I'm not going to finish this tonight, sorry. The headache's returned with a vengeance. I played five turns last night and am cranking out the units.
As Zalson says on defence we have the measure of Rome, and more so keeping the war going is a definite plan until we can crack the nut. I think the best plan is to go straight to cannons (Nationalism is in the bag and use them to remove defences for our other units to attack.
Travelling on a mote of dust, suspended in a sunbeam.
Hope you feel better soon, Brian. Sounds like we are holding our own against Rome for the moment. If we think we are keeping up with Julius in tech, at least not falling farther behind, then we should be in decent shape to eventully cconquer with rifles or cannon or whatever we decide to use. I just worry about Julius out-teching us and showing up with a stack of cannon or rifles.
OK, I've just finished the ten turns, well technically nine, I stopped up at the end of turn 259 rather than moving on a turn since we've a decision to make.
In terms of fighting I managed to push back a semi-serious incursion, killing seven cuirassers, two pikes, one mace & a trebuchet for the loss of nine catapults (two cats got withdraws at low odds) with no other losses (though a HA did withdraw from a treb fight at high odds). I killed numerous barbarians in the North, but didn't keep count.
In terms of builds my eastern more developed cities tended to build units or siege and my western cities infrastructure. We're breakeven (slightly over) at 40% and a fair chunk of science. Workers looked to build improvements wherever they were, largely focusing on windmills, cottages and farms. There's a settler on a go to order to the silver/sheep site in the north (a musket will get there one turn ahead of him) with two more settlers in the works. Most built units are on go to Flimbo's Quest.
I equalised our espionage spending (and completely forgot to look at how specialists were assigned anywhere)
In the middle of the set Shaka asked us to declare on Willem so I said ok (as Willem was getting his rear end handed to him), three turns later Willem is willing to talk, he offers 160 g & 5gpt for peace. All this for killing two chariots and scaring a settler into hiding. Was only ever going to be a phony war anyway as we didn't have enough units out west (well technically I could have gotten together a strike force to capture a few edge cities but would have meant leaving cities defended by only one unit in the tundra with waves of barbs coming in.
In tech I took Nationalism and killed research. Have revolted to nationalism but I didn't draft anything, it's frankly a mite too early yet (rifles are the sweet spot IMO) but the next player could set up a draft cycle.
So why did I stop up now, Iulius has a serious stack heading up to us, c 15 Cuirs, a number of Trebs Elephants, Maces and assorted other units, with a mini stack of five or six behind. I checked what he'd give for peace last turn, Theology and c350 gold. So it's up to the next player, do we want to take this peace (I'm not sure if the tech is allowed by rules or not) or chance trying to wipe out this stack and see what he'll give afterwards.
Sorry for the lack of turn by turn, but it was mostly look around and see what we needed.
Travelling on a mote of dust, suspended in a sunbeam.
Sounds like a positive set, Brian. Our economy is improving (breakeven around 40% is just a huge improvement from where we were not long ago ), another incursion by Rome was knocked back, and the diplo with Willem sounds good. Shaka beating him up is not really a surprise, and is a lot better (for us, anyway ) than Shaka coming after us.
And now Julius is back with another large stack. Is he offering us the tech and gold for peace? If so, I would take it; we can use the time and cash to push our tech ahead and prepare for future troubles. Rome will hopefully go attack someone else, saving us the trouble of dealing with that stack. And if we do have more problems in the future (almost certain), we will be better prepared by then and might have an ally.
Of course, Rome conquering more territory is not exactly positive; Julius is strong enough already. But unless we want to fight Rome right now rather than later, why not take the tech and cash? (I think we can take (or give) techs in peace deals under our varitant, if I understand correctly.)
Can we handle that attack force? If we can, I think we keep tanking the attack, killing his units in our territory, and giving him war weariness. It'll maybe allow him to cede us some cities for peace -- and will also keep him from killing Mansa and opening up a second front. That's geopolitically what I'm worried about.
What's Willem's tech situation at? What is Rome's at?
Has he made progress or is he grinding into us AND making tech progress?
(June 17th, 2018, 12:39)haphazard1 Wrote: Sounds like a positive set, Brian. Our economy is improving (breakeven around 40% is just a huge improvement from where we were not long ago ), another incursion by Rome was knocked back, and the diplo with Willem sounds good. Shaka beating him up is not really a surprise, and is a lot better (for us, anyway ) than Shaka coming after us.
And now Julius is back with another large stack. Is he offering us the tech and gold for peace? If so, I would take it; we can use the time and cash to push our tech ahead and prepare for future troubles. Rome will hopefully go attack someone else, saving us the trouble of dealing with that stack. And if we do have more problems in the future (almost certain), we will be better prepared by then and might have an ally.
Of course, Rome conquering more territory is not exactly positive; Julius is strong enough already. But unless we want to fight Rome right now rather than later, why not take the tech and cash? (I think we can take (or give) techs in peace deals under our varitant, if I understand correctly.)
I asked out of curiosity, and that's what he said.
Rome is actually quite compact in the game. Once we get past the usefulness of Castles he'd probably not be that tough a nut to crack.
Tech situation is below. I see nothing immediately dangerous.
Second edit, if we could keep Iulius off our backs, by the time we'd our army repositioned we'd be able to re-declare on Willem. He's ready to fall, our army is twice as strong as his.
Travelling on a mote of dust, suspended in a sunbeam.
I'm happy to take Julius' stuff for a short peace, and aim to push on for new military tech. It could be rifles v rifles by the time we get there though, but that's better than knights v curassier...
It may have looked easy, but that is because it was done correctly - Brian Moore
Equal military tech would certainly be an improvement. Rifles are some ways off, though. Unless we got it via trade, we do not have Paper yet, correct? So we are at least 4-5 techs away from Rifling, with several of them being fairly expensive techs for their era. That will take time, even with peace to help us tech a bit faster.
Sounds like we are holding our own against Rome for the moment. 
If we think we are keeping up with Julius in tech, at least not falling farther behind, then we should be in decent shape to eventully cconquer with rifles or cannon or whatever we decide to use. I just worry about Julius out-teching us and showing up with a stack of cannon or rifles. 
. FWIW, it suits me for you to take a couple more days. I expect to have more time from Wed onwards, as I said before.
Our economy is improving (breakeven around 40% is just a huge improvement from where we were not long ago 
), another incursion by Rome was knocked back, and the diplo with Willem sounds good. Shaka beating him up is not really a surprise, and is a lot better (for us, anyway 
) than Shaka coming after us.