Das Boot (directed by Wolfgang Petersen and Singaboy)

[hzhp800]

I know you have a lot on your plate right now, but I would be interested to hear your thoughts about your core city layout. 

You settled your core cities to maximize adjacency bonuses and Hansas and this worked to tremendous effect early on and impressed all of us lurkers. However, knowing what you do now about the vulnerability of coastal cities would you have laid out your core cities differently, sacrificing adjacency bonuses for more defensive positions? Or would you have kept the city layout (mostly) the same and simply made different decisions regarding diplomacy/war/unit production etc. to better defend the territory?

In any case, thank you for the continued great reporting and gameplay, this game has been terrific to follow. 

[Singaboy]

That's an interesting questions.

Germany lends itself to closest possible settling to maximize adjacency bonuses. However, if you look at the map, any city in the north had to be at the coast due to the 4 tile minimum distance requirement and rivers. I wanted to get galleys out as soon as possible to find CS due to the silly mechanic of the first free envoy (ought to be changed).
My mistake was not to settle south beyond settling one coastal city Kiel. It might have served me a lot better to go for Weinberg and Teutoburg first. I underestimated the OP power that England possesses. Remember that I got harassed by Norway and their early game ability to pillage land. I was focused on taking out Norway instead of going after the real threat, England. On an island map, it is essential to grab Great Admirals, though it might have been difficult with England's cheap harbors.

I think, in the end, Germany is not the best nation for an island map, but still a potentially OP nation on other maps. It has been fun to play the game after all due to the many twists. one can learn a lot also in terms of warfare with each game. I am confident to fight any land war when things are roughly equal.

[Singaboy]

Turn 156/157

Archduke is continuing to fight in the western German theatre while Woden has wisely pulled his troops back. Archduke has managed to sink all four Japanese subs and with his second sea dog, he manage to take one of my frigates. I have pulled my remaining frigate back into Salz m Meer and promoted it. At least it has now strength 62 when attacking. I am not sure what Archduke is going to do now that oledavy has no units left in the area.
oledavy has commenced attacks on the eastern shores of Archduke's Island. Without his 3 GA's and fleet, he pretty vulnerable. I still think, the Venetian Arsenal and stacking of Great Admirals/Generals should be banned in RB games in future.

Anyway, I am a mere bystander here and shall see whether Archduke will take Salz am Meer. After that, he can't really attacks easily in the west. Not too sure whether he thinks it's worth the time, effort, troops and WW to do that.

[Singaboy]

Turn 158:

I can understand that oledavy has decided not to send in reinforcements to the German battle zone. It's Archdukes kill zone. I am going to lose Salz am Meer. Whether Archduke is going to raze the city or not, it doesn't matter really. He won't get units from it and I will fight to my teeth to defend Aachen and Teutoburg.
My war weariness levels are bad. His must be staggering.

I pull out my promoted frigate to discover the fleet, a frigate, a sub and two ironclads. Maybe a sea dog behind there as well. Nothing I can do about the capture or raze of Salz am Meer. I might as well sink another frigate even if it costs me crossbows.



Hence, I pull in three crossbows thanks to the GG and fire four times and sink the frigate. Might as well go down in flames. Archduke has a lot of targets to choose from now. It might delay the fall of Salz am Meer by a turn. I am getting another frigate there, so that would be nice.

Aachen pulls three tiles in to prevent too many tiles from going to Salz am Meer. Aachen is building a bombard which might come in handy when defending the surroundings. I wonder how much longer Archduke will waste here instead of going for oledavy.

[Singaboy]

Turn up to 162:

I didn;t even realise that I had stopped to report. Besides the ridiculous flurry of diplomacy nonsense, I lost Salz am Meer as expected. Archduke sent mixed singals, wanting peace, then not wanting it, changing his mind every turn. To me, all three have shown incredible lack of trustworthiness for future games. All the promises, the alliances are just self serving nonsense.
I even sent a peace deal to Archduke thinking oledavy would offer peace to Archduke so that I could irritate Woden a little. Anyway, let them be at war with me until Teutoburg is taken. I will celebrate the mini victories etc. And this turn I got one.

Without his sugar daddies (the GA), Archduke's navy is just an ordinary thing. His submarine took out a crossbow, but I strike back with Kiel's city defense, the frigate inside the city, Aachen's camp and crossbow insides. This is enough to get the final crossbow to sink the sub.

Now, none of them has gone for a peace deal, hence their war weariness must be staggering high. Woden is being relentlessly attacked by oledavy, Archduke lost a city in the north. Heck, let them hit each other and raze cities while I watch from the sidelines.

I finished a bombard in Aachen and a second will follow in Weinberg in two turns. This will give me the opportunity to finish siege tactics and build those forts to move on in techs.

In the meantime, I am building a spy in Aachen. I read stories of entire economies wiped out my spy steals. Let's see what the spy can do to Archduke. The game is lost anyway, might as well try some new stuff here.

[Singaboy]

T163

Woden is getting what he deserves and Archduke and his silly conquest of Germany is not helping them one bit. Now Archduke is going after my mini city in the west, as if that makes a difference. He is busy with his frigate fleet there while oledavy smashes Woden. This is really poor play if you ask me. I am not quite certain why Archduke didn't agree on my peace proposal. Salz am Meer and Zuckerstadt in occupation gain him hardly anything but he suffers war weariness thanks to the war with me.

oledavy has razed yet another city and Woden's score is slipping, almost reaching my lows.
Lisbon is going down next and with it, 9 envoys from Woden and 8 from Archduke. Sweet

[Singaboy]

Meanwhile we are hitting turn169:

Archduke had started to hit my shores with a sub in the west, maybe to vent his anger that he cant accomplish anything in the game. I am not too sure what this should do.

Anyway, all of a sudden, he turns up with part of his navy instead of helping out Woden. Woden has so far lost one city and is about to lose another city this turn. His core will suffer badly. Woden's and Archduke's commercial city state, which they sank at least 17 envoys into, has been razed the last round.

So, I guess, instead of fighting oledavy head on, Archduke sidetracks and tried to conquer Germany. Maybe that way, there is more entertainment for me than simply watching oledavy steamroll Woden. Archduke is now sending strong ground forces as well. His first goal is obviously Kiel which is pretty exposed. Woden had lost 4 frigates trying to take the city. Archduke will be more successful, but let him take some flack first.



I am able to use the city defense, the frigate inside and a crossbow to sink one frigate. Not too sure, whether the city might fall in between turns. However, a strength 71 city is a different beast from the Kiel he took the first time round.

In the west, he has a submarine pestering my land. Unfortunately, I can only shoot three times at him. Well, at least he has to retreat now I guess. I counter his troops pretty aggressively too. If I just sit back, he will invade, pillage and take my land.

In other news, I have a spy sent to Woden, he should steal some gold in 3 turns. Someone also took away gold from me as my got has dropped by around 20 in previous turns.

[Singaboy]

More turns have passed, Archduke managed to take Kiel as expected due to his navy.

His is now trying to take Aachen but hits a much bigger roadblock there, I have a camp and the capital with medieval walls. They can hit a punch or two. I have successfully gotten my spy in a Brazilian city and am supposed to get 240 gold for that, though I am not too sure how that plays out as my gpt doesn't seem to improve. On T173, I actually get a Great Merchant, that gives 500gold and two envoys.

Archduke has three muskets near Aachen, I need to remove them first as only they can take Aachen. The rest is just wearing down city defenses.



Hence, I use both muskets to attack, followed by city defenses. The result is one musket dead and the other barely survives. The next turn, he can only use the bombard to attack my city, not both. And if he uses the bombard, the crossbows can't move and hit at the same time. The healthy musket, of course, will be able to attack.
However, I can use my upgraded field cannon and most likely, both city defenses to counter. I still have knights and horseman behind the front for emergency attacks, in order to prevent a meltdown of Aachen.
It does seem though, as if Archduke's eastern navy has moved away to help defend his Island against Japan.

[Singaboy]

T174

Archduke had both bombards in position and only those two can really bring my walls down, the rest would take a while without a battering ram or other support. Hence, this turn it is time to take those bombards out  Notably he has a new musket landed on the shores from the west. It is not promoted, hence it would be a good idea to take it out in one shot before it can get promoted. But that has to wait.



First, city defenses redline both bombards, the eastern of the two is taken care of by my newly minted field cannon, which earns a promotion too. I decide to go all out, defeat the second bombard with a horseman and then attack one of the crossbows with a knight that takes hardly a scratch. It will open both units for counter attacks, but I hope he can't kill both of them and doing so, will delay his attack and expose more troops to counter attacks.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Hey, Singaboy! Just finished reading through your thread. I really appreciate the detailed reporting, especially for the war with Norway and the final war with England and Brazil - I feel like I understand both of those conflicts a lot better now!

First, I wanted to say, both wars seriously impressed me. At the time, I thought you had a much bigger army conquering Norway than it turns out you did. The fact that you managed to overrun the entire civilization in ~30 turns, with two players resisting you, with such a skeleton force, is a brilliant accomplishment. At times I was shocked by the risks you took, but they all paid off.

Second, your defense against both England and Brazil in the last conflict was also inspired - you killed as many Brazilian units as Dave did, I think, and despite England's overwhelming advantages in naval firepower you made him pay in blood for every foot of ground, even counterattacking around Aachen at the end. When you couple your tactical abilities with your economic micro, it's no wonder you're always a threat to win these things.

I have a couple of questions.

1)In retrospect, how do you feel about the decision to conquer Norway? Did you expect to do as well as you did? What was your plan if you had stalled out at one of his cities (like Asgard, perhaps)? In some ways, it seems like your spectacular success there backfired and painted a target on your back.

2)If you had time to prepare, how DO you think England can be countered on these island maps? Is there any plan that could have saved your core from England in the first war?

Thanks again for the detailed reports, and congratulations on a very well-played game.