[SPOILERS] PBEM 8 - Shoot the Moon's Thread

[Twinkletoes89]

To answer your question - I am certain that you cannot move and upgrade units on the same turn

[novice]

To answer your question - I am certain that you cannot move and upgrade units on the same turn

I'm pretty sure you can upgrade the unit as long as it has more than 0 movement points left.

[Shoot the Moon]

I'm pretty sure you can upgrade the unit as long as it has more than 0 movement points left.

For this turn, both you and TT are essentially correct, as the movement I was planning would use all my movement points. Thanks you guys.

I razed his capital. I'll post pictures and explain why I razed tomorrow afternoon/evening (sorry for the wait, I am just quite busy today).

[Shoot the Moon]

Ok, here's the couple days late update (although in my defense, I haven't played a turn since then, so it's not actually anything but last turn's update still :neenernee):

First off, here is what I saw when I inherited the turn:



That's one holkan in the city, one archer to the W and two catapults to the N-NW. I attacked with a c1-shock HA which knocked down the defending holkan to 0.4 strength. I then decided to attack with my sentry HA so that I could have the most information possible about whether to keep or raze the city.



Here is what I saw:



Before making my decision, I checked out what was in the city:



I had two thoughts when seeing this: First, the academy makes the city more appealing to keep. Second, who the hell builds a colosseum but doesn't even have one unit for HR happiness?

I really wish I could have kept the city for the academy, but it would have been absolutely engulfed by Mayan culture. Notice that Paprika not only has 60% defense, indicating fourth ring borders, but is also now the capital AND the christian holy city. Add in the fact that all the tiles still would have Mayan culture from the capital, I would have to be able to raze Paprika in order to keep the city. At this point, I only had 9HAs in Mayan territory, and it would have taken me another 2t to attack Paprika. As much as I would like to keep it, with three turns notice Maya can easily defend against 9 HAs, so I had to raze the city.

Small gripe with the civ interface: it is so stupid that after capturing a city you can't mouse over any of the units that are newly revealed. I had to make my decision without knowing what the new stacks I revealed consisted of. Anyway, here is what Maya's military looks like now:



I then proceeded to move the rest of my HAs (and some one movers) to 1N of my sheep:



Here's what the stack now looks like:



Next turn I plan to move those 8HAs (one is on the tile 1W of the sheep after killing a injured holkan that had attacked my stack) to the tile 1SW of Maya's cows. I hope to get a bit of a sneak attack in on Pepper, although if the first HA I move in shows too big of a stack I obviously won't move everything in.

Also notable for the Mayan front is that in 3t I'll get another border pop, which will certainly help there and pretty much deny him settling another city up north.



A couple other things to note: I get a GE in 3t. From demogs, I can tell that Warriorknight has over 200 hammers in a wonder right now. I really hope it is not the GL, as I would rather want it. Anyway, if for whatever reason he hasn't completed it soon, I'd be more than happy to steal it from him. As such I set my tech path as such:



It should only slow down getting feud by one turn anyway (would have 2t left) as I can overflow so much research off aesthetics and lit as to hopefully be able to finish feud in 1t after it anyway. The gold from Maya's capital is certainly a nice boost to my research.

Finally, here's a quick peak at the demogs:



Warriorknight and I have more or less been trading off #1 GNP for a while, and I recently caught up to him in crop yield and production (I think he may have whipped a couple cities last turn as his crop yield went down, so I essentially consider us to be even in those three categories). That I'm keeping pace with his GNP despite his being financial is certainly a good sign. His power is obviously higher, but I have the feeling that I am currently putting my military to better use. HAs are going to be obsolete in the next 10t or so, so I might as well get some use out of them now even if it lowers my power rating.

[novice]

Great job, StM!

who the hell builds a colosseum but doesn't even have one unit for HR happiness?

Well remember for Maya they're ball courts.

Warriorknight and I have more or less been trading off #1 GNP for a while, and I recently caught up to him in crop yield and production (I think he may have whipped a couple cities last turn as his crop yield went down, so I essentially consider us to be even in those three categories). That I'm keeping pace with his GNP despite his being financial is certainly a good sign.

WK is playing Peter, isn't he?

[Shoot the Moon]

I believe he may have been Peter in the aborted atempt at the game, but I am pretty sure (at least according to the list I have in the second post of this thread) that he is now Pacal in this game.

[novice]

I believe he may have been Peter in the aborted atempt at the game, but I am pretty sure (at least according to the list I have in the second post of this thread) that he is now Pacal in this game.

Ah, I see. Bothersome that threads cannot be renamed.

Anyway, that means Maya's ball courts are creative.

[Shoot the Moon]

Fair enough point about Ball Courts, although in Maya's position I still maintain that they would have been better off building three spears for the same happiness under HR, as my attack would have then failed.

[Shoot the Moon]

So here's what I saw at the start of the turn (although it isn't showing now, there is a holkan above those cats to the N of my HA):



Yeah...he didn't even kill my sentry HA. I think the only thing he had that could reach it was some cats and an archer, so it is somewhat understandable that he didn't kill it, but still, you really want to kill the enemies sentry units, especially when they are giving THAT much visibility and it is a free kill. Oh well, I'll take it.

Next I moved a newly minted sentry unit to here to scope out Pepper:



Which revealed this (signs updated for your viewing pleasure):



Anyway, upon seeing only 1 archer in there I decided to move an HA stack to that same tile. First, however, I hit the holkan and 2 cat stack with some HAs. The first combat 1, shock HA lost (at roughly 30% odds to win and another 15% to retreat). That wasn't terrible, but then:



Could that have possibly spawned in a worse city?!?!?!?!?! Have I yet mentioned that I hate the RNG this game? (I also lost a mace to an injured axe at 85% odds this turn that would have stolen two workers ) I wiped up his cat and remaining Holkan, using my sentry unit to do it none the less so that I wouldn't have to take away another HA from the pepper attack.

Anyway, I still moved my units as such (explanation to come). This is the tile SW of the cows:



And this is on the cows:



I also have two HAs on the spot where the holkan and 2 cat stack was

My thinking is that even considering the GG, Maya still needs to whip a holkan out of pepper and throw that cat, xbow, axe stack at me to have a chance at saving pepper. I could always then retreat out having forced Maya to waste hammers if the odds look bad, or I could wait another turn, letting my other two HAs and single movers move up and healing from the suicide cat. In essence, the only real cost of me being there is something like 8 gpt in unit supply costs, while it forces Maya to waste units and whip things (and use a GG on a holkan, which obviously isn't the most optimal play).

Two final things to note from this turn. First, WK has alphabet:



My reading of that says that he is up feudalism (although I am roughly half way done with it), guilds, alpha, calender and currency on me while I am up mono, lit and CS on him (is that an accurate reading? I've always had a bit of trouble reading that screen in NTT games).

Second, WK has 300 hammers (300 exactly, or just rounding error off) in something, but it hasn't completed yet. Judging by the techs he has and the costs of wonders, the only possible thing that could be is Chichen Itza (no other wonders that he can build costs 300 hammers on quick speed). I had desire for that wonder, so that's fine with me. I actually find that build a bit puzzling myself, as he is far and away the power leader in this game. I would think he would want those hammers to go to military units to conquer cities like I am doing, as I sincerely doubt he is worried about defense. A little odd.

[SevenSpirits]

Fair enough point about Ball Courts, although in Maya's position I still maintain that they would have been better off building three spears for the same happiness under HR, as my attack would have then failed.

Well, I'm sure he had a unit in there previously, and just moved it out because he was short on units elsewhere. And remember the Ball Courts are half price.