[SPOILERS] Cornflakes brings the popcorn (because creativity is overrated)

[Cornflakes]

My navy is up to 11 Frigates and 4 Caravels. Raiding force is lined up to begin the attack next turn:

   

My Caravel lead the advance since it has extended vision, and it spotted the Russian Quadrireme. I debated whether I wanted to hold back a couple of the frigates so as to not show any support bonuses if the Russian Quad advances and spots the Caravel. But ultimately even seeing just the Caravel should be enough to trigger suspicion so I moved everything forward as much as possible. I had my scout embarked in order to participate in some capacity if necessary and found a perfect role for it this turn. TheArchduke will be able to see the scout this turn and might decide to take a couple pot shots, thus distracting him from spotting my navy to the south. Embarked strength comes from era so my Scout will be defending at 35 vs 25? Quad attacks and will be just fine. If Russia takes the bait both of his quads should be dead. Frigates have decent odds at 1-shotting Quads and my Caravel can clean up. Even if I roll low with both Frigates my Caravel could kill one and trap the other in ZoC.

Next turn I'll swap policy cards over to max gold production and at that point I'll see how much I'm bleeding. I requested peace with Rome plus a gift of 400 with which to upgrade into MG next turn. We'll see if Rho accepts. He didn't accept white peace when I offered a couple of turns ago.

Greece is still holding out with a few cities. I have an Alliance with Greece for vision but haven't been paying attention lately. I did see that his army composition was heavily Muskets so the slow conquest could simply be due to the time required to march forward. Or Greece could be putting up a strong resistance. Check the other threads for more details

[Cornflakes]

I think the most silly mechanic in the game is that attackers get to use the roads of the defender. Cavalry just trump everything else due to their mobility and the defender's roads allowing them to advance at will. Cossacks are 6 MP using Industrial roads. Russia is able to cover from west to east of my empire in 2 turns (Cossacks could start west of Valletta and hit Free Cell on the 2rd turn). North to south my entire empire can be crossed in 3 turns (Cossacks could start south of Pinochle and hit Dominion on the 3rd turn). If I had Musketmen defending at 2 MP the comparison is be laughable. It would take me 7 turns to get from Pinochle into Dominion, 5 turns to get from Valletta into Free Cell).

Rome with their Musketman army is stuck advancing only 2 tiles at a time and has to worry about getting stuck in Zone of Control. Greece can make use of defensive terrain to get in some potshots with range units, and then get in a walls attack or two before the infantry can get within reach. I think Cavalry is 100% the one right choice for offensive warfare. Even in the case of TheArchduke although Warrior > Swords upgrades were the backbone of his army I think the Horsemen that he was building as the war progressed had as much of an impact as his quickly & cheaply upgraded swords. For the early game though warriors are the right choice for defense vs barbs (as opposed to slingers > Archers).

This has very little relevance to my game, just some mid-afternoon musings.

[Cornflakes]

   

TheArchduke must have gotten spooked because his Quads disappeared north. I found 1 with the scout which had moved 4 tiles north so I don't think he was able to spot my fleet last turn. I moved everything up with a Frigate now in range to kill that Quad next turn (I think 90%+ chance of 1-shot kill). My 2 attacks on the city rolled 26 and 40. Expected minimum damage was 29 so something didn't work out. I wonder if that is a hill city getting +3 to defense? That just barely makes the numbers work out so must be the case. It looks like I rolled very close to the minimum possible on the first attacked and the absolute highest on the 2nd attack.

Next turn I'm going to use the GAdmiral's retire ability to upgrade one of the city attack frigates to a fleet to give it +10 strength. That will do on average 16 more damage per turn which is a 33% increase in after-healing damage. It will take 3-4 more turns to wear down the city. My reason for waiting to use the GAdmiral was that I'm pretty sure that upgrade costs for fleets/corps is increased from the base unit. By waiting until after I upgrade the frigate to MG I would save that marginal gold cost. But at this point I may not have the gold anyway to upgrade and the strength is needed sooner rather than later.

In the eastern part of that screenshot you can seem my sentry net keeping an eye on the coastline to make sure Russia doesn't try to sneak Cossacks through the antarctic sea and get around my navy in the channel. I'm planning right now to use the Great Engineer's charges will be used to build

   

The loss of Chess resulted in coming up short on Nationalism this turn. I'll pick it up next turn and see how bad my gold situation really is at that point once I swap into max gold civics  I don't think I'll be able to get back to break-even, especially after I lose Free Cell and Pinochle. How do fleet/corps work with respect to maintenance costs? If I combine my units into fleets/corps will I cut my unit maintenance down?

My knights are bravely making a last stand at Free Cell to buy a turn to complete another Caravel. Losing those knights will cut down on maintenance as well. 2 are fortified on hills getting the Preslav +5. The middle knight on the Horse is getting support from the other knights plus the scout so they are all about the same strength on defense. If TheArchduke picks off all the knights before attacking the cities there is a chance that Pinochle might possibly complete its Caravel this turn. What I should have done is swapped a couple more tiles away from Free Cell to Pinochle to squeeze as much production as possible out of Pinochle (Free Cell just needs 7 to complete its Caravel). I'm suffering more than 10 war weariness now and TheArchduke must be feeling the pain as well. WW doesn't hurt me nearly as much though since I'm not in contention for the win  Nothing personal TheArchduke, just a game, and certainly no grudge going forward ... but Brazil is out to inflict as much pain and suffering on Russia as possible  Vive la resistance!

[Cornflakes]

One more thing ... Russia does not yet have Cartography completed as verified by the yield on his finishing boats (still +1 on a netted fish but Cartography adds +2). Even if Russia completes Cartography on this coming turn they're still at least 6 turns from unlocking Square Rigging without the eureka. I'm fairly certain that TheArchduke doesn't have Muskets unlocked and even if he did just recently unlock them there's no way that he can get a musket kill in time since there are no barb camps in his backlines. My navy is less than 6 turns from his northern coastal city and thus I'll be able to flush out and destroy any Quads he has build before he'll be able to upgrade (except for 1 that he could hide in the city center). His 2 galleys might get upgraded to Caravels but I should be able to wipe them out. I'm actually thinking about using my GAdmiral on one of the un-promoted Frigates headed north instead of using it at the city bombardment. Why do I care if it takes an extra turn to capture the southern city? There's nothing for him to chop to crank out walls. And even if he did get walls up that would just delay capture by a turn. The worst thing that could happen is that he gets a Cossack down to boost city strength and gets a couple of ranged units to pink away at my ships. Ok, that's actually a decent risk. And the quicker I get the southern city razed, the sooner those frigates can head north to aid the siege of the other coastal city.

Oh, and I just realized what probably spooked TheArchduke ... Zone of Control UI red marking might have been visible from my Caravel even though the Caravel itself was outside of Russian line of sight

[Cornflakes]

Lead Frigate 1-shot-killed a Russian archer. There were a crossbow and that archer visible along with the Quad. But the Quad has nowhere to hide and I can clean it up next turn with my additional Frigate + Caravel in range. I was concerned about DotF-boosted ranged attacks would be able to take out my Frigate if I immediately attacked the Quad.

The 2 bombardment frigates together knocked another 100 HP off leaving the city at around 70 HP after healing. I should be able to raze it next turn.

Gold is back slightly positive after the civics swap.

[Cornflakes]

My Frigate in the north took 2 hits from DotF-boosted archer + crossbow putting it into the red. If I hadn't killed the archer last turn I'm pretty sure that  I would have lost the frigate. As-is I was able to move up the coast enough that the Russian ranged units can't reach my frigates, but still close enough to eliminate the Russian Quad this turn, earning a promo on the red-lined Frigate. In the south ...

   

The fleet was enough to bombard the city down to 2HP for my Caravel to capture without using the other Frigate. I therefore moved the frigate into the other sea tile in the cities culture and ... was able to upgrade it to an MG! 85 strength bombardments + promos incoming! Cashflow is now positive after the policy swap so I was able to afford this purchase without danger of going on strike in the near future. I may have enough firepower to 1-shot kill the next Russian city up the coast. If not then at least take down the walls and then focus on land ranged units in sight.

I held off on razing the city this turn. Testing suggests decent chance that the Caravel will end up trapped in the lake as opposed to getting bumped back to sea (lake is closer to my cities). Why take the risk? I end turn via SHIFT+ENTER without choosing between keep or raze, and retain the option of razing next turn ... at least that's what I found in my testing. We'll see if that works out in practice

[Cornflakes]

   

My Minas Geraes takes its first shot. With 50/50 odds of a kill I roll low and deal 90 damage. I'm safe from any retaliation on the tile I fired from, while still being close enough to reach the next city on the 3rd turn. One advantage of increased range to 3 is that rough terrain is now ignored. I can shoot over hills, forests, and I think even mountains. Russian must have Cartography now because their northern Quad is fleeing over the ocean. I'm pursuing with my Caravel and should be able to run it down in 2 more turns. Actually now that I'm considering this it might be dangerous to pursue with my Caravel since I might run into an ambush from Amsterdam. I know they have at least 1 caravel and wouldn't be surprised if they also have a Frigate or 2 on the water as well. Even if the Russian Quad escapes to upgrade it can't do much (or anything) alone against my navy.

Further north there was a crossbow within range of 2 of my frigates. I think they had about 50/50 odds of a kill but again rolled low leaving it with just the tiniest sliver of red health. In the east around Free Cell my frigates did better, killing a Cossack in 3 hits and a horseman in 2. I pillaged Pinochle's harbor which gave me enough gold to upgrade an MG in the east but I didn't notice until after I'd used all to fire. It probably would have been better to upgrade an MG and let the horseman live, since that would have given me a greater chance at eliminating another Cossack next turn.

[Cornflakes]

Another Russian Crossbow narrowly escapes death 

   

I'm not sure why TheArchduke moved that Crossbow onto the coastal hill where both of my frigates could get shots in without retaliation. I rolled 48 damage with the first frigate which is dead average, and 48 on the 2nd which (accounting for the additional -4 to the crossbow on the 2nd shot) is quite low roll. Average damage on the 2nd roll should have been 56 for the kill

In the north I catch 2 galleys as they are trying to flee through the arctic ocean . I shot the westernmost first since it could run the furthest next turn. I pursued the remaining Quad with my Caravel for another turn. I'll probably abandon the chase next turn since he can reach the cover of Amsterdam. Although if I can remain outside range of Amsterdam's walls and ranged land units I might take the shot. But more important than killing an exiled Quad is keeping my Caravel alive and healthy to participate in taking the city. My other Caravel is coming up from the south as well so it wouldn't be complete disaster if I lost it but still to be avoided. In fact it was rather unwise for me to run the Caravel up that far alone this turn. What if Rome has a pair of Frigates hanging out near Amsterdam?

Back in the [former] core to the east:

   

Free Cell lives another turn! And completes a Caravel! I bombard a Russian Cossack and Horse to death as well as upgrade my 1st MG in this theater, and 2nd overall. Total fleet: 9 Frigates (one fleet), 2 MG, 5 Caravel.

Rome has a mighty fleet laying siege to Preslav which will be a major hit to my gold. It is the only foreign city within trade route range and is yielding 30 from 3 routes. Those will have to be assigned internally now for just 12 which will put be back in the red  I'm a bit nervous that Rome might engage my fleet. I cannot understand why Rho21 won't make peace with me and give me a couple hundred gold for MG upgrades. I could have really put the hurt on Russia with a 3-4 MG's bombarding the Cossacks around Pinochle, Cribbage, and Free Cell.

[Cornflakes]

Time for a quick review of what went right/wrong this game. I'll start off with my civ choice. Having played Brazil I think I'd rank it mediocre overall. The Minas Geraes is an overwhelmingly powerful unit and was my single biggest reason for picking Brazil. The rest of the package turned out in practice to be essentially worthless. Picking Brazil did however force me to focus on the basic mechanics and play a solid opening in order to remain competitive with the other civs. I think my strategy was best summed up in the following comment from the very beginning of the thread:

If I can just reach MG while keeping up enough of a military to dissuade my neighbors from attacking, then I should be able to blow the game wide open at that point.

Overall I think I succeeded in playing a solid game. I was able to remain ahead of both Rome and Russia in all stats even though they each captured more city states than I and each took out a neighbor. I think I showed that peaceful expansion can remain competitive with an early rush. I'll start off with my mistakes before looking at what I did right:

MISTAKES

• Too liberal with declaring friendship with Russia the first time around T60. I think this was my biggest mistake of the game. At the first DoF I underestimated the ability of Russia to leverage the peace to take out Germany. At the time I had the builders available to chop and harvest an army if necessary for defense against a Russian attack. Without a DoF Russia can't take out Germany without committing extensive resources to defending their eastern flank. 
  
• Too liberal with declaring friendship with Russia the 2nd time around T90. By the time of the 2nd DoF I had build up a solid defensive border with 3 encampment. I had left only 1 vector of attack open to Russia directly through Sushi Go, and really only 2 tiles there that were vulnerable (SW & W of the city). Without Cossacks to cycle endlessly onto those tiles I'm confident that I could have held the city. I had Heavy Chariots and Archers in place and could easily have had the gold in hand to upgrade Knights/Crossbows by avoiding a couple of discretionary purchases I had made the previous turns. Overall I played to conservatively on foreign affairs, opting for the simplicity of being able to sandbox.
  
• Not prioritizing navy earlier, coupled with chasing Military Science too long before diverting to Square Rigging. If I hadn't a DoF in place with Russia (see above), and had unlocked Sq-R I could have launched a first-strike with Knights/Frigates. That would have been a costly war attacking into DotF, but at least that way I could have killed the horsemen before they were upgraded to Cossacks! That would have slowed my development but I was already ahead of Rome in development and yields by that point and had MG's as my late-game trump card to equalize with Rome.
  
• As a side-effect of the above DoF's with Russia I didn't take advantage of the opportunity to snipe the 2nd religion from Rome, handing them the State Property belief and missing out on that belief myself. That swing in gold generation would have made all the difference in a potential knight attack on Russia and the eventual and inevitable naval showdown vs. Rome. As it was with the DoF in place I was afraid that Russia would devote the equivalent of a university purchase to a missionary + apostle purchase to snuff out my religion in the cradle if I did make the play with Stonehenge.
  

Now, WHAT DID I DO WELL

• Development in general I played very strongly. I grew cities better than anyone, developed districts better including maximizing the district discounts, expanded well. I also unlocked Apprenticeship much earlier and with a larger number of mines than other civs.
  
• Improved tiles - I always had enough improved tiles to work at cities, and had far more improvements than Russia. I think Rome did a decent job of having enough improvements to work, but my cities were larger. Instrumental in this were 2 builders I purchased back-to-back around T50, and the subsequent completion of Pyramids. I also had more mines worked resulting in overall higher production.
  
• Eureka & Inspiration boosts - I only hard-research researched Celestial Navigation without the boost (no seafood within miles along my coast ) until the very end after I was already losing cities to Russia. On the culture side I only missed the Defensive Tactics eureka (good, not involved in an early DoW), the recruit an artist ( ) and Nationalism () inspirations.
  
• (!) Early warriors instead of slingers. Warrior as the first build allowed me to handle the barb camp that sprang up immediately to the southwest without delaying founding of my 2nd city Pinochle. Warriors allowed me to avoid maintenance on Archers, or conversely allowed me to run Discipline for much of the early game instead of Conscription. I was thus able to easily deal with barbs as they repeatedly popped up around my empire. About T45 I had 2 horse camps spawn almost simultaneously within 4 tiles of my capital!! But was able to easily contain these barb insurrections.
  
• Leveraging of the early city state contact - After meeting Valletta I immediately incorporated their +2 towards units into my strategy. I resolved to build only units out of the capital until I was ready to capture Valletta, thus maximizing their bonus rather than slipping in a district or monument.
  
• (!) Focus on production yield over all else in the early game. It seems to be widely known now that production is the strongest yield and I was building upon the experience of those who have gon before here. But I think I executed this well. I spent a turn moving to a plains hill plant, and worked the 1/3 tile at the start of the game. I was the last to grow my capital to size 2 by a number of turns, but by turn 25 was already starting to show the benefits of the early production focus as my city count and population caught up and soon surpassed the rest of the field. I intentionally located 2nd & 3rd cities on plains hills, and prioritized Apprenticeship and mine improvements early.
  

The two I marked with exclamation points above (!) I think contributed the most to my development and lead in all stats. Rho21 executed the Eureka & inspiration boosts as well and probably better than I. The improved tiles and districts were as much a side effect of the (!) points. Those are my 2 biggest take-aways from this for future games.

[TheArchduke]

Excellent reporting and read, Cornflakes! Just finished it.