting there first. It's a game of sit and wait for most teams I should think. Even the ones who are light years ahead on the score graph have to stop before they reach domination.
Just my 2 cents

 

[Tubby Rower]

beginning culture 103459 (1379cpt)
Babylon 69490 (517cpt)
Babylon has 53 cities

Ending culture 112266 (1497 cpt)
Hammi 72412 (375cpt) (averaged 487 over 6 turns)
Hammi has 51 cities

French Ninevah has held. Hopefully they can jump off from there and beat that bearded b. down.

If Mapstats cpt is correct we are generating culture at 4x the rate of Hammi.

I only investigated one city and then I started saving up for a spy or two. We have ~300 in the bank and +300gpt. I'll try to get the screenie of Oil Springs up.
Note: Do not attack Carthage or China. It could lead to a dogpile on us. Check Mapstat's flipping and adjust troops accordingly.

Spoiler Turnlog :

pre-turns - add some cops but maintain 3 turns to spies
get some happy people in a couple of cities
rush a library
investigate Oil springs for 54

IT : Americans ask for an embargo against the Babylonians. I agree if anything else to improve attitude
Abe also asks for peace extension, sure.
trade embargo against us between China& carthage ends

t1: Shanghai riots I can't believe I missed it. I went through every city.
had to reduce sci to 10%. spies due in 3 still

IT: See about 12 American guerillas dropped off at one of the Hammi cities
China requests a MPP & ROP. nope
Arausio leavs Hammi and returns to the motherland

t2:Hammi lost another city this turn to the French (Nineveh)
drop sci to 0 & spies due in 2

IT: Abe's guerillas won one battle, and lost 2 then pillaged a RR. I have some settlers lined up just in case those cities are razed
China & Carthage signed another embargo

t3: zzzz

IT: Vikings want to extend peace, sure.

t4: Spies are in. Set research to harnessing the smallest component of the atom
I think that I screwed something up. There is no pre-builds for either the Intel or SPHQ. So I fudged something (Intel in Entremont due in 9 & SPHQ in Nemasus due in 2)These are as quick as these can be built.

IT: China and Carthage sign MPP
Vikings & Carthage sign embargo against us
Carthage & France sign MA against Hammi

t5: missed this turn somehow. I guess nothing happened

t6: SPHQ comes in and our gpt goes from ~50 to 329gpt

 

[Tubby Rower]

I'll get the save up tomorrow from work. I can't upload it here at home....stupid dial up.

 

[eldar]

Wow, 50 to 330gpt with the SPHQ? I've never really played with Communism in C3C, I never knew just how powerful it was!

 

[Tubby Rower]

Wow, 50 to 330gpt with the SPHQ? I've never really played with Communism in C3C, I never knew just how powerful it was!

I didn't either. I was pretty surprised.

I was able to upload the file from work this morning So here it is <><><>

EDIT:: Now since Hammi's cpt has dropped it's reduced the turns down to 44 before doubling his culture. If his culture stops right now we still have 23 turns to go. I 'm not sure we want to attack Hammi right now. Let's let him get weaker (he will becuase the whole world is out to get him). France is holding Ninevah pretty well and the next city in line is Babylon itself. Hammi has 2 sources of oil so without knowing refining we might be stuck waiting until we know where his resources are.

 

[Bede]

Roster check:
Pied Piper - up
eldar - on deck
Bede
Minute Man
Mab
Tubby Rower

 

[Bede]

Roster check:


eldar - up
Bede - on deck
Minute Man
Mab
Tubby Rower
Pied Piper - skipped

 

[eldar]

I have it, I'm not likely to find time to play it today. Tomorrow though.

 

[eldar]

The Save

Played to 1750 to get the turns back in sync.

Yawn... 2 more flips back to us, one new tech, Intel Agency, I planted a spy with Carthage (so as not to risk starting wars, but I wanted to play with the new toy!), Babs culture-per-turn is dropping, ours is over 1700 now, but there's still a loooooong way to go (30+ turns at current rate).

Turn log:
0 1710 Research to Electricity @ 30%, 8 turns, -21gpt. Whipped up a lot of culture (I went through every city) - now at -36gpt with all the lost citizens but we can still research Electricity in 8 turns.

IT: France capture Eridu. We are officially the most powerful nation in the world?!

2 1720 IT: Niagara Falls flips to us

3 1725 IT: England capture Nippur.

5 1735 Sci has to come down but Electricity still in 3

IT: Intelligence Agency completes.

6 1740 IT: Toyama flips to us

7 1745 I plant a spy with Carthage, because there's no risk of starting a war. He has a very tiny army! Go on another mass Kulcha rush. Convert quite a few builds to Courts.

IT: Electricity->Replaceable Parts. Suggest we go Medicine->Sanitation after because Sanitation isn't out there yet - it might be worth it.

8 1750 There's a single Settler to go somewhere, I can't quite figure out where. Culture (using Excel because MapStat still doesn't get it right): Us 125363, +1747. Babs: 76180, +445 (down from +482 at the start of the set - he's whipping stuff in cities he doesn't have a majority of population in, plus he's lost a couple of core cities). Current rate, we have 32 turns to go. We'll have over 180K by that time.

Picture of Carthage's army:

Roster check:

eldar - just played
Bede - UP!
Minute Man
Mab
Tubby Rower
Pied Piper

Neil.

 

[Bede]

Thanks, eldar.

Roster check:

Bede - up and got it
Minute Man
Mab
Tubby Rower
Pied Piper
eldar