Alhambram toast his first PBEM game with Russian vodka

[Rowain]

Congrats and many thanks for your entertaining and great reports

[Alhambram]

First post game thoughts of me before reading all threads of other players and lurker thread.

Firstly I just want say that it is incredible that I managed to get religious victory of all victories! When I started this game, I was wondering whether I could pull out religious victory in multiplayer game and made it to my goal for this PBEM. And now it just feels amazing that I managed to reach my goal, although I did prefer "peaceful" win which I almost got around turn 140. Then after failing it, I just switched to more "aggressive" religious win with Cossacks.

I did completely screw up my game in beginning and I thought that I already lost back then around turn 90. oledavy going on holiday proved be turning point for me. Since I got free time to reflect myself calmly those days and I managed to press upon reset button. From that moment I played much better then before, aggressively capturing city states and I started to reap fruits from my investments into my Lavra's in form of more gold per turn with Church Property and culture in form of Great Artists. And then Cossack came, it was really turning point in my game.

I knew that Cossack was powerful, but when it got in my hands it far exceed even my most optimistic hopes about it. When fielding Cossacks, I did feel invincible when dealing with other players.
It was of course helped a bit by Woden's lack of civil engineering till it was too late. From turn 160 till now, I always managed to improve Cossacks, making them stronger with every turn:
-Great General which gave them 5+ strength and 1+ movement point.
-logistics which gave my Cossack 1+ movement point.
-Promotion 1, +5 strength against ranged units, Promotion 2, flanking bonus 2x.
-Forming Cossack Corps.
-Religious Wars which gave Cossack +4 strength against Woden.
-National Identity which decreased injury penalty.

If game would contiune I still could add those:
-Promotion 3: +1 movement point (Great General Cossack in my land would get 8 movement point as base and with road it can hit any target 16 tiles away!)
-forming Cossack army
-I did research Scorching Earth and plan to Colonialism in future, both civic gives me total of 4 envoy which I shall put in Preslav to claim suzerainty and result: Cossack +5 strength upon hill tiles.

Then I need to deeply hat off for policy card logistics, it turned out be key to my victory. My Cossack got extra movement point to make them even deadlier, my battering ram could run very far and thus Woden's cities fell as dominoes. Also to mention that my bombards could move and shoot and my builders could move and chop/harvest at same turn upon forested or hilly tiles.
Also my missionary/knight rush to Madison started from my land which gave it 5 movement points and with this I could convert Madison this turn already, otherwise next turn (I already got little peek at oledavy's thread when he would get his religion and it turned out be next turn! Oh my god what a close victory! )
EDIT: oledavy just admitted that he would get religion next turn. And oh about religion spread into cities with holy sites, now I understand why Woden only got his capital converted only while I instantly got 3 cities converted when I found my religion: I already got 3 cities with lavra's.

[Alhambram]

And to show off further power of Cossacks (I didn't lose even one of them in 1 vs 2 war against Woden and oledavy! )

Total kills this war against Woden: 10 musketman (8 promoted), 4 crossbowman, 2 bombards, 6 field cannons, 1 crouching tiger, 4 infantry, 4 horseman, 1 battering ram, 2 builders, 1 inquisitor, 1 missionary, 1 frigate, 1 archer, 10 cities including capital.
Total kills this war against oledavy: 1 scout, 1 city.

Total losses against Woden: 1 musketman
Total losses against oledavy: 1 scout, 1 city

[Kaiser]

Congratulations Alhambram, that was a great game and a pleasure to watch .. read about in your and the others threads

[Alhambram]

Since you may not find it in my thread for a little while Alhambram, I just wanted to let you know, I was going to found my religion this turn (t183). 

I'm not sure if you knew this, but when you found a religion, every city with a Holy Site gets it for a majority of that city's population. In which case founding it would have cleared Weedy Movement out of 3 of my cities. If your missionary had been one turn slower, or Mt. Vernon hadn't coinflipped, we would actually have gotten to play out our modern war. I'm not sure if you realized how close it was, but I certainly was biting my nails every turn   It had to be an amazing finish to lurk, I'll say that. 

Anyway, congratulations on your win - well earned. You were a fearsome opponent and playing you was a pleasure.

Thanks you, you were also fearsome opponent for me. I pinned you down as favorite to win this PBEM in beginning of my thread and hoped desperately that I would win before we truly clash. I was not sure whether I could win against your veteran experience when it comes to late game war. 
By the way, I already seen a bit of your thread: you was hoping for defender of faith. Well I already thought up a counter against it: since defender of faith don't apply empire wide but per city. All that I needed to do was bring my apostle with proselytizer promotion (I do have one in my possession at turn 182 with 2 charges left) chained with Cossack next your city where majority of your army resides and convert. Then poof, 10+ strength from defender of faith is gone! (In case that you surround city completely with units, I am forced to kill one of them with Cossacks and then convert the city).

[oledavy]

Since you may not find it in my thread for a little while Alhambram, I just wanted to let you know, I was going to found my religion this turn (t183). 

I'm not sure if you knew this, but when you found a religion, every city with a Holy Site gets it for a majority of that city's population. In which case founding it would have cleared Weedy Movement out of 3 of my cities. If your missionary had been one turn slower, or Mt. Vernon hadn't coinflipped, we would actually have gotten to play out our modern war. I'm not sure if you realized how close it was, but I certainly was biting my nails every turn   It had to be an amazing finish to lurk, I'll say that. 

Anyway, congratulations on your win - well earned. You were a fearsome opponent and playing you was a pleasure.

Thanks you, you were also fearsome opponent for me. I pinned you down as favorite to win this PBEM in beginning of my thread and hoped desperately that I would win before we truly clash. I was not sure whether I could win against your veteran experience when it comes to late game war. 
By the way, I already seen a bit of your thread: you was hoping for defender of faith. Well I already thought up a counter against it: since defender of faith don't apply empire wide but per city. All that I needed to do was bring my apostle with proselytizer promotion (I do have one in my possession at turn 182 with 2 charges left) chained with Cossack next your city where majority of your army resides and convert. Then poof, 10+ strength from defender of faith is gone! (In case that you surround city completely with units, I am forced to kill one of them with Cossacks and then convert the city).

Very clever. I was wondering if you might try to employ something like that 

I think you probably would have won the late game clash between the two of us, in my conversation with my girlfriend last night I was giving you something like 60/40 odds. It would have been interesting to say the least though. Nice work using the Cossacks/Logistics combo. That's terrifying and it took me awhile to figure out how I might beat it. I'm not even sure I could given how many cossack corps you had running around at the end. 


Oh, really nice move on Zanzibar earlier in the game btw. I had an inkling how much that hurt Woden, but I didn't appreciate how truly devastating it was.

[Alhambram]

Since you may not find it in my thread for a little while Alhambram, I just wanted to let you know, I was going to found my religion this turn (t183). 

I'm not sure if you knew this, but when you found a religion, every city with a Holy Site gets it for a majority of that city's population. In which case founding it would have cleared Weedy Movement out of 3 of my cities. If your missionary had been one turn slower, or Mt. Vernon hadn't coinflipped, we would actually have gotten to play out our modern war. I'm not sure if you realized how close it was, but I certainly was biting my nails every turn   It had to be an amazing finish to lurk, I'll say that. 

Anyway, congratulations on your win - well earned. You were a fearsome opponent and playing you was a pleasure.

Thanks you, you were also fearsome opponent for me. I pinned you down as favorite to win this PBEM in beginning of my thread and hoped desperately that I would win before we truly clash. I was not sure whether I could win against your veteran experience when it comes to late game war. 
By the way, I already seen a bit of your thread: you was hoping for defender of faith. Well I already thought up a counter against it: since defender of faith don't apply empire wide but per city. All that I needed to do was bring my apostle with proselytizer promotion (I do have one in my possession at turn 182 with 2 charges left) chained with Cossack next your city where majority of your army resides and convert. Then poof, 10+ strength from defender of faith is gone! (In case that you surround city completely with units, I am forced to kill one of them with Cossacks and then convert the city).

Very clever. I was wondering if you might try to employ something like that 

I think you probably would have won the late game clash between the two of us, in my conversation with my girlfriend last night I was giving you something like 60/40 odds. It would have been interesting to say the least though. Nice work using the Cossacks/Logistics combo. That's terrifying and it took me awhile to figure out how I might beat it. I'm not even sure I could given how many cossack corps you had running around at the end. 


Oh, really nice move on Zanzibar earlier in the game btw. I had an inkling how much that hurt Woden, but I didn't appreciate how truly devastating it was.

That Zanzibar move was very first crack I could see from Woden seemingly perfect game, after that more cracks followed but at turn 160 I never imagined that total collapse of Woden should come soon. In fact I would call my war already succesful if I managed to take Jungle Cruise and Nan Madol alone. But within 4 turns both were taken already by Cossacks and Woden yet lacked civil engineering, so I gave attack upon Monsanto a try and it worked!

[shallow_thought]

Congratulations! A great win in a truly entertaining game.

You've probably ensured that anyone playing as Russia will be dogpiled before they can get Cossacks in any future game though .

[mackoti]

bravo.A very good game .

[yuris125]

I was very impressed with how you were able to use the break in the game to step back, take a look at the game you played up to that point, and make plans for how you were going to win - despite considering the way you played the start.. less than ideal. Congratulations on a great game and a well deserved win!