(February 14th, 2014, 13:14)WilliamLP Wrote: I'm not sure if you included razing Cherokee in one of those. That move was just way outside of his zone and all he got was a few gold pieces and lost a few chariots to us in doing so.
Right, I forgot about that one. Great,....I hate that guy more now! :LOL:
(February 14th, 2014, 13:14)WilliamLP Wrote: To be fair I'm not exactly a saint and would like to hit him when he next fights Plako, as well.
Good to hear. He's really, really asking for it with that plant. He's forcing us to garrison that border much more heavily now. If we have to build the troops anyway,...
(February 14th, 2014, 13:14)WilliamLP Wrote: Conceded! That would have been a really nice move in retrospect. I was too excited to be getting the chance to finish Retep that I wasn't thinking about the details new border at all. Mea culpa there. It would have been a very aggressive settlement (not able to take its first ring for a very long time) but the position would be better than now.
Thanks. In my mind, it wouldn't have been aggressive of us to plant there largely because he'd always have 2-tiles distance for his cities. So it wouldn't be threatening for us to own in the way that it's threatening for him to own that spot. In that way, the plant is more of a defensive move for us.
Now he either realizes how much that plant screws with us,...for which we owe him full hostality, or he doesn't realize how much that plant screws with us,...well what can I say about that? How about 'time for an education'! Funny that I come to the same answer either way! :LOL:
Some things to consider:
-keep an eye out for how close we are to a GG. We really should seriously consider baiting Ichabod before he gets rifling/cuirassiers (when we've put those 30 cats together). If we DOWed Bacchus, Ichabod would stay on the sidelines for a couple of turns to try to determine if it's a real war,....birthing a GG would definately convince him. If we were 1 point away for example we could send in a scout or archer if for suicide duty while the rest of the army is over by Ichabod.
Has Ichabod spent any EP against us or is he still feigning disinterest in our lands?
(February 14th, 2014, 13:27)WilliamLP Wrote: Expanding on that point:
So the city wouldn't actually claim any useful new tiles for us and would be a drain on the economy. It would also risk riots (wounding the units inside) and flipping since Bacchus would out-culture the city tile.
Its sole purpose would be a costly settlement-blocking fort. But, even as such, I concede that it would have been a good idea.
Culture mechanics details? Bah! All I'm hearing is that we should have razed Forever Machine.
I'd be willing to bet that Bacchus is going to have a false sense of security with that plant. Look for a forest chop SSE of Madame Butterfly as a sign.
Move a big stack of cats 1E of Butterfly and his instinct would probably be to garrison Red Dot. We'd get to fork the 2 cities with a Knights stack. Until he gets engineering a Knights stack would be protected by a river crossing from anything in Red Dot.
We need to build up our military before seriously thinking about anything like this. We'd also need a spy to peak inside Forever Machine. Lastly, we'd have the option of offering peace for "Red Dot" (probably should be calling that pink dot now).
But you know what? I'd also bet that he's going to plant a city 1S of the corn in no time. Triple fork, here we come!
(February 14th, 2014, 15:15)MindyMcCready Wrote: Thanks. In my mind, it wouldn't have been aggressive of us to plant there largely because he'd always have 2-tiles distance for his cities. So it wouldn't be threatening for us to own in the way that it's threatening for him to own that spot. In that way, the plant is more of a defensive move for us.
Color it like you want but that plant would be a far more audacious move for us than him! For him, it's a really nice city, and the only reasonable place he could have planted a city, on unused land in his culture that he's been contesting for since turn 20. He's even pre-built FP cottages for the city to use. For us, it would only be an economic loss and not a small one.
Quote:Now he either realizes how much that plant screws with us,
I don't know if it really screws with us. Any border will be a little awkward. This way at least we don't have to worry about 1-movers attacking from the fog without a turn of warning. Defending against knights isn't that big a deal, we just leave a couple of fortified pikes in cities. That way if he wants to assault a city at least he does it at a loss, and the cities aren't that valuable to us yet anyway.
Quote:Some things to consider:
-keep an eye out for how close we are to a GG. We really should seriously consider baiting Ichabod before he gets rifling/cuirassiers (when we've put those 30 cats together).
It's a thought, and we're actually really close, something like 111/120 to the fourth one.
Quote:Has Ichabod spent any EP against us or is he still feigning disinterest in our lands?
Yes, he started recently (he has a couple of courthouses up) and we no longer have research visibility. Other than indirectly through paper.
Quote:We need to build up our military before seriously thinking about anything like this.
Yeah, we need to do that anyway. We don't have the luxury of being able to fall behind Ichabod for too long.
Eye-rolling time for you again but I really don't want to be the first aggressor this time around. This is partly on principle and the Neutral Good side of my personality (heh) but also because mutual peace is so clearly and strongly a positive sum proposition for both of us that I think there's a chance he will realize this. I think there's a less than 50% chance that this works, but if it does, the game is so much stronger for us than one where we have two aggressive borders that it's worth taking the shot.
(This doesn't mean not planning to defend, but it does mean not being a first aggressor.)
As usual, the times when I'd change my mind are when a war would be fast, decisive, and the result certain. None of these are true right now. If a situation comes up where we have a big stack of Cuirs and Bacchus is occupied in a war elsewhere, then sure we start forking stuff!
We had a pretty rare boring turn, which are always delightful!
Comm's total navy here is 4 Carracks and 1 Galley. Our boats are hiding in the lake. Him being Portugal we can't be sure there aren't units on board the Carracks. We are officially cut off from the island, unless we're willing to consider spending a hundred worker turns on a trollish diagonal rectangle of forts.
He might start messing with our nets, but we can live with that.
I'm seriously thinking about 1-turning both Compas and Optics in the next two turns and starting to pump Caravels out of the Moai city here.
It's pretty dangerous for us to be this low, and I'm intending to catch up on this graph. A lot of GA production is going to go to Cats and then promoted Muskets.
(February 14th, 2014, 21:36)Hashoosh Wrote: I'm not familiar with the history of this game and that's awful lot of pages...
What's your conflict with Bacchus based on? Is that red dot where he's planting? Have you taken ForeverMachine and then lost it to him?
Ugh sorry for asking all the questions, this just looks like an awesome game you've been playing, I'd love to know the backstory.
No problem! Most of the 100+ pages of this thread is not really intended for lurker consumption but just Mindy and I arguing about whether to attack now or not, lol.
Brief history of Bacchus conflict, turn 62:
After an extremely fast start with one of the best starting locations in the game (ignoring neighbour distance) we were locked in total war with Retep here but still managing to expand east a little. Bacchus showed up out of nowhere with a 2 chariot city-raiding party. (2 chariots is not to scout.) This was a negative sum move for him just intending to bring us down since the city was too young to capture. We barely had enough in the city to stop him; he had about 25% chance to raze if he went for it.
I think he probably had designs on occupying all this land to our southeast.
Turn 89:
Ignore the 13 unit raiding party in our lands to the northwest. Also Carmen is now Manon because Retep razed it while we took care of a ridiculous Pink Dot from Ichabod (see the ruins, and look how far away it is from him on the minimap). The point is that the barb city Cherokee spawned to the SE of our borders. Now this was _way_ out of Bacchus's position. But:
He went to the trouble of sending 2 chariots over to raze the city! He got a couple of gold pieces but it was a negative sum move for him against us again. Because it was obviously aggressive and we could simply kill his chariots, we did. I'm guessing at this point he still planned to contest all this land.
Turn 109:
He planted Stranger toward us, which wasn't crazy or indefensible at all while we were occupied in another war. But when Retep finally gave us peace after about 90 turns of fighting:
We razed Stranger with an overwhelming attack that he didn't have time to respond to.
What's also interesting is that his thread name in this game (before he knew we were neighbours) was actually a mocking version of my thread name in PB11! He since changed it.
Interestingly though, things have been very peaceful for the 60+ turns since these events.
But throughout this game we've had to fight, defend raids, and raze cities of 4 different players for every tile we have in almost literally every direction. So hopefully this game has been the one to teach RB that we're not the choicest morsel of easy noob pickings to go after in the early game.
Also, I would have declared and re-offered peace two turns ago to show his intent, but I couldn't because Ichabod started logging in and out right at the beginning of the turn when I started playing, and it would have been a double-move to declare. If it smells like clock cheese it probably is I guess.
The main lesson here is probably to build more sentry chariots next time.
Anyway I haven't even seen the game yet but I'm extremely pissed off.
Funny that I come to the same answer either way! :LOL: 
