[NO PLAYERS] PBEM 7 Map Making & Lurkers

[oledavy]

What can I say but well played Sullla, excellent opening turn 

I'm disappointed by CMF. Between going on a trip and playing in other games, I know he's not playing his best here and it really shows in that opening turn. I wish they had paused the game while CMF is away so that they could actually get a good fight. Sullla should have had a lot of trouble landing a first strike, instead, he gets half CMF's fleet in one go. 

Just goes to show how big a role morale can play in this game. CMF was defeated a long time ago, and the resultant burn out and inattention turned what could have been a competitive battle into a likely slaughter.

[T-hawk]

Chevalier thought he needed to blitz Genova as fast as possible.  He never thought otherwise. And my guess is that giving Sullla time to reach battleships would make it a lost cause.

I think Chevalier has been playing fine.  It's not his fault that every metagame crutch broke Sullla's way: weak neighbor to eat, first strike in every war because turn order, the visibility glitch on the Sea Dogs.

(Should we tell Chevalier about that last?  Seems unfair for the game to tell him his units were invisible when they weren't.)

[pindicator]

I'm not sure there's a lot Chevalier could do different in his position. None of us knew how Civ 6 gives away the position of invisible units, so we can't fault him for trying to put his sea dogs as he did. (That line where Sullla revealed the game no longer shows where he can't move when at war makes it even more absurd that you can see them at peace!) I don't think there's enough space in the ocean for the movement advantage to really play out, because Sullla had taken a central position in the ocean.

If it was me I would not have pressed as hard for Genova at the beginning of the war, and tried to land a heavy first strike then gone for Genova -- but I'm not sure that would is better, because there's no guarantee in either way of playing it.

[pindicator]

I don't know if Woden and CMF have discussed this, but if they take Genova (looks likely with the last screenshot), they could sail units through before razing, and try to raze both canal cities. I'm not sure if they could feasibly attack with the armada and bring it through though, which is what they'd really want to do

[Shimomo]

With the English movement advantage, would it not have been better for CMF to try and completely avoid Sullla's first strike? He could have massed his ships in a big block just northeast of Sullla, then on the turn before DoF expires CMF runs everything the 5 (of the 7 possible) moves away from Sullla where there's no possible way for him to get everything into the combat. Sulla with his 5 move ships would only be able to get a single line of units to attack, but doing so would put him within range for devastating counter attack. If Sulla keeps everything in place on T1 of the war then CMF with his 7 moves has enough to cover the space retreated over, plus attack for the first strike. If Sullla retreats on T1, then CMF first sacrifices a ship to scout out the location, and then moves his ships forward until they are within 5 tiles. Sullla might retreat for a couple turns, but eventually will get pinned against the coast. A few ships could escape down the canal city, but the rest I think could be caught within 3-4 turns of slow advancing.

Sullla would have the opportunity then to upgrade to Battleships, but the turn of upgrade allows CMF the chance to first strike, and after Sullla retreats out of Nan Madol water on T1 of the war he's only got a few water tiles in his culture where he could do the upgrades.

I think you're right. Going for Genova has been disastrous. Like Sullla just mentioned, cities are replaceable, and the naval battle is all, something only he seems to have grasped (not even us lurkers realized how poor a decision going straight for Genova would be). Like you say, CMF should have A) been massed in a huge block and B) been just out of range / just barely in range. Pre-war efforts should have been to keep Sullla as closely pinned to the coast as possible, before backing off at the last possible moment.

EDIT: Also about the game being too easy for Sullla--I also wish the other players (especially Japper and Mikeforall) had played better; it would have made for a more interesting (although longer) game. That said, I think Sullla has worked extremely hard on this game (he's said he's pretty burned out) and to the extent we can say anyone "deserves" a victory I think he does. Yes, Japper/Mikeforall played an extremely weak game, but 1) that should have benefited CMF/Woden just as much and 2) they took away Jesuit Education. It's not Sullla's fault Archduke froze up at the moment of truth; that's on Emperor K and Archduke, and a little bit on slow diplo from Woden/CMF, who should have been making sure AD knew they were on his side and not in builder mode. Sullla tends to do a lot more research than any other player, and it pays off in things like his civ picks and long term planning, his tactics and chopping, and his civic and tech boost plans. His metagaming needs some work, but overall we can't put the burden of a "too-easy" game on him for the mistakes other players made.

EDIT 2: Also this game is over. Tanks will push through former Khmer; Battleships will savage CMF's coast. Singaboy just has to hold the line against AD, which he can with Steel cities and Battleships, until Sullla can bring some of the Roman navy over to support him.

[Old Harry]

With hindsight you're probably right about genova cornflakes. I don't remember anyone suggesting it was wrong before this turn though so it's not exactly a blunder.

Without the Nan Madol envoy trick I wonder if CMF would have kept his forces out of reach? It's tricky because he didn't know when Sullla would get battleships, so perhaps he needed to lure the fleet out of hiding? And he didn't know his sea dogs were visible. If there hadn't been any targets this turn could Sullla have just retreated for a couple of turns until upgrades were available?

Shimomo - Sullla and singaboy have both put an amazing amount of effort in to this game so the win is well deserved, but saying Woden and CMF should have done better out of their weak neighbours is forgetting who took over the neighbour they could realistically attack.

[T-hawk]

Chevalier knew the naval fight was everything. He decided he was doomed to lose the naval fight if Genova existed as a canal for Sullla's southern navy to come through. He decided his only chance to win the naval fight was to nail Genova to prevent Sullla's fleets from merging. He may still have been right in that principle, even if the execution failed.

[ebbitten]

The Genova play definitely is looking questionable but I think the decision to focus fire on the ironclad was just straight up wrong. Sulla posted something in his thread about how they would take roughly 7 attacks to kill vs the three attacks a frigate can handle and there’s no way that an ironclad is worth 2+ frigates, especially given that they’re about to become battleships.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Japper007]

Woden really should work on his battle tactics and war strategy, it's such a shame because his economic game is one of the best on this forum. It broke him up on three seperate occassions now:

-The first attack on Khmer, Cornflakes and I where both surprised he didn't push on after raising that city, he could probably have killed at least Cornflakes outright if he hadn't peaced out to quickly.
-His cautious manoevering during the two-pronged attack on me and Cornflakes probably meant he lost out on a lot of cities that should've fallen to him and CMF and not to Sulla.
-And now this business with the naval battles which likely cost him the game.

[aetryn]

Woden really should work on his battle tactics and war strategy, it's such a shame because his economic game is one of the best on this forum. It broke him up on three seperate occassions now:

-The first attack on Khmer, Cornflakes and I where both surprised he didn't push on after raising that city, he could probably have killed at least Cornflakes outright if he hadn't peaced out to quickly.
-His cautious manoevering during the two-pronged attack on me and Cornflakes probably meant he lost out on a lot of cities that should've fallen to him and CMF and not to Sulla.
-And now this business with the naval battles which likely cost him the game.

Well, to be fair, in the second Khmer war Woden was seriously concerned about ending up with weakened forces that would have made it easier for Rome to just roll over him after - something that could have been made more likely with a less favorable split of cities to Rome/China. Throughout that team's posts for that period, you can definitely get the sense of the fear of being a victim of the Rome steamroller. Was it overstated? Possibly. The terrain didn't favor an immediate Roman follow-up and the timing window for Legions might have been closing anyway. On the other hand, I can't blame anyone for being afraid of Sullla attacking them from a superior position.