[Spoiler] Kaiser has a plan

[Kaiser]

Quite some action today in this PBEM18 forum, I wonder what is going on, is there conflict brewing between Woden and Ichabod?



Farm down, CMF is plummetting in Strength, I hope he lost a unit. He has a damaged Slinger and Warrior I know, and a full health Warrior at the marked position. I think there is currently maximum one other Warrior around so he likely lost 1. Is he going to get a Warrior or Horseman in time?




Taking control of the battlefield shows no reinforcements here, he even pulled his Slinger far away. Hm I was hoping for him to invest more in his defense than this. Is he gambling on me not taking Bruins because it is of no value for me due to occupation penalty?
He is right in that it would be a lot better for me to get Antanarivo first as I can use this city like a normal city and he will likely never cede Bruins to me but it would bring him back to 2 cities with 3rd on the way somewhere.



Ichabod: 2 pop/building, 3 era score 1 to go for his Golden Age and Monumentality
Woden: -
CMF: - though he got another science increase, did he finish another campus? it is not showing in his empire score though, but there are also only 2 GS points for him not 3 (due to suzerain Bologna if he would have built a Library) In any case he does not seem to invest too much into his defense right now



Antanarivo is sending him a trade route though, that is 50 gold ripe for the taking on its way back. I wont be able to plunder it before it makes the route though.

[Kaiser]

The thread activity stayed high in comparison to before, best is I show some too, no?

I wonder what is happening, I hope it means people will have to get off their snowball.
Woden is probably already near a finished AH, which combines with his Cothon and Colonization to 150% increase Settler produciton. He needs to get in a war soon
Ichabod will likely get a Golden Age with Monumentality, I am not sure if he was the one without pantheon, but if yes I expect him to pick the rainforest one and have a high income.
Suboptimal is on 4 cities but else I have few ideas about his plan
CMF is racing in science but has to concern himself with me

[Kaiser]

Thx, I will try to get some posts in during my vacation but it will probably be less than normal as we have many activities planned and a big chunk of my wifes family with us.

It is encouraging to see some feedback, I started to get the feeling to talk to myself.

Be aware that I am the beginner in this game with only two previous CIV6 PBEM played and both with a bad performance.

I can wholeheartedly recommend writing a detailed thread as it will help you think about more possibilities. It might be a hindrance though if you suffer from indecisiveness

[Kaiser]

check the spreadsheet for some updates about the vacation score tracking.

In short my wife convinced me to make peace with CMF as well as not to declare onto Woden (as a phony war to rob him of some and from Vilnius and Bologna) to disturb his settling plans for his 7th city  

We ended up taking Antanarivo and CMF build at least 2 Horseman for his defense so I believe we succesfully slowed him down while still getting some benefit. Sadly I mismoved and lost a Warrior and declared a turn to early to conquer a Builder from Antanarivo (apparently you do not get Builders when they are on the city tile).
So the total gain was not as successful as I would have wished.

Highlights:



We went for Monumentality to get the Builder speed and buy some Builders and Settlers for reduced and



I took Bologna's Suzerainity from CMF during our war for some Era score and met



Woden W of us, this was a surprise as I assumed him to be SW but maybe he forward settled here to control this choke? It looks like there are a couple narrow passages W which are disadvantegous for waging war, we need to make sure to get a stable border here.



Here you see my attack on Antanarivo after making peace with CMF. My Warrior about is to die, I sadly moved him on the tile of the Horseman where the Archer could kill him, instead I should have ran him NE to safety and ate the shot with one of my Horsemen.



Sending a trade route to Vilnius not only brought me 4 additional gold from Egypts ability but also the 3rd envoy for its Suzerainity. By becoming Suzerain we met Ichabod who seems to be W of here.



Meanwhile we conquered Antanarivo, I had to make sure that CMF could not snipe the city from me. It came with a farm and a damaged Monument.




Here you can see Settler #7 from Woden, his apparently either going for our spot or more likely in a settling race with Ichabod

[Kaiser]

Dark ages of vacation score tracking, I did not really do it detailed during the vacation and even forgot some turns to take screenshots.

We gained 39 score during the vacation and established a  lead as well as 2 Suzerains, both of which helped us meeting a neighbor.

Please check the spreadsheet for the details, but here is the summary:
Woden:
Is up to 6 cities and has his 7 Settler out. He is leveraging his Cothon ability quite heavily and gained 57 score during my vacation timeframe. His cities are likely less developed than mine but will pick up pace soon.

Ichabod:
Is up to 4 cities and has an impressive into economy going. His score increase by 42, including 15 points for his religion. He is likely getting roughly 30-32 and from his two holy sites with the help of rainforests (giving +2 each) and Scripture doubles these. To get to 32 he likely has 2 Holy Sites with 4 neighboring rain forests each.
That means he should have these 2 cities which are already producing with a base of 30+ this early in the game. I expect him to start a settling spree quite quickly and fear that these two might be running away with the game.

Suboptimal:
The unknown, is somewhere to the E and on 4 cities (I think), his development is slow but maybe he has a lot of land to settle. Score increased by 37 points.

CMF:
Stumped in growth by our early aggression, he was forced into building units and this shows in his score, which only increased by 17 points in this timeframe. He seems to be positioning himself between us and Suboptimal which is fine for us at the moment.

[Kaiser]

Ok, this might be confusing as I still have to write the vacation played turns from T59 onward to T65, but here is T66 already



4 Era score and the best defensive unit of the Ancient era, we are already in the classical era, but the Maryannu's still pull their weight here.



We also unlocked another Governor title with civic where we would unlikely would have gotten the inspiration.



We abuse our MYC directly for some long range sniping to confirm the Base Strength of this Bireme. As Woden's cities have a strenght of 25, it proofs that he has not Swordsmen or Horsemen built yet as this would give the cities a base strength of 26 (like mine)



He is up to 6 cities, with another Settler near Vilnius and makes 18 per turn, I feel like I took to long to leverage my excellent position and he is outsettling me heavily.



Here are his newest cities I believe, the Settler was in Rivendell last turn. Due to not beinf 1st anymore I have to take 2 screenshots again, my shitty convertible has a better screen resolution so I can get up to 8 players into 1 screenshot.

Woden: 1 pop/building
Ichabod: 2 era score
Suboptimal: 2 era score
CMF: -



Antanarivo under control and finally renamed. I am sorry for its Citizens but the name was just a mouthful to much for me to pronounce and write.
The border with CMF is currently heavily militarized, confirmed units:
- 2 Archer
- 2 Warrior (1 50% damaged)
- 2 Horsemen

We have
- 1 Warrior (1 was stupidly lost)
- 3 Archer
- 3 Horsemen (2 currently healing at Bortus)

I think we want to fill later a city roughly where my Warrior and Archer are standing next to each other to smooth this border out, we have a 1 - 2 city lead (I am relatively sure he built two Campi and his points add up to only 3 cities) and the better military around. He is already building an encampment near Bruins which is at least a bit concerning.



There was some more era score and to grab, so we did it



And used our first MYC to clean this scout



Some more infrastructure projects before moving Magnus to KG and Liang to GM



Ichabod founded his religion and went for the feared pantheon combination with Brazil. He leveraged it into a very strong religious combination for a huge increase. My wife and me were discussing this and she convinced me to leave Woden alone so he and Ichbod might clash and slow each other down while I try to get back into a dominant position based on my science rate and potential settling up the spots available to me.



As you can see his income is huge, every adjacend rainforest gives him 2 and 2



He has only 2 HS finished and no shrines or temples, that means 2 of his cities contribute almost all of his income and receive a likely +10 or more boost.
Hopefully they clash and slow each other down, Wodens passage to us looks like there are only tiny openings and Ichabod seems to be SW of Vilnius, so far away but a natural ally.



Suboptimal has to be to the E though, we will send a unit there if Bruins is not blocking the way to find all players and hopefully get some era score for it.



What to we do when not irritating Woden and Ichabod? Well, we are going to try to follow quickly to 8 cities while getting some Eurekas done and the border with CMF secured
Our main contributors are going to be EM, KG and GM, Isaac and Bortus will continue their development and will get some Builder support soon.



here is an overview shot, I switched Bortus to a wall to get the Eureka and get this border safe. Thanks to the MYC we are shooting with 35 strength from our walls

[Kaiser]

Both, I guess. She was already against declaring but followed my logic that I can stop his scout from blocking us.

CIV 6 is a snowball game and investing in the war against CMF would have meant focussing our empire on the war in building many more units. While this would have likely yielded 3 more cities as CMF would have answered with military on his side, the timeline would have been very long.
I think I could have gotten Bruins relatively quickly, but for Kings and the Blues we would have needed to wade through many more units so I guess we would not have been able to finish this war quicker than 25-30 turns. That would have been a huge time commitment and strain on my economy which I want to use differently if possible.

Most importantly, going for Bruins would have delayed conquering Antanarivo considerably and we would not have gotten anything out of Bruins until CMF would have been eliminated due to the occupation penalty.
So strategically making peace with CMF let us conquer Antanarivo undisturbed, get back to economic development and settle the available good spots further increasing our advantage over CMF. We now know that Bruins might be blocking passage to further lands where Suboptimal is located, but we have enough good sites to settle at the moment and going in this direction would stretch and endanger our empire. We are also establishing a lead in which we will likely be able to keep until the next Golden Age when Woden will have enough Cothons built to leverage his economy into

Let us have a look at the numbers of this war:
Our Hammers invested:
- 2 Warrior = 80
- 3 Archer (1 upgraded for 60) = 155
- 3 Horsemen = 240

All units were build with their respective production card so we total to 475 / 1,5 = 316 and 10 (we got 50 back by plundering Antanarivos trade route, I should have waited a turn and captured the worker instead)

Our Hammers gained:
We also gained Antanarivo with a damaged Monument and a farm, a Settler is currently worth 170, let us say half of the Monument 30 and a third of a Builder 20 = 220

CMF Hammers invested:
- 1 Scout = 30
- 2 Archer (at least 1 upgraded for 60) = 95
- 2 Warrior = 80
- 2 Horsemen = 160

Let us assume he had the production card slotted as well (there is none for the Scout), that totals to 365 / 1,5 = 243 and 60

CMF Hammers gained:
0 (or 40 if you want to count my dead Warrior here, who was killed by Antanarivo)

We both end up with a decent military at the moment, mine being roughly 50% stronger than his. Due to my gains I invested 96 into this war while he invested 218 (counting 4 as 1 ). He might be able to leverage his units into conquering one of the other CS, I believe he has a religious one nearby, to improve the odds in his favour, but we can keep our military around and force him to keep his nearby.

CMF ended up delaying my two cities by a turn each, but I might have kept him from getting his 4th (or 5th) Settler from his capital for probably 8-10 turns, which he had to invest into his two Horsemen.

I believe the border is favourable for us, as he should not be able to settle the so so spot in between Bortus and Isaac due to loyality pressure coming from my 3 cities and my golden age. We might even consider settling there earlier to put pressure onto Bruins, but I need to look into the numbers to see if that is worthwile over better spots (nearly all others are better as this place lacks but comes with a lot of and Sphinx sites.)

[Kaiser]

Ichabod wants to build a Horseman next turn, I am not giving him this opportunity considering his : and potential upcoming conflict with Woden. This means I am likely handing Woden his 7th city but I believe he will need it to be a threat to Ichabod.
Ichabod is down to 40 he likely bought a Settler or Builder and will show his settling explosion.


 
A mix of Builders and Settlers is being built, the current Builder will chop the forest W of Em into a Water Mill completing the Eureka for construction. The builder in work at GM will improve the PWheat, improve the PWheat at the Capial, farm the tile SW of it and Lumbermill the PHF E of it.
I am currently deciding between finishing the Builder at Kelly Grayson before the Settler. This would let me get two more lumbermills down and likely a pasture on the GHSheep near the Volcano. It would delay the Settler by two turns though.
However we would get closer to getting Feudalism done (that is one of the reasons for the farm at GM, the other one being the Housing), which would let our new cities start with 5 slot Builders




There likely is CMFs mysterious religous CS here, my other Horsemen and Archers will heal up and get the Matterhorn bonus



Wrong order, but at least we are top of the board again so only one screenshot to check
Woden: civic#9, 2 era score
Ichabod: 1 pop/building
Suboptimal: 1 pop/building
CMF: -

[Ioan76]

What did you choose as Golden Age bonus?

[Kaiser]

I picked Monumentality to benefit from the increased Builder movement and also to buy some units with and