[SPOILERS] Don't mention the war

[Profane]

Maybe TMIT's giving away free XP to while pretending to be participating in a dogpile, thus not offending Rome despite sabotaging their war effort?

[plako]

I love how you somehow seem to be holding off a 3v1 while also building a settler in that screenshot

It has been waiting in the queue for a long time waiting for a time when I could finish it instead of building crucial military builds. Maybe I now actually can do that.

Great turn for you . I really wonder what TMIT . First to get involved second to built such an expansive army and third to use it that way

Only problem I cna see is that Rome can move over defense-terrain right up to FL and Hel.

I hope I can block his way before they can enter the tiles adjacent to my cities and have enough troops to kill the stack in case they move to flat land. I don't care much, if the stack is standing on some random hill. It will be very expensive to keep the stack on my territory.

[plako]

T58 played. I try to write a bit more comprehensive report later, assuming I find time for it.

For some reason TMIT+Mackoti decided to feed me 4 more Chariots. I killed them with 3 spears with good odds and 1 Chariot with 50-50 shot. I got GG and decided to use it for healer and promoted the Chariot killer. I strongly considered making a Praet killer out of 1 Dog soldier, but the low base strength probably will kill him too easily. Rome has a stack of 8 Praets+ 2 Axes+ Spear and another Praet coming behind these. Too bad I might had to give hill position near Felix Leca to this stack. I had to simulate a bit.

Serdoa did come forward and did reveal 2 more Chariots. It should be pretty easy to deal with them. I've enough Spears to focus on that direction now that all chariots in the west are dead.

[plako]

Here are some shots from the turn.

1st shot shows the Chariot stack in the hill. I really don't know what they're thinking here. Mackoti has moved to hill 1st and TMIT has followed the suite. Can't complain though that was 3 easy kills and one 50-50. In case the last would have failed I had 2 other Chariots on range to finish things. All in all battle results have been very lucky so far.

This netted me a GG that I used to generate a Chariot healer from the Chariot that survived the battle.

Here is the scary Praet stack and there is one more coming behind these

As you can already see Serdoa progressed and brought 2 more Chariots visible. I should have pretty easy time handling these. Praets are the problem. I probably should have whipped a Dog Solider from scratch from the Leca this turn so that I would have got 2 of them on the hill. Now I just get one. Nevertheless Spear might prove quite useful when handling Serdoa's stack.

This is the status after ending turn:

[spacemanmf]

Nice work, sir. You're up a bit on the odds - let's hope it doesn't swing the other way when the praets attack (if you let them).

[plako]

Thx Spaceman.

I've had some messages going back and forth with WK. This is the most intresting one:

Chatted with Rome, and this snippet came up:

David: valid concern, this is more or less an alliance just to remove one player from the game, nothing permanent
though, I'm reading the latest email fallout now, and things are not going well

Not sure if it's helpful to you or not, but it's the only relevant thing that came up. I've also attached my power graph of T58 containing TMIT and Serdoa's power level. At this point there's nothing else I can do, although I will continue to do what I can to assist.

BTW, I would request that you to keep these messages between us only, although I already know that you won't tell the others given your situation.

I find the reason to dogpile me a pretty laughable. How is 4 player game going to be so much better than a 5 player game? Because of the map layout everyone has pretty even chances to benefit from my demise and the ones not joining are probably the ones benefitting most.

Well to be honest I've done my fair share of dogpiling so I shouldn't be judging. I just need to pull out some steam. I totally understand and accept that these games are not just a test of empire management although I don't think the current situation has much to do with diplo skills either. Everyone probably wanted to be friends with Rome and played nice towards them. I think I didn't do too badly there either so there was probably other things that made me their target. Then when the target was found convincing others to join them must have been pretty easy. I'm really glad I managed to meet WK before them and secure NAP.

[plako]

After some sims it doesn't make sense to try to defend the hill. Only Shock dogs are defending well enough against Praets when standing on a hill. I should have moved every Dog this turn on the city to gain fortification bonuses. Teching masonry next and whipping walls might be a good idea too. That 10% more could prove very useful in defense.

[luddite]

After some sims it doesn't make sense to try to defend the hill. Only Shock dogs are defending well enough against Praets when standing on a hill. I should have moved every Dog this turn on the city to gain fortification bonuses. Teching masonry next and whipping walls might be a good idea too. That 10% more could prove very useful in defense.

Does the extra 10% change things enough to get odds vs. the Praets?

[plako]

I've already decent odds with 40% cultural walls, however every tiny bit more improves my chances and it might be the difference needed to save defender or 2.

[NobleHelium]

Well I imagine the opportunity cost is walls vs another dog soldier, so that should be the comparison.