Gavagai's PB42 thread

[Boldly Going Nowhere]

Also, what is wrong with lurkers in this every game?

This is the age old question.

Edit: I've done my part. Lurker thread +1.

[Gavagai]

Really hate attacking such cities before Frigates... Got it at the cost of 4 Knights. Ot4e is down to 1 city.



This is what OH is doing. I think he underestimates the seriousness of his situation. I get that it puts him closer to Nationalism but still, Military Science would have been better, I think.



Ok, what the fuck is happening between Cairo and Superdeath... They have put these EPs into each other, I checked, wasting lots of commerce. At least, Superdeath has a decent economy but for Cairo every bit of GNP is precious like water in the desert. Krill must be facepalming hard now because the correct play for those two is to help him dismember Old Harry... Instead they are fighting over this lush island which is perfectly positioned right between them and also exists only in their imagination.

[Gavagai]

If you ask why I am winning this game and Krill is not, then my war with Ot4e is the answer. I started a war which on paper I should not have been able to win and won it. Krill has a symmetrical situation with Old Harry but so far had not been able to achieve a decisive victory. This is the difference which has most likely decided this game.
Given that, I think it would be instructive to talk about my war with France a little bit: how and why I won it.
For starters, I have very early realized that I will have to fight a major war in the Knights era. I knew that to win this game I need to stay ahead of Krill in terms of population and land area and it has become clear early that I cannot do that with Elkad's land only. A target has to be chosen after that, and the only options were Cairo and Ot4e. The following factors determined that choice:
1) If I have attacked Cairo, Ot4e would have probably backstabbed me but the inverse is not true.
2) I needed Astronomy to attack Cairo, I did not need it to attack Ot4e.
3) Ot4e's land was much better.
4) Cairo was going to be a softer target.
Of those factors, 1-3 pushed towards Ot4e and only factor 4 favored Cairo. The choice has been made somewhere around T100, I think.
After that, I started to prepare my civ for war. That required some painful decisions. For example, I currently have only two real commerce cities in the older part of my empire and those are pretty weak ones. A lot of potentially strong commerce sites were turned into awkward hybrids. I expected to have a very short window of opportunity between me getting Knights and Ot4e getting Musketeers which counter Knights hard. Therefore, I knew I would need to build a lot of Knights very quickly, this is why I steered my empire towards higher mfg over GNP.
The second thing I did was setting myself up to be able to mass-produce knights with three promos. This wasn't easy. Firstly, I have built Paya which allowed me to run Theocracy without Theology. It saved crucial beakers for Guilds beeline. Secondly, I had to manually spread Hinduism to my main production cities because I didn't have a convenient religion which would spread naturally. Finally, I needed to build Colosseums in my production centers - a rather expensive building without Charismatic. But the payoff was worth all the effort.
The third important thing was that I started to put all my EPs into Ot4e very early. I also built several spies and scouted out his land while not ever giving him OB. Once again, this is a significant investment which gave me a great payoff.
That was my preparatory work. Let me now consider Ot4e's position for a moment. He had less land than me but his land was on average better and he developed it nicely. It was also rather compact, allowing for short communication lines and easy defense. He was behind me in overall output but not by that much. He was, roughly, at tech parity with me: we both were at Knights era. He also made some really good decisions at the eve of the war: build MoM and launched himself into a double golden-age, teching his way towards Gunpowder. Him getting Gunpowder would end all my ambitions, this is why I felt forced to start the war earlier than when I was fully prepared. On paper, I should not have been able to win, at least, so decisively. So, what went wrong for Ot4e? A bunch of things.
1) He didn't jump into slavery at the end of his first GA. It went like this: he used his first GA to tech to Guilds, stayed in Caste when it ended than a few turns later started a second GA and revolted to slavery. I think that I have attacked him around that point. If he revolted to slavery at the end of the first GA, he would have a few additional turns to whip units. He had much less natural production than me but quite a lot of food, so it was given that he should rely on whip for defense.
2) His techpath right before the war went Guilds -> Philosophy -> Gunpowder. I think we all know what the odd tech here is. He was something like three turns from Gunpowder when I attacked him and stayed at 2 turns distance throughout most of the war (his techrate was dropping every turn due to mass whipping). He got the tech eventually but only after I took all his core cities. If he skipped philosophy, he would have had Gunpowder at the start of the war and the war would be totally different (note: this is mutually exclusive with earlier whipping suggested above).
3) He had knights with 2 promos against my knights with 3 promos. This is the payoff of all my preparatory work. Even though we were at tech parity, I had better units which meant he cannot engage me in the open field.
4) I had visibility on all his cities all the time. Once again, a huge payoff of my investment in espionage. I always knew exactly how many units he has and how they are positioned.
5) I had Engineering while he hadn't. The importance of this should not be underestimated and not only because it gave me a tactical advantage through which I have eventually won the main battle of this war. I also had a strategic advantage as the tech effectively shortened my supply lines.
6) He tried to defend Rheims:

This city was nothing more than a deathtrap for any units committed to its defense and should have been abandoned.
7) He blundered into losing his army. Well, nothing more to say about that.
8) Ot4e had no strategic depth - an unfortunate side-effect of having a compact empire with short communication lines. This is really the crux of the issue and the main reason I ever thought that the war was winnable. I always knew I would have a very short window of opportunity at best but I always knew that I don't really need a long one. Orleans bordered my territory and I needed only a few turns to reach every single of his core cities. A small mistake, a minor inaccuracy on his part - that was all I ever needed to deal a fatal blow. And this was what it came down to - Ot4e lost everything in a single battle.
The conclusion I want to draw from it is that the war was much closer than it looked like. It all came down to a few turns of delayed military production, a few turns of delayed gunpowder. Ot4e could have defended if he played perfectly. But, well, no one plays perfectly, except maybe Mackoti, I did my share of weedy moves in this game myself. People make mistakes when put under pressure, you need to count on it if you want to win games.
I really want Ot4e to comment on that, he will be able to do it very soon (of course, it is much easier to be talkative after winning than after losing, so I would understand if he gives this opportunity a pass). Mostly, I want to know why he went Philosophy after Guilds. It looks like he did not understand that the war was imminent until, like, a couple turns before it started, wanted to grab Nationalims before Gunpowder. Very, very greedy. Another thing I want to know is why he settled Rheims early in the game, this city was a major strategic liability all along.

[Gavagai]

Also, I see the lurker thread has suddenly woken up from lethargy. If some people have conceded and you discuss at what point the game should end, I will help you: the game should continue as long as at least one of Krill and superjm want to keep playing and should end once they both concede. They are the only people who have some realistic chance to affect the outcome of the game at that point.

[Gavagai]

OK, fine, Old Harry also counts. I do not really understand how he is still functional, so I have to allow for the possibility that there is some global factor involved which I don't see.

[Gavagai]

Ot4e's last stand. He will be eliminated next turn.



This is happening. Apparently, Cairo uses his huge fleet of Caravels to invade SD's mainland. Cairo is playing like some kind of very inteligent AI here: I think for a human this kind of stuff would fail some very basic sanity check. Since I took this screenshot Cairo has logged in and captured the city. I don't think he would be able to hold it for long though, SD is one tech from Rifles and has more than enough strategic depth to survive until them.



Demos post golden age. Rival best GNP is superjm. He is running a small proficit, however, while I am running a small deficit, so we are about equal or he is a bit better.

[Gavagai]

Getting ready to superjm's invasion...

[Gavagai]

Harry declared on SD. He really keeps looking for adventures on his sorry ass...

[Gavagai]

Cairo sent me a fish for fish offer. There two things wrong with it:
1) You should never initiate fish for fish from the position of weakness. It pretty much amounts to begging your opponent not to attack you which is pathetic.
2) If you have doubts about your neighbor's intentions, you need to reach understanding with him before you move your huge but immobile army to the other end of your empire and start an idiotic war with your other neighbor, not after that.
I have offered fish for fish back. Normally, I wouldn't want Cairo to feel safe because I wouldn't want him to attack Harry. But he is not attacking Harry, he is attacking SD what I very much approve. So I might as well encourage him. This commitment costs me nothing as I do not want to attack him before sj's crisis is resolved and after it is resolved the game will very likely end (or I will have my hands way too full).
Speaking of the devil. Both me and sj have researched RP and sj has already played, so now I can finally run some numbers.

GNP is pretty much even. His, actually, is slightly better because I have more culture and espionage and am running a deficit. I will have Rifling in 6 turns, he shows 7 but I assume he can make it six. The moment he researches Rifling he will get 30 Cavs from upgrades. I will have 30 Rifles active in the war theater in 4 turns after the tech and an uncountable amount of weaker units to clean up after Rifles. So... he will have three turns to do damage. And then...

This picture is kind of deceptive. He is running max specialists now and I imagine he can have something like double of his mfg. Also, he can revolt to Police State at any moment he wants. Still, this is a massive deficit. OK, but we are forgetting about the draft, aren't we?

Most of these cities can only be drafted once. This is about ten additional Rifles. Not much, given that I am going to add about 5 Rifles per turn to my initial 30 by a conservative estimate.
So... I guess he is fucked? He has no staying power and has to rely on a devastating alpha-strike... which is not going to happen. He will be able to take these two cities:

It will cost him already because I have built theatres and am running artists there and will get 40% defensive bonus in time. After that, I will tear him apart. I think I will march my SoD straight into his territory. He has no siege, not that Catapults can do much against Drill3 Rifles.

[Gavagai]

I am trying to generate a GP for my fourth GA here... But the game will likely end before I start my third one. So... I guess I am stupid? Whatever, this city is in the very far south and won't be able to contribute much to the war effort anyway.