Suleiman's Harem

[Flouzemaker]

Whoops!

What the [BLEEP]!?

I appears De Gaulle managed to incorporate another, bigger stack of Artillery to his forces, and we forgot to check, thinking the Artillery threat was dealt with. Obviously a serious mistake.

What the [BLEEP]!

That same turn also allowed him to triple the size of his attack force, thus taking Wonsan with extremely alarming ease.

[BLEEP]!

I appears we grew somewhat overconfident because of our string of victories...

[BLEEP]! [BLEEP]! [BLEEP]ing [BLEEP]!!

Frankly, the final stack's size was rather ridiculous.

However, the two or three victories we managed to pull out of that tragic battle inspired the birth of Cao Cao, another Great General.

I dont care about a Great General! I want my Wonsan back!

Still... what should we

Send him to Edirne to serve as yet another Instructor. We'll be training ourselves some extremely mean units, ready to face a harsher, modern world... training them with a thirst for revenge!!!

 

[axident]

Now would be a great time to bribe someone to join in the war(s). It's your power and Boudica vs. France and its vassals, so the bystander AIs might join either side, especially if France threatens them or bribes them into action.

If I were you, I'd make sure it's the "right" side, even if it means giving up every single tech possible. The resulting bad blood and trade slowdown will slow EVERYBODY down, and when the dust settles, hopefully you will have many new cities and be in the best position to ramp up tech again. (Or production if you want to keep warring.)

Just my 2 cents.

 

[Flouzemaker]

Now would be a great time to bribe someone to join in the war(s). It's your power and Boudica vs. France and its vassals, so the bystander AIs might join either side, especially if France threatens them or bribes them into action.

If I were you, I'd make sure it's the "right" side, even if it means giving up every single tech possible. The resulting bad blood and trade slowdown will slow EVERYBODY down, and when the dust settles, hopefully you will have many new cities and be in the best position to ramp up tech again. (Or production if you want to keep warring.)

Just my 2 cents.

At the present time, there are no bystanders.
While I had made peace with De Gaulle for a few turns, Boudica (and Churchill), and Suryavarman (and Isabella) didn't.
So now, we're back to Suryavarman, Suleiman, Boudica, Isabella, and Churchill VS De Gaulle, Catherine, and Hatshepsut.

The real problem, is that Suryavarman & Boudica don't send organized stacks the way De Gaulle does. From time to time, they send small stacks of 4 to 6 Mounted Units, sometimes accompanied by some type of Artillery. Isabella and Churchill might as well not even exist - although, you could say the same for Catherine and Hatty.

In short, Suryavarman & Boudica mostly enable me to worry a lot less about pillagers, as their small stack intercept and kill about half of De Gaulles pillager's, making that job much easier for me.
Suryavarman also has a pretty decent naval force (which I do not, though I am starting to build some, now that I've got Oil). The Khmer have, inadvertently I'm sure, protected my sea resources a lot.
But in short, both Surya and Boudica seem to be too far away to make a truly big impact in the war.
However, since I'm closer, their offense would be much more organized against me. So, just for that, I'm glad they're on the side of evil err... good... err... my side.

 

[Ajidica]

Do you have flight? If so, build fighters to find deGaulles stack and Bombers to eliminate it. Artilery is for mop up duty. Just make sure france doesnt have SAMS, I find fighters and bombers dont like being intercepted by those.

 

[Roi de Cinq]

Wonderful!

 

[Flouzemaker]

Do you have flight? If so, build fighters to find deGaulles stack and Bombers to eliminate it. Artilery is for mop up duty. Just make sure france doesnt have SAMS, I find fighters and bombers dont like being intercepted by those.

Rest assured it's my first priority once I obtain (or discover) Flight.

The new Airships infuriate me, but although not mentioned, I did use some against De Gaulle. If my memory serves me well, they've all been intercepted by Cathy & Chuck's SAMs by now.
This game is teaching me stuff about warfare I never bothered to learn in previous expansions or difficulty levels. I'm just so used to having tanks well before everyone else, upgrading them to cause collateral damage, and then literally roll over an enemy that stands very little chance. Now, I'm forced to diversify, and maximize the use of each different type of unit.

I'm also used to being much further in the tech tree than this by the 1970's (actually, I would normally have already won by cultural means, by now).



1974 AD:

De Gaulle made a small attack on Novgorod, generally unsuccessful. Some units are injured, and other small scattered groups (or single units) cross our borders, likely for pillaging attempts.

How easily can we get rid of them?

Very. We have some tanks in production, while I don't believe De Gaulle has access to any.

At least there's that.

We've also sent a spy to Wonsan. Hopefully, this one won't get intercepted because the previous five or six spies we've sent across enemy territory sure didn't do anything!



1975 AD:

The VP rings...

Greetings, celebrated ally!

How goes it, Winston? Sending all you've got at the enemy?

Err... sure... why not? To be perfectly honest, the motive of this communication is to perhaps glean knowledge of Divine Right from you.

You don't even have Divine Right?

It didn't seem like a priority at the time, no. Though now, I admit, England looks rather silly without it's secrets.

Yeah. That's fairly pathetic, I should say. Have Divine Right, Winston. And don't let such precious technology fall in the wrong hands!

I promise it will not happen, Suleiman!

Alright. ~chuckles~ Farewell, then! ~chuckles~

We've completed the Forbidden Palace in Moscow.

Hmm. Good, I guess. Honestly, it seemed like a good idea at the time, but now...

What?

It just looks like we're not going to win a Space Race, and we're certainly not going to win by Domination. Still, Suryavarman is taking a comfortable lead, now. It looks like the Ottoman Empire isn't done conquering, not by a long shot. As such, maybe the Forbidden Palace would have served us better in a location like Wonsan instead of Moscow...

We'll have to live with our past choices, Suly-honey.

I guess we'll have to.

 

[axident]

More 2 cents: if it's close to the oil age, I would hammer all the French oil fields with spies and/or fighters/bombers. (Can airships pillage too? Those too, then.) This may take multiple attempts and thus wolf packs of spies per oil well--and also probably shifting your espionage weight higher against France. That's also a peacetime way to rid yourself of enemy aircraft and armor, so you can preemptively do this to your next military target to slow down their massing of oil-based troops. If you can vassalize France the game is probably yours, as you can continue to sabotage enemy land-based oil. (You'll have to use ships and/or aircraft for sea-based oil.) Domination can be very fast once you hit bombers + tanks; I wouldn't count it out as a viable strategy until the AI is literally a turn away from building their last, unsabotaged SS part.

 

[Flouzemaker]

1977 AD:

De Gaulle only seems to send the odd (and doomed) pillager into our borders for the moment. So, our Russian invasion stack resumes it's march towards Rostov.

Groovy.



1978 AD:

Plastics have been discovered!

Excellent. I want to be sure our Oil sources are protected. Send a Work Boat to build an offshore platform for our ocean source, and have at least three Battleships guard it.

Right away. But can I suggest we research Radio, so our liberated cities can stand a cultural chance with broadcast towers?

Sounds reasonable.

My dearest Sultan. getting rid of stray French pillagers before they can pillage anything has become quite easy with our new Tanks, dearest Sultan.

Groovy, right?

Affirmative. Also, our troops have reached and bombarded Rostov. However, Catherine has damaged our Stack with two Russian Artillery.

So?

There are as many Ottoman attackers as there are Russian defenders. When our own Artillery gets through with them, our forces will be stronger, and certainly favored to win... However, if Catherine is lucky enough to win one or two individual skirmishes, we'll likely fail in liberating the city.

We have to try. We have to...

SCORE!!

 

[TheLastOne36]

nice on taking rostav

 

[Flouzemaker]

1979 AD:

We can still eliminate small French Stacks easily. However, it looks like De Gaulle is trying to make two somewhat bigger stacks advance towards either Pusan or Seoul.

Hm...

De Gaulle wants Seoul. Definitely. He may or may not attack it first, but he wants it. My sources say he intends on asking for that city in return for peace, should you try to have peace talks.

Well, he can forget it!



1982 AD:

More of the same, dearest Sultan. We easily dispose of stray French troops.

Excellent! What about his advancing stacks?

They're still there. They're just... not advancing. It's strategically confusing, to say the least!



1984 AD:

Yay! Our defensive efforts have inspired the birth of Bernard Montgomery, the Great General!

Have him build an Academy in Edirne! I want a nasty, evil Tank every turn, not every two turns!

or course!

in other news, a Stack of ten French Artillery (guarded by two Infantry) has established itself on the logging forest south-west of Pusan. They could bombard it next turn.

On a forest, huh. How annoying. I'll have to chop it at the first opportunity, it seems.

If we sacrifice three artillery of our own, I believe our now sizable force of Tanks can handle them, eliminating France's chances at reducing our defenses or causing collateral damage.

Sold! Do it.

Moments later...

Success! Even easier than expected. This makes me think that we could possibly annihilate all of the French Stacks one after the other.

We'll see. We'll see. Let our Tanks heal a little bit, first.



1987 AD:

There you have it, dearest Sultan! We're well on our way to destroying another French stack!

 

[Flouzemaker]

1988 AD:

Disappointing news, Manny-bunny.

What now, Sarila?

Suryavarman and Isabella have made peace with De Gaulle, Catherine and Hatshepsut.

Darn. We'll have to bribe the bugger again in some ten more turns. Very well.



1991 AD:

Now that all French Stacks in our territory have been destroyed, mat I suggest a potential course of action?

M'kay...

There are a very, very large of Frenc defenders in Wonsan.

I know, it's intimidating, quite frankly.

But we also have a good number of Tanks that cause great amounts of collateral damage (+50%, to be precise). All we need, is a sufficient number of troops.

We don't have that many.

We might. Thanks in part to railroads, all the defenders of Pusan, Seoul, P'yongyang and Novgorod can join in. Though it would temporarily leave those cities under-defended, it counts as enough troops to reclaim our Wonsan.

That's a little risky, isn't it?

The cities will be ineptly defended for one turn only. I submit that it's impossible for De Gaulle to use that to his advantage. Wonsan can be ours again, and it can be ours again right now!

Alright. DO IT!

All Artillery, Tanks, and defenders of Pusan, Seoul, P'yongyang and Novogorod attack Wonsan until...

WOOOOO!!

Wow. Excluding the Artillery, we have not lost a single unit. On the other hand, the French death toll only classifies this as... some kind of genocide or something! Look at the Power Graph:

Awesome! You can clearly see when we destroyed his attacking stacks, and better yet, the impact of his losses in Wonsan! De Gaulle has to be furious!!

 

[Flouzemaker]

1993 AD:

YAY! Henry Ford has been born in Istanbul! Another Great Engineer!

Joy. Let's keep moving with the war, here!



1997 AD:

Maybe I'm reaching too far, but I think we can attempt to capture Thebes. I wouldn't say no to the Corporation founded there...

Though we have less Artillery than usual, our Stack is on the move!

Excellent...



1999 AD:

We're attacking Thebes:

Ha! Ha! Ha! Chuck, I call this PAYBACK!

But later...

The Russians are attacking Rostov!

That was weak! Her last unit died even before I could take the screen shot!

At least, our heroic defense has inspired the birth of Nabuchadrezzar II in Edirne. He'll be an Instructor, I suppose?

No, send him to Istanbul to build an Academy. I want our Capital to train troops a little faster as well! Meanwhile, let's prepare to move against Namp'o.

 

[Flouzemaker]

2006 AD:

The pesky French keep attacking Thebes.

I know, it's annoying. My invasion stack can never fully heal!

But Istanbul and Edirne have trained a second Stack that we can use against Namp'o.

How thoughtful of you, Beste!

However, defending Thebes is proving to be difficult. Adding reinforcements is a tough task. And if we killed 1 paratrooper, 2 SAM Infantries, 2 Infantries and 1 Artillery, we have lost a total of three Tanks in the process.

~grumble~



2008 AD:

Thebes has endured yet another French Attack. This time, we lost 1 infantry and 2 more Tanks, while De Gaulle only lost an Artillery and 2 Infantries.

That was humiliating, to some degree. What about our Stack heading for Namp'o?

We should be ready to take the city in 2011.



2011 AD:

Alright! Let's grab Namp'o! Wait... dang Visual Phone! What is it?

Hey buddy! How have you been?

OK, I guess. And yourself?

Awesomely! I'm so winning this game, buddy! Too cool!

Congratulations. What do you want?

Radio.

Against what?

My good will.

Goodbye.

 

[Flouzemaker]

OK. Now we can take Namp'o! Attack!!

Are you sure? De Gaulle attacked our stacks with two artillery last turn. We took some damage, and taking Namp'o might seem like a reach at this point.

The [BLEEP] keeps attacking Thebes! I want to hurt him, hurt him bad! Attack!!

As you wish.

Woo hoo! Man, none of our guys are dead, but they be weak like [BLEEP]!

We would benefit from some type of break.

Lemme make a call...

Hallo?

If I give you Fission, will you declare war on De Gaulle?

But of course! I've been waiting for such an offer for the longest time!!

Excellent! See you later!

Allô?

Hey, [BLEEP]. Your dadday, here. What'll you give me for peace?

~sigh~ My World Map, 260 gold, and 13 gold per turn. How is that?

That is excellent!

As Suryavarman and Isabella declare war on the French Triumvirate, Suleiman makes peace with the latter.

 

[Flouzemaker]

2012 AD:

Suleiman!

What?

As part of the compensation you owe me for your vile betrayal, give me Radio.

No.

GIVE IT TO ME, like, ~sigh~, NOW!

Farewell, Cathy.

Looks like Boudica and Churchill, her vassal, have made peace with the French Triumvirate of Evil.

That's annoying. But bribing Boubica back into war probably won't be very expensive.



2013 AD:

The visual Phone is ringing...

Suleiman!

I am NOT giving you Radio! Will you let it go?

No. How about you give me Fission, and I give you Flight?

OK. Some planes will probably come in handy. You know I'm building some right away, right?

Frankly, I don't even care anymore. You, like, ~sigh~, broke my heart and stuff!

Don't pretend like you've never broken a man's heart before, Cathy!

Maybe, but in truth, you can only truly break a man's heart if you've broken his [BLEEP]s first.

Whatever. Farewell!

 

[TheLastOne36]

LOL i love it when that happens.

 

[Flouzemaker]

2015 AD:

A Great Prophet has been born in Edirne!

What's his name?

The Great Prophet.

Yes. What's his name?

The Great Prophet.

Look, I know he's a Great Prophet. What I want to know is his name!

The Great Prophet!

Forget it! Just keep building planes in Istanbul, while Edirne refills our Tank supplies.


2020 AD: 60 turns left!

Well. That's where we are. 2020. 60 turns left. Suryavarman has a lead of over 500 points.


The only true Cultural threat, Catherine, has been eliminated.
It looks like it's going to come down to a Time victory, and Suryavarman has a good, healthy lead with the World's biggest army (that he just never sends all the way to France).
Could he betray Boudica or Suleiman? It's a possibility. He has some warmongering tendencies, but I've never seen him attack an ally with same religion.

Cyrus has a healthy Tech lead, by now, and he's a danger in terms of Space Victory.

So, the main question is: in 60 turns, does Suleiman have a chance of catching up to Suryavarman?

I presently plan to keep on attacking France when more offense will be ready. I can't even presume to keep Thebes or Namp'o for very long without conquering or razing more French cities.
BTW, if you wonder where Paris is.. on that map, up North, you can barely make out a lake. Paris is in the tile south of it.


Another option would be to betray Suryavarman, and take his three Continental cities. In all honestly, I just don't think I have the time to build the transports and stuff to take the islands.
However, should I do that, the risk that the AI dogpiles me is very high... and many cities not on the expected front lines aren't that well defended.

If I somehow get close enough, I have two Settlers at hand that can beef up my score a little by founding last-minute cities. (One on a plains-hill right at the Ottoman-Celt border, the other south of Edirne, on the crappy coast next to those mountains. It's crap, but it'd be just for the points.
But I need to catch up to Suryavarman enough., first.

Scores:
Suryavarman: 3904
Suleiman: 3421
De Gaulle: 3013 (and destined to dwindle)
Boudica: 2526
Cyrus: 2490
Isabella: 1904
Hatshepsut: 1478
Catherine: 1453
Churchill: 1327

Most population: Suryavarman: 30% (Suleiman: 14.83%)
Most land: Suleiman: 25.07% (Surya: 22%)

Note that Cyrus has built the SS Life Support.

Right now, I'm leaning towards pursuing my French invasion, although difficult. If all goes well, it could enable me to attack Cyrus if he gets too close to a Space Victory, which suddenly appears more possible than I originally thought.
The hope, obviously, is that this path will enable me to catch up and surpass Suryavarman's score.

Your thoughts?

 

[Catharsis]

If Cathy or Hatty were to get eliminated, that would allow Surya to release some of his cities as a colony, right? Would that be a good or bad thing? (I'm not a Civ IV player in the strictest sense of the term. )

 

[TheLastOne36]

The biggest question is, will you be able to do all that in 60 turns

 

[axident]

Tanks + Bombers = fast wars, though you seem to prefer non-Drill tanks whereas I almost always go for Drill Tanks for faster healing/less collateral damage. You could probably vassalize or cripple France while all but eliminating Boudica, all within 20 turns. Build mass transports while your troops heal and then rush Khmer and/or Spain for Dom vic. Alternatively, keep pushing France with your existing troops while massing newer transports and troops, then send them over to Khmer. That way your newest-built stuff can mass on the western front and blitz Boudica when the time is right, and your transports can keep on rolling over Khmer.

I almost never go space race so I won't comment on that.