[SPOILERS] Pindicator promises brighter days ahead

[pindicator]

So I logged in and as I was clicking through build pop-ups I realized that we probably should wait until after Gav plays. Exited out as soon as I could. We could easily set up to attack next turn, after all.

If we want to.

[Lewwyn]

If we go in on Gav, we're likely locked in to death. So that's the choice we have to make. Likely TBS gets to farm away or swallow someone else.

We don't have to attack this turn, in fact I'd advise against it.

Checklist:
1) fix EPs
2) move at least 5 of 6 galleys south.
3) move all 2 movers into Kim
4) move at least 10 1 movers out of Kim towards the coast this turn: 1-2 elephants, 1 maceman, 1-2 spears, 1 sword, 5+ CKN.
5) Do HAs auto upgrade to knights in the build queue? Can we get a head start on knight builds by starting HAs this turn? If so, that's a move we should make.

I'm not 100% on attacking Gav, but I see benefits to attacking him now before he has Knights and wants to come back for his shrine. Elsewise we are maybe the only ones positioned to take out TBS...

[pindicator]

I definitely agree that if we attack Gav here we fight to the death and that lets TBS continue to farm. Plako probably ends up getting half of Gavagai's empire; Commodore might sweep in for another snipe, and we'll probably fight for something like 1/3 to 1/2 of Gav's cities and then have to decide if we want to continue against plako or not. Just writing all that is making me question going after Gav again now.

How far out do you think we are from attacking TBS? Guilds is coming in at the end of this turn. After that we will want to have ... 20 knights? 30? We can probably move the majority of our CKNs and slow mover hitters up north as well as I'm pretty sure Gav is going to keep the sacredness of Fish on Fish, for at least as long as he's tangling with plako. The slow movers can raze those border cities in the west that we want to eliminate; the knights can then run straight for TBS's capital and from there we mop up eastward while using the CKNs to keep his army (presumably out west) from being able to stop us from taking everything in his east.

Does anyone jump in if we go after TBS? Probably not at first, not unless it looks like we're really beating him badly. But most of his defenses are pointing north and west, so I'm guessing there's a possibility from those directions.

Ugh, when I think it through TBS is the smarter play. Just all that wide open Gav land looks so so tempting!

[Lewwyn]

I'm still traveling maybe another week. I won't be able to log in and play until then likely.

Not sure about choice. I support either way.

[Lewwyn]

So the best thing would be if we could use our existing army to take out Gav, while building knights and then when gav is almost finished rush back to the border and hit TBS. Basically our army is sitting there not doing anything right now we should keep our investment moving... So maybe I think, both?

[pindicator]

Basically our army is sitting there not doing anything right now we should keep our investment moving... So maybe I think, both?

 I kind of love it.  This is just a game after all, and we might as well make it as entertaining a game as possible.

TBS has his sentry chariot down by our stack now, so there's no hope of moving that northward without him seeing them coming a mile away.  Gav and plako's power levels continue to nosedive as they beat each other into oblivion.

Here are Gavagai's forces as I could spot them:




I would guess this is the majority of Gavagai's forces, seeing at how his and plako's powers have done a twin nosedive over the last half dozen turns.  

Gavagai's northernmost stacks shown here are 9 tiles away from the capital, so his two-movers are 3 turns out.  If we were able to take his capital with all our two-movers on the second turn of a war then our 1-movers would easily be able to reinforce before he could pull back. We're also looking at 12 two-movers instead of 40. His one-mover stack is 5 turns away, and composed of 5 catapults. Finally, there are more units in plako's culture (nice job of encirclement there Gavagai!) which are even farther away, even if they were in his own culture.



Finally, our post-GA demos.  I was able to still get Guilds in 1 turn at 70%, so this is only with 1 Wealth Build.  I dont' think we have to necessarily rush to do anything with demos like these ... but I also really like the idea of busting heads just because this is a game and we should just play like there's no tomorrow.




I had swapped everything over to 1-turn non-military builds (mostly Walls in anticipation of castles and the extra trade route they will provide) but now with the appeal of attacking Gav I'm thinking I should swap all that over to longbows, HAs, and CKNs. However, I had some technical difficulties trying to log in again just now, so hopefully that doesn't mean the server has gone down again

Thanks for continuing to input Lewwyn. I kind of agree about the army, but I think I view it more like having the army gives us the option to attack if we think the attack is a good idea. If we did go after Gavagai - I think we'd get the next line of cities before his forces could return north. Our two-movers could fork his capital and Bangor while the galleys could grab/burn Heliopolis. After that we would have to engage to push farther south. We could just sit there and let him come to us really - having more cities for free isn't a bad deal in itself. And I think this war has already hurt plako enough that there isn't any harm in letting plako get the majority of the southern cities back from Gav.

Last turn's pic of Gavagai's lands for reference. Note how every city south of the capital is only 20% culture, so only 2 rings of pressure. We'd have first ring around the capital open and clear of his culture.

[Lewwyn]

Yeah looking at the demos the biggest problem for us is land area. If we don't get bigger there, there's no point. Everything looks amazing for as much land area as we have vs rivals. Truly efficient. But we should go get some more land. 

[pindicator]

Okay, I'll play tomorrow after work with the notion that we're attacking Gav. Kind of miffed that we couldn't swap builds due to a tech issue with the game, but oh well.

As for the timing of attacking Gav, the land group is ready to go now. We could declare next turn and fork Burgos and his capital with 9 HA and 4 chariots - not a huge number but I think that would be enough to at least take the capital. Actually, it seems a little borderline so maybe we want to take a few turns to get knights in that group first? The galley group is a turn or two behind anyway - we have 4 galleys that will be able to pick up units next turn and 1 or 2 more another turn behind. Also Gav has his own trireme in the south, but that shouldn't be too big of an issue for us.

Guilds is also done at end of turn, so it's going to be knights everywhere for builds.

[Lewwyn]

Enquiring minds want to know.

[pindicator]

Shoot, I didn't update. I'll get pics up later but basically:
* Guilds in, knights everywhere. Most cities 4t knights. I'm also chopping the last of our forests into knight production
* Assessed how to invade better and found that Gav can actually see all our units in Kim. Found a tile to state the 2-movers in that let's us fork and also avoids his vision.
* Accidentally moved the CKNs with the HAs, so oops. I guess we're 2 turns away from attacking now: stage next turn, move in the turn after
* If fish for fish is sacred wtf is pig for pig? TBS offers that. Perhaps he means for us to grow fat together? 
* Engineering in 5