Brick by Brick (Spoiler Alert!)

[TheHumanHydra]

I guess I'll just have to do some digging. As always, thanks for your help, NobleHelium.

[TheHumanHydra]

Azza is using his ten turns of guaranteed peace with Old Harry to take some of Serdoa's cities with what remains of his army:




He already took out Serdoa's southernmost city. The next one in line contains the Great Lighthouse, and I'd rather him not have that. The remaining mainland city is a darned good one too. <Sigh>, maybe I'll have to have another go at it.

Or ... I could do something more dastardly, and hit all those catapults in the open with my knights (flanking). As far as I can tell (I've been doing constant reconnaissance on his territory), that's Azza's whole army save for city garrisons, though I'm sure he's building more. I could run my main army into his territory simultaneously ... eek, that's tech parity, though I could start drafting rifles at that point - I just wouldn't have any built up yet. And I've got to believe Old Harry's going to try and rescue the game for himself, even if it's a long shot - at some point, when Azza and I are committed to fighting each other, he's going to ram his stack into the back of whoever's winning, probably me - I'll have to have units to counter that. The final conflict may be dicey, even with (hopefully) tech superiority.

Speaking of which ...







(After end-of-turn.)

[TheHumanHydra]

I find Azza and Old Harry's troop movements puzzling, thus worrisome:




Where is Azza going? Maybe he doesn't know it was all Serdoa's eastern cities were destroyed, so he was going for them? I don't know. At least he razed that city instead of keeping it; I don't need him to have an expanded power base for the future, although that does puzzle me to. What's the point of attacking Serdoa if you're not going to keep his cities?




Old Harry's moving to the northwest, away from his borders with both me and Azza. Serdoa's not a threat anymore, so such a move can only be directed against me, either to defend or to attack. If to defend, this is again puzzling, since he knows my main army is in my north, his south. Well, not any more; I began moving it south to counter this. I bet you can guess where it is:




Dang war-weariness. At least all my draft unhappiness will be gone by the end of next turn. I need to sit down and try and calculate when the war-weariness will be gone, though, because I can't draft under these conditions, and I'd like to be able to draft when I go to war. Grrr, this is disrupting my plans ...

My knights are massing, and as you can see I'm building a few more, to attack Azza's stack (or defend against Old Harry) should I choose to do so. Everything now depends on my opponents' moves and how soon I calculate I'll be ready for total war.

[TheHumanHydra]

This was an interesting turn for me that helped me get a better mental handle on the game.

Warning: this is turning into a very long post detailing the precise nature of my present plans. You have been warned.

First I did some reconnaissance:




Still don't know what Azza's doing. He hardly moved his units. Whatever it is, it doesn't appear threatening, and as long as his army remains in the field, it gives me an opportunity ...

Lol at Serdoa's city name. By the way, that's the first time I've ever said lol. Ever.




Both Azza's and Serdoa's cities are strongly-held (in case you can't read the note over Serdoa's, it says "6Lo, 3Ca," which is my shorthand for "six longbowmen, three catapults." As you have probably noticed by now, I routinely - actually systematically - use this notation to denote what units were on each tile the last time I had line-of-sight there.). Looks like I won't be attacking either of them here for a while.




Old Harry did not move his stack the full three tiles north. This combined with the fact he split units off from it a couple turns ago and not added to it, and that he has seen the size of my army, leads me to believe this is a defensive deployment: from this position, his stack can reach any city in his empire in two turns. This was the most important piece of reconnaissance, and took more than a little worry off my shoulders - not that I would be defeated if attacked, but more the stress of multiple potential threats and priorities in terms of deployments and planning. I still believe Old Harry will at the last intervene against me if I attack Azza - unless he reads Azza's as the stronger empire - but for now my preparations can go forward unhindered.

Speaking of which ...

This intelligence in hand and having considered carefully the state of the game, my window(s) of opportunity, and the problem of war-weariness (still no calculations, though ...), I developed and initiated Plan Marlborough, the projected build-up of drafted rifleman and cavalry forces, intended for a decisive attack on Azza, codenamed Operation Redcoat. Optional is the preliminary attack-of-opportunity I have already discussed, Operation Roundhead III. Yes, you read that right, drafted riflemen, despite my earlier complaints. Let me explain ...

First, you need to know the technological situation. Azza, having researched Printing Press, has diverted to Philosophy, obviously intended for either Nationalism or Liberalism or both. I am about two turns from Rifling. When I saw Azza researching Printing Press and not Chemistry (for Military Science and grenadiers), taking into account the time to build up forces, I assumed my projected attack would take the form of a moderately large numbers of riflemen plus my existing units against small numbers of whipped riflemen just coming online (and Azza's existing units). This was not entirely promising, though doable, and did make me ponder putting it off till cannon (Plan ... Wellington). When I learned this turn Azza had diverted to (most likely) Nationalism, I realized my technological window-of-opportunity had likely just gotten larger, since he no longer appeared to be beelining for riflemen, and that my projected attack would likely take the form of moderately large numbers of riflemen (plus my existing units) against drafted musketmen: technologically, if not numerically, more promising.

Now I began to seriously consider the exact nature of my build-up. I calculated that at least half my cities would be able to produce three cavalry every eight turns while in Golden Age, two every eight turns while not (this will be the case). More importantly, all my cities would be able to resume their drafting cycle (which stacks draft unhappiness due to insufficient cities, remember [no, I can't get enough on-line in time not to]) regardless of present atrocious war-weariness with just a little effort on my part. I noticed I have an outstanding gems-for-gold-per-turn trade with Old Harry that is depriving me of two happiness (with forges) in all my cities. Theatres would provide one extra happiness per city due to dyes. Colloseums would provide a further extra happiness per city - and these together would let me run the culture slider up just a little for lots of emergency happiness. Military police were allowing me to maintain break-even happiness at present, which drafting itself would turn into a little extra due to reduced population. Oh, and I have Taoist missionaries coming too. All in all, this should allow me to run a consistent -6 draft unhappiness in all my cities in spite of an equivalent amount of war-weariness from fighting Serdoa, with the slider available to offset additional unhappiness from fighting Azza until the former wears off. Barring that, there's always just letting my cities run unhappy citizens - if I have read the game right, Operation Redcoat will mark the beginning of the end for this game - what does it matter if I run my cities into the ground as long as everyone else's are ashes? Not that I should need to run them right into the ground.

With Rifling reading as one-turn-and-a-bit on the research bar and nothing I could do about that, I decided to switch to Drama quickly and run the slider down to the minimum needed to complete it in one turn (30%) to save gold for hopefully a one-turn push for Rifling tomorrow (no big deal if it does take the second turn). So no delay on Rifling, but I'd have Drama too, and be able to one-turn theatres in at least my six biggest production cities in the interval. Or ... I could start the colloseums this turn, finish them next turn and overflow onto theatres, and finish the theatres the turn I start drafting. The lesser-production cities would be able to catch up a few turns after. I would probably start the Globe Theatre in Hydranauts, my ~+10 surplus food city, immediately while everything else switched to catapults while I teched Military Tradition. This is what I did (sadly it meant giving up Oxford University and the Moai Statues for now):




Here are the positions of my armies:




First Army Group (infantry), assured (I hope) of the safety of the south, is moving back north in preparation to launch into Azzan territory when required. Second Army Group (cavalry) is massing in the south in preparation to launch into Serdoan territory and ambush Azza's stack if the opportunity persists. All you can see there is the main force - it should be more than 50% larger when all units, including scouts, are reunited. This is Operation Roundhead III. Roundhead I was a possible cavalry (knight) attack on Azza from three directions, supplemented by what infantry were then available, to burn down a third of his most valuable cities before he could respond, this when I first started drafting musketmen. It was passed over before any preliminary moves had taken place because Azza's border garrisons were found to be stronger than anticipated. Roundhead II was the direct infantry-and-cavalry (again, knights) attack on Azza's eastern border (my northwest) I was prepared to launch if Old Harry did not seek peace. Roundhead III is like Roundhead I a bit of a risky move, because the cavalry forces again absolutely have to be successful for it not to backfire, and it's again an attack-of-opportunity before my main forces are ready. It can be called off at any time, even if Azza sees my knights, because he will almost certainly believe they're just there to fight Serdoa, with whom I'm still technically at war.

Well, that was a heck of a long post, sadly image-light, though there wasn't much more to show. Hopefully it gave you some insight into The Mind(s) of TheHumanHydra, and some more fodder for your discussion in the lurker thread. Next turn I'll hopefully be able to give you a state-of-the-empire the turn before I start drafting (hopefully), plus it'll have been 10 turns (already, I know!). These are exciting times, my friends. If all goes well, we are about to embark on the course toward the Last Battle of human history.



The New Model Army drills in Legoland, circa 1435 A.C. Early matchlock muskets were soon to give way to more sophisticated flintlocks and the first rifled weapons. [I am not sure where to credit this image but the artist's signature is in the lower-right corner.]

[TheHumanHydra]

Turn 135 report:

Operation Roundhead is a go.

[Qgqqqqq]

Thanks for the update!
For the record, that was about the amount of images I like seeing.

[TheHumanHydra]

You're welcome. Image number noted for future reference, thank you.

And an apology: I played really late last night and wasn't able to take the screenshots for a state-of-the-empire. Maybe Qgqqqqq's post means I should do them less often, though?

And to clarify my last post: Operation Roundhead, the attack on Azza before my rifles are ready, is a go because Serdoa destroyed Azza's stack - so I don't have to, and can even use my knights in the main attack instead! I finished Rifling; drafting will begin this coming turn. Oh and I got a Great Engineer last turn.

[TheHumanHydra]

That is all I have to say.

[BaII]

OH boy this is going to get interesting. Also what are you going to do with that GG?

[TheHumanHydra]

Very interesting. This play is for game; I'm expecting attack by any and all parties at any moment - Old Harry, even Serdoa, and no doubt Azza will whip up a storm. But there's no better opportunity - tech advantage over everyone (rifles to muskets), production advantage over everyone (the draft), only one rival who can catch me, and his field army just destroyed - twice.

Since I may come under attack at any moment, most new units will not head to the front right away, but mass in a third army group within my territory, ready to respond to any threat or press the attack from a different angle. Old Harry does have a window of opportunity to do some serious damage the first few turns of war, since both present army groups (infantry and cavalry) will be away and peacetime garrisons cannot stand against a serious stack. But any threatened city can produce two units per turn through whipping and drafting, and ship in additional units similarly rushed from adjacent cities. I hope that any incursion, no matter how destructive, could be contained after or at the first city. And once my third army group is ready, centrally located, I should be reasonably safe - this of course assuming the war against Azza goes well.

There is cause for optimism: both recent mass-army attacks in this game, which saw said armies destroyed (me against Serdoa, Azza against Old Harry), were conducted against opponents who had a standing army and could whip to supplement it. In this case, Azza's field army has just been destroyed; he can only whip. This bodes well, I think. (He does have a rather large navy. I don't know what to think of that; I can't imagine he's been wasting dozens of units just sitting in the boats as a contingency all this time. All the same, my coastal garrisons are stronger than normal, and I'm watching carefully.)

The Great General will be used as before as a medic when necessary, with the option to XP-scatter if that is more useful. Thanks for the question!

Now to go play the turn ...