Played turn 141; did what Seven's signs said, basically.
Next tech is Priesthood. Next task to worry about, after whipping a bunch of factories, is going to be health, I expect. Since we're going to be making a seaborne attack anyway, I feel like Refrigeration could be in order soon. Mass Media could be another good choice, for Hollywood, if happy doesn't settle out after building Rock & Roll.
Aside from getting factories finished, military buildup goes apace... aside from the cities that have happiness problems.
Of note, other people are starting to complete Infantry. Also, GES is 2 turns from Plastics.
Great! Now we just need flight and our army is set for a while.
With battleships, a destroyer or two, and transports, we'll have naval superiority and can also bombard any (coastal) city's defenses down to nothing. Then we just need bombers to wound everything and marines to finish the cities off.
Strategy is to target one player at a time and raze all their coastal cities. I guess we probably start with Luddite, if we can. He's the most threatening opponent due to his advanced tech position.
Lorien should probably just build 11xp (3 promo... probably CR3) tanks. Drydock cities should whip out as much navy as possible. Other cities should build marines/bombers. Border cities should probably make airports and then build bombers while more inner cities make marines.
Played t142. Started flight, next turn we can crank research back up just enough to finish it. Not sure what we want after that - Biology/Refrigeration? Artillery? Straight to Rocketry/Satellites/More military tech?
I'd suggest turning research down to zero after we have flight (so try to avoid much overflow) and research biology. We can use the gold to cash rush a bunch of airports/bombers/marines. For example, for the cost of Bio/Refrigeration we could get ~25 more bombers. I think the game is approaching an end, so we really have to weigh those benefits against each other in a different light.
Next turn we'll also finish Three Gorges Dam. So, er: we need to get rid of our coal. All it's doing is +50% for Ironworks and -2 health everywhere we have a factory. Once we have POWER everywhere which is yet another 2 unhealth, I don't think we can afford the coal anymore. Let's windmill over both our coal mines. I'll also try to get a wheat in trade from Commodore.
I've loaded up 3 marines into a galleon. Technically our NAP with yuris is now expired (we could have declared this turn). Now, we don't want to, since he's giving us 3 health in trade (banana + deer), but maybe we can extort him some more. Our galleon can reach two of his cities next turn, and they have a total of three units between them right now, so if he doesn't reinforce we could easily raze both of them.
I agree with bio/refrigeration next. Bio is a minor boost at best, considering how few farms we have, but Refrigeration would both give us more health buildings and increase the speed of our ships to ludicrous speed.
I know I swapped a windmill for a coal mine at one point, but... that's a really good point. It's amusing that cutting down on a resource will improve our health situation, but if that's what it takes, windmills are close to the same value, even on a resource.
As a teaser, Yuris agreed to hand over his (only) Wheat in exchange for a 20-turn NAP. I'm hoping, in that time, we can get health buildings up where they're needed and maybe steal a wheat from someone. (Does GES have wheat? <.< )
I cash-rushed a bunch of nearly-complete things. We want to cash-rush things because troops > techs once we have flight. Here's how we decide what to rush:
Rush the things with less production modifiers.
(That's because the rush cost is the same no matter what modifiers we have, unlike slavery.) Since we mostly just have universal production modifiers, this means rushing anything is fine. There's one exception: we don't really want to rush boats as much, because drydocks give us +50% on them. Make sense? Later if we find we need more boats we can rush them, but for now let's stick to marines, airports, bombers, and the odd infantry/tank.
It doesn't matter if we rush a nearly-complete item, or something with just a few hammers invested (as long as we're not rushing from scratch, which is bad). Either way we are trading some amount of gold for half that many hammers. Let's try to rush as much as we can, because we want a big freaking army in 7t. Here's why:
* Our NAP with GES/Luddite only lasts until t150. On t151 we may attack each other.
* Commmodore just called in our 7t cooldown NAP. On t150, we may attack each other. The conversation follows.
Quote:Hey Commodore, I think it must have been 5 turns by now. What can we give you for wheat?
Seven
Quote:Hey Seven,
You're right, it's been over five turns you gold spends as well as Luddite's, so I doubt there's anything special about that. However, I note your people have learned the secrets of Lego, and other plastic things. Wheat for oil?
-Commodore
Quote:Hey, haha, oil's pretty dangerous you know, you can build all kinds of scary crap with it. I suppose I could do the following terms:
1) You offer us wheat on your turn (i.e. now).
2) We'll offer you oil on ours (still need a turn to get the second source up) for 45gpt.
3) You may not initiate our NAP cooldown until you have Plastics. (I still can (if I'm crazy I guess, or you decide to never research Plastics), and then 7t later either of us can declare.)
4) You may not give Oil units to other nations while we have a NAP.
5) The oil for gpt and wheat for nothing deals may only be cancelled at the same time.
Sound interesting? Alternately, I could send you 17gpt for the wheat.
Seven
Quote:Hah, yeah, oil is a bit on the dangerous side. Your deal isn't unreasonable considering the advantage that oil gives, but I think I'm going to have to say nay to it. Being not actually blind, I think I'm going to have to call "we fear you are growing to powerful" and turn down the trade. Also, I'm here initiating our NAP cool-down, effectively freeing us both at Turn 151 to do whatever crazy hijinks we feel like. No offense, but the deal below is basically "Commodore sits while Yuri or Luddite is eaten for the win". I'd like to be able to defend my friends should Mali look to be adding more brown to the nicely yellow and green map.
Cheers,
-Commodore
Quote:I feel obliged to inform you that by initiating the cooldown on t143, I believe you've enabled hostilities to commence on t150.
It's clear that WE can attack t150. We'll have had 7 full turns during which we knew the cooldown was in motion, yet weren't allowed to attack, namely, t143-t149. You will only have had 6, but since you play right before us and we hadn't gone yet, I'm willing to grant it being equivalent to you informing us before you played, so that you may declare on t150 as well if you like.
Not that we wanted war with you.
Seven
Even before his last message he seemed to have been lost to us as a friend, so I dialed up yuris. We have two galleons of marines itching to do something about him, though what we really want is peace and health resources. (We're getting banana and deers from him right now.)
Quote:5:33 PM me: hey
still there?
Yuri: hey hey
yes, need to plat SotS turns
me: ah
so we don't have a NAP right now
5:34 PM are you interested in extending it? ^^
Yuri: yes, but not sure we can afford it :P
your price was steep last time
even though we didn't pay it in the end
5:35 PM me: attacking you right now is very tempting, we're still napped with everyone else
we could raze a couple cities this turn
Yuri: yeah, I have no doubts
me: however, I do want to avoid a 1v3 of course
even if by the time it happened you wouldn't be a factor
5:36 PM Yuri: I completely understand. however, I don't think I'm in position to ask for it or negotiate, so name your conditions
5:37 PM me: ok, hm
you planning to use your gps for a GA?
Yuri: yes
5:38 PM me: hm, ok
5:39 PM how about your wheat? can you spare that?
Yuri: just one health resource shouldn't be a problem, yes. even if we only have one copy
5:40 PM me: ok
wheat for 20t & NAP for 20t? or, what would you suggest?
5:42 PM Yuri: that sounds good to me, but can I think until next turn? check the latest save, make sure this payment won't create any serious health problems (I'm sure it won't, but I'd like to be sure)
5:43 PM me: hm
promise not to reinforce your terribly underdefended coastal cities in the next turn?
5:44 PM Yuri: :D ok, I won't, apart from the normal draft
5:45 PM me: ok
fine
hope it works out
Yuri: thanks me too! I'd be glad not to lose cities
5:46 PM even though I don't know if it matter in the long run, I can't see you not winning the game
me: mmm, our tech rate is actually not even the current best, I think
5:47 PM Yuri: yeah, Plastics in 1 turn, not the best, lol
me: (GNP is very inflated from eiffel tower and free speech culture)
lol
that was a lot of overflow
something which was almost done, combustion which was almost done, drama, plastics
5:48 PM or something like that
Yuri: ah, I see. still, very impressive
I can't do Physics in 1 turn :D
end of GA + obsolete Colossus hurt a lot
me: we couldn't either btw
yeah, I can imagine
9 minutes
5:58 PM me: hey
5:59 PM so, if you do decide you want to stay at peace, please offer the wheat on your turn, yeah?
Yuri: sure!
me: k cool
cheers
Yuri:
So he seems amenable to trading us his only wheat for peace, but he wants to check next turn if trading the wheat away will hurt him. That's wonderful, but, we really don't want to attack him this turn. Next turn we'll have twice as many galleons in position anyway. He promised to not reinforce his coastal cities except by drafting, which if he follows it means attacking next turn was better for us than attacking this turn. If he doesn't, well, I think he's going to take it in the shorts. But the best outcome is he gives us the wheat. What I expect is for him to try to get a little bit more out of us. Like ask for a resource in exchange, or some gold, or something. We'll see. I won't negotiate until the turn's back to us so we can see the tactical situation. If we do get our 20t NAP with him I think that's ideal. We'd rather have had it with Commodore but such is life.
Back to the turn. We finished flight and the Dam. Woooooo! We now have noticeable health and happy issues in various places. Ranamar, I urge you to turn a blind eye to most of them. (Well, other than the fact that we're trying to get 2 health everywhere from wheat and 2 more from not having coal.) Imagine the game is decided within 20 turns, which seems likely to me. In that case, an aqueduct is a 67h building which gives us, at most, 40 food strung out over the entire remainder of the game. That's terrible: we should just let the people be unhappy/unhealthy and whip them away when possible. (Let's swap into slavery whenever we have a lot of things we can whip, especially boats.)
I do think we should get refrigeration though, probably in the next 6 turns. We want our transports to have as long a range as possible, because having our naval stacks collateralled to death by battleships would be unacceptable.
I agree with bio/refrigeration next. Bio is a minor boost at best, considering how few farms we have, but Refrigeration would both give us more health buildings and increase the speed of our ships to ludicrous speed.
I know I swapped a windmill for a coal mine at one point, but... that's a really good point. It's amusing that cutting down on a resource will improve our health situation, but if that's what it takes, windmills are close to the same value, even on a resource.
I'm curious what you're referring to about being mean. This?
Quote:Richard: Also, "being not actually blind" lol
I think he expects us to go for domination, actually...
5:59 PM TBH, I'm not sure why you said "raze"... At a guess, it's because you don't want to deal with new cities.
me: we don't want to have to defend any more cities
just cripple all our opponents
6:00 PM
Richard: what, and then space race?
6:01 PM
me: no, then kill them
but without having to worry about their boats anymore
I think I'll grab this turn if you don't mind
Richard: ok
me: want to make sure we can really hurt yuris if necessary
Oh btw, I started the coal windmills, they'll finish next turn giving us wonderful fresh air everywhere to compensate for all the hydro power we're using.
SevenSpirits Wrote:I'm curious what you're referring to about being mean. This?
No... mostly the way you squeeze everything you can out of Yuris...
btw,
Code:
Hi Seven,
I got an interesting piece of information, and now seems to be good
time to discuss it. Allegedly, when we told you about our Apostolic
Palace plans, as agreed in our wonder build information exchange deal,
you spawned a great engineer and gifted him to GES, to let him beat us
to the wonder. If this is true, I consider it to be an appalling
violation of the spirit of the information exchange deal. And
afterwards, you had the nerve to talk about how adopting mercantilism
broke the spirit of the open borders agreement
I'm hoping this is some kind of misunderstanding, and will be eagerly
waiting for you to comment on these allegations. However, if they turn
out to be true, there is no way we will sign a new NAP with you. The
rumours have already leaked to the public, and my people will not
understand if we sign a NAP in spite of everything
Looking forward to hearing from you
Cheers
Yuri
I'm not sure, but I think he may be right. We'll have to go back and look at the language of the various deals.
I remember that. What happened is we got an engineer and wanted to figure out something to do with him. As part of this, I looked at the sabotage production costs everywhere and concluded that yuris was building AP, due on some certain turn. (Based on a very high hammer count consistent only with building a non-resource wonder started on the turn after Christianity was founded.)
At this point, the information we'd gained - unsolicited - by email from yuris was something we knew independently anyway. He can't stop us sharing information we got ourselves just by telling us the same information - that's far too much to expect.
Since we wanted GES to build AP anyway (it benefits us), AP is the best use for the engineer in that era, AP is particularly good for the only person who might buy our engineer, and I'd been trying to get GES to do the religion economy since earlier in the game because I like spiritual and think it's a cool plan, we offered to sell him the engineer for that purpose.
So, er: we need to get rid of our coal. All it's doing is +50% for Ironworks and -2 health everywhere we have a factory. Once we have POWER everywhere which is yet another 2 unhealth, I don't think we can afford the coal anymore. Let's windmill over both our coal mines. I'll also try to get a wheat in trade from Commodore.
That's wonderful, but, we really don't want to attack him this turn. Next turn we'll have twice as many galleons in position anyway. He promised to not reinforce his coastal cities except by drafting, which if he follows it means attacking next turn was better for us than attacking this turn. If he doesn't, well, I think he's going to take it in the shorts. But the best outcome is he gives us the wheat. What I expect is for him to try to get a little bit more out of us. Like ask for a resource in exchange, or some gold, or something. We'll see. I won't negotiate until the turn's back to us so we can see the tactical situation. If we do get our 20t NAP with him I think that's ideal. We'd rather have had it with Commodore but such is life.