UNGY-01 Another spy attempt

[Gr8scott]

Lurker comment:
Concerning infiltration, I think it is by all means superior to anything else at this stage of game.
You'll get around 3,5k EPs. You just can't generate that many EPs in reasonable time at this point. The downside is getting EPs only towards one rival, so you'd have to choose carefully.

Infiltration is a huge chunk of EPs no doubt (I thought it was a bit less than 3.5k though). The downside is that there is a lot of time between now and when you can reasonably use the EPs. It is very different from lightbulbing which gives you an immediate tech.

To get the benefit of EPs, it takes time. You have to:

-Figure out who to infiltrate: Monty is close, but not a tech monster. Since it is a huge decision, waiting to decide who to infiltrate usually makes sense.

-Build sufficient spies to infiltrate (this is a royal pain, especially when you would like to be building units for an aggressive neighbor).

-transport spies to the target CIV and wait for the 5 turns to pass.

-Succeed at tech stealing.

-repeat.

All of that time allows the benefits from Scotland Yard to accumulate to a fairly decent pool of EPs. For example, if SY adds 10EPs and it takes you 50 turns before you start stealing, SY has added 500EPs.

Admittedly, this is no where near the infiltration EPs, but it is usually enough to steal all or at least most of what you want to steal. In a commerce high capital (you guys need more workers/cottages , you could easily get a +15 or 20 EPs from SY. If you can get by with a few less EPs early on, then SY is hugely beneficial over time. There are just very very few ways of getting bonuses to EPs, and a 100% modifier on a commerce city is huge.

I'm not saying that SY is necessarily better, but I don't think infiltration is a no-brainer. In the right circumstances (commerce high capital, unclear infiltration target, etc), SY can be very strong.

On the downside, you have pretty high costs right now (from city maintenance), which will mean you can't run the EP slider as high. This puts a crimp in the benefit of SY.

Tough call...

GS

 

[shyuhe]

We can also abuse boat spies in this game. If your spy remains in a boat, they are immune from detection but can accumulate turn discounts. So maybe infiltrating Qin is the best option? Either way, we need OB with him

 

[mystyfly]

Well not necessary to read whole thread but active player should read recent posts and discussion since the last set.

I reread every post since pigswills turnset before playing.


I think we should build SY. Sometime in the midgame, we might either attack QSH or Khmer and move the palace to reduce distance cost. So it would also be rather hard to determine who to infiltrate.

Workers, Axes and some spears are now priority. This is not that easy as we're pretty hammer-low. We should probabely cut some forests. After we've dealt with monty, we should capture that barb city. How fare are we allowed to go in the war? Capture/raze some cities? Only defensively? Remember we'll get another +100% GG in our borders (GW ). I'd say let Monty sacrifice his units against our cities. We've got the luxury that one of the border cities is on a hill. We should also switch to slavery to whip emergency defenders.

 

[Rusten]

We have no standing army but Monty has enough on his hands. Pretty much the worst case scenario

Oh my I just looked at the save and it turns out you're right. This means we're in huge trouble as I doubt he's going across the water all the way to the Khmer for this one. It's too late to switch to buddhism now isn't it? He's already decided who (us ~~) to attack. He does have a galley in his capital, but that's still reaching. There's even a settler there so it's most likely not for military pourposes.

We have more land mapped out than I thought before looking at the save so that's good although we still need more. I think we should open borders with the Khmer/Qin for better trade routes once we get sailing.

I am without a doubt in my mind positive that the first Great Spy is better spent infiltrated. We will get more than one of them so I'm not worried about not getting one into our capital when the time is right. The next ones are more situational. I linked that thread on the 2nd or 3rd page btw shyuhe

Other things to do the coming turns; stop that worker nearby Nottingham from going east to the hill and rather send him north to mine the gems. Also remember to wake up that fortified worker near the gems+fish+sugar city. We have to execute everything very well right now given our bad situation (WHEOOH ). There's so much to get and possibly so little time.

PS: The amount of commerce we've lost from not having trade routes due to not hooking up our cities or have sailing makes me go .

 

[ungy]

As for the Gspy, infiltration is so strong it's really pretty overpowered at this point in the game. In the last spy game, they didn't allow it for one team.
We, however, are playing immortal and probably need all the help we can get here. So I think we can plan on infiltrating. As for concentrating the EP, that is true but then the "normal" kind can be spent on other AI so it doesn't hurt too much.

Our big problem is Monte. I think we should prioritize a road network to get troops there faster but don't think we have time for barracks. I think we need to start whipping units ASAP. Unfortunately our unpromoted units won't do too well against Monte's aggressive units.

Morganknight you're up:

If Monte does declare war, don't hesitate to pause for strategizing.

 

[Morganknight]

I've got it.

 

[Morganknight]

Well...I can't get my images to upload, so just a report with no pictures, sorry...If I can get it to work later, I will try to insert some pictures

I feel like I did the best I could with what I was given. We gave open borders to Qin and Ragnar. The library in London only had a turn left so I finished it and started a barracks there and in York. I pulled our archers into our frontier cities, and reassigned all of our workers to getting our cities connected by a road network. I explored our northern reaches with our Great Spy while waiting on Alphabet>Sailing. The barbarian city is currently being held by four archers, I think. I assume Slavery once London's barracks are finished and start whipping out axes.

We were right. Montezuma did declare war on us, and the two archers in Nottingham fell in quick order.

While sailing our world fishing expedition, we meet first, Mansa Musa, and then Sitting Bull.

I rush alphabet with a little deficit teching and am able to trade it to Qin for Sailing and Meditation. Mansa gives us Priesthood for Meditation. I queue up Code of Laws for our courthouses. So far, only Mansa has researched it and he is a little far away to send spys to at this point in the game. I leave the tech slider at zero and run espionage at 50% for a while.

We build our first Galley and set our Great Spy to sea. Surya seems to be doing a bit better than Qin and is fairly close so I infiltrate his city. I have not been able to build any more spys yet since we are focusing on our military at the moment, but once we do, there are several ripe and juicy techs to steal form Surya.

Monty advances on Canterbury, but our forces finally manage to throw him back. We receive a Great General, which I send to the front, and start positioning our troops to retake Nottingham. Our Woodsman III warrior was promoted to an Axeman and is joined by our General.

The gems are online.

 

[shyuhe]

Qin has a galley heading towards the gems/sugar spot. I have a feeling we're going to lose that city site This game is going to be a very uphill battle as Monty has lots of land and we will probably be at war with him for a good part of the game. At least it looks like Ragnar is going after Mansa. If we can take care of Monty, then this game is definitely doable. Now the question is how to take out Monty with less than stellar production...

 

[pigswill]

Qin settiling on our island could be a 'blessing in disguise' as we could steal techs from him with bonusses for proximity to our capital.

Had a look at the save. Overall its better than I expected, we've lost one city but potentially have the units for a reasonable stack. Maybe we just consolidate the units into a stack and counter-attack even if it means the temporary loss of another city in the meantime.

 

[Rusten]

Losing out on our sugar resource and that amazing city spot is most certainly not a blessing any way you look at it........
I was so in love with that spot, one of the best cities I've ever seen, makes me sad and annoyed that we didn't settle it 5th. Can't believe horses only was picked instead, but oh well (*tries to think ahead but the image of what that city would look like +/- liberalism comes back haunting*)

My other city suggestions are still looking good though. Barbarians settled on the desert spot (it has fish btw), we can put one on the hill 2S of the horses and another on desert for corn+fish. However, nothing beats that gem-sugar-fish. Even if we're at war we should send a settler down there to plant a city, it only costs ~70 hammers with imperialistic depending on how much food surplus compared to actual hammers. Now it could be too late though judging by that galley

 

[ungy]

Ok got it for tomorrow--I'll post some thoughts later.

I guess I wasn't clear in the beginning about our variant--we are going to steal techs but not trade for them.

This is obviously huge but if you guys think that makes it unwinnable we can reconsider. It greatly dilutes the variant but again it may not be winnable at immortal w/o tech trading or a huge early empire.

 

[Rusten]

I don't think it makes it unwinnable ungy. We're still able to use them to manipulate politics as we agreed and if we play it smart that should be enough. I usually beat immortal with any variants that come to mind in SP. They're often of lesser extent though but on the other hand in an online SG I try even harder.

In hindsight maybe we should've made an updated post with rules of what we agreed on to avoid confusion.

 

[ungy]

I don't think it makes it unwinnable ungy. We're still able to use them to manipulate politics as we agreed and if we play it smart that should be enough. I usually beat immortal with any variants that come to mind in SP. They're often of lesser extent though but on the other hand in an online SG I try even harder.

Well we've got ourselves a bit of a hole to dig out of here--and remember you're the strongest player . Despite the favorable starting land, Monte as a neighbor is not good at all for this variant.

I'm happy either way--I won't play on until others weigh in on this.

In hindsight maybe we should've made an updated post with rules of what we agreed on to avoid confusion.

definately agree--I did post it that way early on but absolutely should have clarified the rules at the start of play.

 

[pigswill]

ungy: could you clarify if we have now reached our tech limit i.e. from now own we cannot obtain techsthrough research or trade but can swop our techs for anything except AI techs.

I'm wondering if we should aim for a raze-fest vs Monte. He's going to declare on anything below friendly so the diplo penalties won't matter so much. We can't afford much more city upkeep. Wiping out some of his cities should seriously lower his power rating. It would be very good if we could capture his capital (also bound to be the buddhist holy city so worth keeping for spy bonus). Maybe we'll find a replacement so Rusten will be less upset about the potential loss of his gemfish city.

 

[Rusten]

Maybe we'll find a replacement so Rusten will be less upset about the potential loss of his gemfish city.

Loss? What loss?! Whoever settles on my spot will find themselves locked into an immediate war and I will not show mercy. That city shall be ours!

Spoiler :

 

[ungy]

OK- Rules clarification:
We will only get tech by stealing it.
We can trade tech to the AI for $, civic, war, etc.
We can wage war as much as our hearts desire and take what we want.

Ok the next set:

Let's go to 10 turns/ round from now on--there's more happening and this is not a normal game.

Priorities: 1. weaken Monte. It looks like he's got nowhere to go but us. We cannot win an immortal game unless we defeat or cripple him. Maybe take Nottingham back and ideally Texcoco then peace.

2. Steal some tech. We have urgent need for: monarchy, currency.
Also need COL. Don't steal any low priority techs yet.

This is basically a war round and we try and steal monarchy.
I'll plan on playing tomorrow.

 

[Rusten]

I'll plan on playing tomorrow.

Okay, but take your time. The coming turns are very crucial and I won't have time to play until 30-ish hours from now anyway (university paper to finish).

We can wage war as much as our hearts desire and take what we want.

 

[ungy]

OK- here we go:

inherited turn--I make a resource trade with Mali. We really need the happy.
Mali are not popular but that's OK for this.

We have quite an usual warlord unit:

let's hope he survives a while.


I decide to hold off on building the spy. While we need monarchy, we also really need units to deal with Monte.

Monte's chariot in Not kills one of our axes
Ragnar comes with a demand:

Always happy to oblige.

Monte's woody2 jag runs out into the jungle after our workers

75 whip sword in canterbury-chariot.
Hindu in Hastings.


50BC:Not good: Monte has 8 units converging on Hastings inc HA.


This does provide us with an opportunity--often the AI will crash it's stack on a hard target like that.

We whip the walls in Hastings.
Qin founds on the our spot:

Our units from near nottingham can't reach in time--I'll attack that and hope for the best at Hastings.


Christianity founded.

25 BC. That woody2 jag is really screwing us up.
I whip another archer in Hastings--we really need Monte to crash here.

Monte attacks us and loses 3 units--odd. Usually they go all or nothing. We lose an archer tho.
Temple of Artemis built.

1AD building up to attack Nottingham.
another odd attack--his woody2 jag attacks Hastings (wins unfortunately) but
we kill it our next turn.

25 more of the same.

50..

75 AD Monte builds us a shrine!

Unfortunately we're a little weak on our attack--Nottingham has 5 defenders and we have only 7 units to attack with.

100AD Monte comes out to attack--we kill a couple of units on defense and now we attack Nottingham

We have 8 units to 4 defenders.

We lose the first 2 battles but no more and Nottingham is ours again.

We get a GG in London.

Price for peace: Nottingham--no thanks. Not sure we want it anyway--I'd really like to get Texcoco.

150 Monte crashes 3 units on Hastings

We heal up a bit

Note: Monte has a HA in the fog W of Hangzhou.

 

[Rusten]

Nicely done so far. We're getting 400% increase in GG points from those battles within our cultural borders. Monty suiciding on Hastings is great. Looking at the technology screen should be depressive at this point, but I'm sure we'll recover.

75 AD Monte builds us a shrine!

You forgot to upload save btw, unless you decided to play some extra turns.

 

[ungy]

oops.. save is here: