[Spoiler] Kaiser has a plan

[roland of gilead]

I would hope so.

you can only build them with an airfield it but i believe you can move them to city centers. It may be best to just build one where you best can then use airstrips or city's to base them.

time of the essence of course.

Bi planes have a really limited range 4 so maybe good defense against sea attack at best. 2 just saves you a lot of science.

I feel ok about things just now. Woden is fighting against tanks and artillery and hopefully soon air. If we can jointly bet him and pick up some oil and a city or 2 in the process we have a good chance. We can then turn on CMF but you can be sure sub and him will be fighting soon enough.

perhaps the short term is just survival for now though.

bombers early late game just smash everything up walls tanks everything.

let's just survive the next 5.

[Kaiser]

AK is gone at the hans of Woden, I am surprised that he was able to take it with just a Curassier Corps and his BS Corps, but we have to bite that bullet.



My consolation is that he lost a more important city for him in Misty Mountain and that we can resettle somewhere here, even off coast, even potentially opening up another city spot NE of the Fur.



Apparently Suboptimals BS Armada can now shoot 4 tiles and continue bombarding our cities. I really need to get my Artillery into place to surprise strike this ship and take it out. It has been a pain in the ass and forming an earyl Fleet/Corps or Armada/Army is one of the best GG/GA abilities.



Sadly Suboptimal has an Archaeologist there and will see my Artillery Army, so surprising it will not really be possible anymore I think. Maybe he gets caught offguard by me building the railway and having slotted Logistics?

Not pictured, but our South needs to militarize quickly as Suboptimal has at least 2 tanks W of Kings. Luckily I already positioned some FC and 2 PS here and will mostly produce PS for the moment. I need PS Corps as a minimum to defend against these guys.

We got 2 Aluminium in our territory, both are connected. One is at Bologna, so the situation is a lot better than for Oil. However one of our Aluminium is under our Campus at John Lamarr, that is right, it is bordering Venice.
There is another source near former AK (under its Encampment), so it would have been ok from the total availability, even if we would not have been able to secure our South against CMF.

I also gifted CMF 60  as this is the unit upkeep he has for the 4 units defending Isaac the last 3 turns. I know he defends it to not loose wild and bruins against the loyality pressure from Suboptimal, but it is such a neat move that I think this needs to be recognized. 
I probably will continue this until I deem it no longer necessary, I might need a way to get him to clear the horse tile the turn after the next to take a shot at his BS Armada.

[Kaiser]

We lost the musket which killed his Curassier, an exchange I would take again.

I currently worry about what Woden is doing with his gigantic treasury (you are welcome btw ). He has apparently been mass building Curassiers as his Iron dropped from 100 > ~10 last turn already. I fully expect him to mass upgrade these into tanks when he finishes the tech, they cost 330 a tank costs 480 so that would be 310 / upgrade, more for corps and armies.
He might even be building some Heavy Chariots here, but the gold investment is huge. 65 for a Heavy Chariot means a tank upgrade costs 840 , more for armies.



For that reason I decided to risk my MM Army and plunder the railroad there as this will disable 3 bridges here and thus slow down any attack.
If he survives this shooting, he will then redeploy onto EM CH to hold that bridge.

I think I successfully scared myself with Woden's treasury, we need more PS fast, nearly everywhere is building PS now to get as many Armies deployed as possible

This also tipped me away from the Biplane play, it would be cute and we could do some damage to any advancing armies, but ultimately this would not be strong enough to win us the game or stand against a crazy Woden tank rush. I do not think anymore that we can crush Woden with conventional warfare.

Next research target is Chemistry for Research Labs and AT crews. From there I likely beeline to Nukes. Having the best city in the world and a central position, going nuclear and devastating Woden's central region and Suboptimals access to the main continent including his power seem like the best shot for getting a concession from these two.

Until then it means holding out, I probably save my money to get as many PS upgraded to AT as soon as possible. We will get the third Artillery, likely to take Venice and deny the gold to Woden and Suboptimal. I hope Ichabod sees this danger as well, as he has the longer front and smaller capabilities.

[roland of gilead]

Seems reasonable.

Hopefully they put all their faith in tanks and we can smash them with these.

could you offer ichabod a horse and a niter as a deal to hopefully draw his attention to this.

[Kaiser]

I start the turn to this, I am happy about the low damage on our PS, but this looks an awful lot like a bait for my Artillery. Instead I am going to get my units here under protection and army up the PS to get its odds of surviving even better.



I am also greeted by this, 2 tanks here, seemingly without backup pillaging my lands. Thanks to the railway, I am able to scrounge FC together from all over the empire to work on these.



We did not need all units, the tank on the Niter was actually harder to clear as I could find less safe positions for my FC to take their shot. In the end we used 3 FC (CB, Isaac, John Lamarr), CB walls (equivalent damage to a FC), a FC corps (EM) and a FC Army (Bortus) as well as a Curassier Corps (Bortus Encampment) to clear both of these.
I also brought down some PS (now combined into an Army).

We basically had to swarm these, it is a fight which is possible, but I am not so sure how this looks if the tanks come in force or are, even worse, Armies instead of plain tanks. Luckily Suboptimal is currently preferring to have ahuge military score over strong land based units as I am yet to see a Corps or Army for a land unit from him.



I did not execute one last turn, but I did now realizing that I was easily able to one shot this guy inside my borders. That is a total loss of 182 MP for Suboptimal, it feels good to get some payback here.



Here I am trying to get cute, I want CMF to leave the horse (he has full horses so I offered a different strategic resource instead, I think I actually changed that later to be Aluminium as it is adjacent) at Isaac so I can build a railroad there for my artillery to move and sink his BS bait. I will need 2 railroads, for that reason  GM is currently producing a Barracks instead of repairing the walls of its encampment. Suboptimal can throw away his Cavalry or let me slowly build up GM Encampment.

If CMF gets it, then I will Railroad the horse and repair GM Walls next turn so my Artillery can safely take a shot on the BS the turn after.
If the BS is still there that is.



I tried, but this is the best I could come up with, he has full niter but Oil seems better anyway to warn him of Curassiers (Iron unit) becoming Tanks (Oil unit). The Money shall indicate Woden's treasury, as it represents its first 2 digits.
Hopefully he gets it, I probably should send 2 PS Armies over just to be sure that he will not be overrun, ~ 10 turns until we can upgrade them to AT Crews

Here is the save

[roland of gilead]

Seems like a good turn. I agree that is bait.

Let's hope the tanks weren't a diversion but those railroads mean that doesn't matter perhaps.

you do need to watch with that new encampment. anything in it will be wiped if taken. It may not survive the turn after it is built.

[Kaiser]

You mean the one at EM? It should come with 400 health in walls, but yes it is potentially quickly dead. It slows down any attack on EM and its Campus though

GM Encampment can be taken every turn until its walls are back up. However it will cost Suboptimal a unit, so we will see. Next turn GM will build its walls again so the Artillery gets protection in the encampment

[roland of gilead]

Yeah that sounds good.

Sub will have to pull back from Issak or face those artillery picking him off.

hopefully we can hold our own v Sub and double team Woden and make inroads there.

[Kaiser]

Woden has spent his money, all the 5000 , in one turn. His MP will likely make a leap next turn, as there should be loads of tank armies coming to Ichabod or me. I think Ichabod is more in danger though.

The CS of his weakest (and newest city) is up to 87, meaning his strongest unit has 97 CS which would be a tank army, fitting with my expectation.

We continue building PS where possible, 9 turns till we get AT Crews.



Meanwhile Suboptimal is using his superior range to pound onto Isaac, his BS Armada has a CS of 87 +3 Rajendra + 5 GA = 95 vs our 89 defense. His other BS only shoot with 78 CS, so I am hopeful that we have a couple of turns until Isaac is threatened to be conquered by some tank armies by Suboptimal.

In any case, I am trying to set up a surprise for Suboptimal here, he likely has his Spy in the city, but I had no other place to stage my 2nd artillery.



I hope CMF gets the message to remove his Cavalry from my horse, so my ME can build a railroad there and allow me to bring more units. Both Artillery should be able to move using roads and still fire on the BS there, but it would be great to be able to stuff that area to avoid any land based counterattacks.



I think Ichabod is well aware of what is happening, but here is a reminder and a question about how much gold he needs to get a tank army himself. That would immensly help him by increasing his CS against Woden.
I am moving PS up to my border with Woden, we need to fight this under our cities, luckily EM and KG both have well placed rivers as a 2nd line of defense here.

[Kaiser]

Moderate damage onto our Musket Army here, Suboptimal has another BS there somewhere so he should be able to finish the musket next turn if we do nothing.



So let us do something about it, right? This clearly is a trap, but I am about 80% sure that he cannot kill my arty army in the damaged encampment without attacking the encampment with a land unit (the 20% insecurity are about privateers/sea dogs being able to destroy it, I could not spare the time to test this extensively so I went with it anyway).
So the solution is to cram as many units as possible into this narrow space so his two tanks near former Geneva cannot reach and conquer the encampment. This is a big gamble, but removing his lvl 4 (4 Range BS) is also hugely beneficial for us as now the only BS which outranges me is his BS Armada.



Success, now I am hoping that he cannot destroy my encampment with the Arty Army inside



I also look for some pillaging opportunities and map reveal here, the Oil and the Coal look possible, depending on how many units he has here to defend.



GM is getting through the MA as quick as possible, we officially breached 200 . Sadly my overeflow seems to have been lost as we should have had 93 overflow from the Stable and Armory alone, let alone the Encampment repair.



Woden's upgraded Tanks are either here ...



Not really here somehow ...



Or here ...



But he also send me this offer, which is a huge slap in the face considering that he razed AK unprovoked (admittedly I was handing Ichabod 5 CS and later also engaged on the capture of Misty Mountain) and claimed territory which is very close to my capital.

This either is a very good ruse in trying to, successfully, luring my units away in direction of Ichabod or a try to scare me with his MP into a short term peace while he tries to go for Ichabod.
His problem is that I have anyway most of my army near GM, so even if he shows up with 4-5 tank armies, I think I can hold. He might have up to 10 though (total MP increase was ~300 while the difference between a Curassier Army and a Tank Army is 16 CS) which might be difficult, but If he shows I can reroute my PS which I just now directed towards Rio/Belem.
Thankfully Ichabod is starting to build a Railway from our border to his core, so my PS will be more flexible. Depending on where he shows up, I will bring more units to the hot zone.



But maybe he was asking me for my price for peace?
Here it is, I cannot let him keep the Black tower or Moria, in order to keep it myself I need Grey Havens and Mount Doom to be mine or destroyed (which Suboptimal certainly will do if Woden should accept).
If he should accept, it is still a race here as that would leave me a well defendable border as well as a comparable albeit a bit smaller territory than his and Ichabods combined. Luckily Ichabod controls Misty Mountain which lets me bring in units to hinder Woden from conquering Ichabod, this deal does not give him free reign to conquer on one of my allies.

I do not think Woden will accept this, as Moria is as hard to swallow as the Black Gate was for me, maybe even a bit harder. But without Moria I do not get access to enough OIl to justify this deal.



Suboptimal is starting to accelerate, interestingly Ichabod's Gossip told me that he is pursuing a cultural victory a couple turns ago. Suboptimal is the bigger threat though and I wonder what the tourists will think of a couple well placed nuclear warheads in his territory. Now we just need to get there before he can wind this game