SGOTM8 - Xteam

[leif erikson]

I know the Mad Land Viking is ready to spill some blood but I think (like you) that we are at a crucial point in the game and need to discuss some points.

I agree and am in no particular hurry to play. besides, we need the posts!

You raised several that I did not think about. If you have some time to play with one of your test games could you look into my proposed city gifting idea? If this works with England we could do the same with either Rome or Japan to gain a foothold there.

I'll give it a try if I can set it up.

I think you're on the right track. What I'm worried about with the original plan is that the tech pace isn't as fast as I'd expceted. It could take some time to get to Chivalry. If we remain in Despotism, while costly, we might consider a series of wars with Greece, each with limited objectives. Perhaps firstly to take Athens and Cornth and secure the iron source. We are strong compared to them but horses against Hoppies will be painful. In Despotism, we *could* use limited pop-rushing, as Bluebox did, to achieve our goals. Greece only has 7 cities, and besides Athens and Corinth, they're in pretty crappy locations. I am beginning to worry about time, how much we have. We do need to be careful about completely wasting Greece as they are our only Scientific Civ.

From a strategic standpoint, I wonder if it would be better to get our home continent taken, get a Forbidden Palace bult, build out Libraries and Marketplaces and then we can create all the wars we want and try to gain some cities from which to launch modern campaigns?

Looking at the map, it seems that Gyathaar placed these smaller islands so that we'll have to use them to jump off to attack the main continents. The range of Helicopters is 8, iirc, and of paratroopers is, well, I can't seem to find it. From Nanking to Lutetia is 7, so it isn't like we're going to have lots of extra range.

 

[leif erikson]

Gator Comes up with another Plan
I have another idea I thought of the other day that we might want to try out in one of the test games. Now that we have taken some of China's cities could we make peace with England. Gift them 2 cities on our island. Issue DOW, wait a few turns then capture those cities from them and sue for peace for a city on their island. Since we are strong to England this might work, any thought?

Nice call Gator!!

I found an old test game that was suitable. The year at completion is 150 AD. The situation was that Japan's Firaxis score was 574, China 480 and America 479. We have a higher power rating by about 20% as I had finished wiping out the Aztecs. Japan has a city on my continent so I gifted them 2 additional cities (each size 2 so they wouldn't auto-raze when I took them back) and then declared on them. Obviously, I had placed troops to take them and took all three within 2 turns of the declaration.

I think it took 5 turns for Japan to talk. They gave me a size 1 and a size 2 city on their continent, plus some Gold for peace.. They refused to give a size 3 or 4 city. What is interesting is that when I gifted them a city, with no military in it, they got a Reg Spear in each, I got them bare!

The key, I think, is that our power rating must be higher than theirs. The problem now, if I were to continue playing, is that Japan's culture is way high compared to mine and they might flip. I have tons of Gold but am in despotism, so no buying anything yet.

So, the question will still be what we do with these cities. It seems to me we must use your plan before cities get too big but then we have centuries to hold on to them before airports and they are of use to us. We must care for them and, somehow, protect them?

Here is a screenie from the test game:

 

[DJMGator13]

So we have potentially found a way to get a city on the English island, but how do we keep it and how do we build a military sizeable enough to attack with?

We need to look at England real hard right now. If we change to Republic we could potential start cash rushing an army there but without harbors and safe passage (we must have a coastal route, no sea tiles) we would be limited to archer rushing.

If we get the CHN city and an ENG city we could destroy both China and Greece while hopefully learning Chivalry and amassing some gold for buying units to attack ENG with.

But the million dollar question is still how to raise an army to attack. We need to think hard on this.

EDIT: I thought of one possible way but I'll wait to hear some other suggestions first. Mine is an all or nothing approach and could cost us the game so I'd rather hear some other choices first.

If we feel we need to wait for the paratroopers and copters than we're better off building libraries and switching to republic to push the tech pace.

 

[leif erikson]

We need to look at England real hard right now. If we change to Republic we could potential start cash rushing an army there but without harbors and safe passage (we must have a coastal route, no sea tiles) we would be limited to archer rushing.

Looks to me as though we have coastal tiles all the way to England. Have a look at the screenie:

 

[bluebox]

Inviting England onto our continent and beat them up sounds pretty cheeky and nothing you would like to do on RBC but could work quite well here.

Your idea is not an "all or nothing plan", Gator. Rather, it's pretty close to my "civ zoo" idea And I think England is a perfect first target for that plan.

The English city I like most is Hastings. Oxford may be the closest of their cities, but Coventry is a possible target city if we want the English horses.

We could get a city or two, poprush as long as we are in Despo and (re-)settle.


Following your idea, Gator, we shouldn't have any problem with giving away cities in peace deals at all, e.g. with Rome! Any city is enough for them to agree in a peace deal, so we might get away with Hangchow or the like.

We can expect all remaining Chinese cities left will be razed upon conquest. But we need trade tokens. Therefore, I suggest to make the peace deal with China, don't demand POLY and instead get all cities we can get from them, gift them away or trade them in peace deals with England and Rome. Then head on the England road and when we feel we're ready, the "Via Appia".

One obstacle might be we have to think the opposite way we are used to in one regard: Be happy to give away homeland cities, they are of greater value when they don't belong to us.

The problem we still haven't a solution for is what to do with oversea cities.

 

[bluebox]

I suggest revolting to Republic as soon as we have the peace deals. It would be dangerous to suffer the Anarchy phase while we are still in war, because we can't rush anything. Then rearrange our troops and start to grow our core cities >6 for unit support. This shouldn't take too long as we have Pyramids.

We don't need the gold for research but for rushing things in outbound cities.

CivAssist II says we approx. get a net gain of +11g with a 10% research (Engineering for bridges!?) in Republic. WW is only significantly dangerous if own cities are captured and I think we know how to prevent that.

I ask how many times we could iterate this "gift and conquer" stategy before the AI declines to follow it or before it gets exploitative??

 

[Capt Buttkick]

Nice turn set, bluebox
That's a terriffic trade for Constr there and again my disappointment over my own tech choice is somehow leviated by excellent trading by other team members

I think that even if we could gain a city or two on other continents, doing that would take the focus away from our main goal, earliest finish.
The most important objective now should be to eradicate China and either hurry FP or jump palace up north.
While we do that, we should prepare our cities for a tech pace the other teams won't be able to match.

This game will be won in the MA, imhso, so we should get there asap.

 

[leif erikson]

I like the discussion.

Just to add some fuel to the fire, I ran Offa's city capture simulation utility this morning. I set it up for Athens, which happens to be size 3 atm (Must have popped a settler). To simulate, I used 6 reg hoplite defenders and attacked with 20 horses and it says we have a 93.5% chance of taking it.

I ran it again with Athens at pop 7+ and with the same 20 Horses, our chances drop to 60%.

There are Wines in Athens and Iron in Corinth.

@Bluebox - Exploitive? I thought that was the name of this game?

This game will be one in the MA, imhso, so we should get there asap.

You're absolutely correct in this. The question is if we can get this working whether it helps or hurts? I think the toughest part will be the Gold needed for the adventure, that will hold back research. It does give one something to think about though!

 

[DJMGator13]

To keep the discussion going I’ll throw out my All or Nothing plan.

Can we turn this game into a form of a 5CC. Let’s completely wipe out China and Greece. By then we will have gained 2 off-island cities, one near Rome and one from England using our Bait City Plan. Once China and Greece are gone we abandon all our cities on the mainland and have our palace jump to the ENG island, leaving our current military behind. We build a few settlers to establish another core of about 5 cities and start building an army there. After we wipe out ENG we repeat the process against Rome and Japan.

One major problem I see is the cost of our military. Even though we’ll abandon our cities we want to keep the military there to kill any settlers that show up on our shores. We may want to keep one harbor city so that we can keep the horses, iron, and luxes hooked up to our new core. Another problem is trying to find enough land on the Rome and Japan area to establish a small core of cities.

This basically has us rebuilding our core 2 more times but it could be significantly quicker than trying to research to the late IA.

I’m not opposed to going the research path also, but I think that is what everyone else will be doing. We need to run some numbers on how quickly we can wipe out China and Greece while establishing a second core versus the time required to research our way to the late IA.

It’s a wild plan that I have never done before so feel free to criticize it. Thoughts, comments??

 

[bluebox]

That's a terriffic trade for Constr there and again my disappointment over my own tech choice is somehow leviated by excellent trading by other team members

Your extensive trading session was totally ok, Capt

We'll stay very aggressive throughout the game as our goal is Conquest. This fact might help our research here and there by extorting techs. IMO it's absolutely ok to finish off Greece and stop her tech trading once and for all. A way to relatively push our tech pace will be - like always - by spoiling the pace of our opponents.

While we do that, we should prepare our cities for a tech pace the other teams won't be able to match.

Sorry, Capt, but I doubt that we could achieve that from our current position. IA it too far away IMO. If we'd set up for IA before world conquest we should have been much more focussed on research right from the start. We have ideas already how to reach overseas cities without helis. We might use them in the endgame if we ever need that long.

I’m not opposed to going the research path also, but I think that is what everyone else will be doing.

Doubt that, too! Mistift guessed the game could be won long before IA. My guess is everybody's squeezing their brains to find ways of capturing cities as fast as possible.

BTW, Alan started the 1st spoiler. We need to be in MA and meet the 6th opponent to be able to post and read!


Let's take a look at Gators new plan. We conquer CHN and GRE and get a lot of small cities. Instead of abandoning them we could gift them to our opponents and reconquer them. We should get a pretty nice peace deal after we've conquered 3 or 4 English cities! And we *can* do that with Rome and with Japan, too.

Any insights on how the AI reacts on (auto-)razed cities in terms of peace deal packages?

This is the role that our homeland military will fulfil. In the meantime, we try to jump our palace to England. We need our biggest city there if we want to keep some cities on our homeland. We don't have to have a big city if we dicide to give up all homeland cities. Is this what we want?

If we are going this way I'd prefer to go to the Roman-Japanese continent where we find two opponents at once and better, already improved lands. Weak England on the jungle-infested island doesn't justify such a radical step IMO. We'd take care of them later.

I feel we're getting on!

 

[leif erikson]

To keep the discussion going I’ll throw out my All or Nothing plan.

It’s a wild plan that I have never done before so feel free to criticize it. Thoughts, comments??

WOW!!!

When you named it the all or nothing plan, you weren't kidding. It certainly is bold!

I'm going to play devil's advocate for a minute, here are the problems that would have to be overcome (not a complete list, I'm sure):
1. Resources and Lux's - You've addressed this to some degree. However, one of the ways to deal with this would be to leave behind a bunch of settlers and, after the free palace jump, re-establish some cities in key places on the original continent. If we could get a leader to establish a Forbidden Palace in the old core area, that would help even more. (A what you say!!)

2. Military. We'll need a stash of gold to carry us over. You've mentioned this as a problem. The more interesting problem is how quickly we can build a new military as well as try to expand on a continent that is relatively mature in terms of another civs colonization. We are talking about A Spear keeping the hordes away until we can get it in gear.

3. Research - I assume we'll have to buy everything we need?

4. Victory. I assume you beleive and intend to achieve conquest before we get to the Modern Age, even before we get to Replacable Parts. The greatest downside to this plan is that if we end up in the Modern Age, we'll prolly have little industrial base from which to produce the Paratroops, Helicopters, Tanks, etc. we'll neeed to fight it out. That is why, I guess, you named it all or nothing.

I'm going to try and listen for a while.

 

[leif erikson]

Doubt that, too! Mistift guessed the game could be won long before IA. My guess is everybody's squeezing their brains to find ways of capturing cities as fast as possible.

So much for silence!! I think this is correct. I'm sure nearly everyone is prolly going through these same gyrations trying to figure out how best to deal with this!

If we are going this way I'd prefer to go to the Roman-Japanese continent where we find two opponents at once and better, already improved lands. Weak England on the jungle-infested island doesn't justify such a radical step IMO. We'd take care of them later.

Just looked at the terrain and Japan has the best land of anyone. Rome is second and England third. If we're going to make this kind of investment, we should consider making it near Japan and cleaning out that continent first. It won't be easier to start but may be in the long run.

I thought we'd met everyone but Bluebox mentioned a sixth opponent. I checked and he is correct as, from the start of our thread:

Map Parameters
Playable Civ - America
Opponents - Six, preselected
World size - 80 wide by 80 high. (Small)
Difficulty - Emperor
Landform - Archipelago
Barbarians - Raging
That means we would need to do the core jump 3 times!!!

I'm going to go think a while . I wonder if we can weave this into a hybrid plan that uses several of the elements we've talked about?

 

[bluebox]

So much for silence!!

Sorry, what do you mean? This was no spoiler, he did his estimation in our pre-game discussion. Don't mind if I misunderstood your comment.



I totally agree JPN should be our main target in this scenario, indeed!

I'm going to go think a while . I wonder if we can weave this into a hybrid plan that uses several of the elements we've talked about?

While you are breeding out a moderated version, I prolly post a time schedule. This is a very optimistic timetable. I estimate it would need about 40 turns to regain our current strength. Will JPN have Sam's then??

X turns from now/date - what will have happened then? - city count
6 - 230BC Finish off CHN, leave GRE alone (possible future ally in our homeland?) - 22 cities

6 - 230BC make peace with Rome to save Tientsin, give some cities - 18 cities

7 - 210BC gift a bunch of cities to Japan - 12 cities

14 - 70BC recapture them - 18 cities

18 - 10AD make peace with Japan, get at least 1 JPN home land city - 19 cities

18 - 10AD make peace with England, give some cities - 10 cities

18 - 10AD gift some cities to Rome - 2 cities

18 - 10AD Abandon Wash., start new core in JPN homeland - 1 city

25 - 150AD recapture English cities - 12 cities

30 - 250AD make peace with ENG, get English homeland cities 15 cities

30 - 250AD after having increased city count, go REP - 16 cities

38 - 330AD prepare to raid JPN, ally with Rome - 18 cities

 

[leif erikson]

Sorry, what do you mean? This was no spoiler, he did his estimation in our pre-game discussion. Don't mind if I misunderstood your comment.

Sorry Bluebox, this is what I meant:

I'm going to try and listen for a while.

Then I double posted.

In other words, I didn't listen...

 

[Gyathaar]

18 - 10AD gift some cities to Rome - 2 cities

18 - 10AD Abandon Wash., start new core in JPN homeland - 1 city

25 - 150AD recapture English cities - 12 cities

Just remember that if you get a leader to rush FP with in home lands you need to first establish a core around the palace before recapturing the home land cities or rushing the FP (else you use the remote palace corruption exploit).
I assume that if you dont have a FP then this exploit is no issue.

 

[Gyathaar]

Also remember you are not allowed to have any units in cities when you gift them away

 

[bluebox]

Sorry Bluebox, this is what I meant:

Then I double posted.

In other words, I didn't listen...

got it !!

@Gyathaar - thx for clarification. I remember a 6 city core was required for a remote fp.

 

[leif erikson]

Just remember that if you get a leader to rush FP with in home lands you need to first establish a core around the palace before recapturing the home land cities or rushing the FP (else you use the remote palace corruption exploit).
I assume that if you dont have a FP then this exploit is no issue.

Another factor to consider, thanks Gyathaar. So we can do what we wish as long as there is no FP to worry about. Although I assume that we would be violating the intent if we gifted our cities, jumped the palace and then, in recapturing our cities got a leader and rushed the FP in our old core area.

Wouldn't that be a kick in the pants, finally getting a leader and then not being able to use it!

 

[DJMGator13]

Wouldn't that be a kick in the pants, finally getting a leader and then not being able to use it!

We could always rush the Great Library or another Wonder.

There's a lot to think about here. Here are some random thoughts (not a real plan).

I don't think we need to worry about trying to rebuild cities on our starting island if we choose to go this route. What I hope is that with open land to settle the AIs will send a ship and a settler over periodically and that we can pick them off with our remaining military there before they can settle a city. We'll also want to keep some workers to repair roads damaged by barbs.

Can we make some money by selling some workers to help us build up a reserve?

Is there enough room in JPN territory for us to establish 4 or 5 cities from which to build a military with? If we can't get 4 or 5 cities on their island the plan won't work very well. We won't have enough gold to support our military and we won't be able to research. It would more than likely end in our defeat.

It might be worth trying just to see if it can be done.

 

[WillowBrook]

Wow, great discussion!

Unforetunately, my car is parked in a no-parking zone with its blinkers on while I ran in to grab email and attempt to keep abreast of this game. So no insightful comments from me.

I must admit the Gator plan is the most amazing one I've heard. Anyone ever tried anything like it? Of course, it could fail miserably....