Chevalier Rides Again: A City Lights exploration

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

City Lights II Turn 149

Well, turns out he did have enough to take Prance, and I lose a battleship armada:


Bugger. That's 3 battleships, plus two I lost here earlier, as well as two destroyers and a sub. If I'd kept all of those alive I might have a squadron able to challenge England here. Instead I have to continue to trade space for time, falling back upon Cloppowa and Ponyville. I have only 2 destroyers and 2 BBs in the theater now, and those dozen battleships are in striking distance of Dodge Junction and Maneco - and Maneco is a core city! I may need to transfer bombers here and resort to nuclear solutions. 

For now, though, eyes on the prize: Seoul, Gyeongju, and London. 

First, we swap into Fascism, for a +5 strength boost, +50% unit production, and a few more policy cards:


I slot in Wars of Religion for +4 more strength, giving me +9 combat strength and +50% production to all units. From here we head to Professional Sports for Ski Resorts and Stadiums, which should solve my amenity issues, and then on to Social Media for the end-game science and culture civics. 

I get a bit of revenge as my air power knocks out an English artillery army:


Not quite equal exchange for the armada but at least it stings him. 

And south of Trotonto I sink one battleship after the second withdraws:

 
There are two submarines skulking but I expect they daren't challenge destroyers. I'll pull back to my cities for now and heal up. 

On to the main front:


My small army si gathered at Sidon - appalling casualties on land, but I rely entirely on air and sea power now. And Korea has almost no AA left, meaning a pair of bombers absolutely massacre Jinju's defenses. It's trivial for the tank to strike the finishing blow:



That takes out an artillery and a bomber. On the whole the hammer exchange is in my favor most turns like this, but my enemies have vastly more strategic depth and resources than I do. 

We make use of Jinju's city defenses, our artillery corps, and a fighter to take out one of the two machine guns, expecting the other to keep retreating towards Gyeongju:



And at sea, we hammer Suwon - the bomber there will probably evacuate since it will be destroyed if it stays, sparing me one round of assaults:


It and Portsmouth could fall next turn, or I could take Suwon and even direct my bombers north towards Gyeongju, which is in range of my tank. Basically my advance is limited only by my move speed at this point.

Point Tinian is about 4 turns' of movement away, so we should be able to knock out London by 154 - although conquering it will take longer.

 

And our fleet is gathered to sweep up the Korean archipelago, while our bombers and tanks storm over the plains. Seoul is once again in striking range, but it has formidable defenses - and the English fleet is getting dangerously near in the west.



Exciting times! I'm having fun again.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

City Lights II - Turn 150: Equestria's Revenge

Situation in Korea at the start of the turn:


Last turn, we stormed our first Korean city of Jinju using a pair of bombers and a tank to blast the city down. At the same time, more Korean machine guns, naval, and air power were immolated at Mtw and Aynook, and with that we were able to fling our fleet around Cape Aynook, opening up the initial bombardment of Portsmouth and more or less demolishing Suwon. In fact, the only limiting factor at sea at the moment is our lack of melee units to capture cities - 2 destroyers and 2 carriers, in theory enough for our needs but just slow to reach the front!

Now we've kicked in the door to the Korean heartland, which is the massive urban complex of Seoul, Korea's largest and most productive city, Gyeongju, their capital, and Jeonju, the third city of the empire. Seoul is seemingly stoutly defended with battleships, hwachas, and machine guns, and Gyeongju has an artillery to fend off battleship attack (I guess that's the thinking). I intend to storm both cities and Suwon this turn - Portsmouth will survive only because we can't reach it with a melee unit this turn. 

First, a bomber based on a carrier off the Korean coast opens festivities:


Seoul loses half its defenses and a good chunk of health, while the battleship lightly damages the bomber. Between Fascism and Wars of Religion my bombers now have +9 defenses against AA, so Korea's ability to stop me has declined dramatically. 

Next, my artillery corps wheels into place. Aided by a great general (who enables siege units to move and fire) and a drone spotting, it can shred the remaining defenses and reduce the city to half health:

 

The pair of fighters I have in the area strip off the remaining health and defenses:

 

And finally the cavalry surge from deep in the rear to occupy Seoul, some 20 turns after my first efforts from the coast:





Now, Gyeongju is only in range of one bomber, and it would normally take me at least one turn to batter it down with battleship fire. But Korea has no more AA in his empire, and in the age of nuclear weapons, that's fatal:

 
I detonate the gadget off Gyeongju's coast, to limit the fallout to only two land tiles - this is our real-estate after all. Tanks race from Jinju up Korean highways and roll into the blasted capital a few hours later, while at sea the pile of rubble formally known as Suwon surrenders to my destroyer as it drops anchor on the city's waterfront:


 
Taking three Korean cities in one turn, and four in the last two turns - most of them core cities, too, including his capital, and destroying his armed forces in the process, feels supremely satisfying. It is my opinion that Korea was the driving force behind this war - Phoenicia and England attacked on his insistence, and it has been his stubbornness that has prolonged the fighting far beyond reason. I offered a white peace after destroying the Korean expeditionary force in Equestria, the Phoenician army in New Equestria, and defeating their main navies in the western seas. That was refused. I offered another peace treaty after razing his western seaboard - refused. I offered a third just after the fall of Tyre, asking for Sidon, Mtw, and Aynook in exchange for ending the fighting. Again refused. At every turn we have attempted to leave in peace with Korea, and instead he has stubbornly insisted on his own destruction. Well, now apart from Jeonju he has a few isolated island cities in the north and some iceball resource plants in the south (technically Phoenician but whatever). He's irrelevant. The army and a bomber or two will complete the conquest of the mainland, and then we'll leave him to rot while our main effort is directed at England, the last real enemy.

Most of the navy, though, has turned to the east, where we'll make our way through the rest of the archipelago. Portsmouth will fall on turn 151, Yangsan on turn 152, and we should reach point Tinian with a gadget ready on turn 153. Three more turns to gut Britain, though I'll need a few turns to sail over there and occupy the radioactive ruins and seize the Venetian Arsenal for Equestria. 

So the situation heading for London:

 

Southwest front, 2 English subs sink one of my destroyers, so I pull the survivor back into port. My fighter evacuates doomed Cloppowa and takes up the defense at Trotonto, where it can effectively ward off the submarines. 

 
A battleship won't make it out of the city, but otherwise I manage to evacuate all defenders. I group a small squadron north, at Ponyville, and begin transferring a single bomber over from the Korean front. Its duty will mostly be nuclear deterrence against that massive battleship fleet, if I can find a way to deal with the AA. 



(Bomber visible at Vanhoover in the east, next turn it will transfer to Dodge Junction and I'll begin plotting nuclear attacks where possible). 

Domestic housekeeping. Our tech path:


We're entering the information age, heading for nuclear fusion. I could get GDR instead, but honestly those seem to pale in comparison with the ability to erase enemy cities with a single unit, needing only to occupy the ruins. Our science is appallingly bad for a normal game reaching this stage, but my amenities are terrible from the war and I've built no researach infrastructure for 50 turns now. 

We're steadily converting our captured cities to our religion, Friendship:


I have Tithe, Work Ethic, Stupas, and I can't recall my last belief - maybe religious colonization? It wasn't intended to be a warrior religion, hence why I left Crusade and DotF off the table. I was also attacked just after I finished the Intelligence Agency in my Plaza, instead of the Grandmaster's Chapel - so I have 10,000 faith sitting around, unable to buy military units with it since I didn't expect this to devolve into nuclear warfare by the end of things. Bummer.

my military:


The army is tiny and the navy about equal to Britain's, from what I've seen. The real power is the air force:


five bombers and four fighters - technically above our aluminum supply, but we can fix it with a policy card - have driven us through the second half of Phoenicia and half of Korea. These and nukes are the reason we're still advancing even despite monstrous attrition.

[greenline]

How would you rate the city lights mod compared to the base game?

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

City Lights I - 153

Here, Mars is 1 turn from launching.

 
The game should end within 25 turns or so. 

7 English cities have been put to the torch by Cree nuclear submarines, including London. The English player immediately surrendered upon opening hte save, so we've all but called this. Germany is the last human player and allowing me to see the victory screen. 

City Lights II - 151
In an extremely surprising turn of events, the devastating blow of losing his core has caused Seondeok to at last sue for peace. After some haggling, I am pleased to announce that acceptable terms were reached by both parties, and the Equestrian-Korean war has drawn to an end. The war against England continues, though.



We start the turn by unlocking Lasers and Professional Sports. Lasers enable us to upgrade our 4 fighters to Jet fighters, which will reign pretty supreme in unit to unit combat once I can upgrade them. Our battleships can also be upgraded to missile cruisers. Professional Sports si even better - stadiums and ski resorts! Ski resorts turn every single mountain into an amenity, which I desperately need. 

Let's start with the headline peace deal, then move to the war against England.

Korea initially asks for every original Korean city, sans Gumi, back, in exchange for vowing to remain at peace for the rest of the game, essentially conceding. We're both frank during discussions - the Equestrian nuclear advantage is, essentially, unstoppable, as is the pony Air Force. The only thing stopping me from sweeping up Jeonju and then his remaining island cities is time to sail over there, essentially. So, Korea is prostrate, and furthermore with no native sources of aluminum or uranium he can't hope to be a military threat ever again - even missile cruisers and rocket artillery don't hold up in the information age. Thus, Korea is not a threat, and frankly unless I opt for domination holding all his cities isn't part of my win condition, anyway. So I offer what are probably generous terms: I retain Suwon, and in exchange for Gyeongju and Seoul back, he is to surrender the island of Yangsan as a base for me to use against England. He pushes back one more time, asking for Jinju in exchange for Yangsan, and I accept.

 
So, Yangsan will come to me next turn when he gets the chance to respond (and if it doesn't, well, then I can take it, and every other Korean city anyway). 

Thus, the war that started back before turn 100 is probably in its final turns. The massive English fleet still needs to be broken, but if I defeat that, and storm his capital, I expect the morale of the English player will be broken and the game will be conceded. SO, here's how we make that happen.



The far western island sees a submarine fleet pillage my seaport at Trotonto. Never join your raiders into fleets! You gain extra combat strength, but you can only raid one thing per turn. Raiders I mostly use as meatshields and to soak up fire, anyway - see the other game against randoms in this very thread. With the submarines nicely concentrated for me, my fighter and destroyer make short work of them (I hit with the destroyer first so I don't leave the safety of the city, then finish the job from the air).



Air units are all-but unstoppable in Civ VI, I'm learning, and the only reason England has made as much progress as he did (two cities, soon three, taken) is because all my reinforcements have gone to the main front in Korea. Now I can turn all my resources to stopping him. 

In the east, my carrier takes Portsmouth:


And with peace with Korea imminent, I need launch no attacks this turn, and instead the fleet makes all steam possible for point Tinian, which we should reach with our carrier...next turn? 2 turns? Either way, I think we're on course for a nuclear strike on London on turn 153. That might end the game.



London is a jewel. He spawned next to Kilimanjaro, nice. Also home to the Venetian Arsenal, though appropriately enough the Industrial Zone that allowed it to be built has sunk beneath the sea since. Still, London is England's largest, most productive, and most research-generating city, and not least the VA enables him to pop out two ships for every one he builds. Thus, even though each individual Cree city is on the whole far larger and more productive (my regular cities are on par with London, and my core cities like Vanhoover, Manehatten, DNRN, and Canterlot are leagues ahead), he's built a navy to compete with mine. We've been fighting with rough tech parity, too - modern era units on modern era units, while my latest kit has generally gone to the Korean front. But note how much of a difference even the one fighter has made on the front! Soon, waves of modern bombers will begin hammering this coast - those two battleships in the lake won't be enough to stop it. Once London goes, his entire empire collapses, as I gain the VA, and he loses his best city. The loss of marginal settlements like Neighpon, Prance, and Cloppowa will be more than balanced.

We end the turn with my fleet securing Point Tinian, all we need now is for the carrier to arrive and the gadgets to be delivered:

 

At home I have half a dozen bombs finishing over the next 5 turns, enough to plaster every major English city:


Again, though, I'm going to continue building these until I run out of targets. Note also a few subs slipping into build queues - I intend to pick up Jet Bombers and then nuclear submarines next, to enable single submarines to lock down entire coast lines. Most of these won't see action, as I think the game will end first, but you never know.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

How would you rate the city lights mod compared to the base game?

It's a pretty well-polished mod, and honestly it feels natural. However, the entire game is warped by the new districts - it's a whole new economic game, basically, as you have to plan your entire gameplan around your rural cities nad your urban cities. I stopped focusing on it because of the war, but next round I'll try to show the main Cree continent and how City Lights districts fueled the massive army from scratch to win the war.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

City Lights I - Endgame and overview

Our first City Lights game has reached turn 158, and will end by turn 160 or so. 

Most of the world outside Equestria and Germany is a post apocalyptic hellscape, radioactive wastes roamed by Giant Death Robots as I systematically razed the entire English civilization over the last 8 turns:











 

So, yeah. About 8 or 9 nuclear submarines and I built over a dozen nuclear weapons, including hydrogen bombs. 

Only Germany and myself remain as viable civs, and Germany is content to let the exoplanet expedition crawl towards completion. So, this game - the original game of this thread, which began back in April, 2022, or nearly 2 1/2 years ago, is almost complete. If my reporting was broken and disjointed - with two entire other games interrupting- well, that's because the playing of it was broken and disjointed. I would go weeks or even a month at times without a turn. Once Rome and then Greece dropped out, things picked up, and the swift destruction of the AI civs by Germany, myself, and England accelerated things even further. 

See how much further down the tech tree I am in this game, with no war and plenty of peace to build! My science and culture, despite a worse start than City Lights II, are leagues ahead, and when England finally did declare war not only did I already have a military in place, but my high tier cities were able to churn out dozens of nukes in only 5-6 turns and promptly exterminate him. 



Every city routes to Ponyville here, which grants +10 food and production for every trade route sent to it. It's the platonic ideal of a rural city - filled with Cree pastures, farming towns, mining colonies, and fishing villages. 

Glad it's over, though.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

City Lights I is over, but II still has one player left to throw in the towel.

City Lights II - 152

I blundered during scouting outside Ponyville last turn and left part of my fleet in range for English attack. The massive fleet of battleships comes storming down on my head, sinking one battleship and crippling my DD and missile cruiser:


Oh, yes, missile cruisers. I'm now one tier up in tech on England in this theater, and the cruiser, even badly damaged, can seriously rough up a battleship - and even the crippled destroyer can seriously harm a BB as well. Plus, I have two more destroyers in range, and my bomber is arriving. With the impeding fall of London - England doesn't know about that yet - he's about to lose his Venetian Arsenal and be unable to replace this fleet. Given all those factors, I go ahead and accept battle here. Our goal is to inflict as much damage as we can on the English fleet, hoping to cripple it, knowing the losses are irreplaceable. 

Intact destroyer cripples the westernmost battleship, then my city ranged strike cripples another - easy prey for the damaged destroyer:

 
That's already nearly equalized losses here. THen the missile cruiser cripples the promoted battleship on the eastern flank, and a fresh DD swoops in to finish it off:

 

3 battleships sunk or crippled in exchange for one of my own lost and two damaged ships. I shall certainly lose one destroyer, probably two, maybe even all three - but I'll still have the missile cruiser, and the bomber just arrived in theater, which should be another two battleships on my turn, and he'll be unable to fight back except by shelling the city. 

Final situation, prior to flying in my bomber to Dodge Junction:


5 intact battleships remaining out of an initial strike force of 8. There's a quadruple promoted bastard just to the south, near Cloppowa, which was of course razed. Broader view of the western front at the end of turn:

 

Note that I'll have two atomic weapons available next turn, and I only need one for London. I may have the opportunity to clobber the enemy fleet once and for all here.

In the far east, Korea signs the peace deal, ceding Yangsan - a frankly terrible island useful only as an upgrade and repair base - in exchange for the return of Seoul and Gyeongju. I accept, partially because conquest was never part of my gameplan, partially out of amity, and partially to relieve a large portion of the war weariness and focus all my remaining efforts on England. We're one tile short of Point Tinian with our carrier, but that's okay because I haven't the bombs yet until next turn anyway. Instead we begin long-range bombing operations on England's west coast:



Our bomber here targets the English sub at center of screen, making for Cardiff but one point short - unlucky for him that I have a spy in the city spotting him. 

Situation on the west coast at end of turn:


The main fleet is ready to steam straight for London as soon as the bomb is dropped. I'll also divert one melee unit south to liberate Cardiff - with Kilwa that's +15% production across my entire empire, plus Cardiff has a solid suzerain bonus anyway. 

Domestic matters, since we haven't seen the home front in a long time. 

New Equestria is beginning to slack off military builds, with the coming of peace with Korea and our reliance on air and nuclear power to finish off England. My biggest desire is builders, to throw up ski resorts around the empire:

 

As promised, here's Canterlot, my best Urban City:


Canterlot gets +18 production from its boroughs, ironically only as much as the Holy Site provides via Work Ethic. However, the boroughs ALSO give adjacency to the campus and holy site for more production and science, AND they enable projects like Elder Knowlege (grants production to campuses) or Foreign Trade Expedition (bonus trade routes). For example, our Campus, boosted by a classical borough:



The Holy Site hits 9 adjacency thanks in part to DNRN's classical borough:

 

And the boroughs themselves are great thanks to the specialist slots. Here's the Renaissance borough:

 

All of that is powered by a mess of trade routes to Baltimare, my premier Rural city. Not as strong as Ponyville in City Lights I, but still a great destination:


That's +4 food and +9 production in EVERY city. With more care and dedication I could improve that further, of course - I haven't paid nearly enough attention to this game due to the long breaks between turns. But looking now it's obvious I forgot to promote Magnus to Provision and station him in Baltimare, and I could have built even more rural districts around the town to boost these. 



Even with that half-hearted approach to City Lights, the mod is the main engine of Equestria, and the reason why I was able to outbuild Korea, Phoenicia, and Venetian Arsenal-powered England, even with roughly equal amounts of science. 

Let's wrap up with a quick survey of the world. Here's the remnants of Korea:

 
A bit of a wasteland, but rebuilding. No native aluminum or uranium, slender reserves of oil, and a science base only a third of my own, plus massive population losses, Korea is content to await the end of the game in peace. 

Speaking of strategic resource concerns, England makes a desperate play for uranium:

 
This iceball, far south of conquered Phoenicia, is clearly aimed at securing that nearby uranium deposit. A single carrier can wipe this city out in an afternoon, so I will divert my second carrier with a single bomber attached to come down here and occupy the city, taking the deposit for myself. He still needs to run the Manhattan Project and build a nuke, so I have time. 

The English heartlands, our next target of invasion (I have to hand build an army to occupy this, jeez. Still pissed they attacked me *after* I passed over the Grandmaster's Chapel). 


His capital of London at Kilimanjaro, and across the isthmus a swathe of conquered city-states and Dutch cities. 

Southern England and conquered Rome:


A string of English settlements along the northern coast, but most of the meat here is the excellent Roman civilization to the south. England spared southwestern Rome so he could focus on me.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

I've probably played the last turn of this game. Surrender negotations are in progress, though I went ahead and nuked London anyway in case they fall through. That was for Neighpon!

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Turn 153

As noted, England communicated his intention to surrender, but until that time comes I intend to persecute the war to the fullest. London has to be taken because of the Venetian Arsenal, there is simply no alternative. So, we press on. 

We'll start with the ongoing Battle of Ponyville, where there are 5 English battleships remaining - counting the 4 promotion bastard that just sailed up from the ruins of Cloppowa. I lost my two damaged destroyers, as predicted, but still retain one, plus the city defenses and missile cruiser, with more DDs, subs, and cruisers on the way. 



City defense, destroyer, and missile cruiser reduce that number to 3 battleships remaining, and my bomber promotes to better anti-anti-air defense:

 
I should be able to sweep the lot next turn if England presses the attack - meaning he has no choice but to retreat. The English fleet has been gutted, in a grueling war of attrition for the last two months. I lost 3 cities, but that fleet was irreplaceable. 

Meanwhile, we reach Point Tinian and execute the war-winning maneuver:


London and the canal beyond get plastered with two bombs - the second catches some more battleships and an English artillery moving to reinforce the city. My destroyer is in place to capture the city next turn, seizing the Venetian Arsenal for Equestria once and for all.

To the south, we also reduce Cardiff by conventional means and set up a destroyer to liberate that city as well:



For the first time in almost 50 turns, I feel safe to resume infrastructure builds back home. The war is for all intents and purposes over. 

I have access to the Coalition correspondence for the first tiem. I'll sort through it and try to get their perspective on the war, too.

[shallow_thought]

Boo hiss! War criminal!

What, he won and is now in charge?

Oh, well, never liked London. Ghastly hole. Moved to Barsestshire years ago myself.

What marvellous ruthlessness and skill! Well played sir .