[SPOILER] PB37: Mirror, mirror, on the wall, who's the most aggressive of them all?

[Krill]

I suppose I should say, if Gav settles further forward then it becomes even better for me to force the issue sooner. Ventessel can't recover and I can attack him in the future (or gain spoils and attack his northern neighbour if they try to take over all that land), but Gav will be having to make long supply lines and fight into 5XP AGG/CHM units without HBR (and even with HBR he doesn't win that war on economic terms).

[Krill]

I need to work on tech timings...Lit is a 6 turn tech, Sailing is a 3 turn tech and I want to start HE ASAP with marble hooked. Things don't add up currently.

[darrelljs]

I was going to ask, why Aesthetics...is it for the HE then?

Darrell

[Thoth]

I was going to ask, why Aesthetics...is it for the HE then?

Darrell

HE + soz + Boudy = huge amount of pain for people not named Krill. 

Oopsie.

You might say he got his axe handed to him.  

 

[Krill]

Oracle landed, took Aesthetics. So after counting tech I think I can get HE finished eot91. Sailing still makes sense for trade routes and marble, so Sailing>Lit>IW seems most likely. Currently at max bpt make 27, but that should hit 44bpt once the library is finished. Save gold until T76, then see what I need to do to get Sailing finished eot79, then looking at throwing the kitchen sink at Lit. There may be slippage there, but before finishing lit I just need to build a scout or 14 hammers, then finish it when I finish Lit to get one turns head start on HE. As AF will be size 7, that gives me 1 turn swords (or anything else, I need size 9, the grass cow and a desert hill for 1 turn HA, and 1 turn knights require forge and workshops). So this is the context for future military action: anyone needs to be able to hold against a constant stream of 40hpt into military stacking up against them whilst everything else I have is on economy. Not easy.

   

I tried to make arguments for the other tech, but basically a T90 HE is hard to compete against in terms of breaking all my opponents.

Maths? I don't want Calendar, it gives me something like +1 happy. I get that and commerce from IW. Construction is good, but I'm not teching Masonry and Construction particularly quickly here. The extra hammers would be nice...but I'll make more hammers from the HE, so that argument is moot.

Alphabet? I'm not having trade routes with Gav, and I'm at war with Ventessel, and I don't have routes to Dark Savant, I lack the hammers to put to research and I'm already the tech leader that needs to expand. Bad choice.

CoL? Don't need another religion. Don't need Caste just yet. Can't afford and don't need courthouses due to AGG as yet, I want to build them at peace, during a GA whilst in OR. It can wait.

MC? Why build workshops? Forge is worse than HE, I don't want a GE (Mids is open to anyone given CML is under Couer's thumb). Colossus would be nice, better if I had a coastal capital and wasn't stuck defending myself from a newbie from the north and a greedy opportunistic bastard from the south.

IW? Meh, don't need swords atm, I need a production base first, although the cost is not that important: the commerce from gems needs to be considered. Working them from 5 turns sooner than other paths would generate 80 commerce. But it makes sense to tech IW sooner rather than later.

HBR? Again production issues. AGG swords make more sense to attack Ventessel (to build up a core of CR3 swords to then go to town on Gavagai). The effect on internal supply lines isn't that important, not if you can one turn units from a single city. Yes HA are critical, and likely to be long term units given the lack of Monarchy delaying Feudalism, but not worth Oracle.

I think Aesthetics is the right choice here, but then again that's due to the long term strategy being built around this. Of course it doesn't make sense to change tactics at this point, right?

Well, maybe:

   

Gavagai is getting greedy. Really looks like he is trying to settle these plains hill. I think he whipped Edirne, his second city for a settler, which would mean that he woul have a settler 1 of Konya on T74, he could settle the southern plains hill on T76. I checked the earliest I could get a settler out, I could settle on the city sign on T76 with a cruel double whip in R101. So I'm not going to try and rush it. I can settle on T78. What I am going to do is show Gav that I have fast movers and more units in this area than he does, and he can enjoy trying to cover all his cities. He will likely spend resources, whips and other units having to defend this area. And what is it costing me? Nothing. I'm building minimal units right now, this is just junk I have left from dealing with Ventessel, whom has stagnating power and is not a threat. Gavagai has to deal with Dark Savant to the south as well. So with a bit of a push from his innate paranoia, Gav is in the process of pushing himself off a cliff right now. And then I'm going to turn up with a stack of CR2 swords and he is going to run away crying.

There are times when some players ought to acknowledge they are overextending themselves. I did that in PB27 due to a RL rush, sleep deprivation and a mid turn pivot. This actually seems like a much more long term, misinformed decision on his part. We'll see. I still get odds on his axe on a hill with my axe...

[Krill]

Updated screenshot:

   

[OT4E]

Agg CR3 swordman kills Rifle in this mod, right? Well done, Krill.

I am definitely going to try early HE in one of my games too. So continue sharing your observations, please.

[Krill]

CR3 swords have +125% city attack, so a rifle with no promotions basically gets wrecked. But they still need C1 to get odds on the rifle in flatland, but odds they get.

So...yeah. The for reminding me the futures bright. Hopefully it's Orange

Against axes though, CR2 swords don't quite get odds on axes with fort, on a hill, behind walls...but CR3 do. This is a reason to reconsider SoZ...

[Krill]

New plan. IW next, settle SE of the fire. Steal rice, chop out gems, go SoZ after library and see where iron is.

[Krill]

Posting here to confirm that I can't move until Gavagai ends turn, otherwise I'm double moving him.