[Spoilers] Haram hopefully reports

[scooter]

I trust the lurkers, this isn't their first game. If there was a real need, someone would have spoken up by now. I've seen the in-game situation anyway, and I know I've been in more complicated wars where we managed a two-segment split just fine. I thought he might be more amenable to reason without the person who razed his city being the other party, but nope. Really underestimated how serious he was about this, but then I haven't really played with him before.

[scooter]

Mack subbing is probably a good thing. I think this game basically boils down to a TBS vs Mack duel anyway, and that'll be fun to watch. My goal will be to avoid kingmaking so long as both Mack and TBS are willing to leave me alone, and I think they're both smart enough to see I'm clearly in 3rd here (basing this on civ/land potential). I do understand that NOT attacking one of them is still mildly kingmaking, but you can only avoid it so much. The only chance for my civ to win this thing rests on damaging their prospects for expansion (since they have easy routes of expansion and mine are all difficult), but I'm not really willing to put the tremendous amount of time in that it would take to pull that off. Basically I'd have to knife them while they kill other people, and I'm not going to do that unless they give me a reason.

So I'll stockpile units, secure my borders, and then maybe invade Dreylin if I'm feeling up to it AND I'm confident that I won't be knifed in the back by Mack/TBS. Basically I just want to secure my civ's place on the podium and be ready to take advantage if one of them fumble it. That and play a good enough game that Mack and TBS have to really work for their win. Basically the goals is to take on Plako's PB13 role of keeping the two leaders honest.

Side note: I wouldn't really blame TBS if he's not super enthused about Mack subbing. But I get the sense most other players are having fun and don't really want the game to die.

[scooter]

and I think they're both smart enough to see I'm clearly in 3rd here (basing this on civ/land potential).

I should clarify this a little further, because I realize this could sound wrong. I agree with Haram's point a few posts ago that technically this is still a winning position if I were to seize the initiative now and exploit TBS's short-term weakness. He's got the game won if Mack/I fight, but he does have a tech disparity and slightly over-stretched empire right now. I looked over the border with him, and I see multiple avenues to really hurting him, especially if I could use a few Commando Cavs.

There's two problems with me actually doing that, though.

1) I don't want to . That would take tremendous work/time, and I just don't have enough interest to do that.
2) Were I to succeed, Mack knows how to pick a spot, and he would just slip in the knife at the worst possible moment and win anwyay.

Basically, I want to be in 3rd place because it makes the turns low-pressure.

The other alternative is that I could fight Mack, but he's basically at tech parity. I'd rather force Mack to keep TBS from catching up in tech, because something tells me he'll be more willing than me to try.

[scooter]

Few minor things. Mack logged in for 3 minutes and immediately proposed peace. Unfortunately nobody could unpause, so I had to re-offer on next login. Pulled ships back so as to be unthreatening. I suspect he'll turn around and kill Tsargon.

I'm debating who to attack next. Dreylin was obviously Haram's plan, and geographically it makes the most sense, but man that looks like it could be a slog. I did check the power graph and... it's kinda useless to me.



I strained my eyes for several minutes trying to decipher 50 shades of purple, and I gave up. If one of you lovely people are better at deciphering that graph than me, I would appreciate the help. Anyway, I know Haram mentioned Jowy as a potential ally, but it's hard not to look at this and wonder:



Those signs are accurate. His homeland is to the north, but a handful of Frigates would leave me immune to counter-attacks. His tech tree is full of WTF.



That is the deeeeeepest Rifling beeline I've ever seen. His army will know how to fire Rifles but NOT know how to ride horses or build catapults. Okay. Anyway, point is he couldn't do a thing to me. His mainland would be a different story, but once blood is in the water, his neighbors may pile on and leave me opportunities.

The risk is that Jowy is both friendly currently and also kind of crazy:



Not even going to use the weed smiley, because doing this requires something more potent than weed. On the flip side, Dreylin attacked us for whatever reason, so he may make more sense as an enemy - not to mention the upside is higher. Speaking of Dreylin, what are you doing, man?



That's Dreylin lighting 3 Caravels on fire for no real gain and getting meh rolls on top of it. I got some shiny promos out of it though.

Anyway, I'm firmly undecided on what's next. I swapped EPs to Jowy because I noticed I could get city visibility rather easily. That'll inform my decision. Also proposed Dreylin OB because at this point I think scouting him is more valuable than him scouting me. I can hide units on boats after all.

I'd really like some airships.

Any burning questions?

[scooter]

I have one. How has Jowy survived this long with no mounted units and no construction?

[Miguelito]

Order on that power graph: Mali, you, TBS, Dreylin, borsche, England, jowy, tsargon

[Haram]

Scooter, from my point of view it was the beginning of the true military build-up. I got rifling and converted to Nationhood just 1 turn before and I was planning to draft 24 rifles before switching back to bureau (I see you didn't draft) and build at least second this number with hammers plus other junk that awaits in a queue. Attack on Dreylin requires also at least 10 more galleons, from my estimation, but rifles and frigates went first, because of Joey. If you would like to go hardcore on military, you may have nearly 100 rifles, before GA ends.

As for Jowy - the 'ally' word was definately too much, so don't feel constrained by this.

Edit: all the decisions are obviously yours, I am not trying to talk into any scenario, just wanted to describe my plans more precisely.

[scooter]

No, I really appreciate it. It helps a lot. I didn't draft in the first turn because I was on the fence about going all-in on this, but I'm starting to lean back towards really going for it.

Was your plan also to get MilSci-MilTrad-Steel all before attacking to include Cavs and Cannons? I'm really not sure this can be done without cannons in particular, and since you have so many Knights it's tempting to grab MilTrad too and upgrade the high XP Knights. I'm looking it over more right now. At the very least, a pair of Commando Cavs sounds nice.

I'm also considering the idea of getting a couple more techs, then turning tech off for a couple turns + mass wealth building and doing a mass upgrade of units. Was that something you were considering? Just curious if you determined it wasn't necessarily worth it with your immense production abilities.

I'm looking into the value of State Property, and man did that civic ever get the axe in this version of the mod. It's so marginal that I don't think I'm in any hurry to get there, let alone if it's even worth it to adopt it. The +45fpt would be nice, but I honestly don't think it's worth it. Here's my napkin math:

SP:

~19gpt from maintenance
45fpt from works/waterm
+9gpt due to less upkeep

FM:
~60com/turn before modifiers (conservative estimate)
corps available

Food just isn't THAT valuable at this stage of the game.

Given that Communism also lost the Great Spy, I don't think it's even worth the 6k beakers anytime soon. Communism really went from uber-tech to horrendous here.

Side note: SO many orphaned resources in this game. Krill was kind of evil in his setup.

[Haram]

Was your plan also to get MilSci-MilTrad-Steel all before attacking to include Cavs and Cannons? I'm really not sure this can be done without cannons in particular

Not really. It is not a map for mounted units. It is not a map for big stacks. My idea of attacking Dreylin was to take down as many cities as fast as I can, to disable his production potential, that is already way, way lower than yours. Rifles/trebs seem just fine to me when his military is spread thin over so many coastal cities. Even if he concentrates his forces in one point and kills one of yous stacks, so what? You can afford losses, you can afford trades, if doubling the land is on the stake. C'mon, you've got effective production (incl. draft) of over 1000 hpt and rifles are just so good counter to everything he has atm.

I'm also considering the idea of getting a couple more techs, then turning tech off for a couple turns + mass wealth building and doing a mass upgrade of units. Was that something you were considering? Just curious if you determined it wasn't necessarily worth it with your immense production abilities.

C'mon scooter, it is more efficient to build a new unit and delete the old one, than build wealth to use it for an upgrade
To be completly serious - I am not a fan of upgrades in general. I prefer to use older units to increase the chances of survival of more valuable ones (like I did, killing Dreylin's stack). And when you have an economy, where hammers are cheap and gold is scarce, upgrades are just No fucking way, in my book.

I'm looking into the value of State Property, and man did that civic ever get the axe in this version of the mod. It's so marginal that I don't think I'm in any hurry to get there, let alone if it's even worth it to adopt it. The +45fpt would be nice, but I honestly don't think it's worth it. Here's my napkin math:

SP:
~19gpt from maintenance
45fpt from works/waterm
+9gpt due to less upkeep

FM:
~60com/turn before modifiers (conservative estimate)
corps available

Food just isn't THAT valuable at this stage of the game.

Given that Communism also lost the Great Spy, I don't think it's even worth the 6k beakers anytime soon. Communism really went from uber-tech to horrendous here.

In general, I agree that SP is not that huge atm, but you need to consider also, that:
- Mack has +110% gold in most of his cities. Kremlin will be HUGE for him.
- If you conquer more land, you usually build more workshops on a new land than on your own one.

[scooter]

Quick note: I'm pretty convinced now that attacking Dreylin is the way to go. Jowy's island cities will always be there for an easy snipe if someone starts to attack him, but that's way too small of a prize. I think I'll just be ready to pounce on his island the minute somebody else declares on him.

I'm also considering the idea of getting a couple more techs, then turning tech off for a couple turns + mass wealth building and doing a mass upgrade of units. Was that something you were considering? Just curious if you determined it wasn't necessarily worth it with your immense production abilities.

C'mon scooter, it is more efficient to build a new unit and delete the old one, than build wealth to use it for an upgrade
To be completly serious - I am not a fan of upgrades in general. I prefer to use older units to increase the chances of survival of more valuable ones (like I did, killing Dreylin's stack). And when you have an economy, where hammers are cheap and gold is scarce, upgrades are just No fucking way, in my book.

I suppose I should clarify so you don't think I'm completely insane .

Of course I agree it's more efficient that way, but I like upgrades in a few situational cases.

1) Upgraded well-promoted outdated units to access promos you wouldn't be able to easily build. I think you've got a decent amount of Maces that are triple-promoted, but I could be wrong here. I'll take a closer look at this whenever my turn finally comes up.

2) The bigger one: when it yields a logistical advantage. I see the primary obstacle to this war as being logistical, not production. I have no doubt that building 80 Rifles in a short period will be extremely easy, much harder will be actually transporting more than like 40-50 to the front lines in time because there are only about 4 Galleons currently, and they're all on the opposite side of the map. (Granted, 50 will do some damage ) For example, I see upgrading the galleys to be a no-brainer because Galleons are the biggest thing missing. If it allows cities to be captured a few turns earlier, that pays for itself in some ways because you give Dreylin less time to build up. There's also a good deal of Maces on the Dreylin front already IIRC, and those are units that can much more easily participate. I'm also not a huge fan of paying maintenance on outdated units because it does add up. Or at least, you hit diminishing returns on how useful they are.

Basically, 3 Rifles built/drafted on the far west side right before the war starts that would each take 8T or so to reach the front is inferior to 1 upgraded on the front lines that can participate on T0 of the war. Hopefully that at least makes me sound like a sane person. I'm still not sure how much upgrading I'll actually do because I also like the idea of having cannon fodder for this. I'll have to start drawing up plans first.

I'm looking into the value of State Property, and man did that civic ever get the axe in this version of the mod. It's so marginal that I don't think I'm in any hurry to get there, let alone if it's even worth it to adopt it. The +45fpt would be nice, but I honestly don't think it's worth it. Here's my napkin math:

SP:
~19gpt from maintenance
45fpt from works/waterm
+9gpt due to less upkeep

FM:
~60com/turn before modifiers (conservative estimate)
corps available

Food just isn't THAT valuable at this stage of the game.

Given that Communism also lost the Great Spy, I don't think it's even worth the 6k beakers anytime soon. Communism really went from uber-tech to horrendous here.

In general, I agree that SP is not that huge atm, but you need to consider also, that:
- Mack has +110% gold in most of his cities. Kremlin will be HUGE for him.
- If you conquer more land, you usually build more workshops on a new land than on your own one.

Yeah, the question is whether it's worth it to get to Communism quick enough to denial-build Kremlin. I'm definitely thinking about it, it's just hard to justify prioritizing that over something like:

*Combustion: Destroyers
*Physics: scientist + Airships
*Biology: worth about as much fpt as SP
*Steam Power -> Assembly Line: I counted a ton of riverside tiles for Levees, and Factories with this production base sounds amazing).

Obviously a few of those have prereq techs, but it's hard for me to move Communism too high up the priority list right now. Maybe the good news is that Mack needs a bunch of those techs too. We'll see what he decides.