[PB59] Charriu welcomes all the townfolk

[Charriu]

T148:

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Turn started with a 44 GPT from Miguelito for my 400 gold deal. I took it and now I'm thinking about renaming my civ to "The Iron Bank". Feels good to be investing in two competing powers on a different continent.




After that turn I got another offer from Miguelito. I was so tempted to accept it only to see what will happen since after accepting the first deal I did not have the 300 gold at hand, but in the end I did not because of this uncertainty. Does anybody know what happens in this scenario? If not I will probably test this just to know for the future.

Tested this myself in a PBEM game and apparently if the second deal is not possible due to insignificant gold then you can still accept it, but if won't go into effect. That's reassuring.

But those recent credits I gave out to players made me think. Thanks to the holy city I pay not that much per turn. What if I start giving out credits to almost everybody. That way I could earn money every turn, while still running 100% science. With that earned money I could give out more credits essentially eliminating gold cost for quite some time. Of course this is only possible in a big game like this. Did anybody try this in the past?

[Charriu]

T149:

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This turn I discovered that I'm a stupid git.




Do you see my mistake? Yes, I pushed up the espionage slider to get vision on Lazteuq, but I forgot to switch espionage to him in the advisor. Well now I have vision on Cornflakes. Maybe this will be important later. I had a quick look at Cornflakes' land.





Discovered 2 great artists, but I already mentioned often enough that he's going for culture. So far he's still far away enough and maybe one of his neighbors will take care of that. Back on my front I switched espionage to Lazteuq and set the slider to 50% espionage 50% science, which will give me vision and the tech. Honestly I should have done that last turn too.




Looking at the front was a pleasant surprise. Lazteuq moved nothing, which at first made me think if I was allowed to play now, but I am allowed. The only thing that changed was an additional catapult in Manatee. Well I start with the northern front:

Northern front




I started with killing the galley with my trireme:

Charriu's Trireme (2.00) vs Lazteuq's Galley (1.42) Combat Odds: 88.1% = WIN

Unfortunately that left the trireme with 0.1 health. Next up was the hard decision where to go next with my crossbowmen on galleys. I would love to get rid of Sei as it presents a pressure on my border that I want to get rid of. The problem is that his trireme is still there, which would force me to unload the crossbowmen 1SE of Sei on hard to defend land. One of my galleys would also be at risk of being killed by Lazteuq. The other target was Bottlenose, which I choose as you can see. Reason was that I could leave my trireme as a blocker towards Lazteuq's trireme saving my galleys. At the same time there is this forest tile 1W of Bottlenose which I unloaded a crossbowman on to see what is going on. Well it was a pleasant surprise to see only a warrior in town and an axeman in reach. I would guess that there is more in the fog, but at least my units are on a defensive terrain. Lumbermills might have gotten better in the mod, but keeping them on the border can be dangerous.
I hope I have a shot at the city next turn, but if not it also served it's purpose in diverting units away from my main strike on land.

Southern front

I had this juicy target of Manatee just in my crosshair. But will 2 crossbowmen, 3 swordmen and 1 phalanx be enough? I had to try it:

Charriu's Crossbowman C1 Shock (6.60) vs Lazteuq's Axeman C1 Cover (10.00) Combat Odds: 12.3% = LOSS
Charriu's Swordsman CR2 (6.00) vs Lazteuq's Axeman C1 Cover (7.82) Combat Odds: 23.2% = LOSS
Charriu's Swordsman CR1 (6.00) vs Lazteuq's Axeman C1 Cover (6.75) Combat Odds: 43.7% = LOSS
Charriu's Phalanx C1 (5.50) vs Lazteuq's Catapult Drill 2 Barrage 1 (7.50) Combat Odds: 14.3% = LOSS
Charriu's Crossbowman C1 (6.60) vs Lazteuq's Axeman C1 Cover (4.27) Combat Odds: 94.2%= WIN
Charriu's Swordsman CR1 (6.00) vs Lazteuq'sCatapult (0.78) Drill 2 Barrage 1 Combat Odds: 100.0% = WIN

This was a very close and hard fought victory. After I was running an amphibious attack against a hill city with 40% defenses. But I think this might have been worthwhile in the long run. After all the only expensive unit I lost was an crossbowman and everything else is very soon trash.




Capturing Manatee earned me 175 gold. I was sure that I could not hold it before I attacked and so the city got razed. This might be the first hard blow against Lazteuq. I decided not to delete the swordman. As you can see the city of Spotted is undefended and at least from my point of view the knight is the only unit that can reinforce that city. Maybe if he kills my swordman with the knight I can raze another city with the remaining crossbowman. After all all the other visible units are catapults and can't kill and that there is no hidden stack of water units in the lake although it would have been great to trap them there. As you can see there are a lot of catapults in range that could have decimated my stack if I landed before the attack, so it might have been the right decision to go amphibious. Best part is that this southern front diverted a significant part of Lazteuq's forces to this side. Those units can't retaliate on my last front:

Middle front




Here I just moved in my main stack. With the diversions in the north and south I should have a good chance against Humpback next turn. And yes I realize that I moved my stack in before I did all the other fronts, which was a mistake. Remember to do the fighting and exploring before the other moves in the future. Thankfully I will not be punished for this mistake.

[Charriu]

T150:

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Thansk Lazteuq for playing before I go on vacation. Very much appreciated. This time I got city and tech visibility on Lazteuq. Unfortunately in a PB city visiblity seems to only update on the next turn. But we are here


Northern and Middle front




Lazteuq reinforced his border towns enough and he suicided some catapults into my stack. He's also blocking the escape path for my galley/crossbowman stack. I didn't see a possibility for more distraction up north and winning against 1 knight with my crossbowman is nearly impossible. Therefore I bordered everybody again and moved the galleys down south out of the triremes reach. From here I can either support the middle front or bring the guys back home.

As you can see the middle front got hit pretty bad, but that's why I kept promotions on the units to quickly heal them back up. Unfortunately a victory at Hampback looked to close to call for me so I stayed put, bombarded, gave a crossbowman medic and healed. I also moved 4 more fresh knights to the stack. To be honest it doesn't look great at this front and I'm lucky if I don't loose units next turn, because as we know Lazteuq has more catapults in reserve. Back to more pleasant events

Southern front




The southern front devolved into skirmishes. Lazteuq did not kill the swordman so it went back into the galley. He also only reinforced Spotted with 1 axeman. Another opportunity for damage and my crossbowman on galley moved in.

Charriu's Crossbowman C1 (6.60) vs Lazteuq's Axeman C1 (6.50) Combat Odds: 69.4%= WIN

Yeah! That's another 98 gold for me and like before I razed the city. I should look up the casualtiy counter:

Charriu:
3 Crossbowmen = 180 hammers
1 Trireme = 50 hammers
2 swordmen = 70 hammers
1 Phalanx = 35 hammers
= 335 hammers

Lazteuq:
2 axeman = 70 hammers
1 spearman = 35 hammers
1 galley = 80 hammers
7 catapult = 350 hammers
= 535 hammers + 3 razed cities

So far the statistic looks good for me, but now the war looks to turn into a stalemate with both of us even on tech level. Therefore I decided to send him a peace offer as I hurt him as much as I could so far. I probably made Lazteuq an enemy for the rest of this PB, but then again this was bound to happen anyway. The question right now is will he take the peace. He still has some turns of his golden age left which he might want to use for peaceful development and he might need the 10 turns to stage a counter offensive. So there is some incentive for peace there.

[Charriu]

T151:

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First report during vacation, so expect that the quality of reporting goes down a bit.

Middle front




Lazteuq threw another 5 catapults against my stack. His knights managed to kill 2 phalanxes, 1 war elephant and 1 knight, but in return one of my phalanxes killed one of his knights.More importantly I got city vision on him this turn. And it looks like everything except for a few city garrisons is at my border. This again also means that his land army is inferior to mine at the moment.
I thought long and hard about wether to attack this turn or wait out. In my head I would have thrown the 2 cats against the stack. I then my have suicided 2 knights against the spearman and then 5 knights against his 5 knights. This may have left 7 injured units on his side and one full 1 axeman and 1 catapult.I would still have 7 crossbowman (4 on galleys) 3 phalanxes and 1 chariot. Even if I took the city I would only be able to garrison it with 2-3 units. That's not enough to survivce his counter attack by at least 2 knights and a catapult.
So I decided to bombard, heal promote and wait. I expect him to suicide 2 more catapults into my stack and attack again with knights. If he only attacks phalanxes that way, great, because they get +50% from the hill I'm standing on. Of course my units also heal a bit of HP back until next turn. My knights also still have some promotions, so they aren't totally weak. Of course I also landed my 4 crossbowman into my stack, so that they survive and get better odds.
Now if GKC joins this war too, we might actually break Lazteuq. So I send him a war against Lazteuq deal to signal that the coast is clea (literary, because I see no ships of Lazteuq on the inner sea.

Southern front



Down south I joined my galley with the 2 triremes and moved them in striking distance to the next city. Of course the crossbowman was able to board again, crazy. Thanks to espionage I saw the galley and caravel (good thing to go for Optics). The won't be able to kill my galley alone,so I might have a shot against the city on this suicide mission.

Lazteuq will also finish Civil Service this turn, most likely with the goal to switch out of vassalage, which is fine for now.

Charriu:
3 Crossbowmen = 180 hammers
1 Trireme = 50 hammers
2 swordmen = 70 hammers
1 war elephant = 60 hammers
3 Phalanx = 35 hammers
1 knight = 90 hammers
= 555 hammers

Lazteuq:
2 axeman = 70 hammers
1 spearman = 35 hammers
1 galley = 80 hammers
12 catapult = 350 hammers
1 knight = 90 hammers
= 875 hammers + 3 razed cities

[Charriu]

T152:

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We are in full attrition mode. Lazteuq offered peace, but refused, because I still wanted to take a look, saw that I got even stronger in power and have plans for the middle front.

Middle front




Lazteuq managed to kill 2 knights of mine, 1 phalanx and 1 crossbowman. I on the other hand defended and killed 2 knights and 2 catapults. Those were the last catapults in range and because of those attacks his knights are already a bit damaged, hopefully not so many knights get promotions. I moved in additional 2 war elephants and 2 knights, but most importantly. One of the knights is my super medic promoted great general, which will heal all my units back to (almost) full health. Hopefully this allows me to finally go on the offensive there. Lazteuq also has a medic 2 great general knight behind his city, but his units won't heal this turn because they attacked and therefore the medic has no effect.
Also that new maceman in his stack isn't really new. He upgraded the axeman in the city.

Southern front



Lazteuq killed one of my triremes, but there's still one left and now I can attack two of his cities. Unfortunately one of them now contains a maceman, which I can't kill without luck.

Charriu:
4 Crossbowmen = 240 hammers
2 Trireme = 100 hammers
2 swordmen = 70 hammers
1 war elephant = 60 hammers
4 Phalanx = 140 hammers
3 knight = 270 hammers
1 galley = 80 hammers
= 960 hammers

Lazteuq:
3 axeman = 105 hammers
2 spearman = 70 hammers
1 galley = 80 hammers
14 catapult = 450 hammers
3 knight = 270 hammers
1 worker = 60 hammers
= 1285 hammers + 3 razed cities

[Charriu]

T153:

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Middle front




The turn started with a pleasant surprise. The general had a positive effect and Lazteuq abandoned Humpback. I took the city and it came with 115 gold and a lighthouse. This time I kept the city even though it's a rather underwhelming city. But it will be a great forward defensive position in a future war against Lazteuq. I moved the chariot 1NE of Humpback in hopes of pillaging the road, but of course I forgot that I had to pillage the quarry first, which I at least did earning me 3 gold. There is the possibility that Lazteuq retaliates, but he should not be able to take the city back.

Southern front



Lazteuq made a great move in the east by blocking the path to the island city with his galley and caravel. I landed my 2 units in order to attack the city next turn and I killed the damaged caravel with my trireme.

I thought long and hard about how to approach the war in the upcoming turns and decided to send Lazteuq another peace offer. There is some incentive to take it with my island landing and with the next turn being his last golden age turn. With peace he can take which ever civics he wants next. I'm also even in gold income with him during his golden age and with enough gold in the bank I should be able to come back in tech towards him. I mentioned this some posts ago. I think continuing the war will result in a stalemate as we are even in tech. Better to get more units and techs in the 10 turns of peace and prepare Humback as a defensive fortress. For now I think I slowed down Lazteuq enough. I basically screwed up his golden age in a big way I would say.

Charriu:
4 Crossbowmen = 240 hammers
2 Trireme = 100 hammers
2 swordmen = 70 hammers
1 war elephant = 60 hammers
4 Phalanx = 140 hammers
3 knight = 270 hammers
1 galley = 80 hammers
1 chariot = 30 hammers
= 990 hammers

Lazteuq:
3 axeman = 105 hammers
2 spearman = 70 hammers
1 galley = 80 hammers
14 catapult = 450 hammers
3 knight = 270 hammers
1 worker = 60 hammers
1 caravel = 60 hammers
= 1345 hammers + 3 razed cities + 1 conquered

[Charriu]

T154:

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The war has ended with Lazteuq accepting the peace deal. From a pure hammer exchange I am the winner.

Charriu:
4 Crossbowmen = 240 hammers
2 Trireme = 100 hammers
2 swordmen = 70 hammers
1 war elephant = 60 hammers
4 Phalanx = 140 hammers
3 knight = 270 hammers
1 galley = 80 hammers
1 chariot = 30 hammers
= 990 hammers

Lazteuq:
3 axeman = 105 hammers
2 spearman = 70 hammers
1 galley = 80 hammers
14 catapult = 450 hammers
3 knight = 270 hammers
1 worker = 60 hammers
1 caravel = 60 hammers
= 1345 hammers + 3 razed cities + 1 conquered


But removing the units that are obsolete or soon to be obsolete reveals this:

Charriu:
4 Crossbowmen = 240 hammers
1 war elephant = 60 hammers
3 knight = 270 hammers
= 570 hammers

Lazteuq:
3 knight = 270 hammers
1 worker = 60 hammers
1 caravel = 60 hammers
= 640 hammers + 3 razed cities + 1 conquered

The hammer exchange is actually a lot closer, but most importantly I destroyed 3 of his cities, one of them a big one and conquered the rather economically weak city of Humpback (which I will rename next turn). Looking at Lazteuq's empire and what units where produced I also think that it was the right time to get out of the war. It will would have resolved into a bloody stalemate, which I wasn't fully prepared for yet. Don't forget I started the war sooner than I wanted to, because the culture pressure got annoying.




I think I made an impact and slowed Lazteuq down a bit. His GNP is equal or worse then mine and he was running a golden age for the last 8 turns. Speaking of that he didn't switch civics on his last golden age turn, so he's still in HR, Vassalage, Serfdom, Pacifism. So now annoying culture pressure for the near future. He is researching Astronomy and will get it in 3 turns if this wouldn't be his last golden age turn. I also saw that he only has one great person (merchant) in his empire and will now need 3 for the next golden age.
On a minor side note. Due to the peace my units got teleported into TBS territory. But closing borders towards him teleported them right back to me. Of course I send another open border deal back.

Now where to go from here. I think it's clear that I made an enemy for PB-life here and Lazteuq will retaliate. It's also apparently clear that he will try to return the same gift I gave him to me (razing coastal cities). That's what Astronomy is for. When it comes to land units we are still equals, but he is still ahead in tech. I will switch into bureaucracy, serfdom next turn. Not sure yet if I should focus courthouses in cities and with that Organized Religion for 5 turns. That depends on how fast Lazteuq will be to Astronomy. The next 10 turns will be important preparations for a defensive against naval landings and a counter offensive on land.




One good things is that he can't move galleons past me without me noticing them, because I control the straits and those cities are on a hill. Of course I will still invest in more defenders in my holy city to the NW of them, but my eastern cities of Figaro, Fireburg and Freeja are more at risk here. For that I prepare a mobil defense stack of nights on my mainland and I will put at least 3 defenders into every coastal city, just to be sure. Good thing is that he will pay more for his units and every unit going onto naval adventures can't defend his homeland. 




Speaking of his home land. One of my biggest goals in the war was missed and that was cutting Lazteuq off from the inner sea. Now he only has 3 cities on the inner sea and thanks to my capture of Humpback he lost the only canal to the inner sea. That way I will know if he has galleons there. Still it would have been great to get rid of those 3 cities. I also thought about founding cities on the former ruins of Lazteuq's cities, but ultimately decided against it. I would only be able to support them via transport, because of one mountain and I may not be able to have that luxury of support. Instead I leave this for Lazteuq to resettle and invest hammers into those spots again.

Oh and on a very tiny side note. Elkad is being attacked by Miguelito and that continent will soon host only two major powers (Miguelito and civac) It looks like Elkad needed stone and he made me a silk for my stone offer, which I of course accepted. I think the conflict between Miguelito and civac will be a very important turning point in this PB as the winner will be most likely the first to hold a whole continent. This is also another reason I don't want to attack Mjmd as he will be a buffer towards those two in the future.

[Charriu]

T156:

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Who needs courthouses, when your citizens love you and therefore refuse to pay maintenance. So far I haven't tracked it that exactly but I would guess that I had at least 10 WLTKDs so far. Staying at 8 pop was a good idea so far.

Lazteuq will complete Astronomy next turn. I would guess he used a great person to bulb it halfway. Otherwise I can't explain how he managed to do it so fast. I also lost track of his main stack with his general. Hopefully I manage to pop borders in Humpback so that I get extra vision from the mountain.As you can see Lazteuq also did not make any moves to resettle his area so far.
I also realized and remembered why he didn't switch civics at the end of his golden age. Of course he is SPI and can switch at any point like me. The reason why I didn't notice this before is because he didn't switch civics as often as I did. The only final question about that is: Who used SPI better? Me or him?

In domestic terms I switched into bureaucracy and serfdom and I completed Calendar. I'm connecting the sugar and incense just to get those extra happiness. Happiness isn't a big problem so far, but better safe then sorry and the extra commerce and food from the tiles can't hurt either. I will complete Aesthetics this turn. My goal is to get to cuirassiers via Drama, (Literature), Music, (Philosophy), Nationhood, Gunpowder, Military Tradition. I figured that Lazteuq might try to get the upper hand on the water, which he definitely can do. The problem is that the more units are on his ships trying to attack my cities the less he has to defend his homeland. My main stack is also still at his border drawing troops there.

Since I accidentally got vision on Cornflakes during the war I figured I could also give you an overview of his 3 main culture cities.









He's way ahead in culture and at a point, where I think it is futile to attempt a culture victory of myself. Still I'm not worried. He has two strong direct neighbors in civac and piccadilly, who can stop him, when the time comes. And should Cornflakes win by culture then it will be well earned.

[Charriu]

T159:

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Back from the vacation and glad to be home again. Can't say I like traveling, but a father gotta do what a father has to do.




I send out my caravel to explore the ocean and wouldn't you know it found an island. So far I'm not too impressed.




Back home I finally renamed Humpback to Esther City. This is from Final Fantasy VIII, my very first Final Fantasy game. What makes Esther City great is a bit spoilery. In the game there's always talk about this mysterious land of Esther and in the later parts of the game you finally enter it and I have to say discovering Esther City truely blows you away. It's a huge and I mean really huge city, which is high-tech technology compared to the other towns and even our present. On top of it the whole city is hidden from the rest of the world by this technology. But best to see it in action at 23:06:




I discovered that Lazteuq has built 2 galleons so far. Right now he's collecting money to push for gunpowder. To my pleasant surprise he's only make half the gold income that I have. He's also building a lot of workshops, so I suspect him to push for Chemistry and maybe Military Science for Grenadiers. As you can see he also re-settled one of his cities and what you can't see is that he switched into slavery. This will slow down his tech rate further.
His sea superiority will be a problem in the future, but thankfully he did not built any galleons in the inner sea. I plan to build some musketmen for defense with gunpowder.

[Charriu]

T160:

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Opened the turn to a little surprise. Apparently Lazteuq invested 1 turn of espionage into me, which lost me city vision on him. Well that's to bad to scout out his galleon moves and numbers, but nothing I want to turn back right now. On the contrary it's great that invested that money into me and not into gunpowder, which he still has to research even though he switched to Engineering. He also got less espionage points then I did when I invested only 50% of espionage into him. Since he has changed tech to Engineering I assume he splitted his income into espionage and research? We'll see.

His new founded city got a free spread of Islam, which is just great because he does not get culture from that.  

I switched into slavery this turn to get Esther City's defenses ready. I whipped a theatre there and I will be able to pop borders there before the peace runs out. That will give me the mountain to the east. Unfortunately the northern mountain is under thick culture from Lazteuq and out off reach for me for a while. Would need to pop borders a second change to have a realistic chance there. Maybe I do that with some artists.

I also whipped some other cities to overflow into musketman next turn with gunpowder. On the diplomatic front I noticed that Miguelito forgot to cancel our last 400 gold for 44 gpt loan. That's just great love to take that extra income.  

Lastly something really funny happened. I was online with civac and we were about to make a trade deal of his whale and 13 gpt for 100 gold from me. We accepted and noticed the deal did not go through. That's because while we were setting up the deal, Tarkeel logged in and already had the same trade deal from civac. Tarkeel managed to accept before us, which nullified our trade deal. Another PB mystery solved and good to know that the code is robust.