Krill still owed Darrell a bunch of complements, it was just too much for him.
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[SPOILERS] Rusten enters uncharted waters
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There is a god! Better late than never.
 Changing army focus from combined arms/stack strength to mounted stomp. No more trebs/pikes/xbows than what's already in queue. I also sold my golden age research short. IIRC it's 700+ sustainable GPT. 200 hammers ahead of rival best. There will only be a 3-turn window between my two golden ages. Or 2 turns if I decide it's better to starve a pop point than delay it a turn.
The marked tile (circle) is not in 2metra's vision and will serve as my staging spot. I can reach Massawa from the fog the same turn I declare war, capture it, and send most knights in range of the next city.
 Most likely headed there next turn and officially declaring war in 2 turns, although it depends slightly on where his main stack has gone and what condition it's in. I'll have a scout on it next turn. I'll have to evaluate pros and cons of delaying (quicker cities vs. facing less units). 4 workers will be in place to finish the 2 required roads. So soon there will finally be something more exciting to talk about, although this should be a stomp. 2metra has already got a GG and has some war weariness from the Borsche war. I'm not really worried about 2metra's units, but it would be nice if most of the catapults are gone before I pull the trigger. That said, I will be able to outmaneuver them with knights in any case as he doesn't have engineering (and never will as it's currently 400+ turns away at +3 gold per turn. His tech has completely stagnated. I've put enough EP on him to have city visibility, which will make everything easier. He really should be able to see it coming, but even so it wouldn't save him. I'm glad I only have 3 turns of pacifism left because I've reached the point where I'm paying extra for the civic. Vassalage and regular free units doesn't cover everything anymore. My power has started spiking in the graphs and will continue to. Other good news: Still clearly 1st in MFG even while TBW (Krill) is still in his golden age.  Started on the Spiral Minaret. Will take less than 12 turns as I launch another golden age in 3 turns. Will give the UoS a go as well, but I imagine OH is ahead of me as they finished paper a while back and may prioritize it simply to deny me. By itself it's pretty bad for them though, so there is hope they don't bother. A good indicator to see how much they fear the Indians. 
Might have to put my attention towards DS (and SD) after 2metra instead of Borsche, because they both cancelled all their deals with me. Looks like DS instigated the deal.
 Having Borsche as a buffer/shield a little bit wouldn't be the worst thing in the world, but long term I want the full continent. Hoping to be friends with pindicator (and TBW) by the time they clash with OH. I should be set with starting continent + SD-DS continent. 5 civs worth of land in a very defensible formation. For my own sanity I will take the first half of the timer against 2metra. I guess it's also the right thing to do in general as he's already 2nd in a turnsplit.
February 20th, 2020, 10:25
(This post was last modified: February 20th, 2020, 10:28 by Rusten.)
Set up my forces into 2 main stacks.
The first one is on the aforementioned tile with 10 knights.  They will capture Massawa on T0. Capture Matara T1. Capture a 3rd city on T2 (1N of river corn in image below). That 3rd city capture hinges on stack #2 capturing Debre Berhan on T1 to remove culture from silver tile.  2nd stack consists of ~12 knights, the leftover 1-movers and all the reinforcements knights on the way. I've got 2 workers available to road plains tile immediately and 2 more with main stack to the hill 2S of Debre Berhan. Means I can capture the city with my knights and get my 1-movers into his territory going towards the city 3N of Debre Berhan immediately. I'm also capturing the island city out east on T1 with a few knights and got 2 galleys in place to potentially capture other mainland cities. All of 2metra's units are up north making these first turns easy to plan and execute. Borsche got vision of my knight stack this turn, so hopefully that will motivate him to defend, realizing that I'm about to stab 2metra. edit: I'll check my total unit numbers next time I log in. At least for the relevant units.
Everything has lined up well. 2metra's main stack moved in further last turn and is stuck Borsche's territory for a few turns. I was probably attacking anyway, but this makes it all the more sweeter. It's on the same tile as the scout, his units listed bottom.
 First strike went as planned. I noticed 2metra whipped 5 times last turn, but playing the turn revealed that they were all HAs or trebs which don't worry me. I took Massawa with no losses, killing a HA and an archer. Currently 2nd in power, sporting 35 knights and 8 urukku pikemen. I really feel for 2metra this game. While I think he's spent way too much time idling with his military I still feel bad about denying him proper revenge on Borsche for razing a city of his in the early game. His game has been uphill ever since. 
February 22nd, 2020, 15:42
(This post was last modified: February 22nd, 2020, 15:44 by Rusten.)
Patience is a virtue. My preferred scenario has played out and it's going even better than expected. Captured the 3 planned cities this turn and will likely be in range to take Aksum (capital) after the next set of moves. Adwa and Lalibela will fall next turn.
 The 2 workers can road 2S of Adwa next turn to speed up things. Better if I can use the wounded knights on the silver tile further back of the main stack to take the city. Looking at it now that's probably not needed as the tile 2SE of Adwa is available after taking Lalibela, but maybe by some miracle he can defend it. I'm churning through cities so quickly that my little naval maneuver out east is largely redundant, but at least I'll be able to capture a potential island city immediately. All 4 captured cities kept their granary and 2 of them (the ones that mattered) also kept a lighthouse.   I've set research to paper (--> compass --> optics --> nationalism --> constitution/gunpowder). I'll feel much better about my position once I have privateers out and about. Will 1-turn the first 3 techs as I started another golden age. Decided to keep pacifism a few more turns despite increasing costs as I can almost finish enough GPs for a 3rd golden age by the time this one ends. Probably not launching that 3rd GA until captured land is developed and worked but it's nice to have it ready and available. 
Had to stop and heal for a turn, but it looks like I might get some usage out of my trebs afterall. My 1-movers made it to Aksum. There are 16 knights in Lalibela and 6 in Adwa (west). Have to play it slightly more careful from this point on as I'm in range of collateral and spears+HAs, but I don't expect him to hold on for more than a couple of turns.
 Still made sure to capture 1 city this turn as I got some use out of the galleys. Took Yeba amphibiously (only had a sword+archer+warrior in garrison). Ethiopian culture reveals that 2metra does have a city on whale island, so the galleys will be dispatched there next.  Kill screen. Only lost 3 knights and an axe so the combat has been slightly lucky, although the majority of combat has been 95-99% win prob.  Already started to look ahead towards next victim. |
