[spoilers] Commodore: Worse than Toku, it's Giggles of Siam!

[kalin]

Just to let you know that your thread(s) is among my favorite here. Let's see what *my* expedition can find.

Kalin

[Commodore]

Just to let you know that your thread(s) is among my favorite here. Let's see what *my* expedition can find.

Kalin

Thanks Kalin! Here's hoping its a bunch of warriors...I need a blue water port to the north here, right now my capital and the long, long canal journey is the shortest way to get galleys into the Central Sea.

[Commodore]

Because it wouldn't be a Commodore Thread without counting chickens before they've hatched:


Honestly, though, barring horrendous luck this is going to happen, momentum and morale are on my side pretty heavily. The question, as always, is if I can break their main resistance soon, or if this is destined to be another 100+ turn grind. Of particular note is actually the stone city; if I can wrest control of the seas soon I want to plant it and take advantage of stone for Great Wall -> spy, Moai, and possible Hanging Gardens (+1 food for Khmer :P).

[Commodore]

By around 500 BC, the Generican Civilization was within a period of immense cultural confidence and expansion. While the conservative and cautious lords of the Zulu clans busied themselves preparing for raids, fearing invasion and arguing for their own clans’ interest, the Genericans experienced a long series of energetic and resourceful High Kings who worked to expand their borders while growing the interior trade markets and developing more farms and settlements throughout the established territories. By 550 BC, the High King Thoth IV had already established plans for settling the low hills east of the Long Salt Lake, pushing the borders of Zululand back even father. It was a time of great optimism within the cities and hamlets of Generica.


Massive armies patrolled the eastern borderlands, predominantly archer companies in the eastern forests of the Narrows, while the Royal Army with its formal ranks of axe and spear-armed soldiers held fortifications within the Greatwood. The major pitched battles of the century before were abandoned in favor of skirmishing and raids between the eastern shore of the inland sea and the Gold Hills. The Hunter’s Plains northwest of Silkwood were largely empty, only the occasional farmer, hunter, or herdsman living in between the two civilizations.

West over the near sea Hookland was colonized by Generic fishermen and horse breeders, settling in the sheltered inner shore within the new city of Hawk’s Ridge. North of the city horse pastures supplied some of the more famous breeds in the ancient world; Hookland Chargers were ridden in battlefields from Dutchland to the eastern marches.

The other major new city of Generica was Willowbrooke, settled in the Narrows north of the Long Salt Lake. The food-poor region was nonetheless one of the richest provinces in the culture, with the iron mines east of the city supplying most of the worked metal in Generica. A sword export for gold with the Romans ended a little before the 5th century BC, but the city was still a major hub of trade. To the northwest, Fort Canal headed a series of canals and portage-ways to move ships and their cargoes from the Long Salt Lake into the Central Sea. A similar series of canals in the south linked the Southern Ocean to the inland sea.

Within the core of the civilization, the massive cities grew and prospered, a network of roads and villages connecting the Great Valley to the smaller valleys around it and their mines and pastures. Carbon deposits from the region show that by this point most of the great forests in the valley were gone replaced by farms and carefully husbanded light woodlands. The first stirring of unrest at the turn of the century were brought about by crowding in the cities, but the Genericans still were a confident, happy people on the whole, looking always for new realms of conquest and trade.

[Qgqqqqq]

If you leave the morale axe unprompted it could land+move (IIRC).
Very cool updates!

[Thoth]

Because it wouldn't be a Commodore Thread without counting chickens before they've hatched:

I dislike razing McDs and spending 100 food/hammers on a settler just to move it one tile north (and orphan a grass hill in the process). If we have to raze it for tactical purposes, so be it. But I'd like to keep it (and Zaxby's as well) if possible.

Honestly, though, barring horrendous luck this is going to happen, momentum and morale are on my side pretty heavily. The question, as always, is if I can break their main resistance soon, or if this is destined to be another 100+ turn grind.

If we attack Deathtrap Hill without Cat support, we're looking at the 100+ turn option. We might or might not be able to take that hill with 5 axes/2 spears/1archer. Even if we win the battle (and those odds look a bit dodgy) it will cost us far too much unless we get lottery winning RNG results. A Pyrrhic victory is no victory at all.


They can't knock us out of the Greatwood yet. Let's keep our forces intact and wait for cats or for them to make a mistake. We'll be first to construction. They'll have the advantage of short supply lines, so our window is small. We won't have the time to replace the casualties we'll suffer trying to take the Goldhill. And we're by no means assured victory even if they don't re-enforce.

That stack looks a lot less scary once we slam a pair of cats into it.


I'd also very much like to keep Sun Tzu out of their site (and preferably unpromoted ) until the Zaxby's strike goes in.

As soon as they see him, they'll know we a) didn't settle him and b) Split the xp. And we won't have another 10xp worth of units to show them. They're bright guys and may very well guess that the rest of the sprinkle went on a galley. In which case the odds of Zaxby's being empty drop to nil.





the turn rolled while I was logged in and the game prompted me for builds in TM and HR. I dialed up a 4t worker and galley respectively.

Settler for either Sandhurst (for the gems and North Sea blue water port) or the double FP no food spec site (those FPs need to be farmed, not cottaged btw. ) may be better. No guarantee we can keep the Horse/Gems trade going with Azza. And if we have domestic Gems, he might be willing to do a Horse/Gold trade until we can secure McDs

We should turn tech back on t95. We may be a bit tight on t99, but we'll have some growth coming up in HR (work coast at size 2 until the Horse completes), Mamoth city (steal sheep from Iron city. Iron city works crabs instead) and I think we can still make the t99 Construction deadline. So long as we hold off on the whipping for a bit.

[Ceiliazul]

By around 500 BC, the Generican Civilization...

Awesome.

...but what of Francis Mutton and Sammy Eweler? I fear High King Thoth's new navy has hastened their end!

A boat, after all, costs a wood and a sheep.

[Thoth]

Some other thoughts:

We now have a trade route connection (but not contact) with Serdoa. The Buddhist founder who just built the Buddhist shrine. So we might have a religion coming our way. ray:

If we want to hit Zaxby's asap and burn the copper....we'll need to use Sun Tzu to burn the copper as we won't have horses online fast enough to build a chariot to put on the galley. Under the right circumstances, I'm fine with sacrificing the GG unit to pillage their metal. But in this case, the timing sucks. We won't have cats into position to strike Deathtrap Hill until t103/104 at best. A fast strike at Zaxbys can go in t100? t101?

I'm thinking we might want to delay the Zaxby's strike by a couple of turns so that it synchs up with our first pair of cats moving into range of Deathtrap Hill.

Burning Zaxby's ASAP costs them a build queue. Capturing it a couple of turns later may give us the opportunity to burn their metal and put a 4 move galley with a unit on it in the middle of their core.

Downside to waiting is that they may well have a real defender in the city by t103, in which case we don't attack Zaxby's and sail into their core instead. If they don't already have a galley on the board in that area by then, we'll have free run of the area to do as we please for a turn (maybe two).

If we had another spear available, we could load spear + Sun Tzu (unpromoted) into the Galley and we'd have the option to bypass Zaxby's, unload the Spear and Sun Tzu onto the Copper. Promote ST to Morale/c1/shock and pillage the copper.

[Commodore]

If you leave the morale axe unprompted it could land+move (IIRC).
Very cool updates!

Fortunately I already knew about this, Queeg, but this might be iffy from a global. Appreciate the appreciation, though! The new hotness is here, and now our galley moves at double-time. As does this axe.

I dislike razing McDs and spending 100 food/hammers on a settler just to move it one tile north (and orphan a grass hill in the process). If we have to raze it for tactical purposes, so be it. But I'd like to keep it (and Zaxby's as well) if possible.

I dislike razing either one, too, but unfortunately, the time to capture is after we wipe the capital culture away, not before...

If we attack Deathtrap Hill without Cat support, we're looking at the 100+ turn option. We might or might not be able to take that hill with 5 axes/2 spears/1archer. Even if we win the battle (and those odds look a bit dodgy) it will cost us far too much unless we get lottery winning RNG results. A Pyrrhic victory is no victory at all.

They can't knock us out of the Greatwood yet. Let's keep our forces intact and wait for cats or for them to make a mistake. We'll be first to construction. They'll have the advantage of short supply lines, so our window is small. We won't have the time to replace the casualties we'll suffer trying to take the Goldhill. And we're by no means assured victory even if they don't re-enforce.

That stack looks a lot less scary once we slam a pair of cats into it.

Agreed on all counts, simming shows pretty much even hammer exchange at best. But who cares about gold hill? It's all about worrying them into whips, which seems like we've done perfectly. They whipped twice last turn, once this turn, and I expect to see the hill reinforced next turn. It's our Pro effect...they have exactly one granary. Whipping is twice as expensive to them, and their lower happy caps make it painful too. I'm not sure if you noticed, but they just lost a couple turns on Construction...

Unfortunately, we gotta whip too. Axe #2 for the galley is coming out of Hidden Valley, by hook or (much more likely) by crook. Note, however, the 90% tech rate in later shots, this way we have a full 17 gold to play with. Thus, we can hurt our citizens more than you might think!

We should turn tech back on t95. We may be a bit tight on t99, but we'll have some growth coming up in HR (work coast at size 2 until the Horse completes), Mamoth city (steal sheep from Iron city. Iron city works crabs instead) and I think we can still make the t99 Construction deadline. So long as we hold off on the whipping for a bit.

PAIN TRAIN INCOMING, CITIZEN-SLAVES.

I'd also very much like to keep Sun Tzu out of their site (and preferably unpromoted ) until the Zaxby's strike goes in.

As soon as they see him, they'll know we a) didn't settle him and b) Split the xp. And we won't have another 10xp worth of units to show them. They're bright guys and may very well guess that the rest of the sprinkle went on a galley. In which case the odds of Zaxby's being empty drop to nil.

Good point. He's backstop right now, planning on going in with the cats unless they try an end-run.

the turn rolled while I was logged in and the game prompted me for builds in TM and HR. I dialed up a 4t worker and galley respectively.

Settler for either Sandhurst (for the gems and North Sea blue water port) or the double FP no food spec site (those FPs need to be farmed, not cottaged btw. ) may be better. No guarantee we can keep the Horse/Gems trade going with Azza. And if we have domestic Gems, he might be willing to do a Horse/Gold trade until we can secure McDs

Settler is better, FP site (which also gets those gems) is aimed for. HR is clearly a galley, aye, but I did the avoid growth thing to fill the granary. Cheap granary advantage!

[Commodore]

Rest of turn: Extra chop lining up to get barracks and cat out by t100. Barrage is worth it. Now consider stables too for shock whumpies.


90% science, still looking good. But who has 140000 soldiers?

Some other thoughts:
We now have a trade route connection (but not contact) with Serdoa. The Buddhist founder who just built the Buddhist shrine. So we might have a religion coming our way. ray:

Yeah, I guess we hope. Sucks to help the game leader though.

If we want to hit Zaxby's asap and burn the copper....we'll need to use Sun Tzu to burn the copper as we won't have horses online fast enough to build a chariot to put on the galley. Under the right circumstances, I'm fine with sacrificing the GG unit to pillage their metal. But in this case, the timing sucks. We won't have cats into position to strike Deathtrap Hill until t103/104 at best. A fast strike at Zaxbys can go in t100? t101?

I'm thinking we might want to delay the Zaxby's strike by a couple of turns so that it synchs up with our first pair of cats moving into range of Deathtrap Hill.

Burning Zaxby's ASAP costs them a build queue. Capturing it a couple of turns later may give us the opportunity to burn their metal and put a 4 move galley with a unit on it in the middle of their core.

Downside to waiting is that they may well have a real defender in the city by t103, in which case we don't attack Zaxby's and sail into their core instead. If they don't already have a galley on the board in that area by then, we'll have free run of the area to do as we please for a turn (maybe two).

If we had another spear available, we could load spear + Sun Tzu (unpromoted) into the Galley and we'd have the option to bypass Zaxby's, unload the Spear and Sun Tzu onto the Copper. Promote ST to Morale/c1/shock and pillage the copper.

KISS says...two axes ASAP, burn Zaxby's, fork LJS and McD. More later, sleep needed.