[spoilers] - pindicator is excited for the next Realms Beyond league mechanics

[pindicator]

172

Mouse and I continue to swap Narita each turn:




Bokuto is starving due to the constant drafting out of that city; the last turn the musket out of that city went into Narita and combined with the pike and longbow there we managed to kill 2 maces before succumbing to his forces. I'm not sure if that was entirely worth it; I do know that I can replace units far easier than he can. In fact, it looks like I'm facing nearly the entire force that Mouse has left to offer. Aside from the island cities that he cannot reinforce from, that is.

He spread those units out this turn.




I had to recapture here: Narita would come out of resistance at end of turn and that would put a lot of land under his cultural control. So even though the city was staffed with a wounded ballistaphant and 2 promoted longbows, I knew I needed to pay whatever the cost.

But he spread out his units even more: he sent 2 ballistaphants out to pillage the road south of Narita. I think he was hoping to keep me off of the hill and away from the defensive bonus? But then he forgot about the fort (again) to the southeast of the city. And now that he split out his ballistaphants I would have an easier time taking them out piecemeal.

In addition, he severely misplaced his catapults. He put them in my culture, and with no visible way to take Bokuto those units were entirely stranded. Perhaps he had moved there first in accident and then knew he had to severe the road south of Narita in order to keep me from hitting those units straight away. That actually makes a bit of sense. But it also was enough to entice me to move up and take the fort. After all: now that is the road chokepoint to the south.




I had okay odds with my great general and so I took the chance and won. But then true to form, the pike that followed up against the 2nd ballistaphant - the one with 98% odds - lost. Of course I lose that fight. 9 times out of 10 I lose that fight.

I double promoted a trebuchet and with 35% odds managed to do severe damage and retreat. Then I lost another unit - this time a camel archer at 70% odds - against his other promoted longbow. After that it was cleanup with my maces. We left a single mace inside the city and everything else up onto the fort.




The north. Those are all single defenders: everything else is going south. As soon as I can destroy his stack then I have this. He doesn't have any collateral he can put against my stack but I have a good amount I can put against his. In addition, his main stack is down to 15 units.

Maybe I should have started a draft of muskets from the south this turn and suffered a bit of double draft pain. But I'm holding off because it doesn't seem necessary. I think I'm going to be able to break him pretty soon now. I'm going to send out some other forces to take his island cities soon.

[pindicator]

173

Narita once again swapped hands, but this time may be the final exchange:




He did not give up the catapults and instead left a decent number of elephants and longbows defending on the hill north of the city.  The main stack retreated back into his territory, but now it is down to 15 units and no collateral units.

I took out the ballista elephant south of the city with a pike.  Then a knight and a mace removed the defenders and the city fell.




The rest was a little more difficult but I had a lot of siege to hit it with.  First I tried a CR2 trebuchet, which withdrew and did significant damage to the top defender.  Then 2 catapults died at low odds.  Two crossbows had better chances - in the 30% range - but they both died as well.  Then it was largely mopup with maces getting odds on all the elephant defenders.  Lastly there was one more crossbow that died at good odds.  In total I lost 2 catapults and 3 crossbows, and killed 6 ballista elephants, 5 catapults, 2 longbows, and a knight.

Over the course of exchanging hands with the city I tried several ways of arranging defenders but rarely did i find any combination that extracted more from the attacker than the defender.  Most of the time it was best to just simply leave a single unit behind.

So now we move ahead.




I'll take a turn to move up all the maces and catapults and heal the units in Narita.  Then we go forward.

Meanwhile, there are other plans in motion. Since it was so difficult to bring my full strength against Mouseferatu I made an effort to attack several places, and hopefully disrupt any reinforcements that may be coming.




First, these maces are moving to take out Akashi next turn. A CR mace gets about 78% odds against his fortified pikes from attacking off a boat; 6 of them should be more than enough to take the city down. I'll likely move a few knights or other units over to join the survivors and these will be the units that capture Mouse's western islands.

Farther west:




I don't know if there's anything to worry about here for now, but so far it's only privateers from Gavagai and not much for troop buildup. He went into a golden age recently and is under Police State, so I wonder if there is some kind of build-up coming to prepare for yet another invasion or if he is just catching up on his navy. In any case I'll try to keep several boats out here and eyes on Gavagai. More likely if he is planning an attack he isn't coming my direction: he has closer targets with lower power levels than me. But we shouldn't be too careless.

In the northeast:




Surprise!

I was holding this back as a bit of a surprise for you lurkers, and it was just as much a surprise for Mouseferatu. I took the 4 caravels and privateer that were the remnants of the failed attack on Ushijima and used them to shuttle 4 camel archers the long way around to hit Mouse from the east. The city was guarded only by a warrior and fell. I'm hoping to divert reinforcements and threaten the capital here. And then stupidly I unloaded every camel archer. I could have kept 2 on the forward 2 caravels and been able to threaten the capital by boat next turn! His capital is also only guarded by a single warrior.

There's one more surprise I'm holding on to for you guys too

But I'm also preparing a force to try once more for Ushijima. Third time is the charm, right? He has many pikemen there, along with a single crossbow and longbow.




The units that are already on boats are heading to the main front. As you can see we've almost completely finished the wave that I began drafting 9 turns ago. But the units that are still on the mainland will stay there now, and a couple galleys that are closest to the capital are not going to shuttle them east; instead them will shuttle my units to Ushijima. I have a number of catapults still on the mainland, a couple maces and knights - that should be enough. I just need a few more galleys.

Chemistry in 2. Then I realize that I still need Astronomy to build Frigates. I guess that one's next!

In anticipation of this war finally being about over, I've started more infrastructure builds and another wave of settlers. I still have 6 (maybe 7) filler locations within my territory, and after Mouse is finished off I'll have at least another 5 spots that I'll want settlers for. And now that I'm in Rep + Merc every city is a net positive, even without infrastructure.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Nice move at Sakusa! I love clever end-arounds like that.

I really appreciate all the effort you put into these war report posts - extremely detailed and informative, so that even I, who know next to nothing about Civ IV warfare, can follow them.

[pindicator]

174

I'm glad these reports are enjoyable! For me, its nice to be relevant at this point in a game: this is usually when I'm starting to fizzle out.


War weariness is starting to pop up across the empire:




I'm building markets and barracks in every city that's near the happy cap and doesn't yet have one. Except down in the south. In the south I'm building settlers everywhere.
(And yes, that's a great general but let's not get ahead of ourselves.)



10 turns ago I started the mace draft; those units are now where they need to be. Only 10 turns to cross an empire! (I need more boats.) Now I've started the musket draft, and while this isn't technically my first one, it feels like the symbolic start of round 2 when I popped this guy out of Torment. He'll head north and pick up more musket draftees along the way, just like I did before with the first mace draft. In the south I'm drafting the same cities that came out of unhappiness this turn. This time those troops aren't going anywhere; they're garrisoning or strengthening positions. Honestly, after Mouseferatu is done there are only 2 reasonable directions to invade next: south to GeneralKilCavalry, or west to Gavagai. Gav would be a most prickly adversary, and GKC is very behind in tech. You can tell which way I'm leaning.




My maces hit Akashi just as unprepared as I spotted it last turn. Not a single mace lost their 78% attacks; however I did lose a privateer when trying to clear out Mouse's privateer in the area. But these seas are now relatively clear and those maces will be shipped to the island to the west after they heal, along with some reinforcements. Actually, maybe this is where the muskets go. Both of the island cities have 2 defenders, and they should not be able to get much more. 2 boat loads of units should easily be enough.

It was in these attacks that I earned by third great general.



I do not know what i want to do with him. I could settle him down at Harbinger - I'm planning on building Heroic Epic down there. Or maybe I want a GG medic.

Finally the main theatre




I know I said my catapults needed a turn to catch up, but I decided not to wait. Everybody who wasn't too badly wounded moved forward.
I thought I had a neat little surprise in store here, but I realize now it won't work. There's a camel archer inside my caravel in the east. I've held off taking any of the coastal cities because if I had before I would either have to burn the city or I would have just let Mouse be able to recapture it with the pikemen in range. I was hoping for the right moment to clear some culture and catch his army unawares. Or at least to time my attack when he would also want to bring his units against my main stack, and divert some of the response like I have at Sakusa. Instead I may not take a shot at all: the culture of Daichi covers all the land tiles. I can't eliminate Azumane and then surprise his stack with mine like I thought to do.

Instead there are galleys coming north to take care of Daichi. And Daichi only has a single longbow right now.

[Miguelito]

Oh yes, the reports are great.
How are you feeling with regards to your empire size and the time it takes to manage? Do you use automation like city managers already (I always have them off, but maybe there's an effective way to use them? ). I still half expect that the winner in this game will be the person who is still willing to conquer more land that will take even more time to manage. If everybody spends the next half year in lockdown that could salvage the game of course (bonus if you don't have kids)

[TheArchduke]

Pindicator. Feel free to make your turn in PBEM 17.

Thanks.

[pindicator]

Pindicator. Feel free to make your turn in PBEM 17.

Thanks.

Send a PM next time, I'll see it faster.

[pindicator]

Turn 176

I thought I had these boats far enough away, but apparently not.




I knew that Mouse had snuck his privateers around north, but I guess I didn't count the tiles right and left these guys a little too far north. Sadly Mouse even got a lucky win at 24% odds so he only lost 1 privateer in the attack. Hopefully his 3 privateers are too damaged to do anything for the time being; in any case, they're out of the way and not able to bother the operations in the main stage.




Mouse tried to sneak out his caravels last turn - also I had moved some empty galleys up to where he could see them, and he probably decided that it was worth the gamble to try and pick them off. However with his caravels out of the city I immediately went south to look for them.

So I moved things up to be like this:




Yes I intentionally abandoned Sasuka. That city and those units aren't really gaining me anything so I picked them up on the caravels and they're moving to join up with the maces and catapults I loaded on those galleys. I'm likely going to land everything by Ushijima and this time will try to finally take that city. However if the main stack outside Daichi gets roughed up enough I may just move to consolidate everything into 1 group and keep the main attach going. Lastly, we could take the capital next turn if he doesn't move to cover it.

Astronomy is due in 3 turns, then we'll finish up Chemistry. And after that I'm really hoping we can go for Education and get some infrastructure builds going. But Astronomy is needed now because OH has frigates.

[superdeath]

Whos on the menu after Mouse?

[pindicator]

Too soon to tell.

If Gav gets bogged down in a war to his east he could be a target for dogpile.
GeneralKilCavalry is the best target as far as tech difference, but he is so far away ... even though I directly border him to the south then I'd have to defend from pole to pole. He still may be the best choice.
AT is also an option, but he would be even more difficult to supply to than GKC because then I'd have to go over ocean.

I guess if I had to pick a target right now it's GKC, but we still have another 10-15 turns left in this war I think.