REM goes on the Sudric Express [Pitboss 33 spoilers]

[Aurorarcher]

Shame no pics but 5 cities! Sounds like a very nice first turn of the war .

[ReallyEvilMuffin]

Shame no pics but 5 cities! Sounds like a very nice first turn of the war .

I do have them, but I had to take so long playing the bloody turn with the horrendous lag I don't have time atm to post. Hoping I get killed mercifully quickly in 30 to save me some time.

[ReallyEvilMuffin]

Although I would like to point out with the game speed we may have well gone sequential...

Once Flight appears the game will need to be swapped.

Consensus was to have it just no bombing improvements I thought?

[ReallyEvilMuffin]

So... What happened?

Well, basically I wanted to seize the moment. Scooter is not in war civics and hasn't built military for a while. I basically had the only oil navy on the scene with about 8 transports and 10 destroyers, and I can't be hit for quite a while by Drey4E. So lots of time to make an impact. I could sit back in my slightly more cities and using my SoL, but I feel that at some point there would have been a dogpile against me that would have been hard to defend if it were organised. So... Hit them when they don't expect it!

So I chose a target. Drey4E still had peace. So did DZ (and only 2 cities). BGN is well defended and a bit far from me, however Pind I surrounded on all sides and I felt I would be able to smash on T1 of the war. I decided to prep up, however I had to speed up the attack, given him getting combustion. I imagined that he had started ironclads which he wanted to auto upgrade to destroyers, so if I didn't go this turn, my transports would be open to counter.

So I then went a planning in the couple of turns I had. I could get 2 promos on my ships, and tried to place them as best I could.

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So 1 was the most important take in my eyes. I tasked 2 galleons and 2 frigates just out of range here with 5 inf and a machine gun. 1 frigate would have enough movement to bombard, they were out of his sight, and I had a couple of airships in Yaks to strike the 1 soliter C1CG2 inf in there.

2 was another easy decision. Essentially our only land border, and thus a prime target. I flipped the hill mine tile a couple of turns ago with culture builds, stopping him seeing the staging city, and also allowing me to use the RR on there. I will move in with workers and RR pre attack and RR the road towards the front too. Just cavalry here on the attack, against a cossack and 2 grens. Some airship cover too.

3 I want to take this city as it is easy, although I dislike its positioning off all the rivers... Bah. It does allow for ICS inbetween it and his oil city though on the river, and this will cause less wastage of leveeable rivers.

4 is where I am mildly vulnerable. BGN has a stack of ironclads (never seen anyone build so many) and a galleon he thinks is hidden in the fish pond. He also has a fair few units in his city there that might cause issues if I take the Pind city to the SW.

5/6 are the primary attack force to the south. Idea is that one goes to each city. I also have boats slightly behind these that will reenforce. Although some of these cannot make the actual attack, using galleon (read transport) chaining, I can make sure that I have a decent prescence in any city I capture.

I have airships all around to try and give me as much coverage as possible.

To my northern border with BGN I shuffled a few cav accross to keep douglas, as he had a large presence on the island and stockpiled a few destroyers to keep control of the seas here. In the DZ cities, I have enough to keep him at bay I feel. I do wish I was not culture crushed in glitch mode though. It will pop 3rd ring borders soon and hopefully be able to flip some of the tiles around it.

Then we got to the attack...

[ReallyEvilMuffin]

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So as I said a very successful start to the war. I actually jumped around with the combats a lot here. I wanted to take every city down to the last defender before committing whether to keep or burn the captures, depending on how many units I could get in there and possible counters.

1 Good combat here. Bombed with frigate, 2 airship hits and then 2 inf to kill. I decided to raze as Scooter has 2 galleons sitting in Kabalvesky that could make short work of the city, with pinds help, despite being able to land a further 3 full health c1pinch inf and a machine gun in the city IMO. Especially with a liberate being allowed by Brick. That I feel was a mistake now because of...

2/3 Stravinsky was only defended by a couple of rifles, and I had no losses taking this after a few bombards and airship hits. I managed to stack this city with a bit of transport chaining. I felt that I would be able to keep this despite Scooter having a couple of units in range, although now I realise that this was perhaps a bit rash. He can unload anything in his galleons and use the railroads in pind land to hit me there... We shall see. I think I will raze this if it gets retaken. He has some boats nearby, although I should be able to kill the destroyer with my naval units if he attacks with it. Are there units in the galleon? Hope not, but I have enough on my island to cover. That cossack stack in 3 is most of Pinds units. 1 cossack in Borodin and a few inf/machine gun in his cap.

4/5 his cap and the SE city. Good capture here, he had 3 units rifle/gren mix. 1 loss, and then stacked the city nicely to defend any counter. Irritatingly I packed my supporting transport wrongly, I had meant to drop a machine gun in the mix. Would have made it harder for him to counter. BGN cannot hit from his city next turn, he only has a cavalry that can reach here. I feel happy about keeping this. Also took the island city with no losses, and landed 5 cavalry to hit the rifle/gren pair in the other island city next turn. I have a lot of air power to hit them also.

6 BGN seemed to guess I was going to attack this turn judging by his play, but sat his galleon in a strange place. Not in range on much at all. Stacked all his many ironclads, but little else. I took a couple out with my destroyers. Even with the C1 promo and coast defence, a non promoted destroyer gets 99% odds there! I should have got destroyers sooner. Took a couple out and covered myself. No real threatening moves towards them though. I'm not even interested in Simon Cowell right on my borders. His road network to this region is poor. He also lacks railroad, although does have a few airships floating around.

7/8 where I might be vulnerable. I have only a few units to his here. However I can start 1 turning machine guns out of douglas and I think will be fine, as I control the water here, so I can ship over extra units as needed. Also have the DZ cities covered well. I have still only seen 2 galleons. There is nothing that could threaten Edward etc.

I have a lot of destroyers coming out now, gonna be difficult to catch me now navally. Still building many units and just the basic infrastructure of factory and shale plant in new cities. No health issues with no coal access still.

What I didn't photo was my Scooter attacks. I killed one ironclad, but essentially blocked off his navy by silkmoths plonking a destroyer and some units in that sea. I am also bringing over as many ships to there as possible, having a leg up on him on ship building. I have border pops in both Silkmoths and my new city there. I should be a tough nut to get anything out of here is my plan essentially.

I started having happy issues in my cities, well one city (already?!) I realised now that this is from loosing the dye trade with scooter which was worth 2 happy in my bigger cities with their theatres, and also I have a combined war weary after 1 turn of about 150?! God. Drey4E declaring alone would push me to an extra 100 war weary. Having to deal with this already by getting the Mt Rushmore NW in Toby. Hooked my stone and can build it in 3 turns. This will somewhat help with the war weariness that I am suffering, and tbh I might need a few jails soon at 96 hammers they are pretty cheap for halving war weary.

Pre and post turn roll demos. Soliders still rising nicely. I am still loosing ground in the MFG field, and GNP is langusihing but I think I am still about top especially considering the war and the amount of builds I reckon Scooter is running.

Of course on the roll, I got my 45% odds GM, rather than the 55% non GM. Bah. No third GA yet. GM goes to Industrialism for 1700k beakers currently. About 4t of tech there, but with the happiness issues above, I really can't afford to loose the ivory after the whale loss with combustion. Shame. A third GA here would have been so useful. Unsure what I could get for him re trade mission. Unsure if I could safely get him anywhere.

I shot white peace to BGN and Scooter. If they start taking these then I will have staggered peace treaties between Drey4E and Scooter. I can effectively prevent a coordinated dogpile with continued war-peacing. I do not believe that Scooter will take the treaty and will likely view this as the final war. BGN might. I don't know. Depends if he wants easy turns or to try and get some more blood out of me. If Scooter gives me peace I will be able to make short work of Pind. If not, then this could drag. I hope that Pind will empty the border cities and tempt him into warring pind and not me.

One sad thing is I now have no useful routes for my cities with customs houses... I have been at war with every nation at most 5t ago.

Any qyestions do ask!

[Thoth]

One sad thing is I now have no useful routes for my cities with customs houses... I have been at war with every nation at most 5t ago.

Any qyestions do ask!

Why did you waste hammers on customs houses? They're one of the worst things in the game to spend hammers on.

[ReallyEvilMuffin]

One sad thing is I now have no useful routes for my cities with customs houses... I have been at war with every nation at most 5t ago.

Any qyestions do ask!

Why did you waste hammers on customs houses? They're one of the worst things in the game to spend hammers on.

In hindsight now they may be a waste, but the three I built in the biggest cities gave an extra 6 commerce per turn when they were built. These cities also had the full lib/ob/uni bonuses and FR. So that's about 11 extra GNP/turn at full sci. Cost of 144 hammers. The wealth build alternative would be probably around 7-8 GNP/turn allowing a higher slider run. I think hey came out more useful than not therefore, but they did Have a long payback.

[ReallyEvilMuffin]

Well I got called on my optimism. He retook the city I should have razed for the loss of 2 cannon to me loosing 8 odd units. Still he only left a single inf in there, so I was able to retake and raze. Took another island city, but now I'm stumped. It's nightmarish trying to navigate this with the railroads making counters so easy. I think I will bite the bullet and get tanks. I might pay some happy to begin with, but it will break the deadlock here. I can bulb it and tech it EoT.

[ReallyEvilMuffin]

So as I said, bulbed and teched to industrialism. The obsoletion of ivory hit me hard though, I'm having about 4-5 cities with 1-2 unhappy faces, and some of the bigger ones with 3 now. Contrasts with the previous turn of just 1 city with an unhappy face. Plans in motion to deal with this. Mount rushmore out EoT. A couple more jail builds will be done, however I also have realised that pind pretty much can't hit the island I took off him now he has no oil, and there are gems there which I lack. I can settle there not this turn but next turn for 2 happy in every city which with the MR build and a few jails should sort me out now the fighting has died down a bit. Pretty much all of my WW is coming from the Pind war. I have about 250 from that, and less than 20 combined from BGN/Scooter.

Shot another white peace to Scooter but doesn't matter if he doesn't accept. I have a large detachment of destroyers heading out to him as I need very little to keep a lid on BGN and Pind. I should be able to keep anything he tries to do at bay owning the waterways around us.

Pressing on Pind a bit more, but difficult with the railroad manourvability to catch him. Pushing on a couple of cities at the same time is basically the only way. Still, tanks now including triple promo ones from the cap!

[Rowain]

Still, tanks now including triple promo ones from the cap!