Woden's and Chevalier Mal Fet's [Insert Clever Name Here] Team Thread

[Woden]

Just wanted to throw this out here to make sure we are on the same page and just in case China/Rome feel they don't have the advantage and want to shift tides once again. Under no circumstances should we accept any peace deal with Rome/China. I feel we have parity and maybe even the advantage right now and we need to use it to hurt them. I am more and more hopeful about our chances as it gets closer. I should be able to hold the land line and I think you may have the unit advantage on the sea.

For my part, I have been chewing on it a little and think I will use El Cid to form a Calvary corps. This will give 1 city at strength of 88 when the unit is inside and with corps being bugged at Nationalism, I don't think they have anything that can answer that kind of strength. And if I can keep the path between Ma'at and Hothor open, I can have it shift cities depending on where the main attack is coming from. My best guess right now is Ma'at, as the land is fairly open from the west.

Full speculation here, but I think their attack force will be mostly Calvary with some Field Cannons for support but I don't think they will bring too many as Calvary are stronger and horsemen are cheaper to faith buy than crossbows. One thing I learned when attacking Cornflakes, is that my crossbows were more useful than my knights were, as I could focus fire on the front line knights and use my knights as bait. And Cornflakes crossbows were more deadly as they prevented me from a full frontal assault and set up death zones to where if I moved my units up, they were certainly dead. When they attack, they will hit a line of field cannons that will hurt them pretty bad. One other thing that I also learned is that a war of attrition favors the one with more units, so I will have to continue building units and sending them to the front. I just hope I can hold the front so my reserves can make it there in time. I am assuming I will see mostly Chinese units, as most of Rome's power is tied up in ships, which is a good thing because I don't know how well I could do going against a full attack for both of them at once.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Well, I'm not as sanguine as you are, but I agree, we never make peace. We will fight it out on this line if it takes all summer.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Turn 143

So one thing I forgot to mention last turn was that I sent a DoF to Emperor and to Archduke - as usual, to the first player for them to discuss, to the second for them to accept if they want. They accepted, and Archduke made an offer of his own:




-sigh- So now he's onboard with teaming up against the leader. I guess he had a low morale  day or something when he accepted Sullla's alliance offer - maybe he thought we were going to leave him out to dry (that would have been very stupid of us to do), and instantly regretted it (going by his support since then). Unfortunately, what's done is done, and 18 turns is a LONG time to hold out at sea. 

See, I'm just now processing the import of Sullla finishing the Terracotta Army last turn:




Every single one of his units is promoted, probably with the +7 combat bonus - meaning his ships are stronger than mine even with the GA on my side. Plus, he's got lots of ironclads, which are very tough nuts to crack. That's not so bad, I want to ignore those mostly and blast frigates where I can. Ironclads won't hurt me too badly, battleships will. Anyway, apparently the Army promotes naval units as well, when I thought it applied only to land units. Damn, that was clever of him. 

So my qualitative edge vanishes in that one move by Sullla, and my numerical edge will be shaky as well - in fact, if he gets first strike, he'll be able to take out 6 or 7 frigates in one blow, neatly stealing the numbers edge for himself. Followed up by battleships a few turns later and that will be that. 

The plan remains the same, though - if I can knock out Genova, I have a chance to wear down his ships in this sea. Every few turns, 2 more ships roll off the slipways at Lepanto, Actium, Midway, and Jutland. I can outbuild him, given time. if he had to worry about ARCHDUKE too he'd be screwed and we could be looking at a 2-player endgame vs. Russia/Germany but noooooooOOOOOoooo -grumble- 

I'm still pessimistic about our chances, but I'm doing my best to contain my whining. : I still hope that this battle will be fun, even if I'm almost certainly not going to win. We've known I almsot certainly wasn't going to win for 50 turns now, though. 

Anyway, it looks like Sullla is taking the bait. HIs fleet is menacing mine away from Nan Madol. I never could hope to hold the city, so I've been quietly evacuating my troops the last couple of turns:




When war breaks out, Sullla will get first strike thanks to the joys of turn order, meaning I can't hold the city from the sea, and by land I'm hopelessly outclassed. So I've been delaying as long as I can to squeeze every last drop of culture out. On turn 145, I'll be sure to pull my decoy fleet back,  hopefully luring Sullla in to destroy the city. Then, the decoy fleet will make sail to link up with the main body, which will be hitting Genova and then turning to confront Sullla before he can respond. His ships can only move 4 spaces per turn to my 7, so I don't think he'll be able to get up there in time unless he has a significant squadron in the waters already to delay me a turn or two. That's entirely possible, which is why I give this scheme only 40% odds of success or so. 

In the south, Sullla's scout caravel is withdrawing, unknowingly having picked up some friends:




He can see the frigate, so I'll leave off shadowing him, but those two Sea Dogs will follow and attempt to take him when war breaks out. :D 

Once I've scraped together the gold, I want to upgrade my southern fleet and then sail them off via Russia for Sullla's southern ocean. I need ot wait until the alliance is close to running out, though, because otherwise the Romans will see me coming (WHY didn't Archduke just sign a DoF? Why an alliance!?), and I want this to be a surprise. Let him think I'm keeping the ships back purely for home defense.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Turn 144




Singaboy has kicked me out of Nan Madol, and Sullla has attacked. 

I admit, I wasn't expecting this move. It seems like a waste of 3 envoys to me, at first glance - that was the lead I had on Singaboy, I didn't anticipate he'd get 3 so quickly. He must have researched one of the double envoy techs hanging around the civics tree here (I rejected Colonialism since I couldn't really use the envoys), and then dropped a naturally generated envoy in or got lucky with a quest. 

Anyway, Singaboy and Sullla are both much better players than me, so I should probably try and learn from this move. What did they gain? Well, they capture Nan Madol 2 or 3 turns earlier than they otherwise would have. They made me delete a trapped musket. And they get a forward base for the war. Is all that worth 3 envoys? Well, maybe. 

I guess it's an important reminder that players don't all judge the game the same way. In my opinion, Nan Madol was indefensible against Rome/China as soon as Archduke ensured we'd face both at once. My fleet depends on its superior mobility to grab a first strike to win - if I'm pinned to the city-state, Sullla can set up to get a crushing first blow while I cover it (which indeed it looked like he was maneuvering for and I was baiting him into). So, I can't cover the city-state, meaning Sullla can easily take it by sea. On land, I could have forced him to slug through my muskets first, but with field cannons and cavalry that wouldn't have been too difficult and he could have been on the city by turn 147 or 148 that way as well. 

But if they thought I was prepared to dig in and fight to hte death for the city (I wasn't - the culture loss hurts, a lot, but it's unavoidable. Better to preserve my forces, drag things out as long as I can. Eyes on the prize - we need our civs in viable fighting form on turn 162), then investing those envoys to kick me out, grab the city early, and force me to retreat a little could be a good investment. Sullla might also suspect that he's not seeing all my ships (the lack of my caravel fleet in the Nan Madol decoy force is a dead giveaway, but the added deception of keeping it around isn't worth giving up its firepower in the Genova assault), so he wants to get this done before I ambush his fleet or something. 

Anyway, nothing for it but to pull back.

A shot of the Roman fleet before I withdraw:




He has 4-5 more frigates off screen to the south. 

If this is what Sullla has, the naval battle will be tight, but winneable. The early turns of the war we'll want ot hit Genova while rapidly sailing our decoy fleet to rendezvous. Once the fleets unite ca t147, we want in turn to sail out and hit Sullla has hard as we can as soon as we can - maybe even turn 148 if at all possible. Steel is getting close and he's got the gold for battleships. Once the battle is joined, I think I ought to ignore the ironclads. They're dangerous and annoying, but the frigates hit just as hard and soon will be much stronger battleships, while at the same time they're way more vulnerable than the ironclads. So our tactical objective is to sink as many of those buggers as we can. 

Here's my set up:




Next turn we flee from Nan Madol quick as we cna sail. Looking at it, I think I made a mistake -my frigates might not be able to sail quickly enough away, surrounded as they are. Shit. Well, I never claimed to be good at this game. The other fleet will approach the jump-off point. There's a scout of Emperor's that's getting dangerously close to revealing my main fleet - hopefully he's smart enough to spot it and stay away, to avoid alerting Sullla who shares vision with him thanks to the Archduke. 

In the south, I continue to stalk the caravel, with a knight thrown in, too:




Look at the home front:


Traders finishing up, back to ships and workers after that. :D

[Woden]

CMF, I like your plan. Good job getting ready. Hopefully you will be able to play the first few turns of the war before your trip, and get a few good hits before I screw everything up. I am wondering if Sullla has emptied the canals out and left Genova relatively undefended. It might be nice to get you ships to look like you are moving to defend your homeland. I would advise using the island of the coast of Nan Madol to your advantage and limit the number of attacks . As for movement, nothing should be exerting ZOC since you are not at war yet, so should be able to move ships through Rome's, maybe?

I will post a turn report tonight with my last few turns and how my units are set up to defend. I am suspecting an attack at Hothor first since they are working on Nan Madol and it only makes sense to have Rome's units wrap around my flank. I think I have almost everything in place to make it a pain in the ass to attack and should be able to defend for a few turns at least. One thing I have been chewing on is sending you Nu-Kandy after I finish Steel (T147). It will help your science rate (has campus, library, and university) and give you a port in the eastern sea. My only issue is that I don't know how it being my holy site will impact my religion. I will have to test it out. If I did send it, it would be in about 5 turns when the trader finishes. I am not worried about losing the science since I will replace it with a library and university at Taueret in a few turns.

You are leaving for your trip on May 5, right? And be back on the 10th?

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Tonight will be my last turn - I'm leaving tomorrow, and I'll be back on Friday hopefully. Sorry that things worked out this way but you get to fight the war yourself :D 

no worries, Woden, you'll do fine. if we lose, we lose, and it won't be because I wasn't the one inputting orders. Just have fun and smash what you can, we'll go down swinging at least.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Turn played, I think I managed to extract most of my ships. 

The majority of the fleet looks clear to lunge at Genova - Sullla's ships are mostly concentrated around Nan Madol Island. Army is pulled back behind the lake north of your city to cover the  flank and evade naval gunfire, but I couldn't move every unit. The remainder will tie down Sullla's ships - I left a doomedm usket alive just so he has fewer ships firing at my ships. 

Tactical priorities: Preserve the decoy fleet with superior mobility. Raze Genova. Try and kill as many frigates as you can, while chopping out replacements as quick as you can to overwhelm the survivors. 

Core builds ships or traders, or anything else you think might be useful. 

You'll do great. : You're a better player than I am, this is almost ideal timing.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Will try to do a full update before tomorrow, btw.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

I swear, I took more pictures than this. 

Anyway, here we go. 

Turn 144

At the start of the turn, Sullla had crowded all of his ships around mine, making it veeeery tricky to extract them. I pushed the bluff defense of Nan Madol one turn too long, I think - I thought by parking 3 of my frigates outside the city, I could prolong the city's defense and squeeze a bit more culture out of it, while still being able to run. Unfortunately, Sullla's fleet outnumbers Decoy Force so much that he can amply spread ships out and cut off withdrawals. 

I don't htink he's spotted Genova Force, though, in the north. I'm now between most of his fleet and the city, and I'm not sure how much he has in the canals. If it's nothing, or just a couple of ships, Woden should be able to use my frigates to blast through and then launch our strike on the city. 

How effective will this be? I'm not sure. I'll be punching with battleship-level firepower, so that's something, and he doesn't have steel yet. If I can knock out the defenses on turn one and block up the exit from the city, I should be able to take it next turn. And by me I mean Woden. Anyway, I'm honestly not convinced that this is the best play - maybe I should be going right for the fleet. However, one thing about me is that I hate fighting on my own ground, and I hate reacting to other's moves, particularly Sullla (just because of his well-deserved reputation as a master Civ player). I try to take the same attitude towards him that Grant did to Lee: 

"Oh, I am heartily tired of hearing about what Lee is going to do. Some of you always seem to think he is suddenly going to turn a double somersault, and land in our rear and on both of our flanks at the same time. Go back to your command, and try to think what we are going to do ourselves, instead of what Lee is going to do." 

I hate spending turns agonizing about what Sullla is going to do. He can't do everything. Let him worry about what I am going to do, for once - even if I ultimately lose this battle (as I believe I probably will, thanks to ironclads, the Terracotta Army, and soon battleships), at least he won't have had things all his own way - he'll be reacting to me, not I to him. 

Which brings me to another point I want to touch on - one thing I haven't fully appreciated si the large advantage turn order can confer. Not only in settling races, wonders, and envoy races (Alhambram, if you're reading, yes, I am still bitter that you got the envoy in Antioch through turn order and not me. ), but crucially these wars. Now, I'm not sure about this - Sullla might find that he can't declare war next turn, which would be hilarious, and that I actually get first strike - but I believe that Sullla gets to declare war no matter what. This means that he's been able to effectively push my navy around, since I've got to stay out of range and avoid losing my navy in a crippling first strike. Imagine if our positiosn were reversed - I could HOLD Nan Madol, and potentially threaten HIM with a first strike. As it is, the only reason I have a chance in this war is my careful pursuit of every naval wonder I could. My strategy since Turn 1 has been shaped for this encounter, and it's only due to my horrible blunders in other areas that it's going to be as desperate as it is. So I guess it balances out. Anyway, if I could stirke Sullla first, I'd stand a damn good chance here. As it is, I rate my odds of victory at about 30%. Three times in ten do I win. Oh, and that's victory in this battle, not the war or the game, which I rate at about 15% and 2%, respectively. :D 

Anyway, how did I respond to Sullla's moving his fleet up? By scattering:




I failed to take a picture o f the huge mass of Roman ships in the fog dead center. 

Most of the fleet flees to the east, where I can hope to slip around to the north and rendezvouz with Genova Force. If he pursues heavily, I will ahve to fight him with the new builds coming out of the cities. Sullla's best move is probably to use his greater weight of units to just press straight for Jutland, then around to Midway and Actium. I'd have to come after him and fight or lose my cities. I hope he doesn't do that, but I have no answer if he does. Desperate times call for desperate measures, my friends. 

However, he might not want to poke his nose too brashly forward, since he can't know how many sea dogs and other ships I have lying hidden in the fog. My caravel fleet has vanished from his radar and he's too sharp a customer to fail to note that. He knows I've got more ships somewhere, I just hope he doesn't know where and he doesn't guess that I'm not cowering in fear, I'm coming after him. 

I hate dispersing my ships like this. One reason suboptimal struggled against Archduke in PBEM6 was that his units were too far away to support each other. You generally want to keep your guys concentrated in one big mutually supporting mass, annihilating things that get too close. This is not the formation I would have chosen, but it was scatter or face total annihilation of Decoy Force, which is unacceptable. The saving grace is my ship's nimbleness - with 7 move points, I can actually concentrate in the center very rapidly. So this isn't totally idiotic. Only mostly.

In the south, his caravel tries to elude my pursuing frigates by going up a narrow channel:



I float the frigates past. My hope is that he'll try to slip out behind them and blunder into the sea dogs guarding the exit to be captured. 

The land army I pull back from the coast:




The lake is a great defensive position, it lets me cover Woden's northern flank. I also throw some gold into my last heavy chariot upgrades, so Woden has a bit more muscle on this front. I'd like to leave units as bait for Sullla's fleet, but ultimately it's probably foolish to throw good money after bad like that. I DO leave one musketman for him to blast - that's two units out of the fight for one turn. He might get suspicious that I didn't delete this doomed unit as I did my scout and my other musket (trapped between cliffs and Roman units), but hell he'll take the free kill. 

Final shot of the Genova Force sailing hell-for-leather for the city. I tried to stay out of his vision range, so it's up to how alert his scouting is, and luck. I'd love to bring this surprise off.




Woden knows the score. Kill the city, kill as many frigates as we can. Chop anything and everything into ships, avoid getting first-struck if at all possible. He's been hand in glove with me this whole time, so I don't think he needs too many specific instructions for me. 

Thanks for following along so far, guys. I hope it's been as fun for you as it has been for me - if things go badly enough the game might be over by the time I get back. :

See y'all next week.

[Woden]

Last set of turns before all hell breaks out. 

Nubia-Turn 143
Open he turn to finishing Mercantilism (no screenshot) and a policy change...

Out goes Limes and Serfdom, in comes Triangle Trade for gold and Professional Armies for upgrades. Last turn I bought an Apostle at Ma'at. This turn I start the inquisition...

And immediately buy 2 inquisitors. these guys will remove any religion that China tries to spread to my cities. 

Here are the forces gathered at the western front this turn. 

And my core, pumping out units...

Many of these probably won't finish before Ballistics but mine as well us the +100% boost as long as I can. 


Nubia-Turn 144
Start off finishing...

First of the 2 needed techs. Ballistics will finish next turn. 

Big news of this turn (as you already now) is Rome attacking Nan Madol. Smart move on their part but seems a waste on envoys. Why no wait until they declare war on us? There are still a few city states around. Rome does have quite the fleet but maybe he has emptied his canal city and left his back door open. We will see on T146. 

Last turn I harvested my 1st crab up north, this turn the second...

Might have screwed up here as it will take 2 turns to get to the 3rd crab and if Rome/China has a ship around, they may be able to poach my builder. Here does only have 1 charge left but the gold would be nice. Should have started 1 turn earlier. 

Wuth the faith from all the chops, I buy Renaissance Walls at my western front cities, Midieval Walls at my eastern coast cities and...

At Nu-Kandy. Should give some defense. If I see ships coming in the east, I will upgrade all coastal cities to Renaissance Walls but for now Medieval Walls will do. Here is how the west looks. 

I will wit to upgrade until next turn and save on a turn of maintenance. I did upgrade my 2 archers to crossbows. One of them has 2 promotions and want him around in the battle.

Finally...

Looks like Valletta is scouting out Rome's coast for us. If we can get behind Rome's fleet, we may have a shot at destroying Genova and hindering Rome's ability to get more ships in the northern sea. 


Nubia-Turn 145
Alright, enough with this past BS, let's get to the turn you have all been waiting for, the calm before the storm. Start off with...

And...

This allows a policy swap, but that comes a little later. I also just want to show you something that is important to both the policy swap and something a little later in the turn...

I immediately harvest the copper and place a commercial hub and aqueduct and start working on the aqueduct. I should have went with the commercial hub and will switch next turn. I did faith buy a monument and granary here, so housing should be good for a bit. I also placed a mine next to the industrial zone for an addition +1. 

Out west, I chop into the Field Cannon at Hothor and overflow into the encampment. I should have started the encampment much earlier but it slip my mind. I have another forest I will chop in 2 turns that should bring it almost to completion. I start upgrading and get...

Which finishes a quest from Lisbon and is useless right now. When my gold is gone, here is what I end up with...

I upgraded 5 Calvary and 10 Field Cannons. With my upgrades complete, I also do this...

El Cid is pretty useless with Field Cannons and Calvary. I do have a few knight but I think the corps will be much more valuable in the coming turns. Chops and Upgrades are done, so it is time for a policy swap... 

Out goes Feudal Contracts and in goes Bastions. You may be wondering if I forgot War of Religion. Well, here's the thing... 

My new city kicked out my religion. I know the new city will probably convert relatively quickly (turns like this is where I get pissed that the UI sucks) but I also will found another city next turn.  Plus, I am thinking of send Nu-Kandy to CMF to help him towards Steel and get a Navy over in the east. I also should have an extra charge on the missionary at Tuaeret that can go to Ptah to knock my religion out if need be. Don't need War of Religion right now and need Professional Armies. I won't be able to hold off too long but figure I can wait until next policy swap to change into it and I have plenty to upgrade in the mean time.  This also means Rome/China may be wasting a card slot if they are already running it. Plus, I screwed up the crab harvest at my northern city, so I will have gold to upgrade 3 crossbows next turn. This all assumes there are no ships of the coast ready to snag my builder, but China's ships are over by his cities...

I think China is planning on keeping his ships there until Gemrnay attacks, which is good since it means my coast is free from atatck. Plus, I could see TheArchduke defogging with a ship if there was something over by my coast, at least I hope he would. 

Here is a shot of around Nan Madol...

Good thing you got your ships out of there. Rome should have first strike since he accepted the DoF and I believe it ends where it started. This is a set up on his part to kill all your ships. I don't know if I would have done that as it spreads him out too much, especially since you have a +2 movement advantage. 

Finally, here is what is waiting for China when he pushes up...

Almost using the same strategy as Cornflakes, keep a unit out front to block enemies from getting next to the city and have ranged units ready to darken the sky with projectiles. Of coarse, it didn't end well with Cornflakes, but this time the defender has the General, so I thin I can do better. I have the General sitting between the cities ready to move to where the action is going to be. China does have units just under the fog in the desert (screenshot didn't take), looking to set up a strike against Hothor. With the hills by Ma'at, it is a bad angle to the city and I see no units in the south (I have a knight watching my flank). Lastly, look at the city strengths, 84 at Hothor and 78 at Ma'at. Calvary have a melee strength of 62. The most damage he can do in a single attack (if he brings a ram) is 18 against Ma'at and 14 at Hothor. With Renaissance Walls having 150 HP, it will take him a while to bring down the walls. Field Cannons with the -17 strength penalty against cities, only attack at 43, will only do a few points of damage. 

I think the land war is going to become a war of attrition, maybe they will pull back and wait for tanks. I will have to see about getting some AT Crews but Chemistry is a ways off. It will be a long day tomorrow as I wait to play and see what I have in store for both me and CMF. Let's all hope I can improve my warring skills and not end up like the last few PBEMs.