[Spoilers] Suboptimal - Welcome to the Tlachtli of Blunders!

[suboptimal]

Turn 69

Open the save to the Mathematics boost.  Campus in Cant completed!  Rho21 is also sending a welcoming party in the north:



I think it may be time for a couple of swordsman upgrades here.  In the south, Preslav has a heavy chariot out and it’s attacked my archer:



That complicates things a bit!  Look around, no barbarian camp in the area.  Must have been seeing things last night.

Up at How The West Was Won I purchase the tile west of the Holy Site for 80.  Down goes a Campus.  Builder harvests the stone, citizen working the stone moves to the 4 tile, archer completes, Campus in one turn.  Archer heads for City #5.  

In the south I retreat my archer and advance an Eagle Warrior between it and the chariot.  Both archers fire, putting it under 40 damage.  The Eagle Warrior can kill it next turn.  That’s everyone except for City #5.

Select the settler and found Near Wild Heaven.  Start walls.  Eagle Warrior moves into city borders and upgrades into a swordsman.  Archer moves back into forest and hangs tight.  Anyone crossing the river can be attacked by both archers and at least one melee unit.  Next turn I’ll swap places with the Eagle Warrior and swordsman and upgrade the EW.  I also bring the northern Eagle Warrior south for some added support.  

Gifts for the Tlatoani

Builders Captured: 8
Cost to Build: 512
Improvements Made: 13
District Boosts: 15.6
Chops: 358 , 36
Craftsmanship Inspiration, Irrigation, Masonry, Wheel, and Iron Working Eurekas (20, 165)

[suboptimal]

Here’s the score report:



I forgot to update rho21’s gold this past turn (early morning turn).  However, his income has been low for some time.  Japper’s income and gold count is as of my declaration of war a few turns ago.  He’ll be offered straight peace once ten turns has elapsed.  rho’s tech lead is solely because of his finding that city-state early in the game and getting a +3 Campus down on Turn 37.  I’ll match his Campus science output next turn when the chopped Campus at How completes.  Japper has one Campus, rho21 has one Campus and one Holy Site.  I've got one Holy Site, one Campus and two Encampments completed with an additional Campus completing at the start of next turn.  Tech-wise I've got Currency at one turn to completion, Construction finishes in two and Engineering is one turn less than 50%.  With my current science rate I could complete Engineering in four turns and Machinery in six so it might not be worth waiting for walls to be built for the boost. 

I’m taking this initial unit placement as establishing a front line at the river.  Next turn I’ll rearrange to be up against the river with the swordsman while I upgrade the other one, then get both against the river and fortified.  My immediate concern is that he could attempt a punch-through with the units on hand if he went down to Cant.  The good news is that I have the gold one one sword upgrade next turn and another the turn after that.  The other good news is that since this is the former Egyptian invasion force both melee units are Tortoise & Battlecry-promoted and both archers have Volley.  I’m not sure if I should leave the Eagle Warrior up north for a picket up there (at least until the scout gets up there) or bring it down now.  If I had to guess, though, rho21 is showing some force, saying "Valletta is mine" and is probably bracing for me to declare war on him like I have, um, let's see...everyone else I've met in this game.

The main question is where is the former Yerevan?  If it’s close by he could have a few more units here now.  If not, it’ll be a while.  

Both of the cities that are still building settlers (Begin and Oddfellows) are showing three turns to completion.  Begin is first in the queue so I expect that one to finish first.  I’m thinking to get out another archer for Cant and then switch Begin over to chariots and/or horses.  Cant is starting walls after the builder completes in two turns; How starts walls next turn.  

The builder at How is going down to Near Wild Heaven with one charge remaining.  Option 1 is to plantation the bananas (cash & culture).  Option 2 is to harvest the forest for about 48 to speed the walls along.  The horses will be the first tile grabbed the city.  

I don’t need to switch out of Oligarchy next turn.  I’m going to drop Agoge and put in Urban Planning.  Construction will get boosted next turn and finish on Turn 71.  That’ll finish Games & Recreation on Turn 72.  I’ll put a turn into Military Training and then start Defensive Tactics.

[TheArchduke]

No switch out of Oligarchy.

Suboptimal, that is a GG leading the troops, I think you will be the victim of some aggressive recon.

I retract my previous statement, i think you are in a good position to crush the hope of the others to come back right now.

Where does the settler on the frontline settle again?

I would be wary, I doubt Rho wants to give you more time. It is the smart play to push on towards you now.

[suboptimal]

No switch out of Oligarchy.

Suboptimal, that is a GG leading the troops, I think you will be the victim of some aggressive recon.

I retract my previous statement, i think you are in a good position to crush the hope of the others to come back right now.

Where does the settler on the frontline settle again?

I would be wary, I doubt Rho wants to give you more time. It is the smart play to push on towards you now.

I can stay put in Oligarchy for the near term.  I'll just have to keep my builds lined up with my civics so that I can go from Agoge to Manuever when the chariots start coming out.  If he crosses the river do I declare war and start taking out units?  His position from Turn 69 is not one to advance more than one sword across and it would could die if it did so, GG or not.  I didn't check if that was Battlecry or Tortoise on those swords.     

The frontline settle is Near Wild Heaven.  Everything else is backfill:

- The settler en route from Cant to the west is going to the City #2 site.
- The settler being completed in Begin is going to the City #4 site once the barbarian camp is cleaned up
- The settler being completed in Oddfellows is going to the City #3 site

I can send the settler from Begin south for the sole purpose of getting two horse resources online for horsemen.  Otherwise it'll be a few turns until I get the first one hooked up at Near Wild Heaven and/or the City #4 site.

[suboptimal]

It wouldn't surprise me if rho21 tried to challenge me here. After all, look what happened in PBEM 6 - despite your dedlurking here he may try pressing his luck to see if I fold up again.

[TheArchduke]

I think if he crosses the river his intentions are clear and you should dow if you can kill any units.

[suboptimal]

I won't have the strength to kill the swordsman if it crosses, even if it stays in the open. His sword would be at 45, 52 if Battlecry applies on defense. I'd have archers attacking at 34 each (19 or 15 each) and the sword would be at 49 (35 or 27). That'd only be good for 57 damage.

If he moves the sword to the jungle I'd pick up a flanking bonus, the archers would do 17/13, the sword would do 34/25 and the EW would do 27/20. That would do 71 damage.

If the archer crosses the river I'd kill it first and the sword second while upgrading the EW to a sword if I didn't need its attack.

[suboptimal]

I'll also note that if he crosses the river with an archer and a sword I'll be able to kill one or both before he kills off one of mine. If he waits a turn I'll have units blocking the crossing.

I won't be playing the turn for another 4 hours or so (busy immediately after work lets out) so if my damage assessments alter your suggestions, please feel free to chime in.

[suboptimal]

Turn 70

Here we go….is there a defensive front or a war brewing?  



Hmmm...got the boosts for Recorded History and Construction. Up at Near Wild Heaven rho21 has advanced one swordsman across the river:



His Great General is still in the area.  He’s got a +2 support bonus so I’m guessing his archer and other swordsman are still where they were.  Furthermore he’s started an Encampment in Xenocrates.  It’s in a good position as it would be able to bombard my side of the river once he gets walls up.  His military power is up to 282, mine’s now 396.  Japper’s jumped last turn as well, from 110 to 168.  Gotta be a couple of upgrades in there.  Four turns until I can declare try to declare peace with him.

In the south the chariot is dead, having suicided on my Eagle Warrior.  A barbarian scout has shown up southeast of Begin, next to my builder and scout.  Barbarian warrior up by How continues chasing the scout.  That’ll change as it moves into archery range next turn.  Campus is done at How, Water Mill done at Find.  Drama & Poetry is complete.  I’ll put two turns into Recorded History and then finish Games & Recreation.  When G&R finishes I’ll be able to take out Colonization (only one city will be working on a settler at that point) and swap out Colonization for either Agoge or Maneuver.  

I begin positioning units for the attack at Preslav, though the redlined archer will need a turn or two of healing, I think. I don’t know if I should start with two Eagle Warriors and an archer and then swap them as the first archer gets wounded.  The Eagle Warriors would be doing 50 damage a hit so it might be safe to bring the second archer in once the walls are down.  Something will happen next turn, methinks.

How starts walls, those will be done in 6 turns.  Let’s see...two turns in Construction, one in Currency, one in Sailing (for pearls) and one in Military Engineering.  Then I’ll complete Engineering and start on Machinery (still at 6 turns).  I switch to Currency now – the issue I’ll have is that I’ll lose the district discount once Games & Rec and Currency both complete.  I’ll get one CH placed next turn at a discount and the second one will have to be full price.  

Find the River starts a monument.  Builder at Begin farms the wheat, scout fortifies in place.  Settler continues inching west.   Three turns until City #2 is founded.  Now we’re back to the situation up north.

Now, I ran the numbers in an earlier post but now I’ve got actual figures to go by (and have the 4th unit to attack with now).  If I declared war on him now and attacked with everything (archer, archer, wounded sword, unwounded  EW) I average between 101 and 104 depending on attack order.  I need to ponder this a little bit.  I don’t know if anything else has shown up in the fog yet but killing a swordsman would be a good start.  I’ll come back to this in a bit, I think.

I start by bringing the other Eagle Warrior adjacent to the first one.  If the swordsman attacks I’ll have a +4 support bonus on the Eagle Warrior.  I also have an archer en route from How, it will be just west of the city center next turn. Six units to his three.  The PBEM 6 me is going “ugh” and my inner Monty is thinking war.  Archduke’s advice was that if I could kill a unit DoW him.  Well, I can just about do that with average rolls (and if I don’t it’ll be very close to death).  Hmmm…

“Fortune favors the bold”
“Only complete idiots are not afraid of anything”
“YOLO”

Eh, hmmm…er…











The order of attack will be Archer, Eagle Warrior, Swordsman, Archer.  This does two things for me.  First, it lessens the amount of damage my swordsman will take.  Second, if I do enough damage to kill rho21’s unit I won’t occupy the tile and he can either send another unit across or move his archer to an exposed position to shoot.  I attack:

Archer for 20
Eagle Warrior for 22
Swordsman for 37
Archer for 21

100 on the nose.  One less swordsman to worry about.  Better yet my swordsman is at 51 hit points and will be able to deal with an archer shot (well, there's also the Tortoise promotion).

Here I was worried about a 2v1 and I’ve declared on everyone and everything this game.  Heh.  The irony.

[TheArchduke]

I completly agree on killing that sword, the smart thing to do, he crossed the river in any case. It is not monty play as you call it but smart play. A promoted sword is hard to replace.
I would however not advance on your part that comes when you get: Machinery.


Machinery is crucial, you got the money for upgrades, he does not and machinery pretty much makes any advance on his part absolutely doomed.
You can then advance at your leisure.