[spoilers]Commodore is Tokugawa of Zulu, or, playing for second place.

[oledavy]

Wait, there have been five Pindicators? I'm pretty sure there have just been four, right?

PBEM17 - Pindicator
PBEM17 - Pindicator II
PBEM24 - Pindicator III
PBEM30 - Pindicator IV

[Commodore]

It's just a taunt, "Jaws That Bite" is the real name. Didn't raze because I want it to be a second front.

[Commodore]

Okay, firstly, I neglected one little factoid in my planning: Rego and Cyneheard are friends. I DoW'd Byz, but it didn't sever the connection. Good grief that's annoying, still, I was just lucky that my victim city had their copper to begin with. There is a Cyne axe poking around near my shock chariot, I'll let the bugger come near and pop him.



Meh. At least the Zulu copper is now online. That's a lot of workers! Ikhanda is getting chopped to completion next turn, and then it's onward to deforest more homelands for assegai and axe.



So, the battle. I ended last turn with the chariotry arranged thus, feeling exposed and curious. I am pretty sure at this point there was just a warrior in Blues Brothers, the city beyond the hills.



A mid-turn power spike means that Rego upgraded something, and I'm willing to bet it was this fella, scowling at the shock chariot here. Needless to say, he took his toll on two of the chariots at unsurprising odds. Finally, BB fell.



After killing BB I moved one of the galleys south to see what can be seen. Given the borders this is the Regopin capital. A brace of four axes in those hills might be enough to kill the capital. At least that's the hope, I think.



For now, zone defense is the name of the game, the last available chariot safely cuts off the road towards the new conquest. We need to delay the retaliation until reinforcements are available. Although maybe if they send enough towards the city, we can abandon it and hit the capital while the forces are split.



I am monumentally screwed, but no shock there. For now, let's enjoy the ride.

[AutomatedTeller]

Congrats - that was quite the successful attack!!

Why are you screwed?

I thought a brace was two of something?

[Commodore]

Congrats - that was quite the successful attack!!

Why are you screwed?

I thought a brace was two of something?

Ah, a double-brace, then. I'm screwed because once Regopin gets out even one round of spears, those chariots are going to vanish like spit on a hot griddle. If I can't get in a capital kill, and soon, the bigger production base will overwhelm me.

[Commodore]

Right on, turn report time. First, a bit of trivia. Yuri accepted my offer of a map trade, I think he's cool with not giving Regopin his own copper at least. I wish he'd DoW one of them to break the trade, but that's impossible to convey in a CTON. He's his land, and bravo on the theme there mate. En taro Yuri.



Disappointing, I know, to those of you who might hope for balls-to-the-walls action here, but not much conflict happened this turn. I retreated my healthy chariot to pillage the cows, and next turn I'll stand ready to pillage the copper mine. I'm hoping to keep it, but it's not a high hope.



Cyneheard is making himself a pest at home, no shock there. That's a woodie 1 axe in the forest hill to the south, and a chariot/warrior stack up north. I'm sure he can scrape up more if he wants, but we've got it covered for now.



It's hard to balance defense and offense on three fronts so widely spaced. I need every shock axe I can muster fast to strike at the Ethiopian capital fast, hopefully before they realize I have copper online. I remembered I'm Tokugawa, though, which means I'm the best balls-to-the-wall warmonger leader in the game. Meet the fillers, easily CG2:



Another archer is coming in at EoT in the critical city of Claws Catch, to cover from a strike of that chariot. It's not ideal, but hey, I got this forest not doing anything and a copper mine, why not 1-turn an archer eh?



Finally, In-the-Wabe. I realized my irrational aversion to two-pop whipping doesn't really apply if one citizen is going to be grumpy anyway, so next turn we're double-whipping this axe to overflow into another axe or impi instantly. Four shock axes, one with CR1, made to order and able to hit the Regopin capital fast. Nice, non?



Whew, this is going to be ticklish. I expect lots of spears walking at Manxome Foe, and galleys striking toward Slithy Toves with a thin yellow line of archers to stop them. Ought to be fun.

In general, my broad strategy has three parts:

1. Hurt Cyneheard hard and fast, ideally within my borders. This is to both get GG points and to force him to reconsider giving away his copper. Impi(s) flashed at him ought to make him nervous about only having horses online.

2. Suck up Ethiopian attention and military towards Manxome Foe, the former Blues Brothers, helped by a reinforcing CG2 archer. Ideally I keep the city, but they won't be taking it back with intact copper. The turn after it comes out of revolt, I'll whip in an axe, that should come as a shock.

3. Keep the fleet alive and strike at the Ethiopian capital. This is going to be hard, as incoming galleys can really mess up my day if one gets lucky. I'm hurting with only one practical southeastern port, but there's not much else I can do about that. Evade and then strike.

This is shaky and the failure of any one of these probably means it's over, but what else can I do?

[Commodore]

Okay kids, let's take a moment away from the big bad war game and into the fun of micro! Here's your assignment:



Welcome to Claws Catch, as worthless a tundra deadland as could be imagined. With a lighthouse the coast could be worked, but that's hardly worth it. So, this isn't going to be a place where I care about commerce at all. The maximum HPT that can be sustainably squeezed out of this bugger once all pre-Machinery improvements are done, are, in descending order of micro-intensity:

A. 9HPT
B. 11.2 HPT
C. 11.913HPT

Obviously, as long as there is happy for it, it'll be making 12HPT easily. How did I come by each number?

[SevenSpirits]

A) Work both resources and the unimproved tundra forest. (Or build workers/settlers at size 2.)
B) Whip off the tundra forest every 10 turns.
C) Magic? Don't know.

[Gaspar]

How did I come by each number?

?

[Commodore]

A) Work both resources and the unimproved tundra forest. (Or build workers/settlers at size 2.)
B) Whip off the tundra forest every 10 turns.
C) Magic? Don't know.

A. Is interesting, whipping or mining the PH sheep both net me sustainable 9hpt. In single player, I'd probably just mine the sucker and forget about it. I've settled worse for resources before, and I will again (if there is no MoM when I hit Calendar, I'll be settling for snowy marble).

B. Is what I get if I mine the tundra hill, and then like you say, whip every time there is a smiley face for it.

C. Is way, way weirder. Either by dumping 60 hammers on a lighthosue, or farming the freshwater tundra, I can actually grow from 2 to 4 every 13 turns with a granary, which nets a 50-hammer two-pop whip. Doing this for three cycles has me at 39 turns but with a "gained" happy face the next turn, enabling a 1-pop whip without worrying about the extra unhappy face. Interestingly enough, in normal BTS farming the tundra (or building the ligththouse...not about to calculate how much *that* breaks even at right now given commerce/hammers and investment payback horizons) and two-pop whipping is massively more efficient.

All this to show...yeah, 2-pop whips are still a good deal, but less so than they were. Now given workers turns' value and the nonzero gpt cost of option C, plus the uncomfortable logistics of making sure 2-pop whips never lose anything to overflow (although that's easier now at least), I'll probably just opt for scheme B. Or I'll lose the city when Cyneheard punishes me for high-risk playing.