RBP3 [SPOILERS] Hannibal of Byzantium (Bobchillingworth, ManiaMuse & SleepingMoogle)

[SleepingMoogle]

Okay, it looks like the Ottomans are going to assist the Aztecs in their war against the Incans. Definite proof that Ruff is part of the Hydra? In any case, that makes the suggestion to have Babylon and Mali assist the Incans make a lot more sense.

[Bobchillingworth]

Damn, this sucks- Krill got Oracle, as predicted, and the Normandy got taken down to 1.5 health by the warrior. 7 turns to heal fully. India will probably have archers by then... I suppose we could still pillage. We def. need to direct our former planned England assault forces to India- gotta make this a knockout. Babylon and Mali are confirmed for sending forces to take out aztec, which will probably mean war with the Ottos too.

After we take out India and Aztec I really want to get Mali and Babylon attacking England, while we work with Maya to destroy France. Will probably need to use HA stacks for that. Success could break the Hydra's back, and just as importantly secure some land for the "core four" alliance members.


I moved only the northern chariot, wanted to see if I could spot France's borders, but only found a few forests. Set research to Poly, 6t with I think -8gold per turn. This turn is going to take forever, lots of tech trades and score increases amongst the Hydra, so plenty of time to move our guys.


Yuck.


Oh and Kyan just posted in the tech thread that he is aware of the enemy tech group's existance and gave away our code-name for them. WHY KYAN WHY.

EDIT:

Hah, and then Krill took the bait and confirmed their cartel and positoned it as an us vs. them thing.

And then Kyan took that bait and hinting more to our alliance's existance. Siiiiiiigh.

[Bobchillingworth]

Okay, sounds like we do have a thing going to an attack later on England and France or Egypt. However right now we need to focus on killing India, who will have archers. So, how do we want to play this- horde of chariots, or wait for HA (at least in 10t, I think) (which may mean us having to research archery which I really don't want to bother with, but whatever wins the war, I guess). Sounds like Maya may start switching to 1-move and just road toward India. Maniac wants to get hunting for himself for spears, and for once I agree on the need- Krill is north, and India will be agitating for a swift repraisal.

[SleepingMoogle]

Ugh.. RNG struck at a really bad time there.

a 1.5/4 strength Chariot isn't going to do much against an archer with an added 20% defense from culture. I let the other Civs know about it but suffice it to say, we will need to revise our plans for now.

It also looks like Polytheism research won't be finished until T71 (curse you maintenance costs!), we'll need two turns of 0% research instead of one to generate the gold.

[ManiaMuse]

Hmm, civstats seems to suggest that Hydra have already gone and traded their techs. Ways to ruin a game with another boring alliance structure...

Shame about the RNG. However as said I think the chariot would still be useful if there was just a single wounded defender.

[SleepingMoogle]

I moved the Normandy SW to make contact with Rome's scout, and we are now setting right on India's border. A short message was sent to both to establish contact. Naturally no hostile intent was included in the one directed towards DJ Civ, but I doubt they won't know already by this point.

[Bobchillingworth]

I guess we should heal out of range of India to keep them as unwary as is still possible. It's probably pretty clear to everyone in the game now that it's a 9 vs 7 situation, but let's not give them any more info than they already have.


So, do we rush chariots to attack India, or wait for HA? We still need to take them out, but I'm not sure who is actually going to do most of the fighting or when- ideally it's fast movers from us, one-movers from Maya using roads, and Vultures from Sumeria, but Ref still keeps bringing up nonsense about peace proposals, and Exploit has been entirely mum so far on what forces he will provide, if any.

Also do we want to bother with archery, or keep on to mono? We may well get beat to the religion- all of the Hydra will have Poly, and we have to figure that at least one of them will have the same idea as us, and will have a 8 turn head start- maybe archery after poly?

I'm writting this before having read over the emails for today, so some of the above may be out of date.

[Bobchillingworth]

Okay, read over the emails. I agree now that mono seems unlikely- do we stick with poly and then get archery, as suggested by Exploit, or do what Mali wants and go for hunting -> archery now? Getting poly makes the most sense, as hunting duplicates with Exploit and I think Maya, but quick archery will make Mali happy, who is the member of the Core Alliance that we have the weakest (and least) relations with. On that note, we may wish to send the Mali a map of our lands, with a request for one of theirs in turn.

In addition to my earlier question of what we will later bring to the India party, what do you all think we should do for Normandy movement? Exploit wants us to heal in his lands; Ref wants us to heal in neutral land and get ready to assist them in a possible suicide charge on an Indian city.

[Bobchillingworth]

Hey Mania- err, what did you post exactly in India's thread ?


India sent us an email, if we bother replying to it at all we should simply politely refuse their pathetic tech offer and say no more, I think.

Also sounds like the Incans are having some war problems and may have to pull out of their conflict, which really sucks, but I suppose gives 10 turns for Mali and Babylon to build up reinforcements. Apparently the Inca have been thwarted by a lone chariot, which is beyond pathetic. Did they even have a plan? Was their entire army a single axe, or something?

I think our team has a few things to discuss, I'll probably be home about 11PM your time and would like to chat if either of you is online. No sweat if you aren't- but do address some of the questions I've raised in the last few posts if you can; I've been spending hours every night chatting up our allies, and while it's probably made us very close to Maya, Babylon, and to a lesser extent Exploit, it can be frustrating not having much in the way of solid, agreed-upon Byz team strategy to share, and I'm very reluctant to promise much without consulting both of you first.

[T-hawk]

Mania, I deleted your post over there. If anything needs mod attention, feel free to PM me, I happened to see this one but don't always read every post in every thread.