EitB AI Takeover SG

[Mr. Cairo]

Nothing much was happening, with both Furia's and Thessa's stacks out of sight, until T254 when Hannah+Basium declared war on Sandalphon. I still think that Basium and Sandalphon will end up winning, but the AI has trouble with large fronts, and the border between Sandalphon and Hannah is very large indeed.

I'm just sitting around in a holding pattern, waiting until Furia attacks, is willing to make peace, or Thessa gets involved.

After HBR I went for Writing as it's the pre-req to Trade.

On Turn 255 Basium cast Divine Retribution. For fun... I guess. I don't think either of Sanalphon or Kardith use a lot of undead or demonic units.

I mesmerized another two bears. I'm not sure if we want to keep collecting them, but I sent one to Niveus for extra culture/happiness, which would let us keep it without a garrison a little longer than otherwise, fwiw.

I also built a Pagan Temple in the capital, for the extra happy. It'll let us either keep on growing the city, or swap to something like Nationhood if we need/want the extra military production.

Speaking of civics, I think I agree with Bob re: slavery vs. apprenticeship, but I do want to whip the lighthouse in Niveus.

Thessa was no longer willing to declare war on Furia on turn 256. Furia still wants Argenteria for peace.

On turn 257 an Enraged Lunatic appeared by Argenteria:

the desert offers no protection to Argenteria because all of Furia's units have Commando, so I moved a Fawn into the city, as well as summoning some Tigers nearby to kill/weaken it for a Fawn the next turn. Which makes me wonder why we only had a single Warrior protecting a border city from an enemy who's units all get Commando.

The Lunatic ran up here instead of attacking:

I attacked it with some Tigers, one of which dealt a lot of damage despite having only 2% odds. So I was able to use the 5xp Fawn to kill the Lunatic at 99% odds, gaining it 3 more xp.

Quite a lot happened on turn 259:

We lost several Workers, the Warrior in Ballinasloe, and a Bear (unfortunately it was a highly promoted Bear). We also lost a few improvements here and there, but it could have been much worse on that front.

Basium/Hannah attacked Decius, who had a DP with Arturus. So now Hannah/Basium are at war with 4 other civs. They'll still probably win, since Decius and Arturus are very weak.

Of more immediate concern is the arrival of yet another enraged Lunatic (same place as the previous one) the turn all our units in Argenteria were damaged by Raging Seas.
I moved a very damaged tiger onto the desert to block it's path. It'll kill the tiger, but then wont be able to attack anything else, and we should be able to take it out like last time, possibly getting that Fawn up to enough xp that it can be upgraded.


And turn 260 has arrived. The Lunatic apparently decided that a tiger wasn't worthy of its rage and moved towards Thessa. I deleted most of the tigers, but summoned a few more in a location from which they should be able to attack the Lunatic if it comes our way.

I also built some spare Warriors for Slane and the cap to guard against Furia's commandos, so they should stay there.

I leave any decision re: swapping out of Slavery for Bob, but I advocate waiting until Niveus can whip it's lighthouse, but that may take too long. Ditto with the Great Merchant, although I would prefer to use it to Bulb or a GA than a trade mission.

Furia still wants Argenteria for peace, but isn't bothering us (at least, not on purpose).

We have 5 more PoL and 2 more Cats than when I started and enough cash to get Trade in 3 turns. Oh, and someone cleared out that Bear den (Kardith?) so our supply of Bears has now dried up.



Bob UP
Brian ON DECK
Qgqqqqq
DaveV
Shallow_thought
Cairo

[Brian Shanahan]

Balls on Hannah's world spell going off. But it looks to be a solid set from the report. Will take a look tomorrow (with Covid 19 we're splitting the office into a 3 day 2 day shift and I'm not in until Thursday {working for An Garda Síochána, I'm considered essential staff}).

[Bobchillingworth]

Got it, will play later today.

[Qgqqqqq]

I think we're missing an obvious opportunity for Ashen Veil. Instead of converting, simply research it and build up enough Savants (or Monks upgraded from Savants), so that when we choose to switch religions we can upgrade enough collateral instantly.

Yes, it'll be expensive, but that's one of the boons of being SPI - while we're waiting we can go by Order for the flush of Crusaders and Bless, stay in FOL for meat, or even go by OO or Runes. And we don't need to stay in Veil, just once will be enough for 10-12 ritualists that will solve our collateral this side of Pillar of Flames (via Chalid or the Order) or Corlindale.

Edit: also, can I stress again the importance of pillaging the roads near the pillaged Warrenpoint? That will give us crucial time if we resettle it, as well as locking Furia out of our road network in the meantime.

[Brian Shanahan]

I think we're missing an obvious opportunity for Ashen Veil. Instead of converting, simply research it and build up enough Savants (or Monks upgraded from Savants), so that when we choose to switch religions we can upgrade enough collateral instantly.

Yes, it'll be expensive, but that's one of the boons of being SPI - while we're waiting we can go by Order for the flush of Crusaders and Bless, stay in FOL for meat, or even go by OO or Runes. And we don't need to stay in Veil, just once will be enough for 10-12 ritualists that will solve our collateral this side of Pillar of Flames (via Chalid or the Order) or Corlindale.

Edit: also, can I stress again the importance of pillaging the roads near the pillaged Warrenpoint? That will give us crucial time if we resettle it, as well as locking Furia out of our road network in the meantime.

I was thinking something like that too last night. We don't need to convert immediately, just a big enough war chest to upgrade units when we do.

I took a quick look at the save just now, and am wondering, could we possibly build a bit of a navy and wander it down south with loaded unit to strike at Mutanbo and Guell? They'd be valuable additions to the empire, if somewhat exposed defensivel.

[Bobchillingworth]

Reviewing the T259 save, I do note that roads allowing Furia to 1-turn our cities still haven’t been pillaged, so I move Warriors to do so.  

Otherwise I only alter a couple builds; I’ve been left in a good position to romp around a bit, and intend to do so.  


T260:  A Lunatic runs into our territory, but a Treant spawns and easily kills it.  I revolt into Nationhood and Apprenticeship.  





T261: Really glad I pillaged that road leading to Argentaria about now; Furia moves her main stack over to menace, killing the Warrior who pillaged the tile.  I move our stack to counter.  


T262: Gutless Furia refuses to advance; I console myself by killing a random Lunatic.





T263: Hannah wants me to join her vs. the Kurios; I’d normally say yes, but in this case we’d be in trouble if Cardith diverted even a few Chargers our way.  Thessa then come with what essentially amounts to a gift of Iron, which I gladly accept.  

Capital and Glens start on Siege workshops, Iron Chariots will be a game-changer.  

Furia continues to hold position.  This works as well; I’ll amass Catapults and Tigers, and whoever takes after me can kill her stack if need be.  


T264: Starting to get bored of waiting for Furia to make a move, but unless she steps on that desert tile I won’t feel safe attacking without a few more Catapults and a couple Chariots; Saverous is too strong.  


T265: More sitting, stockpiling.  


T266: Pop another Looney.  Tech set to Alteration, for Body Mana, though we lack adepts at the moment.  


T267: Trade maps with Hannah; looks like Arturus had razed Combee, and is down to only on city, albeit a pretty nice one.  Otherwise a quiet turn.  


T268: Nothing.

T269: Still nothing!  Sheesh, kind of a boring set.  


Sitrep:  We’re obviously in a standoff with Furia, but the longer it goes on the more our advantage grows, as she isn’t adding to hers.  Not sure when we’ll want to make the call, probably sometime next set, but eventually we can take the initiative and hit hers from our territory, even if she continues to just fortify it in place.  If we do so, make sure the Tigers take the Axe first, with each new attacker picking it up from a dead Tiger; it’s effectively +1 strength for all of our summons / other sacrificial pawns.

[Brian Shanahan]

Have the save.  Took a quick look at it and I'd say we could nearly pile in on that stack now.  Our four Satyrs all have odds (between 60 and 80%) on the top defender before even sending in the collateral damage units.  And while the odds aren't good enough without collateral a bit of softening would strengthen our position.

Will hit the stack soon into my set and see if I can pile on to Hexam from there.  After that, I like the south, but we'll see.

Nice prep work getting all the catapults out lads.  If we take out Furia I think we'll be set for some sort of a win.

Play tomorrow; well later today actually.  It's after midnigt.

[Bobchillingworth]

Bear in mind that Saverous has the Fear promotion, so he'll not only eat quite a few attackers, but probably over half the units we throw at him won't even get that far. May be best to get Courage on them first; as a bonus, a couple Adepts with Ice 1 can lock that stack in place more-or-less indefinitely if we can't finish it in a turn, as Furia almost certainly won't move it if any of the units are frozen.

[Brian Shanahan]

Bear in mind that Saverous has the Fear promotion, so he'll not only eat quite a few attackers, but probably over half the units we throw at him won't even get that far.  May be best to get Courage on them first; as a bonus, a couple Adepts with Ice 1 can lock that stack in place more-or-less indefinitely if we can't finish it in a turn, as Furia almost certainly won't move it if any of the units are frozen.

Good idea, thanks.

[Brian Shanahan]

Played the save.  They were mostly stick in place turns.  I ended up not attacking the stack.  While we probably have enough by way of units to wipe it the fact that after taking catapults to the Archers Saverous will be high on the list and nobody can attack into him (due to fear) makes it hard to take down without courage.

That is why I've built a Mage Guild in the capital (and am pumping adepts there) and went with Divination with my tech choice (only investment was overflow from alteration).  Get a Spirit node going a promote one courage Adept and the stack should then go down.

Early on in the set though a couple of wandering Lunatics paid a visit,  I sicced the tigers on them (lost five) and then threw the two Fawns closest to 10xp on them.  Both won, and I upgraded the uninjured one to Satyr, the second one can become a Satyr too but I haven't yet.

In foreign news, Cardith came asking for help:




Sorry lad, but We've Enough on our Hands Right Now.

In domestic news Ballinasloe built its settler and founded Ring of Sion on the fort that was previously built.  With the copper inside our borders already I decided to get the fish in range immediately.  It'll be a crappy city, but once the basic buildings are up it could trickle in some specialist research or money.




We got a second merchant, I stowed him 1NE of our capital, and I stowed our workers 1NW of the capital too, as they're finished improving tiles.  Both tiles are marked.




I've kept trying to push units out we've got a couple of Swords, Adepts a few extra Catapults and one Chariot.

In the photo of the second merchant above, you can see another foreign development.  Furia has declared on Beeri Brawl.  He won't be much of a distraction, he's playing a bad OCC and his power is pathetic, but it might distract her long enough that we could snipe a few cities.  If that stack wanders away from the border, we could take Hexam and maybe even her current capital.

Demographics and power:

Thoughts:
We can use the merchant to get a golden age or most of Maths.  I would suggest the next player burns him for the golden age, it would help our production a lot.  Get courage on our units if Furia's stack doesn't pull back.  If it does go for Hexam.

We've got 300 gold in the bank currently.  I didn't want to commit to divination (plus the bank was at fifty gold at the time) for definite.  I would suggest using it on a tech after promoting the available Fawn to Satyr.