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As a French person I feel like it's my duty to explain strikes to you. - AdrienIer |
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Cheater Hater, Ruler of the Modbreakers
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T122 has been played, full report will come later (probably in two parts, hopefully the military part coming tonight), but Whosit is down one city! I've put this turn's combat logs in the Dropbox folder already, but here's the event log for a summary:
August 20th, 2014, 21:21
(This post was last modified: August 20th, 2014, 21:22 by Cheater Hater.)
T122 Part 1: Military
So when I started the turn, not much had changed--no extra units arrived in South Plano, but Whosit did build/whip Walls. I exited to do sims, and found out that as I got closer and closer to the actual situation, I was winning all the battles. Of course, I couldn't do things exactly--notably I couldn't put a unit on a galley in WB and attack the same turn, so I had to simulate the amphibious Elephant with a normal Chariot--I still managed to win all permutations though. As such (since I could afford the Galley Elephant; more on Krill/novice in Part 2), I decided to attack (after promoting the Cat to CR1): Cat vs Archer, 21% retreat: Loss (little damage to the Archer  )WE vs Spear, 23%: Loss (~50% damage to Spear) Axe vs Archer, 16%: Win!   (Galley) WE vs Spear, 62%: Loss (little damage )Chariot vs Spear, 62%: Win! Chariot vs Chariot, 51%: Win!  Unfortunately the pics during the attack are sparse/non-existent, since I was so focused on not screwing up (and I was in shock with that axe win--even though it wasn't crucial since I still had the archer to clean up if necessary). After taking South Plano I had to decide to keep or raze the city--but taking the city let me see Whosit's units within range of the city, but crucially only the Spear at the top of the stack. After debating with myself for a while, I assumed that spear was at the top of the units that left Plano, so I razed the city. Let's see if I was right by looking at the overview of the Plano area:  It turns out my suspicions were 100% correct--that matches the units taken out of Plano almost exactly (I think a Spear was added, and maybe a Cat) and would have easily taken back South Plano (I guess Whosit wouldn't have taken it this turn since I have 5 defenders including the Cat in the Galley and Whosit has only 4 attackers, but I certainly couldn't have held it long-term), so it was probably the right decision to raze the city. Going back to Plano proper, I still haven't gotten the courage to move my troops next to Plano yet--the problem is that I did more sims of the attack while I was in the sandbox, and I'm still not doing that well. Sure, I think I win the attack overall (since I kill more units of Whosit's, or at least a comparable amount), but I don't feel like I'm in a position to take the city--our units are all beat up, and he gets to counter-attack with his Cats (which don't take collateral for some reason--is this intended?). However, as I'm writing this up, there's a crucial thing I'm overlooking that I was just assuming before--Whosit doesn't get to promote and heal before I attack again! I mean, I'm still not sure that's good enough to work, but it's a point in my favor. Right now I think the plan is based on what those units by South Plano decide to do--if Whosit has the majority of them decide to wipe out my southern stack, I can move up next turn, then attack T124 and T125 to take the city (as I probably could have done this turn and moved up the turntable--this does let me move the Galley units into the main stack at least?). If Whosit decides to send all the units back to Plano however, I can't attack before they rejoin the city, and my window has likely closed--but that means I can recover the rest of my southern stack (including the lucky 2 promotion Axe). That was a lot of analysis--thankfully the northern theater is a lot less complicated   I used the Impi to scout a bit (only seeing the Galley from earlier), set my Galley to blockade Angle Bay (since it isn't moving anyway), and bombarded with my Cats while letting the rest of my units heal. It appears Angle Bay built a Galley, and Nowhere whipped some walls--boring Now that I've finally made some progress in the war, I need to figure out what I'm doing next. I've already went into extensive detail on my possible plans for Plano above, and Angle Bay mainly resolves to "bombard to 0% defense, then hope the sims work out in my favor at that point", so the question is what happens now? At this point, I would gladly accept peace for Angle Bay and Nowhere, then move quickly to resettle Mirrodin and South Plano, wait a couple turns for the inevitable war to break out between Whosit and either Krill/novice or dtay, then re-enter to get my piece of the dying Whosit. My question to the lurkers: Can I offer peace with cities being part of the peace deal? Gawdzak posted earlier that I couldn't, but my understanding was that the rule was meant to combat peacetime city gifting/trading, to avoid gifting cities to a third party, or the (often wildly divergent) valuation of cities for gold. Could I get some clarification on this? Also, Whosit has mentioned that his net will be spotty for a while, leading to a higher probability of Parkin turns. Is this a good or bad thing for me? I mean, I think Parkin probably has a higher skill level that Whosit (based on prior games), but he isn't as focused on any one civ in this game. At the very least, now that I've actually declared war, there isn't much, if any important hidden information he can glean from his spies (and I'm assuming he isn't reading actual threads, unless he's actually playing for that person). Part 2 with domestic/C&D stuff will come sometime tomorrow unless I get really inspired tonight--the pictures are all in the Dropbox if you want a preview 
T122 Report Part 2: Domestic/C&D:
Crap--the turn rolled before I got Part 2 done--I can't play the turn for a bit though (for reasons that will become apparent), so here's a quick domestic report:   Obviously the big story is Krill/novice's Chariot appearing on my mainland. They technically double-moved me to get the chariot there, so I think they're less likely to declare war--but I'm not stupid, so I did whip the archer in Mercadia and got ready to move the Cat to guard Rath if necessary. As such, I'm going to wait on the turn a bit--Krill/novice generally play early in the turn, and as such I'll still play tonight, but I'd prefer to be after Krill/novice if anything happens--but then again, I'm already at the first half against Whosit! Lurkers, help! Are Krill/novice required to declare on the second half of the turn split if they do declare? If so, does moving on the first half of the time split last turn prevent them from declaring this turn? Anyway, other than Krill/novice, not much is happening domestically--I whipped Rath's forge (and hopefully it doesn't cost me Rath if the Cat falls), set up for some whips next turn, and am trying to get my economy back in order. I also set Polytheism to finish this turn--my plan is to get Priesthood next, then get Code of Laws at maximum discount (considering my GNP is so low, I need every bonus I can get, and I'll need Mediation, Polytheism, and Priesthood eventually). Now to demos--we have a bit of an improvement!  As always, my production generally goes up at the start of each turn--but this turn I didn't whip it away! In fact, my whips next turn aren't really going to hurt my production centers/big cities, so I should still be in a good position in the near-future. Of course, my GNP still is a disaster--it'll get a boost when I'm researching Priesthood and CoL thanks to all my bonuses, but it won't recover until all my troops are in my borders and/or dead. I'm also finishing Ravnica's Library soon (my first), so I could get some scientists for an academy if I wanted.  Not much of a change here--Whosit's Cat suicides dropped him--but the interesting part should be next turn, when Whosit and I should both take a hit.   Originally I wasn't going to show these graphs, since they don't tell us anything new--but looking at them closer, can you spot the difference? Yeah, I got WilliamLP's graphs this turn--I didn't even notice I did until looking over the graphs just now, and as such I didn't switch up my Espionage points Not that there's much to do with them yet--I guess the next target is plako, just based on proximity? Anyway, hopefully I'll play the turn and get at least a preview done tonight
August 22nd, 2014, 22:51
(This post was last modified: August 22nd, 2014, 22:52 by Cheater Hater.)
Apparently in the last post I made an assumption--that this turn would be interesting enough to write a preview for
In all honesty, I'm not sure this turn was interesting enough to write a report for, much less a preview. Whosit's axes killed the remainder of my South Plano stack, I bombarded Angle Bay, didn't move up my troops at Plano--nothing spectacular. Right now the major concern is still Krill/novice's chariot--they haven't moved yet, but I think I'm safe--I moved my Impi in Kamigawa to Shandalar, and from there it can cover everything (notably Mercadia, which can't be covered any other way). I'll try to write up some kind of report tomorrow, but don't expect much--I don't think I want to do military overviews for example. Again, can someone answer my questions I posed earlier--most importantly, can I use cities as part of a peace deal?
August 25th, 2014, 19:29
(This post was last modified: August 25th, 2014, 19:29 by Cheater Hater.)
Apparently I didn't get around to that report either--I got the pictures in the Dropbox now at least
Honestly, these turns are boring, and I have other things I could do--T126 or T127 is the next exciting turn, since that's when I'll have bombarded down Angle Bay's defenses and can start attacking (though I obviously need to do some sims--I have a troop advantage, and Angle Bay doesn't have Cats to not take collateral, but my WE's are still hurting from the suicide Cats). One thing I am doing is moving a bunch of troops out of the Plano attack stack--for some of them they're staying near the border for cost considerations, but my two HA's are actually going to join the Angle Bay stack--that's one of the reasons I would want to delay the attack a turn (along with bombarding the last bit of defenses). Again, I'll try to get a report done sometime before the turn rolls--is there anything the lurkers want to see?
August 27th, 2014, 17:09
(This post was last modified: August 27th, 2014, 17:12 by Cheater Hater.)
I've replayed my turn--I really don't feel like making a report; you've seen the majority of it, and the turn was replayed basically the same. Pictures are here if you're interested--they're from the first run of the turn, but again, they're the same more or less.
August 28th, 2014, 13:02
(This post was last modified: August 28th, 2014, 14:00 by Cheater Hater.)
PB18 Pitboss Portal Wrote:Thu Aug 28 11:38:51 2014 dtay Turn 124 Disconnected FINALLY! I needed a helper to get anywhere in this war (even the , and dtay finally obliged, and has taken at least one city to boot! Unfortunately, this doesn't help that much in the immediate future--Angle Bay appears to be set in its ways (since the stack can't easily get anywhere--though I suppose a galley or two could shuttle units to the capital), but Plano could shuttle units north, since I'm not going to be moving units next to it next turn (since I moved a bunch of Cats back into my territory, assuming I wasn't attacking anytime soon. Here's another question: why didn't dtay join on my side of the turn split? How bad is that in the grand scheme of things? I mean, dtay knows we're at war, and can tell we've been at war for a bunch of turns now (only 8, even though it feels like 80 between the 48 hour turns, the pauses making turns last 3 days, the relative lack of lurker involvement, and now the reload making me replay my turn), and yet he still wanted to play after Whosit. So what happens now? Do we continue the 3-way split until it causes turns to be delayed? (which doesn't seem like a problem, since dtay can seemingly always play, I play right away in most cases, and Whosit generally plays within 24 hours) Does dtay join the front side of the turn split? (either allowing him a double-move or making him wait a turn) Do I have to join the second half of the turn split? (not happening--not only does this let Whosit double-move me, it means I can't play the turn right away like I like to do) While the obvious course of action is to keep the status quo until it causes problems, part of me wants dtay to be forced to my side of the split and lose a turn as punishment--that delay would give Whosit much better chances against dtay's attack (though I have no clue how many units dtay has), and thus he would be more likely to move troops away from the cities I'm attacking. For reference, let's check the power standings from this turn--the demos are from the former version of the turn, but considering neither Whosit nor dtay had moved yet, they're the same in the relevant stats:   Seriously Dropbox, can you stop changing your interface every month! Normally when I share a link it opens a new tab, and I reference those pages so I know what's in the pictures. Apparently it now just pops something up on the same page that gives me the link, meaning not only can I not see multiple pictures at once, I can't share multiple pictures at once (say, click my South and North pictures, share them, then look at them while writing my post). I also have to edit the link now, which caught me by surprise (admittedly only changing a 0 to a 1, but still an inconvenience). I'm still third in power, but dtay has almost 100k power more than I do. When I play this upcoming turn, I'll see how much power dtay lost taking that city. Unfortunately I won't get data on Whosit's power until the turn after, but I can assume he lost a similar amount.
T125 Report:
Hooray, an actual report this time! Of course, the big news of the turn doesn't involve me--it involves dtay entering the war and taking Bell Preston from Whosit. I have no clue how much combat happened in that case--Whosit got his first Great General, but he's already had a lot of combat with me in both wars. Anyway, let's check the two fronts before Whosit gets to react to dtay's invasion:   Starting with Plano, not much has changed--the remaining axes are almost back to Plano, and I think the galley might be new, while Angle Bay appears to have no changes. My attack is coming soon--I need to do some sims to see if an Angle Bay attack is practical next turn (even if Whosit doesn't move any troops out), but worst case that attack will come T127 (since my new HA's won't be attacking across a river, and that remaining 2% of defense will be gone). Plano's more interesting--you can see I've moved my Cats back into the stack, since I'm considering moving next to Plano next turn. I'm actually not sure I do though--if we assume Whosit moves troops away from Plano this turn (to reinforce his cities from dtay's attack), I don't think I want to move the troops up right away, causing Whosit to move his troops right back and only gaining me the removal of some fortification bonus. If I wait a turn, I could move up and attack before Whosit's troops could even get back to the city (if he even decided to bother). Of course, this all depends on what Whosit does--he could give up his northern cities, or move most of his troops from Angle Bay. Obviously I have things I would prefer, but I have no clue what Whosit is thinking. On a side note, this exact situation is exactly why city trading shouldn't be blanket-banned--the trade I would love to offer would be peace for Nowhere, Angle Bay, and Plano, and it's win/win--I gain 3 cities I probably am going to gain otherwise (or at least 2 of the 3), Whosit gets to free up his troops to defend against dtay's attack. This is exactly what happened at the tail end of PBEM 58 for me--Twinkletoes invaded me, AT invaded me the same turn, but Twinkletoes offered peace for two cities, so I could shift my defenses to defend against only AT (until Twinkletoes made AT's stack magically disappear--and I honestly could see the exact same thing happen here with Krill/novice attacking dtay). Yes, gifting has a bunch of unfair uses, but I thought RB operated under "don't be a dick" rules by default? Anyway, let's go to domestic matters:   Not much new here--lots of growth, lots of micro to facilitate growth, some military, some econ stuff. Notably, I still haven't found a place to produce new settlers, mainly since I'm still trying to grow back all the population I whipped away during the war buildup--I think Kamigawa can start a settler next turn, and Ravnica can finish the one it started forever ago after it finishes the library. That covers replanting Mirrodin and South Plano, which are the most important cities I actually have to plant (unless I have to burn Plano when I take it). After that I feel like I should found the Marble city, then look into the other cities on the South Plano Peninsula. Of course, that will all be derailed once dtay or Krill/novice attacks me (which is partially why I still want Whosit alive, to serve as a buffer), but after that I should be able to focus on expansion, research and growth. Now to demo analysis:  The main point here is that the top power (likely dtay) has increased since last turn--apparently the fighting didn't take that much of a bite out of him. My GNP also sucks, even though I've turned on research (in anticipation of receiving some funds from taking Angle Bay)--before turning it back on I was 32nd overall, only ahead of the crippled Barry and the apparently dead Jowy (apparently HAK is the one taking his cities? At least the "war brings everyone down" hypothesis doesn't just apply to our war). Hopefully when the war ends I can start researching stuff, building more Libraries and Markets, getting out Courthouses to improve my slider position, and having more cities and developed cottages.  As a reminder, based on my understanding, this won't show Whosit's changes from the invasion, but will show dtay's--and as such it makes me really worried about dtay's power   Here's what the foreign situation looks like now--I haven't been doing much with this (I offered Open Borders to WilliamLP this turn since I'm near the border of pindicator's territory, but nothing other than that), but thought lurkers would appreciate how much the game has opened up  Here's a new one--the finance advisor! You can see how much of a toll the units are taking on me--remember, in SP I'd consider it a failure if I had any costs in those categories Hopefully someone likes my report--it's been a while since I've done a full one.
Well, I didn't get around to the report today--hopefully I'll do so tomorrow, but in case I don't, time for cliff notes!
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