[SPOILERS] yuris125 on a Pitboss77 boat

[yuris125]

Scooter researched Education. He's going to Lib Steel and kill us all

[yuris125]

You know, I was going to attack Bing this turn, but this might actually be enough to change my mind




I could still go after Cairo....

[yuris125]

After clicking accept with the reasoning that I could declare war anyway if I decide to go ahead, I see that Bing actually has a billion catapults near Core City, making my landing there unsafe




Looks like he had a caravel to spot my galleon stack

In other news, Cairo managed to steal Lib, taking Astro with it. So Bing is the last player without Astro, but he has almost 600g saved, so he's not far off

That said, Cairo still has by far the weakest military, and a completely undefended city on our border. Going after him just makes sense, especially as he just fired golden age and switched out of Slavery (so did Scooter, but going after Scooter still gets ruined by frigates)

I'm going to research Education before Gunpowder, since it is a pre-req, and I should start using my great scientists

Re-offered OB to SD (they did get broken when Scooter clicked accept in my communication about not joining his attack)

[yuris125]

I'll be honest, I'm struggling to figure out the best play. Obviously I have to attack someone, otherwise Scooter has too much advantage and is likely to increase his lead to the point of becoming uncatchable. My plan has been focused on making military acquisitions with samurai, and so far I haven't been able to make it work

SD and Bing both managed to build enough units to dissuade me from attacking

Here are Cairo's western holdings (his west, my east)




Could I take them over? Probably at least some, maybe all - he's not in slavery and still defending with archers. But they don't look high quality

There's also Scooter's astro island to my south




It's still lightly defended (there's a stack of 2 muskets and a crossbow on the tile S of Silver Lake), and would look nice as part of my empire. How realistic would this be to hold against frigates? How many frigates does he even have, considering he couldn't significantly advance the attack on SD?

If I could quickly get to frigates, it would make things easier. But I would need to pick up Education, Printing Press, and Philosophy before I can bulb Chemistry. And of course I need Gunpowder, no Chemistry without that. I can maybe get there in 10 turns, when the next great scientist is due out of Kyoto. But leaving Scooter to his own devices for 10 turns lets him have a full undisrupted golden age, and could well leave him in commanding position (or even more commanding than he has now)

I really have to think if I should be brave and hit scooter while he's out of slavery, and leave the others for later. It's so scary to attack into a player with frigates though....

[yuris125]

So what I'm thinking is, if the situation doesn't change - a quick strike on Cairo to take Seville and Barcelona - the former is free, the latter has marble. Maybe get a little capture gold to fund my research towards Gunpowder. Then once I have Gunpowder, go see if there's a way to grab some Scooter's cities. Letting Scooter have all Astro land uncontested is almost certainly a losing play, but I really don't feel like I can go against frigates with nothing better than galleons. I need at least privateers

[yuris125]

Scooter declared on Cairo, no cities were captured on the first turn of the war, but I see on PBSpy he took two now

I may have to make my attack on Cairo more committed, depending on how far Scooter goes. With Cairo's power graph where it is, and him being out of slavery, this may go very poorly for him. I still don't see a way to make gains against Scooter, the southern island from last turn's screenshot now has both cities decently defended (musket + 2 crossbows in one city, two muskets in the other)

This feels like the case of "it's not only about having enough stuff, but using it well". Scooter managed to take three cities from SD, and is now taking cities from Cairo. Whereas I had my army sailing all over the world, running into sufficient defences everywhere, and not accomplishing anything of note

I bulbed/completed Education, Gunpowder is now a 2-turn research at 100%, and I may have to build wealth to afford running 100% research. Depends on how much capture gold I get

[yuris125]

So one of the cities Scooter took was one of the cities I was targetting




Scooter got Barcelona in a peace treaty, after taking two cities further east (oranges boxes on the screenshot)

I think this is happening y'all. I think I'm going to war with Scooter. Allowing him to smash and grab like this without consequences is a sure way to lose

I cannot reach the city this turn, so I'm thinking something like this




I will move the galleons as shown and demand Seville from Cairo. This city is not viable for him, and I'm sure he knows it (as is evident from the fact that it's already size 3, still not defended, there's no ships on the way, and Cairo is out of slavery). Him ceding it via diplomacy will allow trade routes to continue without losing value

Regardless of the outcome of the diplo, I can reach formerly-Barcelona (assume Scooter renamed it) next turn. Just might have to spare a unit to capture Seville if Cairo does not cede it

The alternative plan is moving to the tile 2N1W of Seville. Downsides are that there's a higher risk of being spotted by Scooter, and I would have to pay a lot of unit supply cost, at the time when gold income is critical. The upside is that I would be able to reach the other cities Scooter just captured the turn after. However, since he did take those cities with military, there's likely at least a couple frigates in the area, and the cities have at least some defences. I don't think this is worth attempting

The main problem with the plan of going to war with Scooter is on the other side of the empire




Scooter has at least 3 frigates around the island to my south, and of course I still don't have anything better than galleons. I said Gunpowder is a 2t research at 100%, but of course I cannot afford 100% science, it will be at least 3 turns

Now, these frigates could be there just as a "don't even think about it" message, to stop any kind of an attempted attack on this island from me (or SD for that matter). By themselves they shouldn't accomplish much more than pillaging some seafood. But of course, having ships in your territorial waters which you cannot kill is far from ideal

My hope is that Scooter, smart player that he is, will value having a peace treaty with me during his golden age, and let it slide. And while it pains me to give him peace of mind during said golden age, realistically I cannot make any kind of significant progress against him until I have frigates (privateers at least give me means to kill stray frigates)

Now as I'm writing this post (which was a bit of a "think as I type" exercise), I circle back to the idea of demanding Seville for continued peace with Cairo. Is it even worth it? If I'm planning to grab a single city from Scooter, hopefully without a shot fired, and peace out with him - should I just keep going against Cairo?

[yuris125]

I did declare of Cairo and take Seville. I'm also positioned to move on Barcelona next turn, if it's safe

The main plan is to take Barcelona, peace out with Scooter, and have 10 turns to take as much of Cairo's land as possible without worrying about Scooter jumping in

There are a number of possible deviations, depending on what kind of defence Cairo can put up, and whether Scooter will be willing to accept peace

[yuris125]

Unfortunately Scooter did manage to bring defenders into Barcelona. 2 muskets and a crossbow, enough to make my attack ineffective

I take Lazy Days without complications, it was still defended by 3 archers, who died to ampibious samurai. Ebudae will be harder to break, it has 4 longbows and 4 archers. It's not even a great city to take, it's on a 2-tile island with no good land tiles, and with too much culture pressure. I'm not convinced how interested I am in taking it - will decide after further scouting next turn. Really the only point of taking it would be to relieve culture pressure; even if I decide to go for it, it will probably have to be razed. It is the taoist holy city, but I don't expect taoism to be impactful enough to worry about it

Scooter built a stack on 3 frigates and 2 galleons on the northern cap of his island to my south. Should Scooter want to attack me, it could hit either Yokohama or Nagoya. Both cities have two longbows on defence and in theory should be safe from an attack from sea, but I reinforced them with samurai from reserve. This is the power of being ahead in navy though, Scooter can declare war, try to find a soft target, but even if he doesn't, there's not much I would be able to do about his invading stack. I imagine that's how he got away with his smash and grab forays so far

Gunpowder in 2 turns though, capture gold from Lazy Days was enough to give me sufficient funds. Then things should get easier

Sorry I thought I did take a screenshot, turns out I didn't, but don't want to log in again

[yuris125]

Opened the game to a white peace offer from Cairo

I knew from a quick look on PBSpy last night that he switched to slavery (he also went vassalage/theocracy), and was thinking that I probably won't make much progress. So here's the situation




I can definitely take Madrid, but to what benefit? In order to make progress, I would need to take/raze Ebudae and Anywhere Is. Both are defended by 4 longbows. With catapults I could work on them and probably take them, but it won't be a quick attack I'm looking for

Especially since I have another problem




Scooter has Military Science. I didn't even register that it was gone from the "can research" list - my bad. His smash-and-grab missions just got way more dangerous. He also has a galleon, which probably has the 2 muskets + crossbow stack that was in Barcelona last turn, forking Toyama and Shimonoseki (the other naval stack is 2 frigates and privateer). I have a galleon with longbows in range to reinforce Shimonoseki, and can dry whip a longbow in Toyama, but this increasingly is becoming a game of putting out fires (or at least reacting to fire alarms)

I have to go to war with Scooter very soon, before he can get too much out of his city count advantage. Which means that getting stuck sieging Cairo's cities, which will take ages to become productive, is likely not beneficial

So I think I will take the peace, and focus on building up a force capable of standing up to Scooter. Scooter doesn't seem to be actively looking for a conflict (at least him bypassing Seville suggests so), but I absolutely expect him to pounce on any perceived weakness he finds. I must ensure I don't have any