[Spoilers] The games they are a changin' - Ichabod Civ 6 PBEM 3 as England

[pindicator]

Played 2 more turns and ew captured Kikyo.  

[Ichabod]

I didn't upload the screenshots from the previous turn, but here's what I did: 3 archer shots + warrior attack reduced the city to ~90 HP. I moved the southern warrior across the river to put the city in siege mode. All warriors moved close to the city, including the heavily injured one. I estimated that Kaiser would kill 2 warriors, but I'd have 3 archers + 2 full strength warriors to attack on the following turn, which would be enough to take the city.




As expected, here's the scenario that greeted me on the following turn. Interesting to note that my warriors got slaughtered by Kaiser's warriors. DotF is indeed a very, very powerful belief. Anyway, I think I exploited the weakness of it very well in this scenario, the fact that it doesn't benefit cities. I made all the obvious attacks and:



I got the Inspiration for Military Training (the Camp) and Mathematics (3 districts). The encampment also fulfilled the quest for Preslav, giving me an envoy there.

I ended the turn by moving the horseman to the west of the warrior and by attacking the archer with my warrior. Kaiser still gets the DotF bonus on these units, either because the game lags until it's gone, or because Kikyo still counts as a Japanese city, considering the ocupation penalty.

I renamed the city to "Like a Rolling Stone", a great song, since it's a great city.



This is Kaiser's last stand. No DotF so far, as religion hasn't spread, but he'll get the Japanese coastal bonus. Kaiser's warrior near Kikyo is toast (best thing he can do is pillage the Holy Site, I think), but the archer can reach Osaka before I can finish him with the horseman, unless I sacrifice the scout (and even then, it is not guaranteed).

Anyway, I'll have 4 horseman ready next turn + another Heavy Chariot. I'm dealing with some barb troubles near the Capital (everything under control), but then I need to decide what to do next. Do we split the horsemen to try and take multiple cities? Do we go for Kaiser first or do we try and take Dalwhinnie while suboptimal is weak?




Do we take Yerevan? I'm actually thinking we shouldn't, at least not right now. Yerevan won't help our amenities situation and it doesn't have any districts as of yet. We can perhaps wait for a Holy Site and perhaps a Harbor (though it'd need a free Coastal tile to build one, so it might be moot). We can also ally with them, as we already have 2 envoys and we just received one from the influence points growth (which I was saving for the Commercial CS, once we had a chance to switch to the 2 for 1 envoy policy). 

I'm thinking that the best game winning move is to go after Suboptimal right now. He can't stop us. He doesn't have walls, he doesn't have units and we have a lot of horseman. He's building a Camp, but Dalwhinnie is his only Iron source. There's a very high chance that Rowain will get involved, but that's really not too bad. I think we can get Suboptimal's second city, in which case Rowain can get the Capital. Suboptimal's second city would open up both northeastern CSs as natural expansions for us.

Another thing to think about is religion. We actually have a great long term religious prospect, but the problem is actually getting the Prophet. There's 3 prophets left, but Suboptimal has the last one guaranteed. Bacchus is already accumulating GPro points. We can probably beat him to it, but it take a lot of effort for no guaranteed returns. So, the big question is: is Rowain going for Stonehenge? I think Rowain really likes Wonders and I think he would go for such a Wonder only because it was left behind, without really making it part of a grand strategy. He'd probably try for the Pyramids first, but I don't know if he has desert tiles avaiable. 

If we knew for sure Rowain is not going for Stonehenge, we could go for it. We can get it in the Capital in about 10 turns, I think, if we revolt to Autocracy + the Wonder card. Considering we are likely to capture a whole lot of religious CSs, we will have Holy Sites even if we don't build them and we have a lot of decent places to build them as well. Zen Meditation + Church Property could be a pretty decent, low effort combo, for instance. We can even try to abuse Crusade, considering Rowain is probably not going to get his own religion, if we get ours.



Anyway, here's the overview of our lands.

[pindicator]

Great job with the attack! I think you made the right call sacrificing the warriors as walls going up would have been a major setback. Kikyo falling essentially is the end of Kaiser. In fact, what do you think about offering peace to Kaiser? With 1 city he isn't much of a threat, and while he'd be able to build up over 30 turns I think we'd be in a position to wrap him up for good ... or even just ignore him. This would also let us turn our entire military against Suboptimal. And if you haven't guessed it yet, that's exactly what I think we should do. You pointed out a lot of the reasons I was thinking of already.

True, Rowain may get some carved out of him as well, but there's another important factor to consider: we are starting to get very close to the eastern edge of our continent. I think Suboptimal is right on the border? If we can push out to where we're getting +5 combat strength and free melee units for new cities, that might what clinches the game.

Actually, how close are we now? Close enough to consider sending settlers out that way?

As for religion, there are some things to consider.

1) How much would chopping Holy Site projects out of Kaiser cost?
2) We do kind of have a religion now at Kikyo - is that good enough to spread around? Defender of the Faith is a Founder benefit, but we should get the benefit of Work Ethic. (And whatever Kaiser boosts the religion to, assuming he stays alive long enough to do so.)
3) Suboptimal may not survive long enough to get his prophet. However, I think I heard of a bug where the last prophet wouldn't generate if Arabia was eliminated before it spawned -- not sure if that's been patched.

I'm not sure Stonehenge is the most efficient play ... but it does seem like a fun play! So if you want it then let's go for it

[Ichabod]

The idea of proposing peace to Kaiser is worth thinking about. It would only last for 10 turns (as I think you've mistaken it with the DoF duration), and, as far as I know, we'd get the cities out of occupation even if he doesn't cede them to us. We could go straight for the kill against Suboptimal and those turns can make a big difference.

To be fair, I'd only finish Kaiser as a mercy blow, to not force someone (Kaiser or Adrien) to play a turn for the next whatever turns. In game wise, we'd get an easier Iron (though we can already get 2 sources in Kikyo and Dalwhinnie - as I really don't think Suboptimal can save that city), the Sailing Eureka (+ easier water Eurekas) and perhaps easier Suzerainity of some CSs (as Kaiser has loads of envoys). These advantages are neglegible compared to crippling the neighbour with the best Civ, I think.

This is a case where allowing Kaiser to resign to AI should be in order. Yeah, he can cause me some harm, if he really tries, but it's really not that big of a deal.

By the way, just to explain the Commercial Hub in Hard Rain. I have a granary 1t from completion, which I'll finish in the turn the builder moves to the jungle tile. This way, I can out that jungle chop into the Campus that we'll build in that tile. But to have the city without a selected queue on that turn, I need to invest some turns into another build, which is the Commercial Hub. After the Campus, we'll finish the Hub.

[Ichabod]

And the point about the Continents is great. I'll take a look at the lens next turn. If Suboptimal is indeed on a different Continent, I need to switch to Iron Working as soon as possible. We will Eureka it by capturing Dalwhinnie, and then we can get Swords for free!

I'm afraid that all Suboptimal's cities are on the same continent as ours, though, unfortunately.

[pindicator]

Eliminating him would be the nicer play. Plus, after seeing how suboptimal was able to give oledavy fits in PBEM2 it may not be wise to leave an enemy on our borders, no matter how weak they appear.

But I would definitely go after Suboptimal now. He hasn't built walls, he hasn't yet replaced the forces we destroyed at Kikyo - you'll never get a better chance to conquer him.

I'd also start building a battering ram somewhere. Walls will be coming online soon. I think we can get Dalwhinnie before he has a chance, but his other cities likely will have them built.

And I never answered your questions about Yerevan. I think we let it be for now. Who knows - we may end up becoming a very devout nation later on!

[Ichabod]

We caught yet another break in this game: Bacchus finished Stonehenge! That basically guarantees us a religion, since Rowain is already tracking us on the GPro race, and he really doesn't seem interested in going for it.

We won't have the best religion ever, but it'll be good enough. It's basically for free.

I sent Kaiser a peace offer for the two captured cities. I killed his archer and warrior, so he's down to a single warrior. But our units are also positioned to atttack Dalwhinnie, which I'll do whether Kaiser takes peace or not. In two turns, we can have 3 archers, 2 horsemen and a warrior attacking the city. In three turns, I think we can have all 4 horsemen on the site. Suboptimal has two archers there, one heavily injured inside the city and another covering the iron tile. He started walls in Dalwhinnie this turn, but there's no chance he finishes in time, as there's no chop avaiable.

Full report to come tomorrow. I started a Battering Ram in Desolation Row. No reason not to.

Next turn, we'll change civics. I'm thinking of going -1 maintenance, +1 hammer per city, 2 for 1 envoys (start investing in the Commercial CS) and +2 GG points. I think we have enough horses for now and we can already get Feudalism Inspiration with the builders we have + Dalwhinnie's farm, so I'll leave the +30% on builders for when we finish Defensive Tactics (i.e. the Civic before Feudalism, so we can pre-build them to get the +2 charges).

[Ichabod]

I think my last post basically covered what happened in the previous turn, but lets have some pictures.



Kaiser tried to run away with his warrior, but moved and shot with his archer. That allowed me to kill both units, using the archers and the horseman.



The warrior on the Camp has a promotion, so he can heal. My idea is to position the archers next turn in a way that the three of them can attack the city, but in a way that they are in range to help kill the archer on the iron tile. The horseman will likely move 1E - from that tile, he can attack the archer or the city. 

If you notice carefully, Suboptimal started walls on Dalwhinnie. Previous turn screenshots show he wasn't building it, so he just started. I have lots of time here, the city has poor production capabilities and I'm certain Suboptimal doesn't have the walls % card, since he hasn't reached PP yet. Dalwhinnie is pretty open to attacks across the river, but crossing the river will be a bit more annoying. Anyway, that's a bit of a moot point, if my reading of the situation is correct. He simply doesn't have the units to compete with my units, no matter how much I botch the tactical situation.



Here's the continent view. The cities we planned to capture are the ones on our own continent.   Well, if we ever go north of Glenfarclas (man, these names), we have that extra oomph going on for us. Another thing of note is that Suboptimal is not building walls in Glenfarclas. I guess he's not very aware of the risk he's facing. That city is incredibly exposed.



Troop movement and selected builds. 



I'm sending the units that were planned to conquer Yerevan this way, to clear the barb camp and explore that peninsula (scout couldn't move foraward to do loads of barbs). There are also barbs to the north, which I sould probably take care before good units start appearing (not sure exactly how, though).

Anyway, I was thinking of settling the next city in this direction. Yields wise, I like the city on the river (due south), in the fresh water marsh tile. It gets decent tiles around (the deer is a 2/3 tile we can buy, there's also a 2/2 hill forest), decent food and a nice 3 mountain adjacency tile for districts (if we harvest the deer, which I'm thinking we can, and for production actually, which is really nice -> can probably finish a monument straight up). But perhaps we should prioritize a coastal city, for the Eurekas + Harbor. Southeast of the northern fish could be a decent spot, in that case, we'd only need to buy one tile to get 2 resources ready to be improved. There's also a lot of tiles to be chopped, which can finish the Harbor pretty quickly. Finally, that city opens up a very easily acquired marble luxury.

But we can also focus our expansion to the East, since everyone else is that way.

Finally, as stated, Bacchus finished the Stonehenge. We will probably get a religion, but the question is, should we put some effort on it or just let things go? 



Here's a possible Holy Site placement in Watchtower. I expected some of the tiles to give +3 faith (2 from natural wonder, 1/2 from forest, 1/2 from City Center district), but things work in a different way. Anyway, the next Prophet costs 120 GPP. We currently generate 1 per turn. That means the game will be over by the time we get it. Considering how bad all other districts are in Watchtower, perhaps the investment can make sense.

But I'm not sure. What we could do is actually build an Entertainment Complex in Watchtower. We couple that with some Industrial Zones (which we'll get before everyone else, I think), to get the first GEng avaiable (2 charges of Wonder Production). We use those charges to finish the Colosseum. I think we have a spot with at least 4 cities already, that can get up to 6, if we capture Geneva + settle that city northeast of Hard Rain. That's a lot of culture and amenities and way better than a Religion, I think.

As a last thought, this is why I think Suboptimal should have gone for a naturally generated GPro instead of waiting for Arabia's ability. His civ has a lot of bonuses connected to faith generation and Holy Sites, so even if you get the free Prophet, you won't have infra in place for actually benefiting from it. I don't think there's a problem in focusing Arabia's strategy entirely on the Mamluk part (perhaps that was Suboptimal's plan, which can't be faulted), but they can actually benefit a lot from Religion (never played a game with Arabia, but I'm guessing from reading the abilities) and I think going for a high faith + Jesuit Education combo could really work. But in this case, waiting until your neighbour finishes his 120 GPP GPro at 1 GPP per turn is not going to work out.

[pindicator]

Colosseum is actually a great idea, is much rather sink hangers into that. One difficulty with it is placing it, as our empire is very spread out. It also has to be placed on flat terrain. So if you were to build it at Watchtower the only 2 legal tiles that are within range of our 4 core cities is the plains tile west of the wheat, and the plains tile east of that marble in the middle of our cities. Considering we are likely to place a city on the coast northwest of Watchtower in the future, I recommend building Colosseum on the tile west of Watchtower's wheat.

Where to put the Entertainment District then? Likely
The grass tile northwest of the wheat. The problem is both tiles would have to be bought. You could also put the district on top of the wheat but that seems like a lot to give up.

I think we should also lock in the holy site at this city. +2 faith is a nice adjacency. Plus if you put the Holy Site on the tile 1W of the city you will get another adjacency bonus with the entertainment district. Then if you add another envoy to Yerevan and we'll be up to a +5 bonus to faith.

As for hurrying the religion, the best way to do that is going to be building a shrine at Rolling Stone. Once we add a shrine and holy site + shrine at Watchtower we'll be at +4gpp/t. We can even continue to boost with Holy Site Prayers, but that's somethingto consider down the road. But the earliest we should be looking towards religion would be as a mid game bonus for if we ever get bored down militarily.

You know what's funny about that continent divide screenshot? Rowain is just on the other side. So if we were ever to fight our civilization civilization bonuses would always cancel out.

With regards to settling spots ... can we grab both of the ones you highlighted? I don't think it's quite time to push settlers east yet until we have a safe lane to send them. And I like both of those spots ... I guess I would highlight the tundra spot ahead of the marble, but only by a small margin.

[Ichabod]

I peeked at the new turn, but haven't played it yet. Kaiser didn't accept peace, so we have to decide if we go for Suboptimal or Kaiser.

Kaiser's warrior is on the wheat spot. I can ZoC him with the scout by moving 1W, and attack with the Horse. The warrior gets Japan bonus (and Oligarchy), so it's kind of a fair fight, but I think I can take him down in two turns. The problem is that Kaiser is likely about to finish a new warrior in Osaka, so that one horse one be enough to take the city.

In this sense, I think we need to decide if we go for a quick finish on Kaiser or we go for Dalwhinnie first.

Our archers are placed in a way that it'd take about 5 turns to have them ready to take Osaka. That's too big of a waste, so the horses are the only units able to hit that city in decent time. But archers attacking Dalwhinnie without melee support will amount to nothing, so this scenario means the archers are useless as well (as if they were moving).

As much as getting rid of occupation penalties is nice and as tempting as it seems to go against a strength 10 city, I think we'll lose too much time attacking Kaiser. I have some moves planned for the horses that can make us surround Dalwhinnie in quick fashion, so I'm tempted to go in that direction. We press on against Suboptimal until we capture Glenfarclas (hopefully I'm not being too optimistic here). We set up a defensive position there with the archers and we come back with 3 horsemen or so, coupled with the Heavy Chariot (ready this turn, should be on the scene by then), to go full force against Osaka. I heavily doubt we'll see walls by then, but we have a battering ram in production, anyway.

The other idea is really go full force against Kaiser now, finish that off and then see what to do about Suboptimal. Again, we are producing a Ram, so even if he finishes walls, it's not teh end of the world. I'm not sure what Suboptimal can get in 5 to 10 turns that will change the odds in his favour, but giving more time to human opponents is always a risk.

Again, I think going for Suboptimal now will see us in a better position 50 turns from now, compared to finishing Kaiser. Since our objective is to win the game, not boast about how great our score and demos are at the current turn, I think that decision is sound.