[SPOILERS] scooter peruses RB's Greatest Hits

[Tohron]

I suppose getting Military Tradition instead of Rifling in my model would reduce the beakers needed to hit Mining Inc. I'm not sure if you're racing REM for it, but if you are, then you're down Replaceable Parts, Chemistry, and Steel, and only up Economics, so you'll definitely need a Golden Age and some bulbing, and may need to hope REM doesn't have a GE available.

[scooter]

REM is pretty rattled. The QOTM is humorous, but more telling is that he has yet to play a turn since the drama went down. He really doesn't have any good avenues. I'll put together a more substantive update after the next turn, but the short of it is he isn't capturing any more RMoG mainland cities anytime soon. He's got cannons now, but just a couple of them. He needs quite a bit more, and then he needs the time to trudge up to RMoG's cities.

I commented a few turns back that I felt REM had thrown away the game by letting Mackoti freely take Communism/Kremlin, but now I think it's really over. Mackoti's new cities are now fully online, his food count is 2x the next best, and he's about to land Kremlin I assume. He's behind in tech, but when you have that big of a potential production edge it barely matters. A coordinated true 2v1 dogpile would probably still work, but that's not much more than a hypothetical given that RMoG have no real incentive to free REM of his war. I guess it depends on how much RMoG want to survive vs make their mark?

I'm about to find out what great person I'll get next. There's a small-ish chance I'll get a second scientist which would throw the GA idea out the window, but I'm actually softening a bit on the 2-man GA anyway. The basic reasons:

* Very little of my production is coming from tiles, so that nerfs the production boost.
* Very little of my research power is coming from tiles, so that nerfs the commerce boost.
* I've burned through a lot of great people, so the GPP boost is smaller.

With that in mind... Bulbing Chemistry with my Physics scientist and then doing whatever works best with my new great person is pretty interesting to me. (The scientist can actually bulb it outright right now because it's now worth > 1500b.) If it's a spy (2-3%) or artist (9-10%) I may be forced to launch a golden age, but the far more likely great people all have some really nice possible uses.

Also, yes, I'm getting myself a ton of airships. I don't expect others to tech Physics all that quickly either, so I'm hoping that'll be a nice advantage for awhile.

[Tohron]

So, which great person did you get? We're all curious.

[scooter]

I will not snark about turn pace. I will not snark about turn pace. I will not snark about turn pace. I will not...

So, which great person did you get?  We're all curious.

I was going to do an update after finishing the current turn, but a couple days later of fighting diplo-locked pauses, and it still hasn't been played. Anyway, here's the short version of what I've done the last couple turns:

* I got a scientist on fairly low odds. That leaves me with two scientists which takes golden age off the table. So I immediately used one of them to bulb Chemistry, and I'm going to get a couple Frigates. The other scientist can either be saved for another swing at a golden age (a long ways down the road), or I can use it to tech half of Biology. TBD.

* I whipped a ton of Airships. They'll become available on this current turn.

* Given that REM is bailing out of his attack, I pulled out of that RMoG city, and they recaptured it. They sent me a cease fire proposal which is what's locked me out of the turn for a couple days now. They seem unoffended by my city capture and "peaceful" returning of it, so that's good. Any serious adventures over land are just non-starters right now due to the fact that everyone has a bunch of Rifles. Therefore...

* I'm going to detour for Military Science after all to get Grens. That should take 2-3T. My peace deals with REM and Mackoti expire in like 5-6 turns.


So the plan should be pretty obvious. I'm going to load up some Grens/Knights and see if I can Viking some folks. Nobody else has Frigates, so I can freely bomb down city defenses with those. Nobody can intercept Airships, so I can freely bomb down defending units. And everybody is defending with some combination of longbows and rifles, so Grens can handle that. Steel for cannons/drydocks will be next after getting Grens.

So with that group of nasty counters that I have, I'll just see what the best target is and see if I can capture some islands. Mackoti, REM, and Plako all have island holdings that would be very vulnerable to this type of attack, and I have access now to like 4-5 bodies of water via canals. I'd vastly prefer mainland captures for obvious reasons, but I don't see that being an option anytime soon unless a true dogpile happens, so this will have to do.

This may be a little foolhardy, but honestly, what else am I supposed to do? It seems like the best bad option I've got.

[Tohron]

One advantage of island cities is that they add overseas trade routes. Might be another reason to fit Corporations in somewhere, since it would give another set of overseas routes for each island city. Shame you didn't get an Engineer.

[chumchu]

[scooter]

I was mistaken - the NAPs with Mackoti and REM end this turn and next. Long story on where that confusion came from. This is what happens to me when we go days without playing. Anyway, Mackoti tried to war-peace me, but I rejected it. I'm going to reject it with REM next turn too. It's a pretty risky choice given that if they both decided to attack me I'd be dead hilariously fast, but it doesn't look like I'm going to win anyway, so yes, I'm staying in with a 7-2 offsuit. I airship-bombed two of Mackoti's units near the front for no real reason other than to poke him in the eye a little bit. It was therapeutic. If I end up taking peace, I can probably convince him to pay me for it at the very least if I can scare/annoy him a little bit first.

I offered REM my stab at a military alliance type thing because I might be able to do some damage to Mackoti over the next couple turns. Not sure if I can or not because he's getting reinforcements quickly, but I'm at least going to try to pressure him for the moment. The key is what REM does. I want him to join with me because it means I can make some gains here. If he does that, I might be able to make something happen. That said, he's going to be tempted to take peace again with Mackoti when it expires next turn. If he does that, I'll take peace with Mackoti and attack REM. I'm not giving him a free ticket to win, and if he treats it as such, I'll punish him for it. I'm still annoyed that he handed Mackoti Communism. 

Ball's in your court, REM.

[scooter]

Turn 266-267

Here's a couple shots from before the long pause.



This is the turn after Physics came in. Queued up airships in most cities, and I whipped most of these the following turn. I didn't actually put any beakers into Chemistry this turn as the interface suggests because I knew there was a chance I'd be bulbing it to completion the following turn (which is what I did). I think I dumped it into Replaceable Parts or something.



The next turn. I just did another one of these on the current turn to get a round of Frigates out.



The result of that.



This is why REM backed away from RMoG. He hasn't made peace with them so he could still go back in now that he's got some cannons, but Cavs are not getting through that in a million years. RMoG have since completed Nationalism and are drafting Rifles now. Nice work by them getting themselves to a stable place and getting prickly. They had a bad start in this game, but they're very good generals, and that's why I was so hesitant to attack them myself.

(I abandoned PlainsHillSheep to return it to them since it was useless without this city falling.)



I also settled this. The city sucks, but with SoL + Merc it's instantly profitable, so settle it I did. I need all the coastal cities I can get. I'm also using this to fort the tile 1NE of here so that I can connect those two bodies of water. I've got a Galleon up there that I'd like to free up, so next turn I can bring that south.

I'll get a shot of it next time, but I've concentrated some units on Galleons on the bay just south of here. Mackoti has gotten 1 Rifle into each of the 3 cities on this bay, so he is reinforcing it, but overall it's still very far from most of his units. We'll see how he responds. I suspect I won't have any options until I get a couple Grens on the boats, but I like having options.

[Epoxy]

THE DAILY ROLL

TURN 266–267: SPINNERS AND LOSERS

Research. Growth. Clout. Several foreign events have thrown a spanner in the works of the Aztecs' attempt for global prestige, whip frenzies notwithstanding: the Kremlin falling to Byzantium, the Netherlands' steadfast defence of their heartland forcing the Khmer to back down, the growing realisation that perhaps the only chance for victory lies in the slim hope of a foreign coup. Airships have buoyed those spirits, somewhat, with air raids of nearby Byzantine island garrisons, but it will take more than hot air to win the legacy of PB35. Chemistry is on the research roster, boosted by a great scientist surplus to requirements, because grenadiers are now the best bet to fight the rifle-equipped armies of this day. Their hands no longer bound by the strictures of peace treaties, the Aztec armies wait for an opening, one which may just compensate for the rising ceiling of the Byzantine economy.

[Brian Shanahan]

Mission accomplished?