Space-1: War While Waiting

[a space oddity]

What can I say, NP?

I like the idea of leaving empty land to entice the AI building settlers!

I will get (and probably play) this tonight.

 

[TedJackson]

Great,

a manageable defensive front again

Well played NP



Ted

 

[handy900]

Nice round

QUOTE]Originally posted by Northern Pike

We should leave some citiless space in the land we've conquered (north of St. Regis, for example), so that the AI civs will keep draining their populations to build settlers in their compulsive attempts to fill the gaps.
[/QUOTE]

Great idea! I've never thought of using empty land as bait. You guys are teaching me all kinds of good tricks.

 

[Greebley]

Ya, if we are researching in 4 turns, I would say we have enough infrastructure for now and probably should build cavalry. I think we can wait on most of the banks until we get more troops for example. I would even switch the towns building infrastructure over to cavalry, provided we can do this without losing shields.

Once we hit the industrial age, we may then want to put one or two cities back on infrastructure.

For the empty army. We talked about rifleman armies. I was trying to figure if we should wait for that. We have to finish banking, eco, the final 3, then nationalism, so over 20 turns I would guess. Given that we don't yet have a full cavalry army, then maybe not waiting is better (assuming we ever have cavalry to fill it).

Oh one thing I learned from my training game with Nad. Corrupt towns are best building workers, settlers, cannon. Only build libaries where it is specifically needed. We may not yet be far enough away for the towns to be fully corrupt, but it is something to consider as we expand farther. Note also we can settle to fill gaps between cities rather than spending 40 turns or cash on libraries as well. This gives us even more cities slowly building cannons (for example), so we are averaging 1-2 a turn.

 

[mad-bax]

I like to build 8 banks and Wall Street immediately where possible.
Other than that I agree on the cavalry builds by core cities and workers and settlers in corrupt cities. I also think that we should raze cities where our opponents are in republic or democracy, and also raze cities of Pop 7 or higher, for the workers, flip risk, happiness problems, and aggravation in having to starve them down.

 

[a space oddity]

Yeah, we don't need to worry too much about our rep anyway...

 

[handy900]

Originally posted by Greebley

Oh one thing I learned from my training game with Nad. Corrupt towns are best building workers, settlers, cannon. Only build libaries where it is specifically needed.

Another use if you have sufficient workers is to set corrupt cities to "wealth". An extra 30+ GPT (if you have a lot of corrupt cities) is nice. One other thing (after nationalism) I do with corrupt towns on a river is irrigate all possible tiles, and draft units to disband in another, more productive city. When you get to RP, conscript infantry has pretty good disband shield count. The citizens in that town get a little unhappy, but if it's totally corrupt who cares. Space, would this be an "exploit" under the rules of this SG?

 

[handy900]

On the infrastructure question, I'd keep at least 2 cities in each core on infrastructure build. Rotate them around so you get balanced development. We'll still get enough units and our infrastructure will not fall too far behind.

I'm usually spending money in AW on upgrades & research, so I don't build wall street. If we do build it, we'll need to make sure we commit to keeping cash on hand to get the benefit from it.

 

[a space oddity]

Look around and see a pillaging army is on top of the single Bab Saltpeter source, good! We're a bit heavy on infrastructure, but I decide to keep it that way for now.

goals:
Build up defense in the north to get our armies free to go south.
Think of a good way to use the leader.

pre-turn
Everything looks just fine, upgrade one Catapult in Oil Springs.

IT
Bab cav kills a Musket.
Barbarian attack a musket and dies.
Viroconium Cavalry -> Musket
Our Palace gets a floor with eagles, how appropriate.
Babs start Shakespeare's.
Greeks start Bach's, Smith's and Shakespeare's.
Otto has founded a city north of St.Regis.

1305AD - turn 1:
Move troops into
Upgrade Pike in Reykjavik to Musket.
Upgrade Pike in Odense to Musket.
4/4 Cav vs 1/4 Bab Cav: wins unscratched
Pillage Bab Saltpeter, check diplo and he lacks it now! [dance]
Found the city south of St. Regis, start walls.
Found the ambitious city south of Oil Springs, start walls.
5/5 Cav vs 3/3 Musket: wins unscratched.

Check slider but can't be turned back, Banking in 2 at +137gpt.

IT
Spain move the MDI's in under the cover of the jungle.
Babs have 2 more Cavs to send.
Oil Springs worker -> worker
Byzantium Cav -> 'duct
Hispalis 'duct -> Musket
Hareid Walls -> Cannon
Syracuse Harbor -> Caravel

1310AD - turn 2:
Three new cavs are loaded in the empty army and sent south.
Some of the attacking force is sent south as well.
The spear army reveals even more Spanish MDIs.
Upgrade pike in Nicomedia, catapult in Oil Springs.

The slider can be moved back a notch, we now make +177gpt.

IT
A Spanish MDI attack the Musket who guards the workers, is redlined and retreats.
Banking comes in, and aftre some thought I decide to go for Economics (=Smith's), money makes the world go round and we have a shot if we keep the leader.
Pompeii Cav -> Bank

1315AD - turn 3:
Switch Rome form Cav to Bank.
4/4 Cav vs 1/4 Bab Cav: wins unscratched
12/12 Cav Army vs 4/4 Spanish MDI in jungle: wins unscratched promoting 1 of the cavs.
Battle for Bingol(Ottoman):
4/4 Cav vs 3/3 Spear: wins autorazing the city.

Upgrade Pike and Catapult in Oil Springs.

IT
Spanish MDI attacks elite Legion and dies.
Spain lands a musket near ...
Babs move 3 cavs within the range of our cannons.
Neapolis Uni -> Bank
Stavanger Walls -> Cannon
Otto start Magellan's.
Massive barb uprising near Birka!

1320AD - turn 4:
Upgrade pike in Hareid.
Move troops around to protect Jerusalem from the Spanish Musket.
4/4 Cav vs 2/4 Bab Cav: wins 2/4 left.
5/5 Cav vs 2/4 Bab Cav: wins unscratched.
13/13 Cav Army vs 1/4 Bab Cav: wins 11/13 left.
5/5 Cav vs 4/4 MDI: wins 3/5 left.

Arrrgh, just noticed Babylon upgraded the muskets to rifles!
I can move the slider back already.

IT
Allegeny riots, gets a taxman.
Babylon completes the Shake's in Babylon.
Greeks start Newton's.

1325AD - turn 5:
Move a Legion to Allgeny as Mil police, fire the taxman.
More troop movement to give MB the opportunity to get rid of the nasty Spanish invaders.

All in all rather quiet turns, with a bit more bad news, the Babs have found another source of Saltpeter, probably bought it somewhere.

 

[a space oddity]

Here is the save.

And a picture of the current front:

 

[a space oddity]

Mad: you're next. Since you missed last round I'll allow you to play 10 turns.

I now see I missed the last battle, there's still movement left on the Knight Army in Ambition, get that Spanish MDI for me, will you?

 

[mad-bax]

Sure thing. I'll play tomorrow. I actually managed to play the Famous five tonight, I just haven't posted yet.

Shall I post or shall I take the cellophane off C3C, hmmm...

 

[Greebley]

Space Oddity,

Babylon had two saltpeter. One is under Ashur. I am betting he has a deal with Spain for it, so will only lack it until the deal expires. He is probably supplying spain with iron too, so if we pillage that, he will be ironless until that expires.

Actually disconnecting Ashur's roads would destroy that source for all but ashur. You may want to consider that MadBax.

 

[a space oddity]

So that's what happened. I thought I was smart checking the diplo screen and drew the wrong conclusion when Saltpeter was in our resource list. Didn't bother checking under cities anymore. The good news of course is that Spain will have to find another pusher.

 

[handy900]

Will be nice to break out of the jungle.

 

[Northern Pike]

Two cities named for me--I'm honoured, Space.

Mad-bax, it shouldn't be hard to hold Northern's Ambition now that we have a road built to it. But I think we should rush walls and then a temple there immediately. Given that the Babylonians have riflemen, it may be some time before we take Akkad and relieve the cultural pressure on NA.

With only two turns to go on Economics, our chances of getting Smith look good.

 

[TedJackson]

Good progress, again, Space

How about settling on the hill E of the ruins of Mauch Chunk - discouraging the AI from coming up through the jungle. Moving the garrison of St Regis to the hill North of St Regis - making it our bait city - and draw the enemy AI up that piece of coast?


Ted

 

[a space oddity]

Yes, that's what I was thinking. The hill will provide extra defense points. All of our cities in that particular row are on hills. We should also be thinking about cutting off the land bridge that the Spanish troops currently are using.

 

[TedJackson]

Originally posted by a space oddity
We should also be thinking about cutting off the land bridge that the Spanish troops currently are using.

Let 'em come, I say. They're quite welcome to impale themselves on our defenses

I mean, we do need targets to generate some more GLs


Ted

 

[handy900]

Originally posted by TedJackson
How about settling on the hill E of the ruins of Mauch Chunk - discouraging the AI from coming up through the jungle. Moving the garrison of St Regis to the hill North of St Regis - making it our bait city - and draw the enemy AI up that piece of coast?

Ted

I like it.