Gandhi of France: The Non-Violent Warrior

[oledavy]

[SIZE="4"]Turn 162[/SIZE]

The event log for this turn:



First off, I founded the cities of Leipzig and Metz







I've already elaborated on what role each city will play, so I won't delve back into here.

I'm up to 17 cities now. Would be 19 were it not for the fall of Aboukir Bay and Damme.

In response to Spulla's landing, I fortified the city of Trafalgar.



At this point, they're pretty much just yanking me around and being annoying. To fend off the eight attackers, I have five defenders in the city. Additionally, a pike completes EOT and the borders pop to 60%. For t163, I can potentially get four more defenders into the city, but I doubt there will be a need to.

I highlighted the worker I moved south of the city. Because I'm paranoid, I decided to spare a worker to block that Combat II knight from hitting the city next turn. If he takes and deletes the worker, his knight won't have enough movement points to embark and will be stuck ashore facing my units. It's pretty much a win-win for me. The only way it's not is if he takes the worker than then covers the knight with the rest of the stack. However, I seriously doubt Speaker will take that risk. I expect they'll embark rather than chance me hitting their stack with collateral and mopping it up. My lack of available siege is really killing me here. Just a single cannon would allow me to kill that stack and be done with this dance; but I will be unable to get anything in range of that tile for several more turns, as my first cannons are just now coming off the lines. However, Speaker doesn't know this.

Also of note, Spulla garrisoned Map Control and presumably Teleport Gank. There are now two CG1 Longbows in map control and probably a third in Teleport Gank. At least it's not another galleon of cuirassiers here to annoy me. Sulla joined two of the caravels with the galleon stack, which are blockading the area. The southern caravel is sitting on Verdun's crabs, while the northern one is sitting on Trafalgar's fish. Lastly, he moved a fresh frigate into view.

Side note: Sulla didn't pillage my whales last turn Now if I can just lift the blockade I can get the happy back.

I spent a long time staring at the screen trying to decide what to do with my frigate. I could either:

A. Pop that caravel sitting on my fish.
B. Pop one of Sulla's galleons, but get the ship killed next turn.
C. Scout around Teleport Gank

Decided on A:



Ship of the Line would definitely be a nice edge to have here if Sulla is going to keep pumping out frigates.

My other military action of the turn was to pop Thoth's HA:



Won with 4hp left

All this puts me very close to our teams 2nd GG:



Just need to get 3xp somewhere.

My military, second largest in the world, though inflated by the inordinate power strength of musketeers.




Currently waiting on WK to play so I can end turn, will probably take a few more screenshots at that point.

Are there any screenshots the lurkers would like me to grab while I'm in game?

[oledavy]

With the border pops from Trafalgar and Vigo Bay, I'm a lot more secure against assault. The only tile I can be surprise hit from now is the city center of Teleport Gank. I've marked the hill I need to get a sentry on to gain visibility on the tile, I should be able to move a unit there in the next few turns. Of course, if Sulla gets steel and a settled GG, he could just start churning out Nav I Galleons right off the bat

Demos:



I'm number one in military, and ascendant in land - with a 68 tile lead on the runner up. I'm solid in every other category. My weakness is not as apparent in the demos:



A lot of land, but not the population to work it, not yet anyway. I'm done with my current round of expansion, and the upcoming turns will be all about integrating my newest cities into the empire.

End Turn.

[oledavy]

A few thoughts on the developments in the west:

At this point, it looks like Team #1 is going to harass us and force us to expend resources into military while Sulla continues to tech away. However, their offensive against Rome is a lot more threatening and serious than their naval campaign against me. Last turn, they birthed Miguel de Cervantes. I am positive they will use him to pop out the borders of Kararomum W if they manage to seize the city. This will allow them to take control of the flood plains area and bisect WK's front. Basically, we need to hold the city to maintain our territorial integrity.

The worst part of all this is that I could have prevented it - so sorry guys About a dozen turns ago, WK spotted a Galleon in elo hell. Him and I postulated that it might be eventually used for threatening B or W. When I logged in after Team #4 played, I noticed WK's scouting signs from the previous turn, and that there were three workers on a plains hill mine north of elo hell. Had I caught that earlier, the entire situation would look different. We could have upgraded those catapults into cannons, and gotten an additional dozen units in range of the Speaker/Sunrise stack. Instead of us desperately trying to hold on, this would be the story of how we tore Team #1 a new one.

[oledavy]

Fuck Fuckity Fuck Fuck.

We got an artist at 4% odds instead of a prophet

[oledavy]

Just to give you guys an idea of how valuable that prophet would have been. That shrine is currently worth upwards of 80gpt with a grocer, market and bank all already built in the city. It's only going to get better with time as we spread Hinduism around more. As things stand, I probably will not have a shot at another great prophet for around 50 turns. So, if you take my initial estimate and multiply it times 50, you get 4,000 gold. Our team is turning gold into beakers at rate of approximately 1 gold = 2.5 beakers.

We're missing out on, conservatively, 12,000 beakers because of a fucking artist pull at 4%

I was really hoping nailing an early shrine would give us the edge we need to compete with Team #1, spreading a religion around a lot dovetails well with our ICS strategy. All that planning, from the decision to build Angkor Wat to the prep-work for a shrine, has gone to waste because of fucking 4% artist pull.

Apologies for the tone, but I'm livid right now

Turn 163 didn't go all as planned to boot. WK moved a galleon before I could stop him, otherwise we could have had an additional mace and musket in W. If it ends up being just a couple units that prevent us from annihilating Team #1's army, it'll be more We already missed our chance to ambush this stack when I failed to see signs that Sunrise was building a fort.

To top it all off, I accidentally ended turn while chatting with WK, before I could get my funding from him. This meant we didn't get the half-turn of PP for Shoot, not to mention lost research efficiency with me running 20% science. All in all, about another 150 beakers lost in a stupid error, that we can ill-afford at this point. Third time I've done that this game. We really need to just all get on TeamSpeak.

Frustrating turn to say the least.

On the plus side, unless Team #1 sells their souls to the RNG, there is no way they can take Kararomum W. If they attack, we kill them, if they retreat, workers have been staged to build roads so we can chase them down. Either way, most of that army is going to die.

[scooter]

Sorry I didn't see your chat earlier until it was too late. But wow, talk about a brutal turn. Missing the prophet is awful. I mean, you can always make use of an artist in AW but not to the tune of 10k beakers.

[oledavy]

[SIZE="4"]Turn 163[/SIZE]

Very happy to put this turn behind me.

First off, Speaker and Sulla loaded up their horses as expected, sparing my worker, but pillaging as they went:



Here's what the battlefield now looks like:



Speaker gifted Teleport Gank to Sulla, who popped it's borders right off the bat. An additional two frigates popped into view, and the galleon in Map Control disappeared. They've now spread their ships out, including their loaded galleons, and are blockading the majority of my coastline. I retreated my small fleet into Trafalgar I should be able to eke out enough of a numerical advantage soon enough thanks to interior lines of reinforcement to push them back and reclaim my seafood. Trafalgar has suffered the most so far from this harassment campaign, and will starve unless I can get Sulla off its seafood.



I've detailed off a few workers to re-pasture the pigs for t165. The iron should be mined again on t167. I'm covering the workers with the pair of pikes from the city.

And while we're talking about Trafalgar:



I hate the RNG so much this game.

In the south, I diverted one of my workers from improving Metz to remine the grassland hill north of Vigo Bay:



It will switch to working the improved before it starves, in the meantime running merchants. The other workers are building the much needed road link that puts Vigo Bay and Verdun within 6 tiles of each other.

I'm about to have collateral positioned in my key cities if he tries to land again. At some point soon, I need to slip a drydock into the build queues for both Trafalgar and Vigo Bay, then we can start thinking about reclaiming the islands.

In the north, I pillaged the superflous cottages around Orleans before the borders popped:



Here's how things looked after ending turn:



Nabaxo has assembled respectable armies in both cities, and I'll be hard pressed to do anything against those stacks without cannon. I think at this point, I'll just wait until I can draft rifles, then finish what I started.

With the expansion of it's borders, the immediate danger to Orleans has passed. The only things that really scare me are those Combat III Musketeers, and even with them present, I'm reasonably secure against attack. Why he has built no pikes is beyond me. You'll notice in the screenshot, I have a Guerilla I musketeer on the hills south of the city to monitor the staging tiles for one-movers to attack. He can kill it if he wants, but it will be a musketeer for musketeer, and I'm about to draft 20 more of them while he's not even in nationalism. If he does try to attack the city, my massed knights should be able to tear through his attacking force. I doubt he'll be that bold though.

Here's a quick look inside Orleans, now that it's out of revolt:



Check out those maintenance costs

When I do my revolt into Natiohood and Theocracy next turn, I've decided to forego slavery and stay in Caste Sytem instead. There are a couple reasons for this:

1. To allow me to attain 40% borders around Orleans and hopefully reclaim it's food.
2. So I can continue to spam merchant specialists in my cities lacking science modifying buildings.

At this point, running mercantilism merchant specialists everywhere is the only thing keeping my expansion costs somewhat manageable. That being said, things will get a lot better net turn after I switch out of Pacifism and as I complete courthouses.

In the East, the graphic for the road behind Sulla's Knight changed, indicating he roaded the tile marked:



It looks like he's settling up on Thoth now. Next turn, I'm staging my fast workers to kill Sulla's Sentry Knight with my Combat II knight. I would use a pike, but he would see it stage in the city. I'll be covering the knight with a pair of longbows, with the jungled hill making them secure against couter-attack. That being said, with Team #1 on the brink of cavalry, I need to get defenders to this part of the world stat if I want to hold it.

My great person plan is very much in flux at this point, currently I have Sluys configured to polish off it's GA in two turns.



However, with WK planning on making a run at a Great Prophet, I may postpone it indefinitely. Likewise for the scientists coming out of May, 1940 and Waterloo. On the plus side, I did effectively leverage pacifism into stacking up tons of GPPS in each city, so I can birth each one as I need him at this point on a couple turns notice. I was thinking of potentially using the Scientists to bulb our way through Scientific Method in the race for the Kremlin, depending on what we end up planning.

Waterloo is now focused on Growth, I would like to at least pick up all those farms before going back into running specialists.



Every member of Team #2 is now running Free Speech:



For future reference, their progress towards a cultural victory at this point:



Ill be curious to see how much Milkshake's culture has increased by next turn. 25,000 culture to reach legendary status. With GA's on standby, that is scarily attainable.

With 17 cities and all my front cities now settled, I finally feel like I am commanding an empire. I've now been at the helm of France for 46 turns.







End Turn.

[WarriorKnight]

Are you sure that the Artist belongs to Team 1? I could be wrong but I don't recall seeing that in the log before Team 2 played, and they have a much better use for Artists.

Also, regardless of how stupid/cruel/evil/whatever the RNG is, there's no need to tell Team 1 that info by renaming cities.

[oledavy]

Are you sure that the Artist belongs to Team 1? I could be wrong but I don't recall seeing that in the log before Team 2 played, and they have a much better use for Artists.

Absolutely positive - Miguel de Cervantes was birthed by Team #1.

Also, regardless of how stupid/cruel/evil/whatever the RNG is, there's no need to tell Team 1 that info by renaming cities.

Was wondering if anyone would notice that

I renamed it right before I logged out. You raise a really good point. It is possible Speaker saw it. However, if Team #1 was not smart enough to realize I was gunning for a prophet when I built Angkor Wat, they don't deserve their reputations. Pretty sure they'll see the event log and fill in the blanks.

[T-hawk]

Our team is turning gold into beakers at rate of approximately 1 gold = 2.5 beakers.

I have to pick on this point - how's that possible? You'd need every city to have a multiplier of +150% science, meaning library and university and Oxford in every city, which is obviously not possible. I realize you were speaking off the cuff, but do you have an analytical basis for that statement or was it just a guess?

(This may be a prelude to an article about how beaker:gold skew works in a team environment where different civs can prioritize different multipliers and set the slider independently. I'll need to think about this...)