Intersite Game - Turn Discussion Thread

[kjn]

I'm not sure we need a pause. We have 20 hours remaining on the timer right now, and CivFr haven't ended their turn yet, so CFC are currently blocked from logging in.

[kjn]

Some general things:

* Do not use the IP address when logging in, use caledorn.no-ip.org instead
* Use the Glance screen under F4 when checking trades, and hover over each relation in the matrix. That's the only reliable way to get trades between arbitrary teams that I've found
* CFC is in a golden age, that's why their gpt is so scary. It started on T162
* Brick by Brick is one of our two cities with a stable (the other is HF), so we might want to go knights there
* I think it might be worthwhile to put the unit whip overflow into those courthouses and markets that will be finished that way. That way we can get 2-pop whips, and still improve our economy

Another more long-term thing is that we're currently set up for a golden age in about 15t with the GPs from MM and ED. It was supposed to be used for getting into State Property, but that plan is aborted now. Given that, does it make sense to continue going for a GA in that timeframe? If we skip that plan, that opens up the opportunity to whip the bank in MM, but we will delay our next GA.

[NobleHelium]

Okay, I'll look at those things. One thing that sunrise forgot to mention us that we need to find out the cost of sabotaging CFC and Apolyton roads on the border. I guess that might be in the espionage thread? Anyone know?

[MWIN]

Please let us not depend on CFC? At least post and ask CFC not to end turn or ask for paus...

Edit: post in CFC thread for pause and then pause it for 4 hours before unpausing...

I'm not sure we need a pause. We have 20 hours remaining on the timer right now, and CivFr haven't ended their turn yet, so CFC are currently blocked from logging in.

[darrelljs]

To lighten up the mood regarding the changing of turn players, here's some C&H:

There's a C&H for every occasion it seems !

I'm about to go to sleep but now that I think about it I think we might be overcorrecting. There should be a number of cities that can get to size 6 and it would make sense to get them there so that we can draft rather than whip catapults.

Good point...it seems like any city that's close to size 6 can be drafted first, then whipped right after...just need to be careful we don't put so many hammers into the Catapult that we make it a one pop whip.

Darrell

[scooter]

Didn't get a chance to watch the whole stream (and I'm not really likely to be able to), so forgive me if this comment has been sufficiently covered... But I'd really suggest taking into account distance to the fronts when deciding what order to draft cities. It makes sense to draft cities now that will just barely make it to the front in time, then slowly draft closer to the front over the next few turns.

[SleepingMoogle]

Hmm.. did the Marble trade take place on T165 or T166? In the latter case, won't that delay CFC's war declaration to T176 at the earliest?

[spacetyrantxenu]

They can still declare war, the game interface won't prevent it. Unless that isn't what you're asking.

[scooter]

Quick: Can someone tell me when our next GP pops out? I know it's in this thread somewhere (and I'll start digging), but a quick reply would be awesome.

[sunrise089]

I've got a really busy day at work today, so I won't be able to refresh this thread quite as much. Here's my thoughts on the recent posts, and I'll check back in a few hours to see if I need to log into the game to perform any actions.

Good news on timing - the slower-than-real-time timer is not set to roll, with no CFC bonus time, at midnight eastern. That should give Noble a good window to play tonight.

* Brick by Brick is one of our two cities with a stable (the other is HF), so we might want to go knights there

I for one have no problem putting those two cities on knights. We want lots of cats, but some knights will still be useful for battles where their higher strength gets us into favorable odds, or just for their speed.

Another thing, is it possible that we have too many catapults? Should we turn some of them into musket/knight whips, because we still need killing units to take advantage of our collateral.

I'm about to go to sleep but now that I think about it I think we might be overcorrecting. There should be a number of cities that can get to size 6 and it would make sense to get them there so that we can draft rather than whip catapults.

It's tough to offer straight up answers to these questions. Obviously there are a few strategies we can take for unit builds and drafting:

1) Slow build infrastructure
2) Whip infrastructure, move on to units
3) Whip units, move on to infrastructure
4) Whip units, move on to more units

1) Draft more sparingly, preserving good tiles and minimizing anger
2) Draft sparingly for now, use the German cities to aggressively draft once they're size six (and so don't whip them)
3) Draft aggressively now

The previous plan was a mixture of 1+2 from the first group and 2+3 from the second. That plan probably was close to optimal for getting the most rifles in the fewest turns, but it left us very vulnerable to the attacks which seem more and more certain to happen over the next 5-10t.

I posted a military overview in my earlier T165 post. We have 14 cats and a few dozen other strength 8-10 units, which should be plenty to deal with civplayer's attack provided they move in a serious force (they of course may just try to snipe cities with 2movers, something that's tough to deal with on their large front but at least keeps more of our cats alive). CFC's attack won't come for 10t, but it will come at a critical city that many people have suggested we must defend. Like Sullla said in his last report, we probably have enough to deal with civplayers and then (with units we're continuing to draft) with one other army by T175 (be it CFC when they move in or Apolyton after they've walked into our territory past the ruins of The Gauntlet). But without substantially more units of all types we won't be able to slow down a third one, and we probably can't let Apolyton walk too far into our lands uncontested.

The other factor is that there's one mechanic that makes infra -> units better (you save or gain gold per turn, so earlier buildings means more total gold over X turns) but another that makes units -> infra superior (units have to move, and in our large empire we'll need lots of turns to get them to our borders). Again I don't know where to draw the line...it probably isn't only building units in a few cities, but it probably isn't two consecutive rounds of unit double-whips either. My hope is that we can get enough units over the next few turns to defend versus two of our enemies, that scooter can work a miracle with CFC (possibly helped by our enemies seeing our hurried production as a sign we're not sitting down), that we can overflow at least some hammers into courthouses to get our science rate up, and that we can manage to secure a source of gifted gold (seriously, can we offer people like 100% interest for this? Can WPC offer us their 20gpt? ) to accelerate the path to rifles.

Lastly, we have to keep this post in mind: Unit odds vs. Rifles. Even after substantial bombardment (requiring way more cats than we have now) we will still probably need twice as many attacking units as there are defending rifles when we engage the Apolyton stack.

EDIT:

Hmm.. did the Marble trade take place on T165 or T166? In the latter case, won't that delay CFC's war declaration to T176 at the earliest?

T166