[SPOILER] PBEM21, "Zero to Hero" (Kuro, Pericles' Ottomania)

[Kuro]

Did I ever mention I hatehatehate technical problems?

Feferi goes into a 2T Spear, Equius will actually 1T a Barracks because of the massive overflow it has/will get too, Aradia and Captor build Catapults, Jane Crocker finishes an Archer and, with chops in hand, shall finish a Barracks quickly. Tavros builds an HA.

Workers just pretty much all go into chops. Battle continues to be a pissing match, with the exceptions of...



This Galley down near Leijon: I have a Trirme which can intercept, so unless it drops off troops before it reaches Leijon, it's not really a threat. Even then, I'm keeping a few units aroound to play zone D.



And this slightly more worrying Galley due to not being able to put a Trirme on that sea anymore. I peeled off an HA from Jane Crocker for use in emergencies.

Eridan whipped it's Spear.

EOT, some stuff completes, like Equius/Captor's Catapults and Eridan's Spears...but perhaps more interesting, due to putting all of my espionage into NH, I can see he's researching Optics. I can only assume he's going Astro and THAT will be trouble.

[Kuro]

Turn in, Eridan completes it's Spear and goes to 1T an Archer, Leijon will also 1T an Archer in case the Galley dropoff works, Worker movements aren't even anything worth talking about: All forest chops or moving into place of forest chops. Zone D has stayed in effect even if my Trirme should be able to cut off the Galley. Jkioan and NH seem to be stockpiling units into Aachen, but there is nothing I can do about that, as my units are not numerous nor advanced enough to do much to them.

Probably going to found Maryam for the chopping ability. EOT, almost every single city finishes a unit.

Boring turn.

[Kuro]

So Feferi completes a Spearman...although the game TELLs me it completed a LONGBOWMAN, despite a Spear clearly being made. Okay then. Leijon finished it's Archer, but will start on another just in case the Galley drops like two Spears or something retarded. Nothing much happened this turn in actual terms: Little in tactical changes, mostly just a looooot of clicking. Cities that finished units built more units, units moved to the only real places NH can attack right now, they started on Astro...boring, if not long, turn.

How about some trivia?

Name the most winningest NCAA Men's Basketball coach ever, in terms of pure number of wins. Hint: This is a recent event!

(Also yes, I forgot to post this for almost eight and a half hours)

[Kuro]

Sorry for the lack of updates, but the turns have been almost all unit moving affairs with no tactics involved and I've had some hectic homeness that has caused me to play sometimes at odd/late times and made me not feel like updating, esp. since this game looks lost. I'll provide a big post tomorrow anyway.

[spacemanmf]

Dude, how can moving units have no tactics.

[Kuro]

Dude, how can moving units have no tactics.

His units were sitting in a city. My units were moving towards the city. My units stayed in the city. There were no tactics involved...until this turn.

[Kuro]

Alright, so, I was dumb and started battling before I took pictures, BUT, midway through, I realize I should snap some pictures.

Note that this is basically the first offensive action I've seen yet and they emptied Crocker for it.



Before this image: There were four knights, two to the northeast and two to the southeast. I suicided three HAs into the southeast stack(By accident, but I realized shortly after I would have anyway, as these HA are largely useless now), two retreating, slammed a Catapult into it, then cleaned one up with one of the two Spears, with the other at such a low health I took a shot at cleaning it up with an Archer at 63.6% odds. Won and retreated it into the city. Suicided more HAs into the Northeast Knights, one of which won at 10.9% odds(But considering I suicided around 7 or 8 HAs this turn, not too suprised), then cleaned up with the second Spear that retreated back into the city.



The other stack. It's only scary if it combines with the NH/Jkioan stack, as otherwise I can swarm it too much, while the NH/Jkioan stack is so Spear/Longbow heavy it can't possibly strike me down. I mostly worry about that ultra-stack pillaging. If it remains unsplit, I may hit it with Catapults and try to knock some of it out while my three Spears, the two I used both at full health @ 4 EXP + the one to be completed, defend/attack/something the Knights.

Units being built everywhere, might ask Ellimoogle for some gold to finish Engineering. So yeah.

[Kuro]

A Dumb Boy Makes Tactics: The Kuro Khronicles

So then, with only those stacks in view, let's check out some possible moves.



The most obvious route: Both of the stacks meet up just in front of the city, with the Knights indicated in pink and the Spear stack in red, keeping me from annihilating the stack's offensives in one turn.



After that, the stack can move like this, to avoid the Knights being able to be hit moving them just out of range(Then looping down around to Leijon), while the Spear/Longbow stack moves along the Hills pillaging or just taking cover, using the defensive bonus to go unharmed.



Alternately, he can combine them into a superstack and move them along the hills.



If he plans an attack by boat, he can move the Knights up to strike at the HA, either using the Spear stack to prevent me from striking at them(Not that I would) or retreat to safety and maybe try to go after Leijon.



They can alternately move here, to prepare for...



Moving here, trying to threaten both Leijon and Aradia at once(Which, unfortunately for them, would really only work with a fully mounted stack).



And, of course, the "Never Gonna Happen" Option: They retreat because I killed a whole four Knights.

[Kuro]

I logged in. Really strange shit: For some reason, when the two Knights attacked(I didn't think they would, you'll see why), my Spears(Who should have had 50%-ish odds) didn't defend against them! Instead, my two Crossbows(?!) defended at, like, friggin' 33.9% odds!

Needless to say, losing two X-Bows with Promos to this for some strange reason really annoyed me.



About the only good news is that, as you can see, one Knight still got take down to 2.4 health, meaning it's out of comission for a while, and all those Spears still can't take much. Still, I'm not going to get the units more damaged, so I send in Catapult #1



Which does enough colat that I think I can send in #2...



Needless to say the stack is still active now, but I've at least got some wounds to lick at. My Combat I, Shock HA is mostly useless at this point for defense, so I went in with it against the damaged Pike defender: With 18.2% odds to win and 16.4% odds to retreat, I should have about 32.6% odds of survival. Not great, but again, the unit is almost worthless.

It does not kill it, but it does knock it down to 3.5 health, which should be 2T of healing and not able to get over any non-Mounted unit.

I then send in an X-Bow that was arriving to defend the city against a Longbow @ 42.4% odds(When you're defending against units in this kind of situation, you have to take some chances). And I triumph! The Crossbow remains with a health of 4.7, which is enough to take on some melee units like Spears.

After that, an X-Bow has 58.5% odds against a Knight, odds you have to take in this case. Unfortunately, I lose.

I promo my next X-Bow to Combat I to get extra odds on a Longbow, raising them from 50% to 68.1%, and attack it too.

And then I lose that too. Losing two coinflip battles now sucks. Because of that, I upgrade that Archer to an X-Bow at an annoying Gold cost and, at a hefty population cost, whip out a Maceman to get Spearman odds on Knights and + odds on his melee. Other units I have begin to pour around or at Aradia, including a spare HA I had and a Spear I built.

After the dust settles, we can see the following result:



The 2.3 Knight should be getting one promotion next turn due to the failed coinflip assault, which is troublesome, but everything else should at least need one turn to heal.

In the end, over the course of defending and attacking, my battles went: X-Bow loses defending to Knight 33.9%, X-Bow loses defending to Knight 33.9%, Catapult dies at 9.5% retreat odds, Catapult dies at 8.3% retreat odds, Horse Archer dies @ 18.2% wind odds and 16.4% retreat odds(32.6% survival odds), Crossbow wins at 42.5% odds, Crossbow loses at 58.5% odds, Crossbow loses at 68.1% odds.

Overall, not super bad, but a bit bad of luck.



My remaining units, which will be slightly bolstered next turn with the addition of a Mace, then have a Spear and probably a Catapult throw in there too.

Hoping that the unit damaging will give me the reprieve I need to make defenses, but it may not be enough...sigh.

[Kuro]

NH made a move I...don't entirely understand.



For some reason, he only moved one Knight out of the stack AND didn't pillage anything? There are some units in Crocker, but it's just a Catapult and a Spear. Even if he's bringing up forces, why not pillage with the Chariot/Knight/Anything and try to help hurt my road network?

My Mace gets excellent 89.2% odds on his top defender, an Axe, so I go for it. It dies.

I Promo an X-Bow to Combat I(It has 4 EXP) to help my odds, then send it in @ 79.3% against a Chariot. Winner winner chicken dinner.

Since my city is no longer really threatened and I have more units in to protect, I make a risky 69.3% chance attack on the new top defending Skirmisher. My luck runs out and it dies, but it's reduced to 0.8 health.

And then I notice my HAs can hit the Knight that fled...

I send a very injured one in, almost no chance to win but 19.9% chance to withdraw. It does nothing.

Neither does the other injured one.

My third Knight, not quite as injured(4-ish health) attacks and takes it down to 0.1 health. My last HA kills it. This also births me a Great General!

To Merge or to put on a unit? That is the question. Since it appeared in Equius, a place I don't want to merge or connect it to a unit, I move it forward as I ponder.



His remaining stack, which consists mostly of Spearman who will soon recover from licking their wounds...but have to go through a 40% cultural defense, fortification bonus and against, at worst, a unit with equal strength to it. Simply from numbers odds are they cannot take my city, and that if they did, the X-Bow + 2 Spears about to reinforce it can re-take it, unless he razes it(But odds are Aradia is part of Jkioan's deal/vassalization/whatever with NH). I feel fairly confident.

I also turned on research to Engineering. But I might have to turn it off again, as my gold costs fluctuate wildly each turn.