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Macro advice forthcoming, though micro thing noted while in game:
I think it makes sense to whip the forge in here, losing the PHM. The raw foodhammer conversion rate is pretty good to start with from a PHM whip, we're not sitting on any extant whip anger, the forge-multiplier wasted overflow is small, we net gain 3 fpt instead of the normal 2fpt b/c of the unhealthiness, and the earlier forge gives 1 additional citizen turn b/c happiness. And then I guess marginal maintenance reduction.
A small thing in any case.
One macro impression anyway is that while I don't think Grimace should be the 1st-look target, the geography is less awkward than I thought and if HAK and retep look too tough for w/e reason Grimace isn't out of the question. Def more awkward, probably will have Gallics lying around for counter strikes, and doesn't have the land-prize retep promises or TGL of HAK, so like... not advocating but noting I thought the geography of attacking him was worse than it actually is.
While we lost access to the center island for the most part, it is probably good to not border Joey at the moment. Can't rage out against us and can't try to disrupt our plans as easily, which matters since the #2 team (which he is atm at least) can play more of a zero-sum game against the #1 than anyone else can.
Liking attacking Retep from a geopolitical security standpoint a lot, and given his suspected disengagement shouldn't be prohibitively difficult.
Ok those were just impressions, more organized thoughts to follow tonight, which is more important.
Fear cuts deeper than swords.
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Attack Grimace? You'd be the emperor of an indefensible hourglass. Sounds like an empire shape ive seen recently... who was that crazy dude in pb18 that tried to set a record for perimeter/area of his empire?
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I reckon that hourglass could have worked if he'd got to Astro/Chemistry about five turns sooner, which won't even be a consideration on this map...
Completed: RB Demogame - Gillette, PBEM46, Pitboss 13, Pitboss 18, Pitboss 30, Pitboss 31, Pitboss 38, Pitboss 42, Pitboss 46, Pitboss 52 (Pindicator's game), Pitboss 57
In progress: Rimworld
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(May 14th, 2015, 08:07)Old Harry Wrote: I reckon that hourglass could have worked if he'd got to Astro/Chemistry about five turns sooner, which won't even be a consideration on this map...
It looked strong. Certainly there is no team Badass in this one, nor Pindicator the Revenger. Nor Krill the... uh, not sure what to call pb18 Krill. Krill the Emotional?
Anyway, Certainly dtay made a good play, I just lolled at the coincidence. If Exp/Imp retep is strong enough that we cant take him with knights, then we got bigger problems than killing Grimace can solve. If HAK is too strong for us we are in deep trouble.
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Agree with Ceil, largely. Retep is going to be zooming forward to his own knights, and HAK being HAK I fully expect the HRE is beelining Landsknechts. Both are better "sooner rather than later" targets than Grimace, who is going to be huddling behind his duns for a while.
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Optimistic, spiteful, bored...take your pick.
Current games (All): RtR: PB80 Civ 6: PBEM23
Ended games (Selection): BTS games: PB1, PB3, PBEM2, PBEM4, PBEM5B, PBEM50. RB mod games: PB5, PB15, PB27, PB37, PB42, PB46, PB71. FFH games: PBEMVII, PBEMXII. Civ 6: PBEM22 Games ded lurked: PB18
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(May 14th, 2015, 10:54)Commodore Wrote: HAK being HAK I fully expect the HRE is beelining Landsknechts.
Supposing this is true: does it matter? Recent experience leads me to believe the important part of stopping a Knight attack is the catapults; spears and axes work just as well as pikes. Well, maybe not quite as well, but close enough. Seems to me that all Engineering does is cut the price of mop-up a bit
Or am I missing something important again?
EitB 25 - Perpentach
Occasional mapmaker
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It's cramming time! I wavered a bit on settling this, but its forests are available and it'll be able to help to grow Cobra cottages, so I'm okay with irking the neighbor. Get the el cheapo stone/Pro walls, stuff in 3-4 CG2 archers, and I think he'll let it ride even with Mindy on the shoulder.
This novel was really impressive for a first novel.
Dtay talked about how happy the Cobra city screen made him. Makes me happy too; this is a lot of riverside cottage goodness. Anyway, with the forge online the ETA for the GE/Gpro gamble is 10 turns, but we can drop it a couple by adding a scientist if desired. I chopped the 3rd-ring forest before settling Coming of Age so that polished off the library very nicely. Growth next with the corn and rice!
No pigs, fish, sheep, or bananas AT ALL in our sphere of influence, if we go to war it's for health reasons!
Also chopped? More forests here into Deadman Switch. This turn is 120 hammers; next two chops are 30+16+6(base prod)=95 hammers, so that twenty more base hammers to put in. An archer whip will cover that nicely...we're about to effect the erection of a massive metal naked guy!
Um. That was an awkward ejaculation, sorry.
That was last turn, this is this morning's (having said that, the turn has rolled again already  ). The completed library drops HBR down to a 2t research, so we do that now, definitely will be happier with a bunch of horse archers galloping around. The map is an increasingly crowded powder keg, when someone blows up I wanna be there to share in the benefits. The great news seen here? Hinduism spread for free once more, this time into Cascade Point herself! Definitely want to hit Monotheism before Monarchy, given this.
Just need to research both in the 8-turn time-frame provided by the inexorable progress of Cobra's great person pool. Cascade Point's pool is gaining now too.
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(May 14th, 2015, 11:06)Mardoc Wrote: (May 14th, 2015, 10:54)Commodore Wrote: HAK being HAK I fully expect the HRE is beelining Landsknechts. Supposing this is true: does it matter? Recent experience leads me to believe the important part of stopping a Knight attack is the catapults; spears and axes work just as well as pikes. Well, maybe not quite as well, but close enough. Seems to me that all Engineering does is cut the price of mop-up a bit
Or am I missing something important again? Yeah, well, mostly it's that they're a decent enough unit compared to "hope and the future promise of muskets" which is sometimes the plan, plus it's got Construction on the path.
...aaanyways, this turn (already almost done), the only new news is Mr. Elkad and his stone got a Great Wall going. So that's a great general or two for him I guess.
Scientist for an academy, I'm pretty sure.
May 14th, 2015, 22:59
(This post was last modified: May 14th, 2015, 23:01 by dtay.)
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If Great Engineer, what do we want to rush? 'Mids and MoM seem the obvious ones. MoM requires the otherwise unnecessary-before-guilds calendar, but like... RtR_Phi + MoM =  Hard call.
Macro Thoughts -
Very much agree that Grimace is not-that-desirable target, was really just trying to express that my sort of mental map of the game had our border being a lot more of a stretch to conquer through than it actually is. Compared to HAK it's actually substantially wider, I had been assuming HAK would get cities a bit east of what he ended up with.
Despite him being 2nd on the scoreboard, I agree retep is by far the most valuable target. It adds no new neighbors until we complete the conquest, and even then it's an overseas neighbor who probably can't afford to have a majority of their military capacity across the channel when GJ and Gav are his other neighbors. So geopolitically the post-conquest world leaves us pretty secure, with lots of land, and two tasty southern targets that we could easily wheel into, with the same knight force even.
Conquering HAK at this point I think is actually almost equally awkward to taking Grimace. Our empire would literally go (nonexistant) pole to (nonexistant) pole. That the grimace path is diagonal makes it look deceptively elongated, but the weird civ geometry + weaker neighbors involved with grimace make it pretty much equally (in)defensible compared to Hak.
Pluses on Hak side are that newly constructed wonder that I would love to take.
I think we should also be open to going in with horse archers should the opportunity present itself. If we're sitting with a stack of like 10 HA and retep's power hasn't gone up at all, border city is undefended, and people still don't have cats, it could well be worth it to grab 2-3 cities while we finish up guilds. Don't know if that opportunity will present itself, but we should be watching for it.
I think we can probably skip stable construction in most cities (maybe put them in 1-2 best production cities). If we switch into vassalage by the end of the 1st golden age there's not that much marginal benefit to 7xp compared to 5, and each stable constructed could be a HA or 2/3 a knight. And getting out HA in the runup to guilds as opposed to stables lets us take advantage of those opportunities easier.
Larger geopolitics wise, it's hard to get a read on Gav given lack of contact. I like that DZ is doing well, it should keep GJ honest and stop him from just curb-stomping elkad, who appears to be struggling. That's another note. Elkad seems to be on the path to weakness, but we don't want to hit him cause GJ would join in from other side and get most of the spoils.
Though conversely, If GJ's imo inevitable invasion doesn't come at an awkward time with the knights plan we should try to vulture a few penisula cities, or raze/resettle, etc.
Fear cuts deeper than swords.
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