SGOTM7 - Team tao

[Sabre]

Furiey - Yeah I'm pretty sure you wouldn't have much of a problem above monarch.

That map looks like a pretty good layout to work with. As has been said, the most important thing will be ensuring there is always adequate transportation. Striking the right balance netween knight and settler production will also be key. We want enough knights to keep the attack up, preferably at multiple points, while backfilling with settlers as close to the front as possible.

I have a question. I know it's against the rules to join workers for pop rushing purposes, but what about joining to convert them to settlers? I mean joining two workers and then cash rushing a settler, keeping the town at it's origional pop. We've got a lot of workers that don't have much to do. I know many of them are slaves, but I think the flip risk of foreign citizens in new towns would be low enough to risk it if it's allowed.

 

[Keath]

Great turns, Furiey! Huh? Nothing above Monarch, you say?

OR, we could send a flotilla of settlers and pikes to the far west. I see at least two spots where we could land and immediately have nine more tiles, and there are several more where we could get 6 or 7. If we time it right, we'd only have to hold out on defense for two turns, and the AIs won't have many units there. It could gain us a quick couple of dozen tiles, where maybe we wouldn't have to make that last invasion. (The galleys could hang out in sea tiles that AIs can't attack us in, so the units would be perfectly safe, and we can move seven tiles a turn away from land, so we'd get there pretty quickly.)

Bursa has several galleys and there is a safe route east to the islands that contain Calcutta and Delhi - if these are the ones you are considering.

Swords and other one move units would serve well to capture a few towns - the large island contains potentially 70 plus tiles, figure 9 tiles per captured town plus two we could build. But it does have a lot of jungle. There are at least a half dozen swords, a couple of axemen and a couple of settlers nearby to do the job. Delhi could be taken for 9 tiles. If we're that close to the domination limit, I agree that this could be the extra we might need and it can happen in about the same time span as getting the Viking island.

***Also, I am expecting a phone call any day that my oldest daughter will be delivering our first grandchild. If that happens, I will have to pass my turns on, so I'll keep you all posted.

 

[Furiey]

I have a question. I know it's against the rules to join workers for pop rushing purposes, but what about joining to convert them to settlers? I mean joining two workers and then cash rushing a settler, keeping the town at it's origional pop. We've got a lot of workers that don't have much to do. I know many of them are slaves, but I think the flip risk of foreign citizens in new towns would be low enough to risk it if it's allowed.

Hmmm - I've checked the rules and it isn't specifically mentioned, but even so it's so similar in intent that it could be against the spirit of the rules. I wouldn't want to use it without checking first. If it isn't then this would probably be a more valuable use of many of the Workers (certainly the ones we capture from now on) than improving tiles (unless we need a road or something for example) - it's not as if we're going to be doing much with the new cities anyway, Wealth for many, Settlers possibly Workers for the rest. After all we'll be rushing the Libraries.

I am curious as to why there was no Arab counterattack. With 3 Spears in each of the cities I attacked, I don't know how many in Mekkah, but at Deity unit support - where are their troops? I have been thinking on Renata's suggestion of going for the little islands - it may actually be quicker to get new troops there as we get lower down into Vikings (there looks to be an easy route East past Zulu). At the moment these cities will autoraze, so we would have to take Settlers as well. If the Arab troops are not at home though, could they be on the islands?

 

[Renata]

I really have no idea on that use of workers. It had actually occurred to me to try something similar in Great Library during the Golden Age -- join two workers each turn for a settler each turn. I don't think we have the tiles available to keep the town from going into the red, though, and of course, the town is most useful building knights.

Best would probably be to PM ainwood; I'll take care of that.

As for the Arabs, they're in Republic now, right? I can't even remember which unit-support model this game is using, but in any case, that should have cut their support a bit. And Mekkah will have at least 7 or 8 spears, no doubt; the capital always does. Probably they're just running 50% entertainers from war weariness and lack of luxes and can't produce very much.

I wasn't suggesting trying to capture any cities over at the end of the island chain, although it's really not a bad idea. A couple of those little islands can actually fit two cities. I was suggesting just plopping settlers down in the jungle on the larger mixed-civ island two turns before we intend to trigger domination. Each one would grab us an additional 6-9 tiles provided we could defend the settler for one turn, then defend the city for one turn. As such, we'd need minimal units for escort; the main cost would be the galleys.

Speaking of galleys (and catapults), I still recommend shutting down AI Bait and trying to intercept AI galleys farther southeast by Jungle Port. As I said, with a stack of catapults and a couple of galleys there to sink boats, we could afford to strip our whole backyard in India and Zululand free of units. All those now-useless spears and such could be disbanded. We'd need a second such stack in Amandioka to pick off any galleys coming up the east coast of the islands, but in that case the catapults are already there.

I support sticking another town at the end of the Jungle Port peninsula to speed up the invasion of Persia.

Cowtown North can get to 10spt if one plains tile is mined; the workers to do so are already within range and still have movement left. There may be additional micromanagement opportunities here and there; I didn't look.

Renata

 

[Tone]

If we strip India and Zululand of military, how many (and what type of) units would you recommend leaving? I usually have around three mounted units that can get to the flipped city within a turn or two but I guess that we really need to be less cautious than this and our knights are better served on the front lines and the horses should be upgraded asap. 2-3 MDIs in stacks placed within a couple of turns of retaking any flips?

Edit: or take a chance with nothing?!!

 

[AlanH]

[/lurk]
There's no rule against joining workers to then build settlers. Why would there be?
[lurk]

 

[Renata]

Just checking, since so many rules are out and about about worker joins. I know I confuse myself half the time. Thanks, Alan.

Edit @ Tone: I'm too brain dead to come up with many more comments. Sorry! Just stupid stuff.

Iznik should switch to settler or library; we don't need galleys all the way over there.

Furiey's map is correct that only one library rush in Bapedi is needed to close that 9-tile culture map, because Bangalore will grab another tile in 19 turns once its library has completed. I mention this because it took me a few minutes to figure it out. Aydin will not need to finish the library it's set on now; it can build a settler instead.

Davidiople needs to be switched to something else.

I think I mentioned that Cowtown North can get to 10spt with one more mine.

In a couple of turns when the jungle chops are finished, Aydin can give up the bonus grass to its west to Great Library, which can then get to 35spt if a worker is joined. That would give knights in 2 turns naturally, without short-rushes.

Probably the best way to handle the AI Bait issue is to just keep bombing the crud out of every galley that comes up that coast, and pick galleys off with our galleys once they're redlined. Get cats to Jungle Port ASAP, and build a couple more galleys in towns along that coast. You can probably manipulate how the AI galleys move pretty well by moving units into and out of AI Bait every other turn.

If we decide to go after some territory on the islands at the end of the archipelago, the town we're about to found in NE Arabia is the logical jumping-off point. Transit from there is only 3-4 turns with all the movement points we have in open ocean. But we'll need a bunch more galleys; if you build one per turn in Sogut for the next few turns, that might do it. But I still really have no idea which way would be fastest.

Looking at the save, there really aren't all that many unnecessary units in India and Zululand (not counting the ones that are already in transit elsewhere). We could probably disband the spears and about half the cats in Amandioka. (The rest we should keep, and get a couple of galleys there also, to sink galleys trying to sneak past to our undefended cities. Transfer a few to the town we're about to build in Arabia?) After that, use your judgment.

Sorry I don't have any major wisdom. Good luck!

Renata

 

[Keath]

As I mentioned, I am off to catch a ferry to be with my daughter. I should be back Tuesday night. Good luck with the campaign.

 

[Furiey]

Good Luck Keath!

 

[Tone]

Just starting.

Furiey's map is correct that only one library rush in Bapedi is needed to close that 9-tile culture map, because Bangalore will grab another tile in 19 turns once its library has completed. I mention this because it took me a few minutes to figure it out. Aydin will not need to finish the library it's set on now; it can build a settler instead.

Presume you mean Adana. What about lib build in Ankara and Alexmanika-presume these should be settlers as well.

I hope that all goes well, Keath!

 

[Renata]

Yes, Adana. The northern of Ankara and Alexmanika (those are the town towns in the south of Zululand, right?) needs a library; the other does not, presuming a library is built in the town that's about to be founded in northern Arabia.

Actually, that pattern will hold the whole way down the eastern coast of Arabia: build towns 2-3 tiles due north/south of each other along the coast, and build a library in every other one for complete coastal coverage.

Renata

 

[Tone]

I have got to a point where I think I need to seek a second (if not also a third, fourth, ...) opinion.

It is at the end of 410 and we have a second Great Leader.

Question is what do we do with it? The only wonder available is Sistine and I've never been keen on moving my palace in the middle of a GA so I would go with a knight army. Trouble is all this boating doesn't suit armies. Any ideas?

Here's my progress so far (I've not found it a pushover against an iron army) and a copy of the save. My intention is to rush some boats next as Persia has almost fallen and we need to get onto the Viking wasteland asap but I'm taking a break as I'm too tired. I'll finish it tomorrow. Feel free to chip in with any advice you feel appropriate.

0-(350)
Sell rax in Cow-S and Antalya and use the proceeds to cobtribute towards short rush at Antalya. Uskudar switches to wealth for a turn then settler afterwards to maintain population @ 7/8. Switch Bursa clown to taxman. Switch Davidiople build to settler due to forest chop and Edrine cit onto irr bg. Iznik switches to lib to claim the extra few coastal tiles and taxman onto grass.mm Lahore and New Calcutta so that Lahore will grow next turn. Grab three native workers and mine plains SE of Cow-N to increase spt to 10. Move elite sword to hill outside Bapedi. Switch builds in Alexmanika, Adana and Ankara to settlers and move slaves by Bapedi onto the forest. Galley on auto-move catches me out-I move them further S and then I don't see the settler in Hlobane-just caches the galley up to load next turn. Send two galleys from Bursa S. settler, pike and two knights will hop on next turn. Load up two horses from Konya and send then South. Workers clear jungle by Damascus and I think that I'm done.

IBT
There are three Am galleys coming in! Vikings head North??? So do the Persians, I think in order to incept our galleysKnight are attacked by a single archer that knocks 1 hp off the defender (1-0: my first blood at long last!)
New Calcutta: rax>knight. Cow North: pike>pike. Jungle Port: pike>axe.

1-(360)
Salonika is built and the Dyes are claimed. Settler on old Zulu lands loads onto a galley.

Battle of Makkah:
1. Vet knight vs vet spear.. a cat fires a defensive shot that has no effect but the knight withdraws after knocking just 1 hp off the spear. Not a good start!
2. Vet knight kills a second vet spear, losing just 1 hp. (2-0)
3. Vet knight loses two hp to reg spear but is promoted. (3-0)
4. Vet knight loses the early skirmish but doesn't withdraw and kills the reg spear. (4-0) We are now down to the wounded defender.
5. This defender is made of steel. The Vet knight redlines him but I lose (4-1)
6. Reg knight seeks a promotion chance. Wins but stays a reg. (5-1)

6 resisters in Makkah. Starving taxmen are employed but the good news is that the city has a granary and market. 3 slaves and a cat.

Victorious reg knight moves a futher 2 S and hits two immortals on the forest by the flood plain wheat. Another vet knight with full movement moves to the fpw and attacks the mini stack-knocks two hp off the immortal but withdraws. Knight wounded by the archer then follows and also withdraws. Last full movement knight from the stack kills an immortal but also loses 2 hp. (6-1). Elite knight from Damascus joins them with non-critical survivors from Makkah battle and some of the 3hp knights from Damascus.

Do short rushes in GL and Sogut.

Cats redline Am galley close to AI bait but then the Vet galley loses (6-2). Reg galley then wins (7-2).

2 knights upgraded and the others shipped over to Arabia with a settler-most end up in Makkah. Knights and horses shipped from Zululand to the homeland. 2 galleys head for Jungle Port but empty.

mm various cities, including New Calcutta that can produce a knight in four turns now.


IBT
Lots of galley activity. Persians drop off two immortals by Makkah and Arabs send an archer in that direction.
Sogut: knight>knight. GL: knight>knight. Izmit: knight>knight. Aydin: knight>knight. Antalya:knight>knight.
2 resistors converted in Makkah and one in Bapedi.

2-(370)
Battle of Diriyah:
1. Vet knight withdraws doing just 1hp damage..
2. Reg knight does the same.
3. Elite wins, leaving just two wounded spears to deal with. (8-2)
4. 3/4 vet loses to 3/4 spear. (8-3)
5. 3/4 vet just beats a 2/3 spear. (9-3)
6. 3/4 vet beats 2/4 spear and takes Diriyah. 7 resistors.

2 immortals and archer dealt with, the archer battle promotes a knight. (12-3)

settler moves to desert 3NE of Susa, protected by 7 full-strength knights and a pike. This empties Damascus and so the two Frankish axes saddle between here and Emanopidu.

settler almost in position to found the southern tip port and new knights head that way and galleys do the same.

worker moves into GL to join next turn but I find that I can mm it to get 35 spt without the 12th man!

IBT
Immortal attacks our stack with settler, killing a knight flawlessly. Hmm (12-4)
Lahore: knight>knight. AI bait: axe>axe. Desert Beach: pike>pike. Insence hill: pike>pike.

3-(380)
Bombard Am galley and then take it out with our reg galley-promoted to vet (13-4). Change build in cowtown N from pike to galley. Move most of the remaining cats East to try and hit the galleys earlier.

Found Mugla NE of Susa. Bombard the immortal and then attack with a knight-lose! (13-5). Second knight takes out the newly promoted immortal.

Battle of Susa:
1. vet knight red lines the vet pike and then loses. (13-6)
2. second vet does the same. (13-7)
3. third red lines a reg but loses (13-8)
4. fourth loses to a 2hp immortal!!!!! (13-9)
5. fifth only just beats a 1hp pike (14-9) I think this is what you might describe as a poor run of luck!
6. My last vet kills the 1hp pike flawlessly (15-9) but I cannot finish the job. I'm not happy!

Found Denizli and get two more knights across into Mugla. Pike goes in to protect the knights by Susa.

Short rush knights in Sogut, Izmit, Antalya and Aydin.

IBT
galley enters and leaves Susa.
Sogut: knight>knight. GL: knight>knight. Uskudar: settler>wealth>settler. Cow-N: galley>knight. Bursa: knight>knight. Cow-S: knight>knight.

4-(390)
Battle of Susa pt2
1. Vet knight withdraws after doing no damage to a 4/4 pike.
2. 4/4 knight defeats vet pike. (16-9)
3. 4/4 knight knocks 3hp off a 4/4 pike but loses. (16-10)
4. 4/4 knight defeats the last defender and Susa is ours but at a massive cost. (17-10)

The road network NE of Persepolis is non-existant therefore I have built up knights in Mugla which will move to a mountain next turn and strile their capital the turn after.

Resistance has ended in Bapedi so I rush the settler. Rush the lib in Madras.

IBT
A Persian knight pops up!
Bapedi: settler>lib. Madras: lib>settler. Izmit: knight>knight. New Calcutta:knight>knight. Aydin:knight>knight. Antalya: knight>knight. Istanbul: pike>pike.

5-(400)
Bombard and KO a persian galley. (18-10)
True to form for the Persian campaign my knight loses against the persian one (18-11) but the get one is victorious (19-11) and is promoted to elite.
12 knights move to the mountains NW of Persepolis and a pike moves into Persian territory SW of Susa to prepare for the arrival of a settler to help bridge the gap.

Short rush in Sogut.

IBT
Am land an archer by AI bait.
Sogut: knight>knight. GL: knight>knight. Epulu: knight>knight. Jungle Port: axe>axe. Konya: knight>knight.
Persia and Am have PP and persia has 176gp.

6-(410)
Battle of Persepolis:
1. Vet knight loses to reg pike (19-12)
2. vet withdraws from reg pike.
3. vet just about defeats reg pike. (20-12)
4. vet red-lines a reg pike but is defeated (20-13). Just wounded defenders now.
5. vet defeats 2/3 pike. (21-13)
6. elite attacks 1/3 pike. Is red-lined but wins and spawns our second GL-Murad I. (22-13)
7. vet defeats the last defender and we take Persepolis and its silks. (23-13)

Axe kills the archer (24-13)
Bombard Viking galley and pick it off with a reg galley (25-13)
Short rush knights in Antalya, Izmit and Aydin.
Turn Unfinished!

Here's the save if you want to look at it!

 

[Renata]

A library we don't have to pay for? I'd rather not build Sistine, actually -- let the AIs keep wasting shields on it.

Looks like you're making good progress! I'm headed out, but I'll take a look at the save later tonight.

Renata

 

[tao]

Very nice progress. Let me confirm my suspicion, that we will finish earlier than 650AD.

Of course, I would use the Leader for Sistine. Not only has it 3 times as much cpt than a library, but it will also survive a flip and re-capture (which a library will not).

IMHO we need more galleys. Persia will fall very soon, and we need transport towards Vikings. But also between the homelands and former Arabia. I suppose, the victory date will be influenced more by transport capacity than by knights.

Be aggressive in settler hurrying, e.g. Damaskus now, Madras, Bapedi, Zimbabwe next turn, Makkah in 2 turns. And also hurry libraries once the Viking invasion has started, since they should be crushed in 5 turns.

 

[Furiey]

My PCs playing up and won't let me open Vanilla as I've been playing C3C (demogame), but I can open the save in CivAssist. The numbers for the palace in Edirne make for interesting reading. We would do far better on gold, but gain no benefit from the production over there, Sogut would lose that 30spt.

That's 289gpt in Sogut, 342 in Edirne. This is for the Golden Age, the difference once it finishes is only 16gpt between the 2 sites. Are we actually going to be playing this game long enough to build up the new core to get the benefit?

 

[Tone]

IMHO we need more galleys. Persia will fall very soon, and we need transport towards Vikings. But also between the homelands and former Arabia. I suppose, the victory date will be influenced more by transport capacity than by knights.

This is going to be the key factor I believe and I think that I was a bit slow to recognise the breaking of Persia. I was expecting more resistance in Persepolis though. I possibly need to switch some builds and rush a few galleys as well as the culture & settlers.

I was a little hesistant to do my first culture rush but we have the cash so I guess it's no problem. In fact I think that rushing culture may be the more efficient way to fill in the gaps (if we can squash resistance) rather than stacks of settlers. I think that we need the transports primarily for military usage but I need to stop and analyse the situation if that's OK with everyone.

It's interesting how the views on Sistine differ.

 

[Furiey]

My first thought was against Sistine, now I'm not so sure. An Army will get stuck on an island, we won't be playing long enough to build up the new core to get the benefit there, that leaves rushing culture to expand some borders and avoid having to use gold or more Settlers.

 

[Tone]

I'm still not sure about Sistine. As Renata says, maybe having the AI waste their time on it is good for us.

We will only really get the benefit if we can place it somewhere that would benefit from a second border expansion. This might need a lib build as well to get to 100cp before it's too late otherwise a library will do the job just fine.

(I find it bizarre that I'm even considering using a GL on a library. It was only one turn set ago that we were praying to the RNG gods to deliver one for a wonder and our GA!)

 

[Sabre]

edit - never mind, Furiey beat me to the punch regarding CivAssist's predictions.

I like the Sistine for culture idea personally.

 

[Sabre]

I'm not sure how much Sistine production is hurting the AI. Presumably they are either at or close to their military limit so that town would probably end up building something that wouldn't help much anyway until we started killing off their units and by then it will be far too late for them.