[PB75 Spoiler] Ginger and Civac's Outside Context Problem

[Ginger*]

   


In the west I sent 6 Guerilla 2 Jannies and 4 Mobility Cuirassiers to harass Anglerfish and Perch, hopefully cutting roads all around and preventing him from moving units around 

In the far south Greenline does fuck-all 

We are world top power at 1.6 million, but Dreylin trails us at just under 1million, additionally drafting and 80 gold of unit maintenance is crippling our economy. We rolled a prophet last turn and I just instantly shrined him to get the gold income. I'm half debating swapping into slavery in 2 turns and just whipping Cuirassiers till kingdom come but I'm too conservative a player to go all-in like that


I offered him peace too for his entire treasury and income, reasoning being that 4000 gold is enough to get Steel and either come back with Cannons or use Cannon first strike to defend while I instead attack Ljubljana. I don't expect him to accept that offer though

[Ginger*]

On the interturn our EP vision kicked in, so we see all of Dreylin's cities (bless Nationalism's +25% EP spending). He also killed our roading workers. 2 of those workers were gonna die, but the other 2 were entirely preventable and I trolled it 
Dreylin looks like he's 7 turns away from Mil Sci, although he might be sandbagging. Naufragar has it already

   
Here is where the main action of the turn took place. Razed the silver mines and more importantly, their roads, now he can no longer threaten Aintab. The hill-mover stacks moved further south, hopefully to cut the last road around Anglerfish. 


   
We march on. Missing two workers now we lose the opportunity to fork the capital and the coast from that southern grasshill. However we remain alert for opportunities to try and exploit our Cuirassiers. Another benefit of this early Renaissance army is that we can ignore Castles

[Ginger*]

We lose our hillmovers, taking down 4cats and 7knights, not a favorable trade but nearly even, okay i guess

We then storm Trout with cats and cuirs, losing all 8 cats but the remaining battles are all >80% victories. Cuirassier Gaming ladies and gentlemen

We run a little risk this turn with some smaller reinforcement stacks trickling in. Also some Cuirassier are exposed to run down some muskets before they can get behind city walls, we'll see if Dreyling trades us down. 

Greenline looks like he can take two cities down south. And Dreylin has pulled away several knights to defend that push.

As the last turn of the golden age, we swap to Vassalage as the empire is pretty thoroughly drafted down. We currently have 47 Janniesaries and 40 Cuirassiers empire wide.

[Ginger*]

Greenline's stack has evaporated but it appears that his distraction has created sufficient weakness for us to go for the kill. We want to hurry this war as quickly as possible before all of his available population gets whipping into Knights or worse, Grens. 

   
We advance our infantry and siege 1S of Trout, and dive with our mounted towards Cod   Cuirassier Gaming
About 14 units remain in trout, either healing or protecting the wounded. If Dreylin tries to go for Trout he'll just get whacked by our main stack of Jannies/Cats


   
Not content with splitting our stack twice, we send a third, smaller stack to siege Perch. If it still lacks a castle next turn, we will bombard, if a castle is whipped on the interturn, same MO as Trout, sac the siege and storm with gunpowder units. 
This stack was supposed to be our contingency stack (Read: Frisky Zulu Containment) but the opportunity to take Perch looked too good to pass up.


   
Economic advisor tells us we'd be in the red without Spiral Minaret, also Org and Agg would each save us over 40 gpt

   
Cities ranked by unhappiness, CHM hasn't been slacking

   
Statistic by most built We can see that we drafted 44 Janissaries over the course of our golden age (16turns taj + 2person)

[Ginger*]

stupid culture retraction bugs

[Ginger*]

and lose 4 80+% bc why tf not

[Ginger*]

Ljubljana declared and invaded with 11 Guerilla Longbows, 2 G2 Muskets, about 5 horse archers, 3 pikeman, and a single knight.  
Okay buddy
granted I really shouldve just left 5 Janissaries at home to at least require him to bring siege but I didn't think he would have the guts to pull this move while I'm top power and have a substantial mil tech advantage.
Guerilla 2 is a cheeky touch to advance quickly but I'm pretty sure we stop him with only one Ankyra lost unless another rabbit comes out of the hat.

On the whole this feels like Chichen Itza 2.0, strong tactical execution of a boneheaded strategic decision . Ljub has every advantage in demo stats and a distinct disadvantage in military power. Choosing to attack now after Dreylin has been thoroughly gutted but before Ljub's demo advantages can manifest in real units probably speaks more to a personal fear or respect of me as a player rather than a reading of the board state itself. "Oh no he's gonna snowball if I don't throw myself in front of the bus right now" 
I guess its time to show him what it means to be the bus driver

The war with Dreylin is good enough that we might not need to stop advancing*. He has a core of 11 knights and 11 cats that still could hurt us but he's been exceedingly cautious with his catapult placement, I think the power of cuirassier dives have put him on edge. Speaking of Cuirassiers we've actually lost a lot (20) this war. There was a critical battle that cost us 8 after some offensive low rolls turned into a vulnerability to counterattack. But each loss has come with substantial gain in exchange. Especially on offense, neutralizing Castles has been ridiculously powerful. Combat odds have been probably average this war. I only feel they were bad because they hurt me in a battle where it really would've counted: a snowball dynamic with tight numbers and promotion->counterattack

*I need to decide whether to forge ahead and close out the war while letting Ljub take a city, or leave enough behind to hold while I go burning in the north.  

I realize I didn't talk about burning Dreylin's capital and why I did it. Our infantry/siege stack was positioned to reinforce on the turn of capture, but was cut off by the culture bug where culture in the second ring was not removed by city capture (calibrated next turn). Honestly I think this should've been fixed in BUG but whatever I guess it's a feature now. So, we burned it because it's existence and possibility of recapture gave Dreylin a potential swing point to recover his cultural control and economic/whip potential. I'd lie if I said that it didn't suck but don't be afraid to kill your darlings. The war is much more securely in our favor now and Dreylin has no hope of reaching Mil Sci.

[Ginger*]

We ate 11 of Dreylin's cats, then traded 6 Cuirs for 5 knights on defense. Bitter pill but we had to swallow it. GG Dreylin. 
So, we bombard and heal and wait a turn, and also advance our infantry stack on Haddock now that the cat threat is gone. 

Ljubljana is puzzling me, reroutes some units back from Ankyra (to go after Meleti?), keeps half in Ankyra, and moves ~10 weak units to threaten Prusa. Split stacking doesn't really work great when my main defense force is 2 movers. 

I also wonder why he didn't go all in; he sees my stack in Dreylin land with his scout. Maybe I shouldn't jinx it, there's still a lot of space to fuck it up, but each turn that ticks by we stabilize the situation. 

Ljub popped his golden age and is finishing Nationalism. That is a bit scary, because his production potential will beat mine for a bit, but his reinforcements will be arriving alongside the return of my army from Dreylin.

[Ginger*]

with 20 cuirassiers in theater, the north has been stabilized. Zulu Ankyra will not get first ring before civ7 is released. I just kinda puzzled what his whole plan was. If he burned and kept diving he might've caused me enough damage but now I'm really just more angry than anything else.
So I offered him peace for Ankyra, being so generous as I am, giving him an off-ramp and opportunity for repentance  

However he has found a way to actually hurt me,
   

Oof I walked right into this one. This was also a pretty expensive city to take, so it just sucks. Speaking of expensive I lost 3 combats over 80%. Idk how my luck on defense has been, I dont have the patience to go through combat logs, I guess Dreylin can tell me after hes eliminated, but my offensive rolls have been terrible for about the last 5 turns. We've lost so many cuirassiers, including one on 97+ this turn.  

If ljubljana wants to be really clever he should liberate it but I imagine greed will get the better of him as it did at Ankyra. 
Greenline has not been whipping any knights and even pulled back the stack what would've made him some gains. Greenline's contribution at the beginning of the war was significant, allowing me to break Dreylin's back with the capital dive, but he's been way too cautious since. We could've wrapped it up by now if he put some elbow grease into building quality units. whip man whip, you won't be getting better tech than knights for a while. 

Maybe he plans to stab me and join Ljubljana? That's a game losing move considering Ljubljana's golden age will likely take him to rifles or spitting distance of. looks like Naufragar got smashed by Superdeath, which was gonna happen eventually if he kept sitting in cat/knight range.

[Ginger*]

To say I'm unhappy with Ljub is a bit of an understatement. I totally get someone attacking me if they can succeed, but when you just do annoyance damage and leave me intact its exhausting, because I'm obligated to make the game miserable for both of us until a substantive apology is received. I don't have the mental grit for this kind of slog that players like Superdeath, Commodore or Miguelito have. Gotta preserve mental and keep fighting correctly despite the tilt. 

Dreylin keeps attacking out and killing a couple cuirassiers at a time. I've lost a lot of units in this war, something like 24 cats, 32 Cuirs, 19 Jannisaries. With a kill count of 42 muskets, 27 cats (on defense), 27 knights, and 9 pikes. I haven't been very efficient (or alternatively you could say Dreylin defended well)

Graphs loaded in, looks like naufragar's defeat in Rome is total, and there will be no pressure on Ljub from the east. He can't attack our core but we keep bleeding power cleaning up Dreylin. Zephyrion produces two 4promo Cuirs every 3turns, but draft wouldve been much nicer. Civac told me Serf/Vassalage was cocky, and he was right. What can I say, I had dreams of Commando factory 
We are however teching away from Commandos atm. Printing Press and Replaceable Parts seem much stronger and more necessary. Although I'm gonna cry for cannons if Ljub decides to invade with a stack of 60 shitters.