[Spoiler] Suboptimal's Next Attempt at Lurker Frustration

[suboptimal]

Plans for The Renaissance

I’ve been putting some thought into what I should be doing in the next age. I think I’m far enough along, and secure enough in my position, to start making some waves. The age will start on Turn 139 and these are my intentions as of Turn 136.

The Navy

I’ll have two Frigates out of Cleggy and one out of Foggy, plus a quadrireme available for upgrade at Nora Batty. I’ve also got two galleys awaiting upgrades, three Great Admirals at sea (Artemsia, Magellan and Chola) and one arriving on Turn 135 (Santa Cruz). I’ll might pursue the remaining Renaissance admiral, Francis Drake, with a project or two. When the Industrial Age admirals come around I’m going to try for Nelson for the free shipyard. The “big one” will be maneuvering for Franz von Hipper and his battleship when the modern age admirals start coming around.

Once the new age starts I plan on retiring Santa Cruz and forming a frigate armada. This will do three things: get me era score for world’s first armada, raise all my city defenses to a base of 52 (because armada) and raise my city ranged attack strength to 72 (). I will also eventually upgrade the galleys and quadrireme for a total force of five caravels, three frigates and a frigate armada. The plan is to position two of the caravels at my easternmost cities on each coast and keep the fifth caravel in escort with the frigate armada, north of Geneva. The lone northern frigate will station at Cleggy.

Cleggy will build one or two sea dogs once Mercantilism completes.

The Army

Most of my cities’ build queues are emptying out right around the turn of the age. I’ll be upgrading all four chariots, the swordsmen at Cleggy, Marina and Howard and the archers at Howard and Marina. The horsemen, catapult and ships will follow as permits with a preference to upgrading the land units first.

I’ll build two muskets (maybe three) out of Cleggy and one out of Truly. Foggy will build infrastructure (trader then Intelligence Agency) until Metal Casting completes, at which point it’ll build a pike and shot, along with a second out of Cleggy after the two muskets. Marina and Howard will each build a siege tower followed by a crossbow; Compo will build a third siege tower followed by a pike and shot. Truly will follow its musket build with an Encampment project so that I can try to secure El Cid.

Infrastructure

I’m building the Intelligence Agency at Foggy. Compo and Truly will build their factories around their unit builds while Cleggy will go factory → coal plant, likely before the sea dogs. Howard will get an archaeological museum built; Marina will build out a discounted Encampment+Barracks+Armory, then work on an art museum. Smiler will continue work on its amphitheater.

If the next wonder building engineer shows up I’ll likely try to squeeze in a project for him. The Colosseum is still available and I believe the production will overflow, in which case I could use it to complete a museum at Marina. There are a few other wonders that could be useful, such as the Terracotta Army, Forbidden City or Chichen Itza.

Tech Path

Industrialization completes right as the age turns. I’ll go Castles → Printing → Metal Casting → Ballistics → Steam Power → beeline Steel.

Civics and Policies

Civics will be Mercantilism → Diplomatic Service → Natural History with a detour to Divine Right if I need a quick policy change. I’ll hold Humanism for a couple of turns so that it completes when the age rolls over. I’ll put the turns into Divine Right to get it down to one turn.

As for policies I’ll be taking out Press Gangs and Natural Philosophy and putting in Professional Army and Feudal Contract with the completion of Humanism. Once Mercantilism completes I’ll likely pull Press Gangs for Triangular Trade. I’ll decide about Feudal Contract at that point in the game but the likely replacement would be Raid if I’ve got sea dogs on the map.

It seems you have a plan?

Yes. I should have 6 muskets, 3 pike and shot, two crossbows and three siege towers on the north coast near Howard plus four coursers, four knights and possibly another musket on the Marina to Pearl front. If it all goes well the north group will be accompanied by El Cid and I’ll have Boudica relocated to Marina.

Wild should fall to my loyalty on Turn 147. As that point approaches I’ll use the open borders to move my troops through Wild into the space between there and Bruins. I’ll likewise bring either two coursers or a courser and musket north from Pearl along with all four knights. Once Bruins’ loyalty starts to falter I’ll bring my units into and through that city’s borders in a show of strength to Egypt. The idea here is to tie down Kaiser’s units in the area between my own units and Canada’s.

I’ll need to check loyalty but once Wild falls I believe I’ll have a reasonable chance of holding onto Isaac with a governor and a garrison. If the numbers don’t work out then I’ll make a decapitation strike against Ed Mercer. Yes, the city will flip free in a few turns and return to Egypt’s control another half dozen after that but that will let me pillage out the area and go attack Isaac. I could also take a page out of Woden’s book and just keep conquering Ed Mercer to whittle down its population. I’ll use sea dogs to keep the Egyptian coastline from rebuilding and help fund the endeavour.

The southern force located at Bruins will be used to attack any Egyptian units that remain south of Gordon Malloy and to try to keep Canada on their better behavior. Once the fireworks start and I get all three factories built (or pillage-purchased) I’ll be pumping units out of Compo, Cleggy and Truly and sending them to the Canadian front. As the Egyptian campaign (and the Renaissance Age) winds down I’ll pivot and try to take Kings and The Blues through a combination of loyalty and force.

The end goal is to take and hold Isaac, possibly take and hold Gordon Malloy, pressure or take Charly Burke and cripple (hopefully significantly) Ed Mercer. Isaac won’t be able to respond quickly since his units are over by the former Vilnius or tied down by Canada at Bortus & Charly Burke.

As for Woden and Ichabod it seems that their conflict remains contained amongst themselves. For the time being I’m content to let that play out. Canada will be a bit neutered once Wild and Bruins fall to foreign control.

[suboptimal]

Turn 136 – World Congress Special Edition

So there’s been a World Congress. It occurred to me that it’s possible that someone other than Ichabod called it since there should a be a full cycle of turns before it meets. Let’s see what’s going on…




OK. That’s the third time that I’ve been presented with that emergency. The first was when it was captured, the second was last turn when I was notified the vote was called and now this. Seriously? I escape out to the map to let the swirling eyeballs rest and take a look around…

Fortaleza will likely fall next turn – it has no walls and the garrison is at 131/200. Charly Burke has taken some damage as it’s down to 167/200. Guess Canada has returned fire from the comfort of their Encampment. I take a couple of close ups of certain regions of interest in Egypt and then go back to the emergency at hand…

Simply put I have no interest in this emergency. Yes, it does put me at war with Kaiser. However, I’d rather see if he has his hands full and has to keep forces at the former Vilnius. That would help me out quite a bit for my own declaration in 15-20 turns. I put one vote into no. At best I won’t be part of the emergency.

As for who called it, well, that was Canada. On Turn 134 they had 67 diplomatic favor and now they are under 50.

[suboptimal]

Turn 137




ORDER! ORDER!

(nod heads)(tellers advance)

The ayes to the right, one. The noes to the left three.




The noes have it. The noes have it. UNLOCK!

I find it curious that Woden didn’t get to vote even though the city-state was on his borders. I forget the envoy count but maybe he didn’t have any there? Regardless, that’s over with for now and we’re off to the turn at hand.

There’s a gradient dust storm over at the border between Bologna and Phoenicia. It’s heading west and hasn’t killed anyone yet. Humanism is a fraction of a turn from completion. Switch to Divine Right and I’ll put two turns into that. Cleggy has finished it second frigate well ahead of when I expected it. Interesting. Start its first musket – 6 turns to complete but that’s getting sped up the turn after next. I position the western builder in Compo and move the engineer to the mine just NE of the dam. My horseman is back near Pearl’s territory and I bring it in.

Caravels continue their recall to port. I leave the frigate in Auntie Wainwright for the time being and the new one at Cleggy stations itself on the fishing nets. I’ve been maneuvering my caravel off the Egyptian coast to check sight lines. They aren’t that good given the hills. However, Kaiser won’t know if I’ve parked any Frigates off the coast of Isaac until it’s too late for his units to see them and then back up. There’s one tile that’s 2 hexes from all current borders. Ed Mercer remains empty. I could land up to four units per turn and have them be safe from Alara Kitan’s ranged attack. Two waves of four might be enough to cause problems for the city.




At Isaac I’d be able to land five at once and maybe sneak a knight through the mountain pass (behind the unit infobox) for some pillaging.




I realized too late (after I saved and passed) that I should be putting these turns into Metal Casting since it’s the more expensive of Printing and it. I’ll get one turn into it and then complete Industrialization after next turn (Compo’s workshop and the eureka will be complete).

I take a quick look at the Great Admiral race for Francis Drake. If no one runs a project I should recruit him in 12 turns; Woden is due to get him in 13. Cleggy can run a project in four turns for a turn and a half worth of GAP generation. I might be able to fit that in but I’d want to time it to complete and get the recruitment, so 10 turns from now. I will also need to run a project for El Cid at Truly as Woden is due to claim him five turns before me (13 turns vs. 18 turns). I’ll want to run that project to complete sooner rather than later, so that’s the next build in Truly. In other news I’ll have Li Bai in 12 turns for another two great works.

Truly’s trader completes next turn. The two best trade routes to Canada are from Nora Batty to either Bruins (121) or Nora Batty to The Blues (161). I’ll run the route to The Blues with Truly’s trader and use Foggy’s for the route to Bruins. Both will pass through Pearl.

[suboptimal]

Turn 138

Open the save to this:




Guess I pushed Industrialization a bit further than I though. Actually, I know the reason – when a tech has the 20% “era penalty” applied to it and you get the eureka you will get 40% of the increased cost. That makes a so-called “penalized eureka” worth 48% of the base cost of the tech. Guess I was within that margin. Heck of a way to announce the completion of the workshop at Compo.

I also have a disaster notification – Mount Kilimanjaro woke up and erupted. No population was killed but there’s some damage to deal with:




All three mines will need to be repaired. Good thing I have that worker in Truly and don’t need to set up any coal mines with it. I’ll get that done and then hang around for Mercantilism to complete – I’ll use the builder’s charges on jungle lumbermills – I think one at Truly and two at Compo There’s also a new barbarian camp but it’s northwest of La Venta so it’s not my problem. There are also three coal resources in my territory: in the just-acquired woods tile west of Smiler, the mine I just put down at Compo and...the plains hill north of Foggy, upon which Howard’s Entertainment Complex now stands. I figured a resource would show up there eventually. I should be collecting 10 coal per turn, going up to 15 once I mine the resource at Smiler.

Marina starts a Siege Tower and moves its archer out of the city center, leaving the shiny new crossbow as the garrison for the time being. I was going to build an Encampment as district #3 here but I think a Campus is a better investment. I put that down in the open grassland to the SW to lock in its cost. That’s a +2 adjacency so not too bad. Compo was going to start a third siege engine but instead starts a musketman. I move the citizen working the open plains tile to the Industrial Zone for 2. For now that’ll take 11 turns but the Dam completing next turn and Feudal Contract will speed that up significantly (the Dam alone is worth +6). Truly starts the Encampment project, done in five turns.

The builders head out, one for Smiler and one to repair Cleggy’s mines. Engineer puts the fourth charge into the Dam and presents me with a bit of an interesting observation. It seems that the engineer’s “20% into the district” ability uses the current district cost, not the actualy locked cost of the district, and takes 20% of that. As a result the district is now only 28 from completion and could be completed by Foggy in two turns. Now, I could cold-build the remaining and keep the engineer around longer, but I’d rather not. I have stuff to build.

I go to move the trader from Truly to Nora Batty but see that the trade route to The Blues from here is worth 15.51. I’ll take that now, thank you very much. The caravels and admirals are back in friendly waters (well, OK, the one by Cleggy is just outside my borders). Kaiser’s brought his northern galley back towards Cleggy. In a weak attempt at deception I move Santa Cruz into the city and the frigate out to the second ring. I think it’s best if I can keep him from knowing I have Santa Cruz up here, just in case. I continue to use my third caravel (with a non-effective Artemsia in tow) to monitor the Egyptian coastline.

I brushed up on the alliance rules in order to see what I would be in for when I declare on Kaiser. Looks like I’ll be declaring on Woden at the same time (alliances since R&F automatically include Defensive Pacts; under vanilla that couldn’t be agreed to until both civs had the Mobilization civic. That could change the naval dynamics a bit and I’ll need to be ready for a visit from Phoenicia when that happens. It might result in a change in policies and builds once Mercantilism completes. I might put Press Gangs back in for a few frigates out of Cleggy (and possibly one out of Foggy and/or Compo) and consider going on the offensive against Woden’s navy.

Woden has taken Fortaleza – it’s negative loyalty but only at -1.5 per turn so he should be able to hold it for a while. That hasn’t slowed Recife or Sao Paolo – they’ve got 3 turns and 2-turns to rebellion. Manaus is under siege now and will likely fall in a turn or two. If Woden takes Brazil it might be over, it might not. I’ll proceed with invading Egypt and see what Woden does to try to interfere.

The era will roll next turn. The good news is that with Humanism completing effectively after the era roll I’ll have about 2.5 turns of overflow that will flow into Mercantilism. The bad news is I’ll go back down to around 97 per turn (actually, 91 once I take out Natural Philosophy). I’ll also find out how much of Woden’s rate is due to Cothons. He’s got at least 34 coming from five Cothons that I can see and I know he’s got a 3-4 more out in the fog.

I also need to shift my upgrade plans a bit. I’ve only got 45 available niter so I can only upgrade two swords next turn. I’ll do that, the four chariots, two galleys and the archer at Howard. That’ll cost 1435. After the current musket builds are over I’ll need to wait five turns to upgrade the remaining sword, then five turns after that I’ll be able to upgrade the quadrireme. It also means I’ll be limited in my ability to build muskets and frigates, so looks like it’ll be pike & shot, caravels and sea dogs.

[suboptimal]

Turn 139

The Medieval is dead! Long live the Medieval! (That old gag :rolleyes. Dedications are expired and, well, you can tell Woden and I were using Harbors as generators. I’m down to 95 from 134 and Woden is down to 88 from 153 . This also means that I’m currently world’s #2 in generation, behind Kaiser at 134. I also see that my milpower is up to 1080 and is now larger than Woden’s. It’s going to be getting bigger very shortly. Right. Time to get a move on. Time for dedications.

Canada actually hit a normal age. Egypt, however, is in a dark age. Brazil and Phoenicia are in golden ages. That means that flipping Wild is a non-starter for now. However, Bruins is now showing that it would flip directly to me. It also means that I’d have an outside chance of holding Isaac. The dedications themselves are...meh…




I take Reform the Coinage because I’ll have several trade routes expiring over the next 20 turns or so. I need 28 era score for a normal age. Should get a bit because of the armada and sea dog.

Check out notifications. Industrial roads have unlocked. Nice. Geneva’s quest is to trigger the inspiration for Humanism. Guess what? Just finished it! OKTHXBAI! The last one is that Canada is seeking a DoF. After some brief thought I take it. It’ll keep Canada from attempting any reprisals in the event I flip one of their cities. It will also mean that Canada can be my bank for at least the next 30 turns.

With that out of the way I start Mercantilism. Seven turns to completion thanks to the elimination of the era penalty and era-related overflow from Humanism. That means it’s time for a policy change. Merchant Confederation, Press Gangs and Natural Philosophy out, Diplomatic League, Feudal Contract and Professional Army in. Diplomatic League is for a very specific purpose – my upcoming archer upgrade this turn will get the Metal Casting eureka and complete the quest for Bologna, giving me two envoys instead of one. That means I can split my envoys next turn and move Amani for suzerainty of Geneva. I’ll rotate Magnus into Pearl since Canada’s pressure is still an issue. I also note that Divine Right is so backwards that it’s now one turn from completion.

Time for some upgrades. Four chariots to knights at Marina/Smiler. Check. Swords at Marina and Howard. Check. Archer on the road to Compo. Metal Casting eureka and two envoys in Bologna. Check. Galleys to Caravels. Check. Gold balance drops from 1434 to 39. Income down from 122 to 98.3 per turn.

Foggy grew to 9 population this past turn. The new citizen was added at the RND, I move it to the Campus. Switch the build queue to the Dam and the engineer completes it. That gets Foggy 3 housing it doesn’t need, an amenity (always good) and +6 at Compo. Foggy will complete the trader next turn and start the intelligence agency since I have no niter and Metal Casting has three turns to go. The funny thing is that Foggy has no international trade routes available because the pathfinder is only going 15 tiles from the city. No matter, I’ll relocate the trader to Nora Batty and send it to The Blues.

Builders move out, first mine repair next turn. I get the caravel at Cleggy into my borders (finally) and sit tight with everything else. Once the Egyptian galley is past I’ll retire Santa Cruz. Hopefully it moves past Howard before the siege tower completes. Scout comes ashore south of Venice; it’s going to head up to Bortus and Charly Burke to keep an eye on things. Boudica relocates to Smiler (can’t go to Marina because of the builder). The horseman that’s been wandering around goes up to Bruins and gets on top of the desert hill there. I’ll continue north for a bit to defog the gap between Bruins, Isaac and Charly Burke. If I get lucky I’ll also get Gordon Malloy out of the fog.

Looking at loyalty the fact that Canada stayed in a normal age slows things down a bit. I was hoping to flip Wild. However, Egypt in a dark age does make life easier for when I go after Kaiser in 15-20 turns. This age has 40-60 turns on it (liikely 40) so I should be midway through my plans with Kaiser (if all goes well) as the DoF runs out. I also look around elsewhere in Egypt. His city of Cassius (founded SW of the former Vilnius) will rebel in 15 turns (-6.8 loyalty). Steve Newton, formerly Vilnius, has a loyalty of -12.8 and will flip in 7 turns. Curiously, the Phoenician city of Misty Mountains is also under loyalty pressure but it’s a slow drip at -1.1. That’s got a looooong way to go but will start seeing penalties in 4 turns. Woden’s stabilized Fortaleza, at least until Sao Paolo flips next turn and Recife follows a turn later. I’m sure, though, Woden’s navy will take care of that. I’d like him to keep that up, at least until I get a few more caravels out.

Speaking of which, the quicker time to Mercantilism has put a bit of a spanner in the works. I need to review unit build timings here. Once Metal Casting completes it’ll be 8 turns to build 5 pike & shot. I’ll be able to use El Cid to get the inland ones to Howard faster and then it’s four turns transit. I think what I’ll do is build two pike & shot (Cleggy & Truly) and three crossbows (Foggy, Marina, Compo), followed by infrastructure. That means I’d want to delay Mercantilism for...two turns. That’s fine – I’ll put the time into Diplomatic Service.

[suboptimal]

Turn 140

No notifications to start the turn. This should be a quick one. Foggy starts a crossbow. I highlight the trader to move and and get a nice menu of trade routes to select from. So much for the trade UI. The Blues is 14.61 so I take it. Builder repairs the mine at Cleggy. The military engineer heads for the grassland between Foggy and Truly – I’ll put a fort on the road there and then one to the south of the elephant camps.

My horseman exploring the Canada-Egypt front moves through Bruins’ territory and defogs the frontier.




Interesting. It does mean that my knights will not advance through here unless/until I capture Isaac. I’ll cross the river and head west next turn. I’d like to get a sense of what surprises Gordon Malloy might hold and what units are in the area of Charly Burke. My scout will be in the gap between Bortus and Canada in about five turns. I’m thinking that moving my cavalry through Kings and across the river might be the way to go (if Canada isn’t too stacked up there).

Up at Cleggy I unlink my caravel from the admiral and inch out to see where the Egyptian galley went. It’s four tiles north of Howard so it looks like Kaiser is defogging ocean right now. Santa Cruz comes out of the city and I create a frigate armada. It doesn’t seem to have had the desired effect on city garrison strength and the effect on ranged defensive attacks will remain to be seen (should be at least 55, equal to the frigate’s base strength). For S&G’s I check out what the armada would do (with a great admiral escort) against the walls at Ed Mercer (take out 1/3 the walls) and Isaac (half the walls). Theoretically I could boost the ranged attacks against cities to as high as 87 by retiring both Artemsia and Rajendra Chola. That’s overkill, though, as I want Chola around for the general bonus and Artemsia’s promotion will get used when I need it.

I’ve got two naturally generated envoys to place. I put one in Bologna and one into Geneva. I also shift Amani up to Geneva and Magnus to Pearl. Net result is +7.5 and I should be suzerain of Geneva in 5 turns.

My military upgrades last turn pushed my milpower up to 1243, a good 210 high than Woden’s. The armada will add ten and I could upgrade an archer this turn but I’m going to wait. Metal Casting completes in two turns and I’ll finish Castles two turns after that. I need about 900 to finish upgrades (three horses, one sword, three archers) of land units, plus another 165 for the quadrireme. Only one of the archers (at Howard) is needed for the upcoming assault, though with three crossbows getting built soonish I don’t need those upgrades. I’ve also got the two swordsmen defogging the east that could use upgrading at some point (just in case).

Elsewhere Woden reconquered Sao Paolo after it rebelled. He’s also building quite a navy as Hildegard was overtaken by a frigate this past turn. I think I’m going to park her up north to keep count as they go by. Woden’s also up to 5 great general points per turn. Good thing I’ve got that project completing in Truly in three turns. That will give me El Cid when it completes, right on time.

With Amani moving I get a look at Wild’s “natural” loyalty. It’s getting +10 from governors – I’m assuming Victor is parked in Bruins as a defensive measure against Egypt. I also see that Canada is sending its warrior for a stroll through my territory. Eh, that’s OK. What are friends for?

[suboptimal]

Turn 141

No notifications. Two turns until the siege towers complete and I secure El Cid. Muskets due out in 1 and 3 turns, first crosswbow in four turns. Metal Casting will complete next turn and then I’ll finish Castles and move on to Printing. Mercantilim has five turns left – I need seven to get my builds completed with Feudal Contract. I’ll put two turns into Diplomatic Service then finish Mercantilism and start getting out the navy.

I reposition some land units and bring the frigate at Auntie Wainwright over to Nora Batty. The Egyptian galley has appeared off the coast between Howard and Geneva, heading west. I also see that Kaiser has Mercantilism complete as he’s been putting down jungle lumbermills. Something else to keep in mind. The horseman on his borders finds an iron mine but hasn’t defogged Gordon Malloy. I’ll keep moving west, particularly since there’s a second city in the fog west of there.

Up near Hildegard there’s another phoenician frigate coming south. That seems to be a rate of one every 3-4 turns. I leave Hildegard in place to continue the count.

The plan remains to go after Isaac and Gordon Malloy. I’ll make the amphibious landing on the coast and try to take the city from the north. Once secured I’ll bring in the cavalry (literally) to assist with any counterattacks and to retake the city if I can’t hold it due to loyalty. While the cavalry is securing Isaac I’ll attempt to take Gordon Malloy. My big concern right now is that my navy is split up. If Woden’s ever-growing frigate fleet got bored of harassing Brazil and came calling I’d be hard pressed to defend. My best course of action in that regard is going to be to get some caravels out and go fleet hunting.

[suboptimal]

Turn 142

Metal Casting is complete, as is the musketman in Cleggy. Replaceable Parts’ eureka is in as well. I start Castles, overflow will get it done next turn, and queue up Printing after that. The River Avon, over by my fogbusting sword, flooded. The swordsman knows how to swim and comes out unscathed. Howard grew in population (now size 10) and I move the citizen to the open plains for the extra production.

I’ve got a diplomatic mission request from Canada and a trade deal from Ichabod. I decline the delegation and see what Ichabod wants. Military alliance. Hmmm...how’s that work again? TO THE WIKI (play original Batman TV action score here). OK...it’s +5 CS vs. people we’re at war against, no shared view. The issue here is that if I declare an alliance I’ll be at war with Woden and I don’t want that yet.

I’m four turns to Mercenaries. Six turns to the factory, 4-5 turns after that to the coal plant. One I’m there, to paraphrase Potato McWhiskey’s Byzantium game, “Sea Dog printer go BRRRRRRR”. The city should be able to two-turn caravels and sea dogs with Press Gangs. I start out by repairing the second mine and checking production rates. That takes the factory down to five turns. I start the factory build.

With 10 turns to the factory and an estimated 74 per turn once the coal plant completes I can get out two caravels or sea dogs and then feel a little more comfortable going to war. Compo and Foggy can spend five turns getting out caravels of their own. I want to be in a position that when I declare on Kaiser I can send my navy to go hunt down Woden’s and have a reasonable shot at success. My coastal focus is such that if Woden comes calling and I can’t hold him off (or I lose the naval battle badly) my game is over. (Ichabod, if you’re wondering why I delayed, that’s it right there). I’d send Ichabod a 15-for-15 iron deal but he’s only got 12 iron. I send him 15 iron gratis and hopefully he gets the gist. He’s down to 383 military though so I don’t know if he’d be able to hold out that long.

I’ve realized that five muskets, 2-3 crossbows, four knights and 2-3 coursers with two great generals in tow is almost as large as Kaiser’s entire military. There’s no need for more. I upgrade the sword at Cleggy and move the musketman out to sea – it’ll go to Howard and regroup on land for the time being. I have to wait five turns then I’ll upgrade the quadrireme at Nora Batty and naval upgrades are complete. El Cid should be mine next turn. I’m going to complete Mercantilism in 4 turns on schedule and exchange Triangular Trade and Merchant Confederation for Feudal Contract and Diplomatic League. I’ll put turns into Diplomatic Service and then complete Divine Right as Cleggy’s coal plant completes, using that to slot in Press Gangs for Professional Army. Once Foggy completes its crossbow (3 turns) it’ll start work on the Intelligence Agency while waiting for Cleggy. Compo will put turns into its factory.

Reposition land units and constructors; realized that I need to wait for Siege Tactics before I can start putting down forts. That’s OK, I’ve got a repairman now. I put it to sleep on its current tile as there’s nothing to repair or chop right now. Naval ships all stand pat except for the caravel watching Egypt’s coast. I send that NE to get away from the coast. Going to let Kaiser’s galley here pass by unmolested. I expect to see a caravel at some point.

Down at pearl there may be some fireworks. Canada’s got a galley out and it’s met up with Kasier’s on the coast east of Pearl. Since Canada goes first I expect the Egyptian vessel to die (it’s under 25 damage). Elsewhere I cautiously advance the scout through the John Lamarr/Blackhawks gap. I find a spearman, chariot archer and promoted crossbow manning the front. I remain adjacent to Egypt’s borders this turn and will swing east next turn. Horseman moves west, defogs more of Gordon Malloy’s territory:




Coal and a 3-adjacency IZ. What’s notable here is that Kaiser hasn’t discovered Industrialization yet – the coal is covered by a lumbermill, not a mine. That bears watching. I pin it to remember to keep an eye on it. I advance a little further and spot nothing else interesting.

[suboptimal]

Turn 143

The turn was held for 48 hours...dunno if that was thinking time or “don’t want to play this game anymore” time. Eh, gave me some time to do a test opening or two for PBEM 20.

Castles completes, got a great person and a diplomatic notification awaiting me. One of my trade routes to Geneva completed so that’s an era score. Just need 25 more to avoid a dark age. The diplo notification is Ichabod accepting the deal. His milpower is back up to 458 (from 383) so he’s holding on for now. The great person is El Cid and he appears in Truly. I send him over to Howard. That city and Marina have completed their siege towers. Time to move some troops around.

Mustket and siege tower at Marina heads for Howard, as does Cleggy’s two and the crossbow from Compo. I upgrade the archer at Howard. The full force that will be embarking for Isaac from Howard will be two siege towers, five muskets and three crossbows, supported from sea by the frigate armada and from Marina by four knights and a couple of coursers. Speaking of which I upgrade one of the horseman at Pearl, where Kaiser’s galley did meet its doom.

Builder reposition over the coal (Smiler) and repair the mine at Cleggy. That second one will return to Truly and put down three jungle lumbermills. I send Howard’s trader to The Blues. Geneva is worth 131 and The Blues is 13.81. The difference is marginal but the route to The Blues is through completely friendly territory. Another reason is that Kaiser has put his own Amani into Geneva to hold suzerainty. I’ll lose the remaining trade route(s) once I declare war on him.

I suppose, time permitting, I could take Geneva – it’s got a Campus and Harbor with the first tier buildings and a university under construction. It’d be a bit of a nut to crack, though, as it’s defense is 64 and it has medieval walls constructed. It’d be a situation in which I’d want to use siege towers rather than trying to break the walls first. I can get four land units around it (two on each side), besiege it with a naval unit (likely the sea dog from Francis Drake) and then rotate units in and out. I’d likely want 6-7 units (pike & shot since I can produce those without resources) and a siege tower. There is a musketman around, though. I’ll need to think about this a bit more.

Knights and ships largely hold position though I move one caravel out to the eastern points at both Cleggy and Nora Batty to act as pickets. In four turns I’ll upgrade the quadrireme to finish the navy upgrades off.

Out at the Canada-Egypt front there’s a second bombard walking up to Charly Burke. It’s two tiles west of the city. My horse starts moving back for home territory. My scout reaches Bortus and finds a two chariot archers (one visible from last turn), a pike and a courser. It looks like Kaiser is keeping this area well-fortified so my initial foray into his territory shouldmay initially go unopposed. Up in the Tethys Ocean his galley has shown up but he doesn’t know I’m here – he’s 3 hexes away and my caravel’s sight is 4. I bring it down towards Geneva, staying out of his sight range for the time being.

That leaves my production queues at Howard, Marina and Truly to consider. Marina and Truly start pike & shot, Compo will follow suit next turn. They’ll form the basis of a second wave of troops (or my initial solution to the Geneva Question). Howard starts an Archaeological Museum for some and some Great Artist points and because it’s slow on the troop production.

Kaiser and Ichabod both grabbed Great Scientists on their last turn. Kaiser got Emile du Chatelet, Ichabod got Issac Newton. That puts me in the lead (for now) for Charles Darwin. Not going to get him though as I’ll be overtaken by Brazil at some point. Speaking of Great People the next general up is Ana Nzinga; she costs 240 points and her retirement ability is to grant one envoy. .

Looking around the map I see that Manaus isn’t under attack – Ichabod has repaired its walls. Sao Paolo will revolt in one turn, Recife in two. Hopefully Woden continues to retake the cities since that’ll let me know his navy is still there. He just reconquered Recife last turn so that pattern is holding. If I can get the ship printers running I’ll get a caravel down here to sneak a look at his force composition.

[suboptimal]

Turn 144

It was my intent to get some more land troops out of Compo and Foggy. However, given the planned timing of war against Kaiser and Woden I need them to start work on ships now. Compo has finished the musket and starts a caravel, Foggy will follow next turn. I keep Cleggy on building its factory since the extra great engineer points are worth it. That will complete one turn after Mercantilism. Truly switches from the pike & shot to its own Factory. I’ll build that and the coal power plant. That’ll complete in about 13 turns and give +7 to Cleggy and +10 to Foggy and Auntie Wainwright.

Down at Pearl the lighthouse will complete next turn. I move the citizen from the open plains to the 6 tile. It has a minimal effect now but next turn will get the full benefit with the housing surplus. The city also acquired the plains hill in Smiler’s second ring. The tile will remain unmined for the time being as neither city can make good use of it yet.

Land troops continue converging on Howard. The musket/crossbow force will be fully assembled there in 4-5 turns. At Marina I hold steady with the land troops for now. My trade routes to Geneva will end as soon as war is declared but I’ll be able to re-route them to Canada. Speaking of which I’ll send them a 10 iron-for iron deal on Turn 147 to give them a heads up.

The navy holds its current position except for the southern caravel. I send that one east to go recon Woden’s current force composition and should get eyes on that starting next turn. The frigate armada is going to go with the navy rather than provide land support – there’s a possible ironclad around and I’ll need that ship to deal with it. I also unlink Artemsia from the caravel – it’s going to head to Cleggy next turn and I’ll link it with the frigate armada for a heal-promote if needed. I might also just promote for +7 vs. ships. That’ll give the armada a CS of 84 when near an admiral, which should 1-shot any enemy frigate in range.

Out at Bortus it seems Kaiser is making a move:




The scout cuts east through his troops and finds a promoted musket near Kings’ NW borders. I run into a Canadian knight and a pike. Kaiser’s got about 300 milpower down here of the 750 in his score. Isaac remains empty. If not for the ship situation I’d consider starting war a bit early. It’s five turns to get from Howard to the Isaac coast, so I need to move out on...Turn 152 to be in position for Turn 157 to declare and invade on Turn 158.

Ichabod’s has jumped up to 111; he must have slotted Natural Philosophy (though he didn’t complete a civic). He’s also spent most of his and his milpower is up over 600 again. Good. There’s still fight left there. Woden remains off the Brazilian coast as he’s reconquered Sao Paolo. Recife and Sao Paolo are rebelling on alternate turns. I’ll be curious to see if he’s split his navy between the cities or is keeping them together. The former would favor me as I could hammer the Recife fleet first. In checking move distances I accidentally moved a frigate out of Cleggy; I’ll move that back next turn.

Regarding the upcoming policy change I think I’ll take out both Feudal Contract and Professional Army to put in Press Gangs and Triangular Trade. I’ll use the extra gold income while finishing Diplomatic Service (Turn 154). I’ll pay full price for the quadrireme upgrade and then slot Professional Army for the courser upgrades (taking out Press Gangs). I’ll hold Divine Right for as long as necessary as the only thing it’s preventing me from gaining is two governments that I don’t plan to use.

One other thing I’ll need to sort out is amenities. I’ll be losing eight of them once war is declared since I’ve got a trade deal with Woden right now. I have no resource trades with Ichabod but he’s got spare marble and gypsum that I could trade for.