[SPOILERS] Dark Savant leads the noble Inca as half-noble Churchiill

[Dark Savant]

JR4 just fired his own Golden Age, and is using it to play peaceful builder.  He's got the #1 power score to back it up (I'm now #2), and is still most likely to win.

What can you do about above? What's the plan to win?

I'm not sure.

Attacking JR4 head-on seems like a dubious proposition, especially when my judgment is that the better solution is to incorporate 's territory and try to get it productive in time to compete.  At least I'm no longer behind in tech -- JR4 is only up Steam Engine on me at the moment.  From what I recall, he does not have any of Music, Philosophy, Divine Right, Nationalism, Military Tradition, Education, or Economics.

I'm not sure what 's likely response is; at this point, it's more emotional than rational, since his only hope to avoid collapse is for someone else to attack me.  (His only shot, in retrospect, was for his attack against me to succeed.)  I'm watching both JR4 and wetbandit, and there's no way that superdeath attacks me without someone else doing so.  Ideally I can take 's border city without a fight, since if just remains entrenched there, I can just capture most of his core behind his fortified front, now that I'm starting to open fronts everywhere against him.

The trouble is, JR4 is likely to gear up for war and invade  anyway.  He doesn't exactly need to devote his entire economy to war to start taking cities from as well.

A lot of this also depends on what wetbandit does, really.  He's still got 60-odd cuirassiers on his border with JR4 and superdeath.

[Charriu]

Any updates from your side? How is the war going?

[Dark Savant]

Any updates from your side? How is the war going?

I should, but real life has been significantly busier lately, enough that not just my reporting is suffering.

I used galleons to land enough units to threaten 's back lines -- enough that if  didn't throw serious force at it (including what's at his border city), it would have eaten much of his core.  He chose to withdraw from his border city -- my force waiting near the border finally poured over the border last turn, and there was only a token garrison against me this turn.

actually had enough to destroy my galleon-landed stack; I wasn't sure that was possible, I no longer have city visibility on .  I now get the impression it was a mistake to try to land so many little harassing forces ; I know still has enough catapults to cause a lot of trouble, but I shouldn't have created so many mini-stacks that can be fairly easily defeated in detail.  I did still destroy more units than I lost, though.

But I'm pouring through the choke now, and unless pulls back units from another front, I'm not sure he can stop my ~80 attacking units anyway, though I'll need to spend a few turns grabbing other cities before I can advance on his capital again.  I have cannons, but they haven't reached the frontier yet and I'm not going to pay 130-ish gold a pop to upgrade catapults; I need that money to get to Assembly Line in something resembling decent time.

superdeath is still throwing everything he's got against on the southern front.  He has more cannons than I do already, and that's just the ones I can see, but he doesn't have cavalry and in fact has pretty much no tech to speak of that isn't rifles, cannons, or their prerequisites.

I still doubt this is all happening fast enough that I can compete economically -- wetbandit (who launched another Golden Age) will get Assembly Line in several more turns.  I'll be at least that far behind in getting them myself.  I'm getting Steam Engine next turn, and can probably be researching Assembly Line myself by the time infantry start to show up in any real numbers.

I have to balance the war effort against the need for some domestic builds so I can try to compete economically -- I'm no longer on a total war footing.  I'm not sure I'm handling the balance right, really, and I no longer have a ton of time to devote to this game, unfortunately.

[Hitru]

As most of you probably know I inherited this game from Dark Savant (at least until further notice). I don't have time for proper war turns and planning, but the situation is close to unwinnable, so it's not that big deal. I will still do my best to keep the game as competetive as possible. 

For the record, if other players (basically Wetbandit) want to concede I'm not against it.

Quick glance of the war front for the lurkers. I just got factories, which are presently being build asap in my core. I could also just try to get some infantry to finally break Ipecac, but to keep my civ somewhat relevant I need to improve mfg in my core. After that it's pure military in most cities. 

   

As you see Ipecac has a lots of units, which are quite obsolete. After I get machine guns those can't touch me any more. That will also solve the problem of protecting my gains against Superdeath. So plan is to keep taking some coastal cities, trusting that Ipecac will rather defend his cap against Superdeath than use his units to kill my city defender rifles, and then attack Superdeath with superior army composition once Ipecac has been dealt with. While I do this Wetbandit and JR have to beat each others to death.

My only hope is that Wetbandit and JR hurt each other enough for me to climb back to this game.

[Charriu]

I must say I love how ipecac lined up his units along the river.

[JR4]

GG, Dark Savant and Hitru. This thread had just excellent reporting. @DS: I`m extremely impressed with your C&D. As far as I can tell, you were able to get most of the numbers right. @Hitru: Thanks for taking the time to keep this game rolling. I think you would still have had some outside chances of pulling off a victory but it`s perfectly understandable that you were reluctant to fight on for several months in a game which you inherited.

It looks to me like you were in a very strong position after taking out Charriu`s cities W of Academia. Could you have tried for even more, like challenging us for Academia itself or Lyceum? I mean, it`s very understandable that you decided to take your fair share of the spoils and no more as those CKNs were quite dangerous. Later on I still felt that we were able to coexist peacefully but your problem was really the lack of good expansion avenues. Bordering us, Wetbandit and Ipecac at some point made a cheap conquest very hard, of course. The reaction to Ipecac`s invasion was really impressive imo, turning the tables with Rifles and Cavalry. It`s a shame that real life got in the way for you, DS but I hope that you sign up for another one some day.

Given your geopolitical situation I`m not really sure how you could have improved your chances significantly. Perhaps the Pyramids or the water based wonders could have been worthwhile on this map? Or perhaps going for a quicker conquest of Charriu (Horse Archers or Swords). Thoughts?

EDIT: I see that you tried for TGL and was just a couple of turns away from completing it.