[PB58] Tarkeel and Amicalola's rule through fear

[Old Harry]

[Amicalola]

ENDOR HAS BEEN RECLAIMED.

[Tarkeel]

Turn 189 (1290 AD)

We knew that AT's ships would be our main cause for worry, and he'd prepared well last turn. His inner sea fleet was the only tile out of vision for us, where he'd upgraded the GG trireme to a frigate and the galley to a galleon, which together took out our galley defenders while remaining just out of range of a counter attack. AT has been productive in his defense too:


The melee stack moved east into Vaarsuvius, which won't fall this turn, where they also threaten to retake MitD. Removing MitD and Endor will leave AT with the island of Miko as the only inner sea port. Onto the action...

Battle of MitD:
C1 Pinch Cuirassier vs C1 Pikeman, 25.1% + 11.2%: Loss
C1 Pinch Cuirassier vs CG1 Musketman, 32.6% + 10.1%: Win!
C1 Cuirassier vs Longbow, 63.8% + 5.4%: Win! (and heal after)
C1 Shock Cuirassier vs C1 Pikeman (0.9), 99.9%: Win!
Sentry Chariot vs Scout, 99.6%:
MitD comes with 140 gold, forge and granary, but we burn it to the ground and delete the chariot. The cuirassiers link up and promote.

The Real Battle of Endor:
B2 Catapult vs CG1 Musketman, 0.1%: Loss
B2 Catapult vs CG1 Musketman, 0.1%: Loss
B2 Catapult vs CG1 Musketman, 0.1%: Loss
The first three catapults didn't dent the musket, sp I had the (belated) idea of denting it with a cuir for better odds.
C2 Cuirassier vs CG1 Musketman, 36.0% + 9.6%: Withdraw!
B1 Catapult vs C1 Praetorian, 0.1: Loss
B1 Catapult vs C1 Praetorian, 0.1: Loss
B1 Catapult vs C1 Praetorian, 0.1: Loss
B1 Catapult vs C1 Praetorian, 0.1: Loss
B1 Catapult vs C1 Praetorian, 0.1: Loss
We still have another catapult, but we're running out of targets for collateral, so send in the big guns.
C1 Shock Cuirassier vs C1 Praetorian (7.1), 74.5% + 3.8%: Win!
C1 Shock Cuirassier vs CG1 Crossbow (4.6), 90.9% + 1.4%: Win!
C1 Shock Cuirassier vs C1 Praetorian (5.7), 90.9% + 1.4%: Win!
C1 Shock Cuirassier vs CG1 Longbow (4.0), 91.1% + 1.3%: Win!
C1 Shock Cuirassier vs C1 Praetorian (5.4), 92.3% + 1.2%: Win!
C2 Cuirassier vs C1 Maceman (6.3), 90.5% + 1.4%: Win!
C1 Pinch Cuirassier vs Praetorian (5.6): 88.8% + 1.7%: Win!
Phew, they all made it! Time for the slower hitters:
C1 Musketman vs C1 Maceman (4.8), 72.2%: Win!
C1 Musketman vs C1 Axeman (4.3), 76.5%: Win!
C1 Musketman vs C1 Axeman (3.7), 92.3%: Win!
G1 Musketman vs C1 Pikeman (3.3), 96.3%: Win!
Our last catapult actually gets good odds now, so we use it:
B1 Catapult vs Spearman (2.8), 66.2%; Withdraw!
C1 Shock Ballistaphant vs C1 Spearman (2.9), 89.1%: Win!
C1 Shock Ballistaphant vs D1 Catapult, 96.2%: Win!
C1 Shock Ballistaphant vs CG1 Archer, 97.2%: Win!
C1 Shock Ballistaphant vs Catapult, 96.8%: Win!
C2 Ballistaphant vs Catapult, 99%: Win!
C2 Ballistaphant vs C1 Spearman (1.0), 99%: Win!
Ballistaphant vs CG1 Musketman (0.4), 99.9%: Win!
Endor comes with 155g, a granary, lighthouse and courthouse, but AT has held it for too long for liberation to kick in. We spend the capture gold on upgrading the GuerillaII musket to a rifle to ward off any surprises, and move up the super medic.

The Siege of Thog:
We spend the turn bombarding, with three of the catapults promoted to accuracy.

The First Battle of Nale
C2 Shock Cuirassier vs C1 Maceman, 65.9% + 5.1%: Win!
C1 Shock Cuirassier vs Praetorian, 64.3% + 5.4%: Win!
C2 Cuirassier vs Knight, 88.9% + 1.7%: Win!
C2 Cuirassier vs Knight, 88.9% + 1.7%: Win!
C2 Cuirassier vs Knight, 88.9% + 1.7%: Win!
Cuirassier vs Catapult, 99.6%: Win!
Cuirassier vs Catapult, 99.6%: Win!
Cuirassier vs Catapult, 99.6%: Win!
Cuirassier vs Chariot, 99.9%: Win!
Cuirassier vs Chariot, 99.9%: Win!
Nale comes with 180g, a market and courthouse. We don't expect to keep it so we don't try to defend too hard.

I can't fathom how lucky we have been with combat this turn, the only meaningful loss was the first cuir on MitD. We did mostly take good odds, but still we'd expect to lose some here and there to random bad luck.



Looking forward it's obvious that we need both Astronomy and Chemistry badly. I think our win condition on this map will be to lock in Statue of Liberty, but Superdeath seems to be the only real contender for that. Nobody else has Constitution yet; Jowy and AT doesn't even have Nationalism. It should be safe to delay Democracy for a few turns, but we've had a look at where to build it.


The best choice seems to be Kessel, which is actually turning into a production center again, especially if we give it all five plains watermills. It will start building a Hindu Mandir for the extra monk bonus.

Lastly, with Ruff being eliminated we renamed his city to Haven:

(Yes, it should technically be Rendezvous Point but Haven just sounds more fitting.)

[Amicalola]

Endor was a case that really proved the worth of Vodka. It seemed very well defended, and before I ran through a sim, we weren’t planning on attacking at all! Just bombarding. However, the sim showed that even with normal luck we’d get a very good result, and capture next turn. That we didn’t lose a single non-catapult and took it this turn was icing on the cake.

It was also very nice to have constant discussion and back-and-forth, during war turns especially. For example, I simmed and argued for attacking Endor this turn, and then tarkeel found a few nice plays once we’d decided (e.g. cuir weakening musket, saving a cat) that further increased our odds. Felt like great teamwork. I think this turn has just put me in a really good mood.

[Tarkeel]

Turn 190 (1300 AD)
AT retook Nale as expected, but we killed two catapults on the defense, and the other four was sacrificed into our stack. You might ask why we took the city in the first place? This was something we discussed at length; at first our main goal was to kill as many defenders as possible, but when we saw that we could take the city we decided to deny the production to AT. As for why not just raze, then we'd find ourself in a settler race with Jowy which he'd have the advantage in. We promote the lone ballistaphant to a medic and heal up for a round.

The Battle of Thog:
Thog still has 10% culture defense left, so we bombard before charging in:
CR2 Trebuchet vs Longbow, 55.2%: Withdraw!
CR2 Catapult vs C1 Maceman, 5.6%: Loss
CR2 Catapult vs C1 Praetorian (7.4), 13.1%: Loss
B1 Catapult vs C1 Praetorian (6.8), 7%: Withdraw!
B1 Catapult vs C1 Maceman (5.4), 22.5%: Loss
B1 Catapult vs C1 Praetorian (5.3), 44.7%: Withdraw!
B1 Catapult vs C1 Maceman (5.4), 46.2%: Loss
C1 Shock Cuirassier vs Pikeman (3.3), 97.5% + 0.4%: Win!
C1 Shock Ballistaphant vs Pikeman (3.3), 87.4%: (flawless) Loss
C1 Shock Ballistaphant vs Pikeman (3.3), 87.4%: Win!
C1 Shock Ballistaphant vs C1 Maceman (4.6), 94%: Win!
Ballistaphant vs C1 Praetorian (3.8), 86.7%: Win!
C1 Musketman vs D1 Catapult, 98.9%: Win!
C1 Musketman vs C1 Maceman (3.4), 97.4%: Win!
C1 Chariot vs Longbow (1.5), 87.1% + 1.3%: Loss
Crossbow vs C1 Praetorian (2.0), 99.9%: Win!
Musketman vs C1 Praetorian (2.0, 99.9%: Win!
Cuirassier vs Longbow (0.6), 99.9%: Win!
Thog comes with 140g, granary, forge and courthouse. We decide to keep it even if it's suboptimally placed.



The marauders that burned MitD trek eastwards where they can join up with forces from Endor. A sentry reveals that Durkon is ripe for the taking!


(We forgot to grab a picture of the garrison in Vaarsuvius, but it's brimming with bodies, mostly obsolete melee units but also some horses.)

Coruscant birthed another great engineer, which is great. It gives us some backup coverage for the Statue of Liberty, and most importantly it wasn't the high odds priest. Main plan is to save it for a three-person golden age later on.

[Tarkeel]

Turn 191 (1310 AD)
Our turn of dumping espionage into AT paid off as we now have full vision of all his cities. The western front looks like this:


We probably could break through on Nale this turn with heavy losses, but we have something else in mind. City visibility reveals that Redcloak and Elan can be threatened effectively from the hill two south of the stack; we move some muskets to block those bodies from entering Nale. The advance stack can heal up this turn and then head south under musket cover, while the siege stack from Thog is healing in Rahital and can put the pressure on Nale next. This should give AT quite the dilemma on where to commit his defenders. So far he's been whipping muskets heavily, allowing us to focus all new units on pinch. I think longbows would actually be better defenders against cuirassiers, especially in hilly cities, as they are cheaper and don't get a promotion against them. A mixed stack is also harder to promote effectively against.



In the east he'll be able to squeeze enough bodies into Durkon for the marauders to take it, but the main Endor stack isn't far behind. The marauders can either link up with the main stack or pressure further south.

By my calculations, we've killed 2600 hammers worth of units (and wrecked some cities) at the cost of 1240 hammers, half of which are suicide catapults. We're running low on catapults again though, so we're likely to get Steel for cannons after Astronomy finishes in two turns. Superdeath is going for SteamPower, so it looks like we won't have too much competition for the statue. Losing the Colossus commerce will hurt though.

[Tarkeel]

Turn 192 (1320 AD)
We open the turn to this cryptic message from Jowy:


We think Dantooine means SD and CloudCity means MrC, but is he warning us against them or trying to get us to ally against them? We've been buttering up to SD in particular lately, so this doesn't interest us very much.


The marauding force drew attention from AT, who charged into it at great cost. I didn't check the odds, but I think we got pretty lucky there, killing 4 knights, a musket, pike and longbow at the cost of only 2 cuirs.


They promptly linked up with the Endor force, and the medic general is on the scene to speed their recovery. Next turn we're in a position to threaten taking Durkon with the advance party, but most likely we'll need to wait another turn.


In the west we press on against Redcloak. If he moves in the ambush stack from the desert and promotes all muskets to CG1, we still have odds on taking the city, but we can also pressure Elan. Our main fear is a sally from the garrison at Vaarsuvius, so we cover the siege of Nale well.

[Mjmd]

I just want to thank you for the in depth reporting and pictures. Also, I've loved all the star wars stuff.

[Amicalola]

I just want to thank you for the in depth reporting and pictures. Also, I've loved all the star wars stuff.

This feels like it would be an interesting game to lurk, with multiple frontrunners and contenders throughout. Glad you're enjoying the reports! One reason I've tried to avoid making many.

[Tarkeel]

I just want to thank you for the in depth reporting and pictures. Also, I've loved all the star wars stuff.

Thank you, I try to aim for what I'd like to read if I were lurking, as well as documenting any major decisions so I can see where I went wrong. As usual, if there's something you'd like to see more of just ask, but it can be tricky to do that in a war situation.

Since I decided to go for a cliche naming scheme as Star Wars, I thought it best to kick it up a notch :P