War with Rome- Foreign Invasions

[Donovan Zoi]

Sounds good. Let's ruin our reputation via deception so that we can run our disposable troops up against a well-defended capital in the hopes of starving our new citizens once we do so.

Pardon me if get a bit misty-eyed with pride.

 

[greekguy]

We have another alternative:

The Romans will trade us Saltpetre!

We could trade for Saltpetre and upgrade all our Knights to Cavalry and Hoplites to Muskets. This will enable us to take the cities far more easily. If we pay with a tech or lump sum gold we should be able to break the deal without a problem. Alternatively with the forces the Romans have in our territory we could demand they leave and they may well declare on us.

hmmm...This certainly does change things. Seeing as our chances for success will be much greater with Calvary, we should probably wait to declare war. If we were to arm ourselves with a dozen or so Cavs, this war would go much smoother...of course, this does open the possibility of the Romans building loads of Muskets to defend themselves. But, I do prefer having Cavs vs. Muskets, instead of Knights vs. Pikes/Muskets.

 

[Furiey]

These are the deals that are available for Saltpetre:

Which deal we take depends on whether we intend to allow it to run for 20 turns or stop it early. If we are to stop it early we either need a deal where we pay up front so we do not lose our reputation if we stop it, make the Romans declare on us (a gamble they may not do this), or accept that our reputation is dead (something we'd probably prefer to avoid).

Deals that we pay up front so we don't ruin our reputation if we stop early:

Option 1: We give: 873 gold. Rome gives: Saltpetre.

We give: Physics. Rome gives: Saltpetre, 78gpt (all they have), Incense. But if we sell Physics we need to look at other deals available and if we are stopping the deal early do them first so that we don't lose so much gpt when the deal is stopped. Persia for example has lots of gpt on offer, so we should sell it around first eg:

Option 2a:
1.We give Physics, Persia gives 139gpt + 197 gold
2. We give Physics, France gives 19gpt + 45 gold (this is all the gpt they have so we should still get it all, but we should check the Roman deal before doing this as depending on how long it is to run we may be able to get more gold overall even if the deal runs for a shorter time)
3. We give Physics, Rome gives Saltpetre and as much gpt as they will give (or France if we sold to Rome in step 2)

Option 2b:
1. We give Physics, Persia gives 139gpt + 197 gold
2. We give Physics, Rome gives Saltpetre and as much gpt as they will give.
3. We sell Democracy OR Magnetism to France for 19gpt + 45 gold

Deals that we pay per turn so we either have to let run 20 turns, break and ruin our reputation, or have to get Rome to declare on us:

Option 3: We give: 48gpt + 9 gold. Rome gives Saltpetre
Option 4: We give: Wines, 35gpt + 3gold. Rome gives Saltpetre.
Option 5: We give: Wines, 633 gold. Rome gives Saltpetre.

I think I would prefer to do option 2 (see edit below for which) and trade Physics as this is a good trade with Persia anyway.

Troop Upgrades

We then need to look at the cost of Upgrades:

25 Knights to Cavalry (3 of our 28 Knights are Elite so won't be upgraded) @ 30 gold each = 750 gold
13 Trebuchets to Cannon @ 30 gold each = 390 gold
Total for Cavalry and Cannon (offensive troops) = 1140 gold

17 Hoplites to Muskets (defensive troops) (1 of our 18 Hoplites is Elite so won't be upgraded) @ 120 gold each = 2040 gold

Total upgrade cost = 3180 gold

Our current treasury is 3114 gold and we are at 70% science to give Magnetism in 2 turns at -79 gpt.

We can not currently afford to upgrade all our troops, although we could afford to upgrade all our offensive troops and most of the defence. The sale of Physics will bring in further gpt to fund our science spending, and bring in more gold to allow us to upgrade the remainder and still rush culture in Rome when we need to.

As a comparison:
Veteran Knight v Veteran Musket fortified in a City on flat land: 20% chance the Knight wins.
Veteran Cavalry v Veteran Musket fortified in a City on flat land: 38% chance the Cavalry wins, still not a cakewalk, but nearly double the chance of the Knight.

Personally I feel that the Romans will already have upgraded the majority of their Pikes to Muskets already. They have Leonado's so it will only cost 45 gold each compared to the usual cost of 90. Our Hoplites cost us 120 each to upgrade as they are the equivalent of upgrading from Spearmen.

edit: I've edited in comments suggestions from TimBentley & Ravensfire.

Option 2b would give us the greatest return from the sale of Physics and get us deal for Saltpetre where we pay in full upfront so we will be able to stop the deal early if we wish. We have the choice of what we sell France, Metallurgy is the cheapest of the techs, but Democracy is an optional one. By selling one of these now we should be able to sell them Physics later.

 

[TimBentley]

Option 2 but doing the Rome deal before France (they should be willing to pay more than 60gpt if they had it, so they'll be paying at a large discount) sounds good. We could sell democracy or metallurgy to France instead if we wanted.

Note that we have 3 elite knights and 1 elite hoplite.

 

[ravensfire]

I have no concerns with Option 1. The other options, I do not like as much.

We're going to declare WAR on them. Paying them up front for a resource is perfectly valid. Anything else is uncivilized.

-- Ravensfire

 

[Furiey]

I have no concerns with Option 1. The other options, I do not like as much.

We're going to declare WAR on them. Paying them up front for a resource is perfectly valid. Anything else is uncivilized.

We're still paying upfront with option 2, we just pay with a Technology rather than plain Gold. The gpt involved is part of what they give us, so if we stop it short we have paid in full already, they don't have to give so much in return. Perhaps I should colour the headings differently (done).

Option 2 but doing the Rome deal before France (they should be willing to pay more than 60gpt if they had it, so they'll be paying at a large discount) sounds good. We could sell democracy or metallurgy to France instead if we wanted.

We need to know how many turns we will keep the deal running. Once we know that and we have done the Persia deal we can calculate which gives us the greater return: 19gpt x 20 from France or X gpt x Y turns from Rome. We therefore need a decision on whether we will stop the deal short and if so how long the Military will take to get ready. We have still not got specifics for the military plans. Or as you say sell Matallurgy or Democracy to France for which we know we will get the 19gpt and will not affect the Rome deal. We can just take whatever gpt Rome offers. I've added the French Metallurgy/Democracy option as option 2b. I've also updated the upgrade costs to take account of the Elite troops. Thanks.

 

[vikingruler]

Thank you Furiey for your excellent suggestion on trading. I will admit our army is not ready to fight the Romans but your idea really gives us some great things. We will be able to fight the Romans on level ground with cavs and cannons so the war will be easier. Also, the war can go slower as the goal will not just be to get Saltpeter but more to destroy Rome.

I feel we should go with option 2a, it gets us the most gold and thus will rebound our economy if and when we upgrade our troops. Also, the upgrading will take a few turns as we don't have enought to upgrade all units, therefore we get money for 20 turns from France and and Persia and a few turns from Rome.

 

[Cyc]

I thank you too, Furiey. Once again the information you have supplied shows our logical choices in an easy to read manner. What would we do without you.

I agree with what you say in the last paragraphs of both your posts here (if you can just kinda mush them together ). If we can tie up the French gold, selling them Physics later may just be the icing on the cake. Well done.

 

[xyourxmomxcorex]

We have another alternative:

The Romans will trade us Saltpetre!

We could trade for Saltpetre and upgrade all our Knights to Cavalry and Hoplites to Muskets. This will enable us to take the cities far more easily. If we pay with a tech or lump sum gold we should be able to break the deal without a problem. Alternatively with the forces the Romans have in our territory we could demand they leave and they may well declare on us.

I pointed that out before, but still, we cant pay for saltpeter all the way until Motorized Transportation.

 

[Furiey]

This is the first time that Rome has spare Saltpetre to trade us, therefore this is the first time that this option is open to us. At no point in the paragraph you quoted do I suggest we do continue to pay for it all the way to Motorised Transportation. We will still need our own supply and at some point will wish to gain a Roman city anyway, but trading, upgrading and then attacking will make the task much easier.

 

[Furiey]

I stopped the chat just prior to declaring to allow for any last minute adjustments. The Romans have taken Cologne, so there may well have to be some. This is our current troop disposition, all are ready to move in this turn.

The Eastern part of our empire:

The Western part:

 

[Cyc]

Excellent, Furiey. Can we get the DoM in here? We have lots of fire-power, but need direction. Should we worry about Colonge and Frankfurt, or just pick them off later?

 

[Furiey]

It is our East I am concerned about, and in particular the number of Roman troops that are going for Germany that will come flooding North to us when we attack. There is an unused Cavalry in Civantonia that could assist in defending, there is also one in Augean Stables that could replace one in the Lugdunum stack, freeing that one to move to the East (rather than have the AS one spend it's entire move nearly getting there). There are also 2 Crusaders unmoved by AS, but being slow troops they will take a while to get there. We will have to keep enough troops in the East to keep the Romans at bay until we can get enough together to raze those cities. We know from the forces going through our lands that there are Knights and Muskets there, so it willl not be easy. We must not let it distract us from our task of taking Rome, and although I would prefer to see those cities behind us gone, if we do not move on Rome we will find that we have used our Cavalry and are now facing Roman Cavalry before we have captured the city and are in control of the Saltpetre. The Neapolis force should be able to sever the other source of Saltpetre (they can do so next turn if they move E then 2 N to get to 2SE of Neapolis and there are no roads between Nepaolis and that point so unless there is a Knight there they will be safe, they can then move to the Saltpetre and pillage the following turn). We may need to keep back some of the Ravenna/Hispalis Cavalry to deal with the Southern troops though and get the remainder of our Cavs for the attack on Rome from those last ones being built now. We will need to build the Colony on the Saltpetre ASAP.

edit: wow, what a ramble, I'll try and organise it a bit later (got to make a Christmas cake now).

 

[vikingruler]

Thank you Furiey for your excellent input. I also want to apologize for not being active as I have been extremly busy. Now I'm very happy to hear that we have cavs and muskets. The muskets will be a great defense as the cavs are excellent on the offense. Anyway onto my plan:

-The musketman we now have can allow us to send more troops to take Rome rathar than national defense
-Our cavs will be very effective aganist the no longer superior musket defender even if it is by a small margin
-I propose a small buildup of defenders in our cities, before we declare war make sure 2 muskets are in each city
-Our cavlary will be in a position to attack Antium, Hispalis, Ravenna, Antium, and all the outlaying cities near our border on the path to Rome
-As for Cologne send 2 cavs down their to spy on the Romans, hopefully a chunk of their army is their and preoccupied with defending the city rather than Rome
-If the Roman army is in Cologne but on the move hopefully they will attack more of Germany or spend a long time going through Germany to get to their homeland, while we have captured and set up a stiff resistance in Rome

I will try to post a map but I'm going on vacation in a few hours and will have access to a computer but no civ.

 

[Furiey]

Once we declare war, we will only be able to complete the Cavalry we are currently building and not start any new ones until we capture the Saltpetre. Therefore if you are going to wait before declaring war it may well be worth rushing the Cavalry we have building the turn before you expect to declare so that we can start building new Cavalry in the city just before we declare war. It would be frustrating to complete these Cavalry the turn after we declare and not be able to build any more.

 

[WeaponX]

Once we declare war, we will only be able to complete the Cavalry we are currently building and not start any new ones until we capture the Saltpetre. Therefore if you are going to wait before declaring war it may well be worth rushing the Cavalry we have building the turn before you expect to declare so that we can start building new Cavalry in the city just before we declare war. It would be frustrating to complete these Cavalry the turn after we declare and not be able to build any more.

Thats a good idea but do we have the money to rush? If we do those last bits of calvary before we are cut off will provide great backup not to mention defense for any weakly guarded cities

 

[xyourxmomxcorex]

To quote Georing (luaffe leader) when England and France declared war upon Germany:
If we lose, may heaven have mercy upon us!
We are SCREWED.
The roman armies will flood north.
I see some of our governers haging from lamposts.....

 

[ravensfire]

The roman armies will flood north.

True - IN BODY BAGS!!!!

-- Ravensfire

 

[Furiey]

We are strong to Rome.

That German city needs to be razed (did they respawn?), but both Persia or even Rome could do that for us. The stack of Romans coming from the south are all slow moving troops, we need to use the increased mobility of the Cavalry we have there to pick them off - it'll be several turns before they reach our cities. We may have to play a waiting game in the south for a while, picking off troops as they come north until there are few left. We will need to build and protect the southern Saltpetre colony until we get the one in the North. It looks like our crusader stack is pretty much intact. Those plus some Cavalry can hopefully move on Antium. We will have to keep sufficient Cavs back to deal with the Romans coming North and Ravenna but once the majority of the roving Roman forces have been defeated the ex German cities will be poor producers and I feel we need to keep our focus on the Roman core and Rome. There are also several Settler pairs about, and in the West we need to blockade the coast as well as the land route to the ex French lands. Workers could be used to blockade the coast as long as they are protected from land attack. It may be better to reduce the size of the blockade - does it really matter if they build right next to the French border where Paris was? We just don't want them building by our border!

I look forward to swinging from the lampost in celebration.

 

[ravensfire]

Start swinging, 'cause we just kicked Rome so hard they will NEVER, EVER recover.

EVER.

I invite everyone to review the events in the summary posted here, especially those with less than positive opinions of our chances.

France has expanded into many of the open areas, and Persia is working hard to do the same in the far North. No matter - those two countries exist only at our pleasure!

-- Ravensfire