[Spoilers] Bacchus debuts on RB showing unmatched vision and slick dice-rolling

[Bacchus]

Got Currency and Scientist. Should have Golden Aged him, probably, but instead I built an academy. 15 Numids are finished, but Dhalpir's power has been rising in sync with mine, he is not unawares of what's going on. Retep's power on the other hand -- constant. I might relocate axes southwards and attack with cavalry to the north. I think I have enough to stave off the Inca counter. Damn catapults.

2 Triremes and a Galley with a Flank2 Numid and an axe are going to reclaim what's rightfully mine from Plako. Smiley.

[Bacchus]

Oh hai.




Yeah, line of sight problems. For some reason I was convinced that the tile the army is on can't be seen by Khmer. The smart thing to do would have been to build a road a strike straight of the fog, but there you are. At least two solid rounds of spear whipping for old retep, as it stands.

Overall plan is: raze the copper city, build my own grabbing the corn and the floods, make William freak out about my expansion into Khmer lands. I'm pretty sure retep will take peace after the raze (in fact, he's been offering me peace every turn since he declared war three turns back in an apparent feint, which is about to backfire amusingly.)

[Bacchus]

Advance scouting chariot revealed the state of affairs:




:D

Not taking much effort to secure that copper. The incoming stack is a bit annoying, though — he has 9 HA's all without promotions for my 11 Numids, which means that if he decides to throw the stack away battling my C1 Numids, I won't have much to take the city with. Still worth a go, I imagine.

[Bacchus]

Well, I got destroyed by RNG:




After getting the General XP dump into the stack there was considerable damage, but the first two, really, both? Here's the result




Before turn roll. I can kill all his HA's, but mine will die in response, even if I bring up the covering stack of 2 axes and 2 spears. An alternative is to smash the city regardless, I have enough troops for it and he will lose copper.

[Bacchus]

Inevitable retribution:



The two losses were at 81% and 69.7% victory odds, so RNG is still solidly on retep's side, but at least the further ones went my way.

At this point, he might decide to counter-counter-attack, but he has 6 axes and three spears attacking into hilled 2 axes, 2 spears and two numids with C2 shock, one of which is at full health, and the other at 5.1 Unless the RNG continues it's pro-retep campaign this should mean that his 6 axes won't be able to kill off the spears, and killing even one looks like an uncertain proposition. To kill off one spear with axes, he would have to win 3 out of 4 initial combats at quite disfavourable odds. If he gets realistically lucky, he should win no more than two of these initial four, which would mean that all 6 axes are used up in taking down the counter-melee shield, and his three spears (plus one in garrison), will be fighting spears at 15% disadvantage (his C1, versus my hill bonus). Again, if he gets realistically lucky, he will win both initial combats against the spears, which will let him take down two cavalry units at the cost of leaving himself very vulnerable to counter-attack due to HP loss, which spears don't take well at all. So, even with realistic luck favouring retep, we should be fine. If everything goes in line with the odds, we are peachy. And with a just a little favourable luck, it will be a triumph.

[Bacchus]

So, because one war ain't enough, two triremes and a galley loaded with a general-endowed Numidian and an axe are setting out to recapture the one-tile island from Plako. The hope is that he had no reason to build triremes, unless he is planning to take the fight to Mackoti already and I doubt it. If he doesn't have triremes ready, then failing to accept the city loss would mean losing several turns of his Moai city to blockade. He also hasn't GA'd yet, if memory serves, and losing the prospect of losing a couple of turns of the golden age moai should be really unpleasant.

Of course, he might have thought of all this and has bolstered the city garrison above a single archer. An archer and a metal unit on no-culture flatland I should be able to handle, but if there are more, it will be an exercise in futility. Of course, I don't have much to lose.

[Bacchus]

Actually, I need to double-check that there is withdrawal from amphibious attacks.

[BaII]

There isn't.

[Bacchus]

Well, Plako built no culture in the city that I was going to raid, so I could approach within striking distance without being noticed. Moreover, he just popped the Goldgen Age and switched away from Slavery into Caste on the very turn I am going to attack him. Couldn't have made it work better if I planned it. I still don't know what awaits me in terms of garrison, but we are all set:



One Trireme hasn't even had a chance to reach the force yet, but I don't see any point in waiting. For interest, I included the Moai tiles in the snip, which I can fairly easily threaten, especially now that Plako can't whip triremes in response.

Edit: moved the trireme up to scout -- nothing but a CG1 archer in the city, fully reinforced for +95% total. I'd rather do this without giving the Numid the amphibious promo, and looks like I can.

[Bacchus]

Well, not much luck from the RNG. Amphibious Combat4 Numid with 88.8% odds lost. The follow-up axe had 84% odds, which had be grasping for my heart. He won, but is at 1.0/5

The safer bet would have been to through the axe out at zero odds before going at it with the horse, probably, but 88.8%! Also, I would have then had no real garrison, even in the best case scenario.