[PB25-SPOILERS] The Lunacy of the Reign of HAK Continues

[MindyMcCready]

So I think the pain is coming in a few turns....Commodore NAP'd out with retep as I expected....and as you can see in the screenshot....he's got everything coming back towards me again.

Unless I'm mistaken, I don't see that much power. Or at least not enought to batter down castle walls while surviving a catapult strike.

And his power just increased a good amount. He is no longer in builder mode...he's in attack me mode.

It still makes no sense for MC to actually attack you. Until he gets cuirassiers we're essentially at tech parity, with equal cities, marginally higher power, while in GA, and still having a greater ability to concentrate power. So this is all bluff or rather an attempt to allow him to also concentrate his power rather than a serious attack.

I interpret the power build up as "I can't get forced peace by threatening someone stronger than me unless I build more military".

Look at the very long borders that MC has. And now in a volatible 3-way showdown with Donnovan and Tasunke. While Gavagai in all likelihood is moving towards his foothold city.

We have not been doing a good job containing MC. Everytime we sign 10T enforced peace he goes and captures another city or two. We need to tie up his units until a 10T peace is favourable for us as well. I am strongly recommending that we either lay a trap for him to wipe a stack, or remain in continuous passive war.

I think that I have given up any thoughts about the island. We need to work with Tasunke to defend that island. Please send Tasunke an Iron-Horse coming from MC's direction as a heads up. If MC moves to the island anyway,...we move our stack and try to use Tasunke's roads to wipe out an MC stack. We must prevent MC from acquiring more cities or give up this game.

So I'm starting to send those Swords & Catapults I had in Fort Anxious eastward to defend various spots. Already had the HAs headed that way last turn.

I agree with this. But we need to keep mobility to also defend the island. In a few turns we'll be in slavery & NH so that should help shut down any weak spots that MC could easily exploit.

Gavagai also still has his SOD hidden away in those dark tiles. So I'm sure as soon as our Peace Treaty is done (which is the same time it ends with Commodore) they'll both hit me right about the same time from opposite sides.
Luckily the Chitzen Itza comes in next turn, so that'll help a bit. I'm just really sad that if we actually do get Taj, we're going to end up having to draft & whip away all of our population while in a Golden Age.

I'm not that worried about a Gavagai attack. We have the firepower to repel him althought it might be a little dicey. The goal will be to stay outside of his cats first strike ability. He's vulnerable at Five Guys, Wendy's and Dunkin Donuts so that might act to keep him honest or possibly allow us to inflict more damage to him than him to us. As we get closer to NH,...make sure that don't whip away draftable population. Whipping down to size 4/5 and not being able to draft could be a costly mistake.

This is what it would take. Should I do it?

It doesn't really sound like you're asking a question. Just in case, no, that isn't worth it. Also, I asked that while we were trying to decide whether chasing MC to Taj was worth it or not. That boat has already sailed.

Warhorse (which we believe is the only logical place for Commodore to be building Taj

I was under the impression that it was confirmed that Warhorse was MC's Taj build site. Not just a logical location? Our estimate of his timeline, and therefore our chances of beating him, was based entirely on him not adding the bureau bonus to his hammers. Please tell me that this was a good assumption.

[MindyMcCready]

You're at 859K with only 2 points of conflict while MC is at 792K stretched across a vast expanse.

Gavagai is definately building some military having added 34K between T151 to T156. You added a similar 29K and that was hardly military mode for us. I don't see Gavagai making a highly irrational attack (even success would probably cost him his stack) given that he made a rational move of signing peace with us less than 10T ago.

So long as we keep our military positioned I don't see either opponent making much progress other than some of our weak spots such as that island. Our biggest risk right now is that MC get Galleons into our underbelly down there,...which is why I would want to capture and keep Dragon Slave if we get half a chance.

[HitAnyKey]

I'll be a bit busy with getting some work stuff done today, so won't have a super amount of time to chat or do analysis or stuff like that. But wanted to quickly reply to a few of your questions/points.

1. Not sure exactly where or how I would lay a trap for Commodore. My guess is that he might be trying to sail his Caravels & Galleys to make another attempt at the little island. Or worse, he'll send his Caravels to scout my mainland coastal cities, such as to discover that some of those cities (such as Moai) are lightly defended. I should be able to get them defended well enough before he is able to get any Galleys over to them, so that shouldn't be too much of an issue. Other than that if he is sailing Caravels & Galleys in those waters I'll have to keep certain batches of troops split up amongst multiple cities. I do have like 5 or 6 Triremes in that area right now, so if he does DOW to send his Galleys in, it'll come down to how many Caravels he has for defense. Since it will likely take 2 or 3 Triremes to kill each of his Caravels.

2. How best to signal to Tasunke "Iron-Horse coming from MC's direction"? Include a city trade of Hungry for whichever of his cities is closest to Comm?

3. Aw shucks, was almost hoping you'd tell me you liked the idea of putting all those EPs into Commodore this turn. It would certainly be awesome to see what all his cities are building.

4. Yes, it is basically definite that he is building Taj there. He is not in Bureau, but even if he was his capital does not have many hammers anyway to benefit from it. It's a commerce powerhouse. It only has 5 mines (3GH, 1PH, 1 Copper GH) and no workshops.

[HitAnyKey]

As discussed in chat, logged in just now to check a few things we were discussing and saw this message:



After talking, we determined that maybe Tasunke is trying to sell us the two cities for a gold offer. So I sent him back a request to buy the two cities for 100G + 40gpt. So essentially, buying the two cities for 500gold. He had whipped them down pretty low (size 5 for Alexandria & size 2 for Thebes. I'm betting he just multi-pop whipped stuff this turn. So if he wants to accept he'll likely wait until next turn when the units complete. Knowing him, I'm sure he'll log in again this turn and see my offer.

[HitAnyKey]

As predicted, Tasunke logged in again just now. No score changes, so also as I expected he didn't accept it this turn. Whether or not he sent back a counter or is simply waiting until next turn to send back this same offer, I don't know. I might log in a few hours from now to check (especially if at some point it looks like someone may need a pause). But otherwise I suppose I can wait until next turn to see if he sends a counter-offer.

[MindyMcCready]

Hey, did "we" sign up for PB27?

[HitAnyKey]

Hey, did "we" sign up for PB27?

Well, I did and Commodore simply added you to the team on his own. Way back in the beginning when those signups started, he and I think someone else kinda just threw lots of people into the list without them even knowing it just assuming most of them would be joining the chaos. And most have.

[HitAnyKey]

Ok, the deal is done. Had a long team chat debating the pros and cons of paying the large counter-offer from Tasunke. Here is the main part of it:

Here is the trade that I eventually accepted:

And here's the new view of Battle Island: (the signs mark the units Tasunke has left on the island that I can see)

[Krill]

I'm sorry but that's bullshit.

[MindyMcCready]

So the soonish new city will go 1N of the ruins. With 3 shared food resources that'll be a great city quickly enough.

Don't develop the city ruins unless events are off. You can get a large tech boost if you're lucky.

If the future hold that we can plant a city 3N of Alexandra we can canal through that island. Realizing that MC won't be teching Astronomy anytime soon since he'll give up the Colossus.

A 6-move galleon could fork MC's capital as well as Deadman's Switch if Tas would get building a fort by Cairo. We might have to settle that GG on a galley for auto-upgrade + super moves. If we sprinked GG over 2 galley + cash upgrade one of them we could drop 6 units into either city.