Jeitinho Brasileiro! - Ichabod's Civ5 PBEM4 Spoiler Thread

[Ichabod]

I'm really having a blast playing these last few turns. The updates helped me get my interest back, so I'm happy about doing them. And Civ 5 is actually quite a fun game, from time to time, under the right circumnstances. Especially considering the level of commitment of the Civ 4 community here, playing Civ 5 is way more casual and forgiving, which is nice for lighthearted enjoyment.

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As predicted, Yuris lost the alliance with Ife and I was able to sign peace. Not only that, but I'm back to friends status with them. Pretty good, a faith bonus and a tactical bonus on the Yuris front, as we'll see.



But first things first. I finished the barb crossbow with the city + CB. Hopefully we can take the full strenght Axe next turn, because I bet he'll move in to pillage the sheep.



I alligned the espionage steal with teching Theology. Let see if this works, hopefully we'll have Education in 2 turns, so we can start some universities and opening much needed specialist slots to avoid growth. I've been looking at some MP games from Civ 5 and I think I misplayed my game quite badly. If you go liberty, growing cities on farms is not the best thing -> I should have prioritized hills (settling near them) and kept the cities in lower sizes. Though perhaps the mods used in the games I see make liberty more competitive, haven't checked the balance changes.



I wonder if the city governor will do what I want him to do -> switch the two free citizens to the artist specialist when the Artist Guild finishes. I wonder if I could get some free culture out of this by doing it this way... Probably not, but no harm in trying.

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So, let's look at the military puzzle we had in front of us, the really interesting part of the turn. I spent quite a bit of time looking at this and trying to figure out the best to do.



The hill occupied by the crossbow is quite annoying, because he can shoot inside my borders. I realized I could try to kill the crossbow or at least make him retreat for a worse position with little risk for my units. The blue circle tiles are hills, meaning ranged units can use them to shoot over hill/jungle tiles.



Here you can see I moved 3 ranged units in position to attack the crossbow next turn. I think it might be enough to kill him, though I'm not sure. But I can keep juggling the units to have more units position to shoot that tile on the turn after next, since there are more hills to be occupied.

Also shown in this screenshot is that I can move the horseman into that hill tile and still retreat with him. I used that to scout for other units on the area (unfortunately, Yuris killed my sentry horseman when I took Yaroslav -> I need to get a new one). The crossbow can shoot the horseman, but than he can't move away from my own ranged attacks. Same reason why I kept the hurt CB on the same tile.



The longswordsman can't do anything against me next turn, due to terrain + positioning. A crossbow there would be way worse, because it would be able to attack my units in some positions. There still could be ranged units hidden in the fog, but I don't think that's very likely. Notice how Azza's warrior is causing Yuris a lot of trouble, by occupying a vital tile!

The longswordsman makes me worried Yuris is making a Terracotta Army play, so he has different types of units. Well, I won't change my plans, so I cn't do anything about it.



Finally, I moved my longswordsman to the tile the horse was. I put even more pressure on the crossbow this way and I think the longswordsman won't be in risk of dying either way (it has 21 strenght to the musket 24, so it's not that big of a difference; it is on defensive terrain and I think it gets the support bonus from units close).

If I get Yuris to spend his GG on a Citadel, that's also good, because he loses the GG bonus and I can steal the Citadel from him. It won't be easy, because I think the GG needs moves to perform the citadel action and I'd have to stand on a Citadel defended tile to do it. But patience would be on my side and I think I could overpower Yuris there eventually. Perhaps I should have moved my GG to the longsword tile antecipating Yuris doing the Citadel, But I was afraid the Sword could die and make me lose my GG.



Finally, this is Yuris southern city, likely to be lightly defended and probably where I'll attack him next. I have no problem with Azza having most of the good spoils. Hopefully there are happy resources on that city (it has Lake Victoria, as you can see). I'm also eyeing those truffles! If everything goes according to plan, I'll ally Budapest and make Yuris more pressured still, by the threat of the CS units.

[Ichabod]

I checked the new turn that I received this morning, but didn't play it. Big news of the turn is that Yuris reached Industrial Age!!! That means two things -> He went fertilizers and he's probably beelining artillery (either that or he wants the fertilizer food, which I don't think is the case, considering the happy starvation all around). Luckily, there's still a long way to go until artillery hits the battlefield.

But that's actually good news for me, in a way. Because I'm about to steal a tech from Rowain and my Spy is about to level up. And I'm teching Chemistry. This means that, after I steal Education from Rowain, I can change my spy for Moscow and steal Fertilizers from Yuris, a very strong and expensive tech. I might even go for the other artillery prereqs while doing it! Very nice indeed.

As for my own research, perhaps I'll go for Architecture, likely following Rowain there. Thing is, he doesn't have Rationalism yet, so I might have a chance with the Porcelain tower (I hope he keeps investing in Patronage). I think that, if I combine the Porcelain Tower GSci, with a naturally generated GSci from a university, + stealing Fertilizers from Yuris (and perhaps metallurgy), I might actually be able to surge my way to Artilleries.

That's all very interesting!

[Ichabod]

I forgot to take a screenshot of the starting situation on the frontlines. But Yuris retreated the crossbow to somewhere I couldn't see and moved a musket to its place, while advancing the longsword to be in range of mine longsword. My first move, based on that, was this:



As you can see in this screenshot, from the allowed attacks by the crossbow, you can't shoot over a forest hill, even if you are on a hill. Based on that, I couldn't attack the musket with my CB, so I used him for scouting instead, moving as shown. I wanted to see if I could find Yuris crossbow. Since the crossbow would be the only unit that could attack me by moving there, I wasn't afraid of losing the CB. The movement showed that the crossbow has to be on the fogged tile on the yellow circle.

This means that now the crossbow can't attack any of my units, since the tiles between it and my units are all forest/hills. This is especially meaningful to the longsword -> only two units can attack him where he is, so he's in no risk of dying on a single turn.



With that in mind, I attacked the musket with my 2 crossbows in range. I think the musket can deal significant damage when attacking my crossbow near it, but I don't think he can kill it. And I can probably kill him in the counter attack if he does attack. Now, I have a pretty decent position. I can get ranged attacks on Yuris, while he can't get them on me -> The stalemate favours me, as I can continually whittle down his units, getting no damage in return. Yuris will probably have to abandon that middle tile or keep getting harrassed. And if he abandons it, all he can do is run back to his land, since there's no space anywhere else.

Important to notice that the GG from Yuris is nowhere to be seen, so no chance of an offensive Citadel next turn.



Yuris is roading towards me, but roads are useless in a traffic jam.

About workers, my next tactical move (can someone describe the difference between tactics and strategy for me in few words?) is probably to cut tdown that jungle under my crossbow. That'll allow two more units to ranged attack the musket tile (while the unit in that tile could already attack my units). I think I can chop jungle in 1 turn with all my worker bonus, which is pretty nice!



I'm considering building walls and the Himeji Castle in Yaroslav. It's a killer production city, if only I can grow it. Problem is, the only happiness avaiable for me is from Yaroslav coliseum, so I need to get that before anything else.

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Barb crisis averted. I need 15 XP for sentry in that horseman, so I'll milk the barb camp for XP for a while longer, while waiting for Budapest to get to 25 influence.



My trick didn't work. The citizens were changed accordingly, as I wanted, but I didn't get the culture bonus.



For some reason, Moscow was revealed this turn (or I didn't notice it before). I'll need to put my spy in Moscow,even though I think Saint Petersburg is Yuris best science city. But I don't have it revealed, so I can't put the spy there. Interesting to notice Moscow placement, I thought it was the city west of Yaroslav. So Yuris was really reaching with Yaroslav... If Azza manages to capture Saint Petersburg and I take Rostov, Yuris will be cornered. That's nice.

Also notice, Yuris reaching Industrial Age through Fertilizers. Artillery is still far away for him, though. Fertilizers is cheaper than most of Dynamite prereqs still left to be researched.



Overview. I managed to cut a turn of the Terracotta Army plan, with both the wonder and the musket completing a turn earlier. So, it's 4 turns with this one until we do a big play!

[Meiz]

For some reason, Moscow was revealed this turn (or I didn't notice it before).

Seems like world congress was founded. I would suggest checking the proposed resolutions next turn

[Dreylin]

(can someone describe the difference between tactics and strategy for me in few words?)

Basically, Strategy is the big-picture goal, while Tactics are the actions employed to achieve it.

[DaveV]

(can someone describe the difference between tactics and strategy for me in few words?)

Basically, Strategy is the big-picture goal, while Tactics are the actions employed to achieve it.

Or, in a way I've frequently heard it expressed: tactics are how you win the battle; strategy is how you win the war.

[Ichabod]

Thanks for the answers, guys.

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If you saw the tech thread, you'll know that we are taking a two weeks break from this game. Anyone willing to try a quick real-time MP game using NQ mod in this period of time? We'd have to set up some specific times to play, I'm usually free between 00:00 - 03:00 GMT. I think we could go through a whole game in 4 sessions of 1 hour or something.

[wetbandit]

I'm in. You want to use the NQ map too? UTC-7 here, I can probably make 0000-0300 GMT work (4pm-7pm if I'm doing this right).

[Ichabod]

I'm trying to google search about number of turns needed for each worker action in Civ 5 and the information is simply not on the internet. How is that even possible? Everything is on the internet these days, apart from how Civ 5 works. Darn it!

Does someone know if cutting jungle takes the same time as cutting a forest?

[Ichabod]

So, these last few weeks we only played few turns, due to people being away. Anyway, we are back.

I stole Education from Rowain, but he stole the Terracotta Army from me. His army is probably huge now (though the soldier demographic is Civ 5 is totally bizarre), and if he attacks me its over, because there's no chance of peace with Yuris. I'll trust that Rowain keeps confident that he can win peacefully and leaves me alone (I think he built the TA more for the CS quests).

Domestically, I started a lot of Unis and I'm totally broke... I think I'm going for Astronomy soon, since I can build an observatory in my Capital, which is pretty nice. I'll keep thinking about it.

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In the war front, I kept exchanging some hits with Yuris, mostly hiting with ranged attacks, not enough to kill any unit. He started chipping away with his muskets at my longswordsman, but he hasn't achieved much, since I'm fortified and most turns he could only attack with one musket.



Here, I almost killed a musket, but it wasn't enough.

Last turn, Yuris attacked my longsword with 2 of his muskets. And this was the turn where my worker finally chopped the jungle, allowing more ranged attacks on the tile where one of the muskets was:



I successfully killed the musket after 4 ranged attacks, and moved a horseman to occupy the vacant tile. I can probably lose the horse, but whatever ends the turn in that hill spot is most likely dead, so it's a favourable trade for me.

Azza's Peace Treaty with Yuris ended and I asked him to declare war on Yuris. He rejected it, but I think it's because he wants to do it in his terms. He can see with his warrior that Yuris army is all on my front, so this is his best opportunity to improve his game position. Hopefully he comes to my help, otherwise a stalemate is the most likely result in this war.