[SPOILERS] The Rise of Lewger: A BacoN of Bacon Revenge (bacOn bAcoNbAcon) Bacon

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azza played passive once again and put off combat



from there his cats can hit clara and any unit bordering rose or Donna.
So I can either retreat a bit just out of the range on all fronts, or continue to press on all fronts, making him choose where to hit. I chose the latter.

oh, and mackoti declared war on Scooter. nice, but I don't think they actually have a common front. maybe he's just killing a scouting caravel or something.


not bad, if Azza lets me hang onto it. I suspect it will change hands again before the war is over - but then again, I thought tthe same about Sarah Ann.


for now, Azza has no iron and no elephants (lost elephants with Clara). he can still build horse archers, cats, maces, longbows.


I lost 2 knights at 70% odds invading Clara, which is unfortunate. I left this stack 1N f Clara for a counter attack and to prevent cats from being too effective. inside Clara I have 2 knights - a C2 and a C1+anti-cat promotion knight that has 9.1 health, as well as a mace and 2 pikes.



pushed here. the two highlighted stacks are the biggest, the other 2 near Donna just have 1 mace, 1 knight, 1 pike (the southern one has a one cat). since stage 2 can't be reached by azza I loaded it up as well. still a few reinforcements behind as well. lots of knights produced this turn and next.

I revolted to caste. we got gunpowder at end of turn and I'll start fitting in a handful of muskets. might build a few more cats just in case as well. lets see what Azza does, I think he has to fight me somewhere this turn. at the very least, if he doesn't reinforce Donna I have enough force there to attack it despite the cultural defense and raze it.

I set research to banking. Not for banks, but because I want Free Market quickly. Since we need education as well and I'm in caste now I'm going to get aggressive with the great scientist in the capital now. I'll probably let it starve a bit to work 5-6 scientists (taking away all the mines, not cottages or food). we aren't desperate for knights atm so I can let them build in other places. the HE epic is complete, and that city is producing 2 knights every 3 turns. also NE is 8 or so turns away so we could have another GP for a golden age in about 30 turns.

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So gifting cities is legit?

so apparently this happenned: the black sword sold 3 cities to mackoti.

I don't know exactly whats going on, it has something to do w/ the war between mackoti and scooter. the whole thing doesn't make any sense to me, I guess global lurkers will have a better grasp of it.

FWIW, Brick, I don't think its kosher. I didn't think so when Dhalphuir gave a city to Azza, but it wasn't worth making a fuss as neither Dhal or Azza are relevant in this game anymore and its jut one more city for me to capture (eventually). This is different, I kind of feel like it violates the "don't be a dick" rule. I can't imagine TBS got enough to justify losing 3 cities in the deal so its probably spite motivated. and its making the game too easy for mackoti.
thats my 2 cents, maybe bring it up in the lurker thread for lurkers to discuss.

[Bigger]

So gifting cities is legit?

so apparently this happenned: the black sword sold 3 cities to mackoti.

I don't know exactly whats going on, it has something to do w/ the war between mackoti and scooter. the whole thing doesn't make any sense to me, I guess global lurkers will have a better grasp of it.

FWIW, Brick, I don't think its kosher. I didn't think so when Dhalphuir gave a city to Azza, but it wasn't worth making a fuss as neither Dhal or Azza are relevant in this game anymore and its jut one more city for me to capture (eventually). This is different, I kind of feel like it violates the "don't be a dick" rule. I can't imagine TBS got enough to justify losing 3 cities in the deal so its probably spite motivated. and its making the game too easy for mackoti.
thats my 2 cents, maybe bring it up in the lurker thread for lurkers to discuss.

well it seems like me and Commodore were they only ones to back up Scooter (odd, since it appears to make Scooter weak and the 2 of us have the most to gain by that) so we are back on track. I'll just say this: Azza is fighting to the death. Which I have always respected Azza for, he never intentionally tries to get eliminated quicker when he is losing, he always fights for his life as long as possible. TBS appears to have thrown in the towel once things started going down hill, which is going to benefit mackoti and dtay . well, thats my unspoiled perspective anyway, could be I don't really know whats going on.

I was going to play again tonight and do a double report but I think I will have to sleep before Azza plays, so here's a quickie:


he invaded only the stack on the doorstep of Rose, leaving the little ones, and Clara, alone. too many cats retreated from battle, unfortunately. he lost 2, a knight, an elephant, and a warrior (??? haha). I lost more, and 3 cats. well that was my mistake, that stack was too big.
Overall I think my efforts to avoid a big SOD fight haven't been effective.


I still have some small pillaging stacks that will require an even trade for him to kill off. I'd like to get the rest of the mines pillaged and maybe the horses. thats about all I can do here, though. I'm going to have to build a large enough army that I can march in and just absorb the cats. the good news is I have done a great job at cutting down his production - capturing sarah ann, Clara, and pillaging hammers and food. Donna is already whipped to size 5 and won't be worth much, so Rose will be his only big production city. so I think I'll just have to march in with 30 knights and 20ish other units and cats and just use blunt force to take his capital (maybe even more units than that). sucks but not much else I can do here, I think.

I'm slowly retreating what I can, including all cats I had in Azza land.


not 100% yet, but one upside of my mistake is that I think he'll have to concede Clara to me. hopefully I can rush in walls when it comes out of revolt - its size 2 so I can whip, plus I have stone atm. here is a small force to take Rory next turn. I think I will have to raze it and retreat the rest of the knights back to Clara, though - I can't hold both Clara and Rory.

that will leave him w/ only 3 mainland cities, and only Rose is any good. I'll be attacking his islands from the south soon too. Just need to be patient and not make any more mistakes.

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No turn today, it looks like. Here's my report from last night.

I'm finally starting to see an end to this war in sight:

Azza went back to his do nothing, watch me trapse across his countryside strategy.


oh, I hated to raze this city. But no choice. If I let it alone he would continue to pump units out of it, and if I tried to hold it I would be stretched too thin.


my pillaging is almost complete. I just have the last remaining hammer source for his big two cities (the hill mine SW of Donna), the unworkable copper to stop mace production, and also the roads connecting Donna and Rose, for strategic purposes. over the next few turns I'll start extracting my pillage forces for a massive SOD assault on Rose, which I've finally decided can't be avoided. Once I whip walls into Clara I'll move all the knights back east (I have 3 pikes and a mace, which should be enough with walls in place). the stack south of rose will try and move south to hit mickey, which I will keep if Azza lets me take it. I have 2 knights NW of the copper, so unless he hits that stack I'll pillage his last remaining metal next turn (if he does knights in Clara as well as some of the pillagers can counter).

Hey, look at that, I gained city vision in Donna and Rose (only) this turn!


once a proud mega city, I've pillaged it to the ground so its only a whipping factory now. at size 4 with no food, its limited in its use even at that.


still large and in charge, but not much hammers. Next turn I have a trieme that will move onto the crabs - 2 turns later both seafood will be pillaged. Azza will likely whip it into the ground too, but at least that will prevent him from regrowing quickly.


currently Azza has his forces split - 90% of his cats are in Donna, knights are evenly split, horse archers and elephants are in Rose. I'm pillaging the roads connecting the two cities. possibly he lets me isolate the two, but more likely he'll see it coming and move the cats into Rose. thats fine.

the SOD will come from the rice tile, not the "stage 2" hill tile. then I'll move NW of Rose. that will allow knights to hit donna easily if he abandons it. I'll need 40ish knights, and probably 5-8 muskets to absorb collateral and protect maces, pikes, cho-kus.


2 of the knights are occupied elsewhere (1 on azza's old island for emergency defense, 1 on a galley). rest are split up now, but I'll be gathering them around Bacon! soon. if Azza doesn't pick any off, but I'm producing them at a fairly rapid pace now. 1/3 of the pikes will be occupied as well defending cities, and a couple of the maces. I wish I had more cats - I'll probably try and get 2 more of those as well. cho-kus can't bombard city defenses .

I should be attacking the island south Mickey in 5-6 turns as well.

oh, I switched off banking onto compass. Azza still has a navy out there, and recently it dissappeared south out of my view in the west (2 triemes, galley) as well as 2 galleys in the east I haven't seen in awhile. I think I have my cities adequately defended, and enough vision to keep from being surprised, but I'm going to need caravels to clear up if I ever want to eliminate him.

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oooh, Pindicator just took a city from mackoti. Probably one of the 3 he bought from TBS - but still, that's interesting. Hopefully that means the war continues for awhile .

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honestly Azza should have been doing this all along, imo. now he has a couple of shock knights, which gave him 63% odds against the pike. they were on flatland, just east of Rose. anyway its a sign I my countryside tour on azza's land needs to wrap up until I'm ready for the big assault.

For that, I need more meatshields in addition to knights (pikes and muskets).



hmm, well.

Scooter took another city off mackoti. ok, mackoti has more island cities than I expected. scooter has astronomy and is able to research chemistry (hah, we get caravels at the end of this turn). more importantly he has amphibious beserkers and 2 extra moves for his ships! I won't be surprised to see mackoti lose more island cities - I can only imagine he's been building more of a land force to fight suttree and Old Harry.



2 cities they took recently. you can also see one of the islands TBS sold to mackoti.


argh, I forgot a copper source Azza has on his farflung island (barely visible to the east in the previous picture). I thought I would cut off his production of the mace here, but no dice.



instead I'm going to capture mickey. I'll keep this one if I can.
You can see my navy has finally made it over here. the trieme to the north is alone, diverted to pillage the seafood. to the south I have 2 triemes and 2 galleys, loaded with 1 knight, 1 pike, and 2 maces. Hopefully they won't be needed for mickey and can hit the island to the south of it. he does have 2 triemes and a galley unaccounted forthat dissappeared south of the island 3 turns ago, but I don't think they are loaded with troops. I have a knight in range of the southern cities just in case.


well I found the lost galleys in the east. although I have no navy over here, Azza doesn't have the troops to do anything with this ship.

That will be the last city I take. Possibly Plako decides he wants that city and finishes Azza off for me. (after all, it was a dhal city only 10 turns ago). hmm, not sure how I feel about that, it would be nice to have whale.

on that note, here's the current death count:

dhal has one city left and should be dead soon. not sure why he was putting up a fight for the turn extension, hehe.
I haven't made contact w/ suttree yet, but can see 3 cities on the map. they are shielded from mackoti by land, though, by Old Harry. I don't think Old Harry will try to absorb him while he's fighting mackoti.
Azza has 7 left atm. 4 of them are island cities.

we have 22 cities. tied w/ mackoti and plako, heh. I probably will keep 6 of azza's cities (one island city is a 1 tile island and pure junk). also have 3-4 spots I'll settle as soon as I can. If the game is decided by most cities, or first to 30 we'll have this won pretty soon now .

[Ceiliazul]

If the game is decided by most cities, or first to 30 we'll have this won pretty soon now .

did you trade maps with ScooPin to see those islands? do you have more cities than vikings?

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yeah. Pindicator logged on with me and rang me, not realizing I was on, so I made him trade maps.

I believe they had 23 a few turns ago, so probably 25 now. but their only method of expansion atm is probably through mackoti. I guess it depends on how well their war goes and how well ours goes.


now. they have much better infastructure than us and also much more populous cities. they've been caste for awhile while I've been whipping. we're at 38% breakeven or so . I have had guilds since I took over and haven't been able to build even one grocer - I need grocers, banks, courthouses just about everywhere but won't be able to until Azza is at least pushed off the mainland.

so, yeah. most cities certainly doesn't = winner, lol.

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azza slaughtered the southern stack, that city will likely hold until I take Rose and Donna. a couple of 32% odd wins by him, se la vie.


all that remains in azza lands, I finished the road pillaging. his super promoted knights are in rose, only 3 unpromoted knights in Donna, so I should be able to retreat these troops. it will take several turns of building up before I can assault his core, though.


thats all you get tonight, I've been drinking.

Pindiscooter has 29 cities, btw, my count was a little out of date.

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ok. I guess Ichabod wants to be friendly. We have 1 silk already, but I accepted. hah.


we have silk and wine already, not sure what Harry is thinking. I would like to help him vs mackoti, but can't afford to side against him right now - he is fighting Scooter and no longer propping up Azza. NE finishes with a chop at the end of next turn, so I'll consider giving/trading him gems as soon as I can cancel the marble trade that is taking up one of my excess gems.

btw, Scooter took a third city, but mackoti took a city back. so pindiscooter should be occupied for a bit.

azza wasted a stack 2 knights, mace, pike. cost him 2 cats . I have one final stack that should be able to retreat (knight, pike, mace).



ok so I decided this turn to change my strategy. I had decided last night to research theology this turn, revolt to slavery and theocracy, and pump out enough units to siege him while researching banking, education, free market. I decided during the turn just now this was a better research path, though:


ok, thats 100% research, which I can't sustain. I have a 38-40% breakeven rate, so 25-30 turns is more realistic for rifling. BUT, instead of pumping out units that will be obsolete with rifling, knowing that a bunch of them will die to azza's cat SOD, I can spend the next 20 turns building grocers, banks, and courthouses, then pump out 15-20 rifles once I get it, and invade with a smaller force. I don't have nearly the force I need to take Rose and Donna, but I do have plenty a force to hold what I've taken and keep him from getting aggressive. I'll need to build all the infrastructure after taking him out anyway, and there's a good chance I can capture all or most of Azza's island cities in the interim.

after Rifling is completed, then theology, education, free market, corporation (most likely).

I need Banking either way (I did 0% research before ending turn), so if you disagree with this tech path Lewwyn you've got 2-3 turns to convince me .