[Spoilers] Old Harry's Game

[Bigger]

lots of people suicide workers for scouting. thestick did it in pbem42 as well.

[Old Harry]

Turn 158

Boring turn, carefully part-building loads of units to complete after I research Steel.

Here you can see just how peaceful I am and how war-like Hydra is:

[Old Harry]

Turn 159

In exciting foreign news Azza will attack Never Surrender (great lighthouse city) next turn with 13 rifles and 8 cats, Serdoa has six muskets, some horses and cats. It'll take Azza at least two turns to get through all these. I wonder if Serdoa has anything else up his sleve? You could see the ruins of You mad? to the south if I hadn't hidden it with the soldier list.


The pre-building of cannons and cavalry is going well, I have 7 trebuchets and a catapult nearly complete and sitting in queues and will get some knights ready while waiting for steel to complete.


Because I can't complete steel this turn I'll get Nationalism instead in the hope that steel will complete eot 160, then Music should be eot 161 and Military Tradition eot 163 or 164 (post-turn edit: it doesn't - perhaps if I run a load of scientists and research builds it will). I plan to revolt to Nationhood and start drafting rifles t160. Hydra could declare and invade again on t165, although he might wait until he has infantry (he's still two techs away from it).


Mean time I'm considering giving these galleys enough XP to get an extra movement point, surprise Serdoa and take Moar Enemies t161. I can give three grenadiers ampibious promotions so if Azza has distracted enough Zerg troops I think it could be worth sniping the city. You know how much I want that city...

[novice]

How do you compare to THH in
- City count
- Pop points
- Demos
- Beakers teched

[Old Harry]

We're level on 16 cities each (I think he settled a lot in Azza's old land recently as I only have visibility on 11 of his cities.)

I have 152 pop points and 34.62% of the world pop, making total pop of 439. Hydra has 25% of that - so around about 110 pop.

I'm #1 in everything except Power and Land Area, although the GNP figure is a bit misleading - THH is saving cash right now and if I set my slider to 0% I'm third on ~500.


I think he is up Steel, Music, Mil Trad, Constitution, Liberalism, Economics, Corporation while I'm up Mil Sci. So he's about 5500 beakers ahead of me. I have part-researched Steel and Sci Meth to the tune of 2500 beakers, so really the gap is about 3000 beakers. I also have a scientist ready to put 1400 beakers into Physics when Sci Meth is done. I'm not sure what the grand totals are, but I do need to keep on gaining...

[Old Harry]

Turn 160

Nationalism is in, I revolted to Nationhood and Caste (I want to keep growing for the next five turns, then I can switch to slavery if Hydra declares) and drafted my first three rifles.


After that it takes six research builds to get Steel this turn, I'll have my first cannon at the end of the turn with another six or seven at the end of next turn and more to follow after that.


In the north east a trireme will check up on the strength in Moar Enemies next turn and if I can take it I will. Azza bombarded the defenses of Serdoa's Lighthouse city so Serdoa retreated his units and Azza will take it next turn, so I hope Serdoa will be distracted by that. You can see that Hydra started a golden age too.


Power - I should go up a bit this turn and a lot next turn.

[Old Harry]

Turn 161

We got Steel. Upgrading cats to cannon costs 122 each - for the 13 that I have that will be over 1500 gold. So do I save cash for four turns so that I can make the upgrade when/if Hydra declares or do I rush to Mil Trad via Music so that I can flank away his cannons?


Hydra got Steam Power. He'll either go Assembly Line to upgrade his attack force to infantry or Railroad (please god) to set up defense for himself. Guess I'll know in a few turns time...


Right now I have 9 rifles and 20 grenadiers, I'm guessing his stack will come back with ~50 units in it. In four turns I'll have 21 rifles, it'll then take another couple of turns for his stack to reach Barnet (I think I can afford to let him snipe outlying cities if it lets me destroy his stack). I have seven cannons finishing this turn and at least three next turn, 20 cannons would be an excellent number to hit a stack of 50, would 30 be better?


If I went for sci meth then physics (a cost of 2700 beakers even with bulbs) then I could get some airships out to see what he's up to. I'd love to know his troop movements, so that I can tailor my army accordingly, but I need to be able to build and upgrade my army, so it'll have to wait. Okay, I'll get music this turn in anticipation of getting mil trad so that my knights can queue-upgrade to Cav. Then I'll save some money until I'm ready to start completing Cavalry (less urgent than cannons due to 2 moves) when I'll finish Mil Trad. Grimsby will be able to 1-turn cav without even trying... <3


The sad news of the turn is that I'm not attacking Serdoa, the wiley old coot has four units in here, two of which are longbows that I won't be able to kill and the others will stop my progress even if I get lucky. I think I'll have to give up on my dreams and just send them back to face the Hydra horde.


Power after end of turn, that is what seven cannons and three rifles look like. I just to do that another three times and we'll be level! Yay!

[Old Harry]

Turn 162

This game seems familiar, but I can't quite place it. There is a lot of dust, um, guess I'll look around and see if I can figure whats going on.

Well I have some music, but Mil Trad will take three turns to research and I have a feeling that I need cash for something or other in three turns time. I guess I'll switch the knight builds to cannons - so I have five knights with hammers in that I could regret if I don't get to mil trad in the next ten turns. I'm going to have 15 cannons next turn, then 20 the turn after. How many is too many?


I'm up to 21 collatoral units (only 13 of which are shit), with 33 clean-up units to join in. (Grenadiers won't really clean up undamaged cannons though, so perhaps I'm only up to 12 killer units...)


Although, maybe Hydra isn't coming back after all? Now I have existential doubt.

[Bigger]

if you have more cannons than THH has total units, that *may* be too many.

[Old Harry]

Turn 163

Oxford is complete! Okay, lets blow all our saved up money on research! Oh. Okay 0% it is, let's upgrade us some cannons instead... I wish I'd built a bank.


Peace breaks out everywhere.


Except over here obviously... I'm going to put a galley within striking distance of the great lighthouse city that Azza just captured (cs_compound) hopefully just out of sight, while down south I'll see if an opportunity to raze Azza's MOM city presents itself at any point. This is only taking three or maybe four units away from the main task of beating THH, but I don't want Azza getting back into the game the same way I did and he's nearly got steel...


And this is the staging point. I've got anti-2-movers in most of my vulnerable border cities, I have eleven cannons already and I'm building eleven more right now, not quite as many as he has units yet Bigger! But with upgrades I might top out at 35? I'm up to 15 rifles and 23 grenadiers. Hydra can declare in two turns. If he doesn't I don't know if I will...


Power from after the turn rolled.