AT loves it when a plan comes together!! [Spoilers]

[MindyMcCready]

Ok, I'm re-reading what you wrote. I'm sending up a warning signal over the 'nobody's teched in 10-12T' part.

That may indicate:
#1. saving gold (for military upgrades,...)
#2. A global switch from a commerce focus to a production focus.
#3. A global conclusion that its advantageous to buy tech for 1/4 price compared to self teching.

Some evidence:
-We're 5th in production and below the average despite having a decent amount of hills, forges and cities. #2
-At 0% we're #3 in GNP and not far off from the #1 GNP. May indicate #1/#3.

If this is happening we could see a surprise jump in power from axe to maces upgrades or horse archers to Knights, either of which would be very hard to deal with. Alternatively, other civs steadily outpacing us in mfg would be an indicator.

Unless we can turn our tech focus advantage into Pikes/Muskets/Rifles we'll have trouble competiting with the increased production or unit effectiveness from gold upgrades.

If you get the sense that *everybody* is playing at #3, I think that the best response is to sell to nobody. Turn it into a no tech trading game with us as the only techers.

But really, if we end up lapping everyone else in tech we're just going to end up excluded from tech trading blocks and no further ahead than if we didn't tech well. This is the main reason that we should consider emphasizing production over tech.

[AutomatedTeller]

I was thinking "well, we can just pop walls in when we are actively threatened" - but that doesn't really work in simultaneous turns, does it? I mean, in sequential, someone dumps a stack on you and you are guaranteed a build between - but in simultaneous, if you go first, you are not.

That's a major difference and explains why people like going 2nd on the offense. Same amount of reaction time for existing units, but less reaction for builds.

Why isn't it a normal thing that attacker goes first in a turn?


Jump in Maces could happen. Not worried about knights, since no one has Feudalism which is a pre-req. We will almost certainly be first to Guilds, if we choose to go that way.

[MindyMcCready]

I feel ok with our position. once we get Feudalism, I'm thinking we shut off research and just upgrade archers to LB, which will help us and Dogs to Maces. Yes, there is some worries about very short term.

Cornflakes is still in a hot war and just got attacked - we aren't the #1 power, but we aren't really an easy target - the extra promo on the archers doesn't show up in power ratings.

As for emphasizing commerce - well, we are financial. If we don't emphasize commerce, what the hell are we doing? Yes, we need production, very badly. We need settlers, we need workers, we need military.

I'm actually most worried about our tech lead - just like we shut out cornflakes when he had the lead, it think people are going to shut us out when we have the lead - which is part of the balance we run.

My emphasis is, I think, going to be:

Workers
Settlers
Military

for the next 10-20 turns, at least in the established cities.

In 3 or 4 turns, SWAT will have 2 or 3 LB and LA Law will have 1 or 2, with more archers being upgraded each turn. The one thing we aren't protected against, at all, is Commodore seaborne raid on MASH, so we need a trireme there. Fortunately, we'll get some warning of that.

We need Guilds for production, actually. And I don't really think I'm emphasizing commerce, at all. We are financial and we have (I think) 6 cottages. that's insane for a financial civ, though part of that is the collosus. that said - what the hell is wrong with emphasizing commece? I mean - we are financial with no cheap buidlings. What else will we emphasize?

1. I happily agree with the plan to upgrade archers to longbows and at least having a cushion for Dogs to maces. Thanks.

2. On Cornflakes, when you say 'hot war' are you referring to Azza or Commodore? Do you know the extent of the Cornflakes casualties? He made peace with Commodore right? Did Commodore make a dent in his power? Or was this just a minor opportunistic skirmish? I'm just not sure how much of a threat Azza still is and how much of Cornflake's troops Azza can tie up. From the T135 power graphs he looks to have 70% more power than us. Given the fixed amount for tech and comparable amount for pop, he may have well over double our units. If that's concentrated and comes crashing through our front door I don't think that we can stop it. Yes, that's a worst case scenario and requires Cornflakes to feel comfortable with his border with both Commodore and Azza. Still, if we want to stay out of an opportunistic war we need to appear a little thornier and less of a contender for top position.

3. We know/hope that the archer XP provides solid protection. It may not figure into Jowy and Cornflakes calculations quite as much. Its entirely possible that they haven't considered the extent of it or haven't considered it as much as we have. You may be assuming that your perspective is their perspective.

4. Happy with the Commodore lookout Trieme.

5. I take your point that you're not emphasizing commerce. In my mind, I saw no workshops so I conclude that you're not emphasizing production (but really they're not good yet wthout caste and guilds) and therefore must be emphasizing commerce. While in your perspective, we have no cottage so clearly we're not emphasizing commerce. We are, for good reason, emphasizing lake tiles which is neither a production nor commerce emphasis. I acknowledge and understand your perspective now.

6. 'What's wrong with emphasizing commerce". Commerce won't translate into any type of lasting advantage. As you noted, we'll be shut out of trading blocks if we pull ahead in tech in any meaningful way which will completely neutralize our advantage. Production doesn't suffer this problem. Unfortunately, this means that the financial trait isn't that good (except it is for us with the Colossus). We can't play to a strength that can be immediately neutralized.

So I think that you understand my concern. And you're largely addressing them with the focus on settlers, workers and military. I'd personally say that every city that we plant north of Lake Blue should be all farms and workshops once we get Guilds while we get some actual cottages in the core.

PS: I'm reading and responding all in a hurry without real analysis of our micro situation. I'm primarily in the position of throwing out wants without consideration of opportunity cost. So don't take my criticisms too seriously. I'm just playing the devil's advocate and trying to point out things that might not have considered or might be considered differently.

[AutomatedTeller]

We actually have 1 workshop!! Over by MASH. It's not used much, of course.

And your input is quite valuable The commerce we have is quite helpful, though, in that it allows us to A) continue settling cities without courthouses and B) upgrade our archers/dog soldiers.

The Moai site I expect to be mainly workshops and V (the banana/fish/iron/ivory spot) will be all workshops - that's going to be a monster site. There's a site on the SE penisula which will be mainly production, as well, as will LA Law. Most of our production is coming from specials and whipping, though.

[MindyMcCready]

I was thinking "well, we can just pop walls in when we are actively threatened" - but that doesn't really work in simultaneous turns, does it? I mean, in sequential, someone dumps a stack on you and you are guaranteed a build between - but in simultaneous, if you go first, you are not.

That's a major difference and explains why people like going 2nd on the offense. Same amount of reaction time for existing units, but less reaction for builds.

Why isn't it a normal thing that attacker goes first in a turn?


Jump in Maces could happen. Not worried about knights, since no one has Feudalism which is a pre-req. We will almost certainly be first to Guilds, if we choose to go that way.

Yes, you might not get that opportunity to build walls in Simultaneous turns. But more to the point, the ability to deter the opponent is lost as they've already committed their army at that point. Longbows fortified behind city walls on a hill can win the war without firing a shot.

As to the attacker favouring the 2nd half, I'm not sure that that's true. Parkin went to great trouble in twisting/interpreting the rules to get first half of the turn timer in PB4 I think although that had much to do with element of surprise. However, "Locke" and "Cervantes" also took the first half of the timer in PB4 which I think had less to do with surprise. Rego took the 2nd half of the timer in PB5 against Yuri.

Can't say I intimately understand the advantages myself having never played PB. I could put some effort into understanding that if you wish.

1st half advantages as I see it
-you get to promote before the next round of combat. Can be vital for healing.

2nd half advantages
-you get to reactively whip (better for defendor I'd presume)
-As you pointed out, the initial turn of war an attacker can catch you with your pants down and prevent 1st turn reactive whipping.

[MindyMcCready]

We actually have 1 workshop!!

My bad.

[AutomatedTeller]

We actually have 1 workshop!!

My bad.

It wasn't easy to see and I think just completed, anyway

btw - I'm a little worried that Jowy has, in fact, hit us. He did not play after the turn rolled and I'm not sure why he would do that unless he was trying to preserve the 2nd half of the timer. that said, all that could hit us out of the fog is HA and an HA stack that can kill 2 spears, 3 archers and a cat is pretty damn big, especially with at least one of the archers being CG III.

I have a dog in the area which I'll move in and I'll whip in the walls in LA Law next turn - I might upgrade the dog to a mace, not sure.

[MindyMcCready]

Jowy doing timer things is bad. Whip now. That city is way too important to lose.

You're overestimating your defensive odds. Our archers will not win battles once collateralled.

[MindyMcCready]

You're also overestimating the value of the Archers.

The first HA would score hits on the CGIII Archer. The second HA would probably have reasonable 25%-50% odds. He'd probably only need 12 HA to take the city, which is doable at this stage of the game and considering his power premium over us.

If he shows up with HA, whip military of course. If he shows up with slow movers then you may have to retreat from the city or whips walls if they'll materialize before his cats batter down the walls. Whip cats and maces everywhere and hope to nail his stack with cats + maces once he goes for the second city. Spite whip to the max of course.

Got to go. Good luck.

PS: Without machinery, Jowy has no defense against our maces.

[AutomatedTeller]

Well, that's true and I'm going to, though it's not an emergency. We get at least 2 turns of builds if cats show up (they have to walk 2 turns on our land) and even 2 movers have to hang out in the open, which is enough time to upgrade a dog to a mace and/or archers to xbows/lbows.

And he might not be hitting us, either. But yeah - I think he's going after someone... if he holds off for a few, he'll never take it. If he attacks now, I think we can hold him - we'll see.