to be clear, I'm advocating getting our mage stack together and actively engaging the enemies on our western border asap. I bet we could raze Golden Leane pretty easily, and use summons to salt the earth around it (mostly pit beasts because of desert). more pillage gold = faster archmages.
I don't feel like 'kill the foes, but leave one city behind for Auric' really fits the spirit of our variant. The most that seems reasonable to me is a pillaging party that doesn't take any cities - to cut down on the number of enemy units and get some cash. I'd be happy to visit Falamar's close city and pillage the place and kill off the HA/Satyr stack - but not actually take the place or go deeper into his territory. Not until Drifa, anyway.
So I don't like your proposed tech path. I want to get Drifa built to unlock another conquest, because I think we're not permitted substantial offensive warfare just yet. I do see that our breakeven rate increased from ~195 to 218 during your set. If we can keep that trend going, we'll be fine. We have 27 cities, 300 hpt - surely that's enough to be able on average to scrape together 20 gpt more every five turns?
Only four of our cities are at their happiness cap, and those four could build public baths. We currently have a lot of markets, Elder Councils, and libraries, but only one courthouse, one harbor, no moneychangers or taxmen or alchemist labs or gambling halls. It's not like we're short on options for economic builds. We've just been short on the security to spend our hammers on the economy. Now that we're so much more secure, I think we can afford to push more for cash than for Power.
I played 10 turns, because the war was relatively peaceful, and I wanted to see the results of my economic efforts. I killed about five units from each of our foes - seemed like everyone sent a little probe to see if we could defend. We could, although in one spot I had to draft some emergency javelins.
I also pillaged the ex-Doviello countryside per Jalepeno's suggestion, and sent in about half the Doviello force to lay siege to Malaha's last city. I didn't intend to capture, just to pillage her countryside and reduce her army somewhat. That's still in progress, if you want to continue making our backlines area a bit safer.
I didn't tech anything, just stacked up cash. Mostly because I don't see any of the immediate options as profitable, so I didn't see much harm in delaying until someone else's turnset. We've got a good deal of cash in the bank, though . We could grab Fanaticism and Iron Working, or Arcane Lore, or something off the path entirely.
Also managed to bump up our net GNP from the 218 at T300 to 319 at T310. I can't take credit for most of it: Doviello cities coming out of revolt onto towns made a huge difference - but maybe a third of it was due to courthouses and such. Note that inflation is almost doubling our maintenance bills, which makes courthouses pay off a lot better than they seem to from the city screen. I've also got a lot of money changers and courthouses in queues, due soon.
In other good news, our Mage count has jumped up quite significantly. I only left a trickle of adept production going, but I did actively find things for our existing adepts to kill, and spent the cash to upgrade them as they hit 8 XP.
However, this peaceful interlude may be about to end. On the last IBT, Falamar gathered up an army and took a city from Sheelba, on our border. It's possible that he goes after Varn next; he's at war with him too. But if that army turns east...the next player would have an interesting time stopping him.
Quote:However, this peaceful interlude may be about to end. On the last IBT, Falamar gathered up an army and took a city from Sheelba, on our border. It's possible that he goes after Varn next; he's at war with him too. But if that army turns east...the next player would have an interesting time stopping him.
You do so love to leave me interesting times!
Got the save. To be clear, we're not allowed to kill Mahala?
Erebus in the Balance - a FFH Modmod based around balancing and polishing FFH for streamlined competitive play.
Quote:You do so love to leave me interesting times!
I promise I'm not deliberately setting these up. Dunno, maybe if I'd followed Jalepeno's advice and played aggressively, in Falamar's face, I could have cut his army down before this happened.
(November 7th, 2015, 21:05)Qgqqqqq Wrote: Got the save. To be clear, we're not allowed to kill Mahala?
It is against our variant rules, until after we get Drifa. Some of us were willing to make an exception, but it wasn't unanimous and I think we need unanimity if we're going to change a rule post-facto. We are agreed that you can kick her while she's down, though. Just send her to the hospital, not the morgue.
Just at the end of my set now, and got the Great Prophet event. I researched Arcane Lore, and am putting beakers into Strength of Will. Thus, we have a choice between 3850b, or a GPro. I can't tab out to tell how much we need for a GA (we have the GS from AL) but my instinct is to take the beakers.
Thoughts?
Erebus in the Balance - a FFH Modmod based around balancing and polishing FFH for streamlined competitive play.
I don't remember that event, but I think 4K beakers is worth more than a golden age at the moment.
Golden Age is worth a heck of a lot with an empire this big, and we probably should try to hand-generate the great people necessary to get one, but we ought to be able to do that cheaper than 4K beakers.
. We could grab Fanaticism and Iron Working, or Arcane Lore, or something off the path entirely.
). 