SGOTM8 - klarius

[Ronald]

I assume all that saved gold is for hurrrying tanks in corrupt towns?

3 turns per round is fine with me.

The gold is actually if we need to run a deficit to research at 100%. One turn more research could loose us the game to wacken. We should have enough units to get Rome and Scandinavia before 1150 AD.

3 turns should not be mandatory. Play whatever you like and feel comfortable with.

 

[Northern Pike]

Hmm, our decisions have become very difficult. Any reasonable plan for the next five moves--to attack the Vikings or to attack Rome--will involve us in breaking a peace treaty and compromise our chances of getting island cities from the Romans, but to sit still is out of the question. Some fairly subtle questions arise here--e.g., would our chances of getting islands from the Romans be hurt more by a relatively minor violation of our treaty with the Romans themselves, or by a really gross stab of the Vikings after we've received cities from them? I tentatively conclude that we should attack the Vikings, since this is clearly the simplest and most efficient strategy in purely military terms, and would keep alive whatever prospect still exists that the Romans might take Tientsin. But if anyone knows of an ingenious device which would make this something other than a choice of evils--could we include the Romans in the war against the Vikings, or something?--speak up.

Regarding Ronald's schedule, and assuming that the Romans fail us at Tientsin, I would hope that we could win in 1170 AD by attacking with units coptered onto any remaining islands in 1160. We should be able to cut the airfield-building turn out of the cycle.

And BTW, if we can get AT in five turns as Ronald suggests, is there any chance that by sufficiently extreme measures we could get the cheaper Electronics and Advanced Flight in four each? We could merge a lot of workers into cities to serve as scientists, for example. If we knew we could do this (meaning AF in 1140 AD), we could abandon support for the Romans at Tientsin, saving us some bomber-turns, and stop worrying about a massive Roman gift-and-retake.

 

[klarius]

I got it and intend to play tonight.
The MPP between Rome and Japan gives the option of a free (without affecting RoP reputation) RoP rape on Rome. So I think that's what I should prepare for. So I intend to make nice with Rome, make RoP and move units into their land, while trying to secure everything else.
War should then be triggered at some time by an attack on Japan, if Rome doesn't destroy China before to trigger war (but this hope is vanishing).
So I'm expecting a peaceful turnset with building units, moving and research, if Caesar doesn't do anything before.
Other wars I will do only if somebody declares. I don't want to be caught by Caesar with the pants down.

 

[Megalou]

And why not attack Scandinavia? Your observations of breaking peace treaties v/s giving of towns in treaties may be correct, but I noticed in the Warlord GOTM (whch I played very reclessly) that even if peace treaties have been broken in the past, the AI will still be willing to give towns, if not as many or readily. And Rome only has 2 island towns that we need to take, IIRC.

This will be a non-issue if

(1) the Tiensin plan fails (if it succeeds, we will need every swinging dxxx to go to Rome and we can turn off research)

AND

(2) we are able to amass enough troops for an effctive and partly simultaneous war with Scandinavia and Rome. This is where I think we may overestimate our power. I don't like the idea of having cavalry tied up in Scandinavia while a small number of tanks pick off charging MIs in Rome.

And BTW, if we can get AT in five turns as Ronald suggests, is there any chance that by sufficiently extreme measures we could get the cheaper Electronics and Advanced Flight in four each?

This is a relevant question, because if we can't do 4 turn research and there is money left we should hurry some tanks. Every tank will be valuable. But I doubt that you klarius would overlook these options.

 

[klarius]

And why not attack Scandinavia?

Why should we attack Scandinavia?
Scandinavia is a small country and can be taken very fast if we have the units (preparation and execution of a RoP rape shouldn't take more than 3 turn). So there's no need to hurry.
And BTW C3C is definitely different from PtW/Vanilla in what you can get in a peace treaty.

We can get into a war with Rome at any time now and have several fronts with them. I don't think we have enough units, if the majority of our cavs is in Scandinavia.
I will look into it again when I'm confident that we have enough units around every our Roman fronts for my comfort, but don't expect that to happen really in the next 5 turns.

 

[Ronald]

War against Rome will definitely take longer than against Scandinavia. The question is how long do we wait to declare on Rome?

It will take at least 5 turns after war declaration before they are ready to talk and give up cities. We will need 3 to get all islands (if they take Tientsin). This is not very likely in one shot. For two tries we need another 5 turns minimum. Time is getting very short for this.
To keep my message short and simple: We should not stop researching at max! Even if Rome takes Tientsin, we need luck to get all cities and I don't want to loose because we were unlucky.

There is a stack of English MI and archers marching towards a Roman city. I expect England to declare war.

 

[Northern Pike]

I got it and intend to play tonight.
The MPP between Rome and Japan gives the option of a free (without affecting RoP reputation) RoP rape on Rome. So I think that's what I should prepare for. So I intend to make nice with Rome, make RoP and move units into their land, while trying to secure everything else.
War should then be triggered at some time by an attack on Japan, if Rome doesn't destroy China before to trigger war (but this hope is vanishing).
So I'm expecting a peaceful turnset with building units, moving and research, if Caesar doesn't do anything before.
Other wars I will do only if somebody declares. I don't want to be caught by Caesar with the pants down.

Are we allowing for the fact that attacking the Japanese to get the free RoP-rape will involve breaking a peace treaty in which we got cities, just as attacking the Vikings would?

That aside, this is a cunning scheme, but to go five turns without attacking at this point is a very serious thing. Do you think you can get us set up to take virtually all of Rome's accessible cities by 1080 AD, say? If so, fine. But if this is just a plan to take some of Rome's core cities, then I don't think it offers enough return on the investment of time.

 

[Northern Pike]

To keep my message short and simple: We should not stop researching at max!

I agree; we can't gamble that the Romans will do the business against that large garrison in Tientsin.

I believe it was your calculation that we can get Atomic Theory in five turns. Do you think we might discover Electronics and AF in four turns each?

 

[Megalou]

Why should we attack Scandinavia?
Scandinavia is a small country and can be taken very fast if we have the units (preparation and execution of a RoP rape shouldn't take more than 3 turn).

I will look into it again when I'm confident that we have enough units around every our Roman fronts for my comfort, but don't expect that to happen really in the next 5 turns.

I don't really see the logic of these two statements. If Scandinavia only takes 3 turns then we should be able to have many more units near Rome after those 3 turns, although maybe a turn or so later. The risk of needing simultaneous wars increases with every turn, even if our military also grows stronger.

However, if you feel that we must not leave Rome unguarded these 5 turns, if want to protect our rep, and/or need the time to prepare a good ROP rape of Rome, then I definitely respect that.

 

[Ronald]

I believe it was your calculation that we can get Atomic Theory in five turns. Do you think we might discover Electronics and AF in four turns each?

I have good news:

When all taxmen are changed to scientists we make 1253 beakers/turn with still +55gpt (we get 166gpt from other civs, so we could run at -111gpt)
1253 beakers gives us Atomic Theory in 4 turns! (and of course Electronics and Advanced Flight as well in 4 turns) So AF in 13 turns from now

 

[Megalou]

I believe it was your calculation that we can get Atomic Theory in five turns. Do you think we might discover Electronics and AF in four turns each?

(Edit: Basically a double post, but Ronald had better news...)
They both cost 4500 beakers. That's 1125 per turn. We are currently making 857 per turn. I counted 131 taxmen and 1 entertainer. That's around 390 beakers more theoretically available. The minimum number of switches from taxmen to scientists would be 90. That's quite promising. But it should be noted that many towns are currently starving.

The cost of switching 90 taxmen to scientists is of course 180 gpt. Other finanical losses will be -144 gpt from deals with Rome and eventually -9 gpt from Greece. We are currently standing at +317 gpt with one turn left on Motorized Transportation. I think we should attempt this, even if it should mean very small chances to hurry units.

 

[klarius]

I don't really see the logic of these two statements. If Scandinavia only takes 3 turns then we should be able to have many more units near Rome after those 3 turns, although maybe a turn or so later.

The 3 turns was meant for later when we have enough units. Currently we don't even have an airfield in Scandinavia. And also not many airfields on the roman island where most of the cavs are.
And our total number of cavs is 32. That's not really much. It's enough for a slow war against Scandinavia, but probably not a real fast one. And in a slow war we will lose lots of cavs to counterattacks.
We really don't have much military for this state in the game. Besides the cavs there are less than 30 units of assorted garbage plus 19 bombers.

 

[Ronald]

....and a picture for our lurkers:

 

[klarius]

Okay I played a peaceful turnset

save

Research went fine. I gave up some flip risky cities so our territory decreased.
Units are going towards Rome. War on Rome is now urgently necessary, though I would have liked more units.
But between pollution and lack of money due to research our production is still not impressive.


Turn log:

Preturn

Go through our cities. Put a lot of taxmen to work. We need the food later when we need a ton of scientists and shouldn't waste it now for a few coins.
Try to find something useful for all the nonsense flak builds.
Sell some temples.
Make Rop with Rome. First units moving show that this will get difficult.
Roads are blocked and still a lot jungle.

IBT: Motors come in. Switch a few builds to tank.
English move towards roman town. Looks like a sneak attack.

Turn 1 1010:
No problem to MM to AT in 4.
Move units around.
MM for tanks.

IBT:
English declare on romans and take Seleucia.

Turn 2 1020:
Pollution in Washington broke 1-turn cav cycle. Heavy MM to give some wasted shields to the other cities.
I move a lot units into roman land to cover roads and rails.
Gift Yokohama to England. I want to see what Caesar comes up with.

IBT:
The Romans land 3 units next to Tientsin.
In their land they shuffle a lot of MDI.

Turn 3 1030:
Moving.

IBT:
Caesar has lousy RNG on Tientsin. He kills only one defender and has one yellow MDI left.

Turn 4 1040:
I give up the bombing of Tientsin. Rebase towards Rome.

AT comes in.
Turn 5 1050:
I don't want to start anything crazy so I leave a lot units unmoved.
We have quite a few units in roman lands.
And quite a few bombers near.

Research is no problem. We can research in 4 turns with a deficit we can afford, just look to adjust the specilists. So advanced flight can be easily reached.
But Rome is a problem. We should start the war immediately to have enough time to even take their homeland.
I think we shouldn't do a lot of fancy gifting. Plain war starting this turn or the next.
And start the war by an attack on Japan. You need to attack inside their land for the MPP to take immediate effect.
But you should declare while the units are outside.
This turn it would be possible to attack some workers near Hakodate.
If you delay a turn you probably need a cav on that island.

A strange thing about Rome. I haven't seen a single cav or knight. But there are tons of MDI running around.
And all cities have rifles. This will get tough. We don't have the time to bomb every city.
I would ally everybody else for the war with Rome and backstab them later.

 

[Megalou]

Neat play, k!

But what happened to your "Don't break peace treaties yet"- attitude? There are 5 turns left of the peace treaty with Japan. I suppose you value the "free ROP rape" higher? But I would rather sign an ROP with Scandinavia now and attack Rome first, not Japan.

The free ROP rape is not necessary because there are less than 20 turns left to play. Knock on wood.

It's good that you drew out the Roman attack rabble towards Yokohama. The towns will be easier to capture and some of those attack units can be bombed if there are bombers left.

 

[klarius]

Neat play, k!

But what happened to your "Don't break peace treaties yet"- attitude? There are 5 turns left of the peace treaty with Japan.

I just have given up the hope that Rome takes Tientsin. So we don't need an extreme good peace trade with Rome.
If we don't do a RoP rape now, we might get a peace with Rome in a few turns and then a RoP again, for a real RoP rape to kill them off.

 

[Northern Pike]

We should stab the Romans right now, but not before re-positioning our forces in their lands. Some notes:

1. Tanks in Roman territory should be right next to cites when we RoP-rape them, so they can attack twice. Cav units should be positioned where they can reach as many Roman cities as possible, to give us maximum flexibility.

2. We can move cav and tank units one or two tiles along roads before we strike without their losing any of their ability to move and attack once we're at war. Thus, one or two (depending on your judgement) of the tanks southwest of Veii can move adjacent to Rome before we attack, along with the two tanks already near Rome. Similarly, we should concentrate ten cav (though not perhaps the five on rails adjacent to Veii) on the tile roughly north of Cumae already occupied by three.

3. Beware of the roaded jungle tile two south of Ravenna, which will completely halt our movement once war starts until we hold Ravenna and Neapolis. Cav units positioned on this tile when we attack will have a lot of options.

4. All our cav units in and around Japan should move into Roman territory before we attack, of course.

5. We should probably attack Rome (the city) first, since we have no idea how much strength that will require. The Jerusalem-Neapolis-Ravenna corridor with its railway (and silks, replacing the furs we'll lose when we attack) should come next, and then Veii. After that we may still have the forces to take Cumae, and possibly Caesarea.

6. Antium and Hispalis probably shouldn't figure in our plans for this turn, because we can't bomb them. Lugdunum we can bomb, but we'll probably be out of bombers by then.

7. Don't waste attacks on the Romans' mediaeval units between Ravenna and Neapolis, unless we've got uncommitted units we can't prudently use against any city.

8. On Byzantium Island we can position a tank to make two attacks on Tarentum, and then follow up with cav if it seems wise.

9. Progress against Nicomedia and Palmyra will be slower, since most of our units in that area have moved.

10. Don't overlook the potential usefulness of mid-turn railway builds. It would obviously be good to rail the jungle tile two south of Ravenna, though admittedly all the adjacent Roman units would be a problem here.

11. Don't forget about Roman York, in the middle of our English position. We have next to nothing in that area.

 

[Ciceronian]

In a few days I will be moving up to Cambridge and so I'm quite busy. I think you'll have to skip me, I don't think I could play a proper turnset soon enough. Sorry for the inconvenience.

 

[Megalou]

Sounds like a nice place to live. I guess that means NP is up again, right?

 

[Ronald]

In a few days I will be moving up to Cambridge.

Too bad you can't play. Have fun in Cambridge.