[Spoilers] Dreylin's short visit to a late Era

[OT4E]

REM got all graphs and now he is just spending all points somewhere. He is not bordering with scooter and he is smart enough to realise that BGN's army consists of a single parade squad, so he is watching us.

We will make courthouses after factories, so by that time I think we must live with being visible to REM. He has OB with us and airships anyway.

[OT4E]

Just not to forget: withdraw chance doesnt work when attacking amphibius.

[OT4E]

Donovan got Assembly line this turn. Now he is making +200, and will probably collect gold for upgrades and I believe he will start from his lovely island. Well it doesnt change much except that we might need some siege for his core, more than I thought. So it can be reasonable to leave rifles as the defenders and take catapults and may be build some more from overflows.

[Dreylin]

Well, at least we'll save some on unit costs!

We can certainly work some more Siege builds into the mix, as well as free up some of the existing Cats with Drafted Rifles. Silver comes online this turn, so extra Draft cap. :shh: Even so, I don't think we can sustain the Draft without hitting core cities hard, which we don't want to do, so we should probably rotate out of Nationhood for a cycle.

[Dreylin]

t311 -

Hmm, so Mr. Zoi has AssLine now and upgrades could be on the horizon:


My napkin maths tells me that it's a bit over 70g for a Rifle->Infantry upgrade, so let's assume he could do 3/turn. He's observing a turn split with us, which is actually a good thing if he's being strict about it, since he might not spend the $$ immediately after the turn roll. Downside is that he's still in Slavery, so can also whip out a bunch when he sees us coming.

Q: so what's up with all this whipping over the past few turns?

A: well I'm just trying to sandbag our score back below REM's so that no-one thinks we're a threat!

Q: but you didn't manage that:




A: Damnit! I'm sure I can find a few more whippable cities, just let me.....

Q: that's as may be, but what about this:


A: well you see....

Q: and this:


A: Alright! I need to test the hypothesis of "quantity vs. quality" for myself!

Note: unfortunately I didn't realise that we need 5h invested in an Airship in order to 1pop whip, so a couple of the peripherals didn't quite make that threshold and will have to wait for next turn.

So with our less than optimum # of Galleons, I've been dropping off a force on the Island to stage a land attack at Ant Zen:


3 Cavs currently hidden in Koi were unloaded from the Galleon at SoT; the Galleon moved N and picked up 2 Rifles & another Cav. In order to stay with the main fleet, those units will drop from the current position and then the Galleon can pick up 3Cavs and then move into the Fort. The Galleon from Chameleons picked up 3 more Cavs and then moved into Goldfish; they land next turn and hide in Koi while the Galleon heads N to pick up 3more.

So we'll have 7 Cavs available to make a land attack on Ant Zen and a handful of Rifles to cover them; next turn the 2 Workers not finishing the Fort can move 22 from Koi with a Rifle and prepare to road. The following turn the Cavs & Rifles can move 222 from Koi for a land attack t313. Meanwhile, both Galleons can fully restock so we have 15units available for amphibious attack.

I've also used some of the Drafted Rifles to free up the Cats from the core cities to start moving SW towards the front with Donovan if we need to use them.

One question is whether we move the SotL through the Chameleons Fort next turn so that it can work with the rest of the fleet for the attack. Even though it won't be any use if we don't, I'm leaning against since Donovan will probably notice the movement and potentially react.

[OT4E]

Upgrading rifle into infantry will cost him 92 gold each, so it is more likely 2inf/turn and yes he is in slavery which mean that we will meet 1-2-3 infantries in each city, but without railroad he has no chance to get them all in one place.

SotL from Chameleons can be used to bombard his front city better, it is too slow to be effective in the main attack.

So I guess the plan is to put 2 workers +2 rifles into the forest on the island on T312. This can pull his attention from his 1 tile island to Art Zen what is good for us I think. May be he eventually decide to keep his gold before we show up.

[Dreylin]

My main concern at this point is Ironclads; they would be a PITA to deal with. Fortunately his Power graph suggests that he hasn't built much/anything over the past 50t, so I don't think he has a secret stack of them anywhere.

First Airship landed in Chameleons last turn, so we'll have a first look at everything this turn and can adjust if needed.

EDIT: if you log in, you should fly it so we can look & discuss.

EDIT2: GSpy is in Scooter's SE at the moment. It should spend one more turn getting to his West (uncovering a few city sites along the way) and then will be useful in Donovanland - we should be able to get him as far as Donovan's Drydocks city before we declare and his move rate gets cut down.

[Commodore]

A: Alright! I need to test the hypothesis of "quantity vs. quality" for myself!

Good man! Fuzzy wuzzy has teeth this time.

[OT4E]

Here is the picture:

He whipped infantry and didnt hesitate to upgrade (double hill infantry) at the beginning of the turn. No galleons in the sight range so they are probably gone for southern island. It means that he will not get more than 2 infantries on that island without fortify. Though if we declare him war this turn we can deny him upgrading, but I fear that his SotLs can escape and make us obstacles during next turns.


So he has some siege and some cavalry, but it must be not enough to stop us and we will have bonus for attacking from different sides.

[Dreylin]

Hmmm, not entirely happy that he's upgrading after the turn roll; I mean it's totally his choice to observe a turn split, but if he's going to do that then he should really go all the way and play the whole turn in one go. After all, if he's moved some of his units but not all of them before we attack, does that mean we're on the first half or second half of the split!?

Ah, not a big deal, I guess but still annoying. I agree that the gain of declaring on him this turn is not enough to warrant it - maybe if we had a second Galleon available to hit KK, or a couple more Airships, but with just 3Cavs available the odds probably aren't good enough.

Great news about the Galleons though! I guess the first job of the Airships will be to knock the tops off KK's defenders and then get the SotLs down into decent range for the Privateers. Still hard to believe that he doesn't have a Fort available to transfer a fleet through Staalplaat!

Feeling good about the attack prospects after seeing the quantity of units we'll be facing verses what we'll be bringing!

A: Alright! I need to test the hypothesis of "quantity vs. quality" for myself!

Good man! Fuzzy wuzzy has teeth this time.

This brings back memories of watching Zulu as a child; having British Patriotism instilled by watching the slaughter of thousands at Rorke's Drift.