[SPOILERS] Woden and ljubljana like boats

[Woden]

No boost to trade routes.

[ljubljana]

Turn 144 - Phoenicia

Well, we finally got one:



This was a very close-run thing, and wouldn't have happened if it was in shallow water or had a flanking bonus (we were not close to it before I killed the other ships), and we might have highrolled too, I'm not sure. But I'll take it! I didn't catch the exact numbers, but it was something like 55 + 7 (Embolon) + 5 (alliance) + 5 (Twilight Valor) + 5 (GA) + 2 (flanking) - 4ish (wounded unit) = 75 vs. the 45 base strength of a frigate, so not ridiculously long odds to one-shot, wild though it is for that to happen between two ships from the same era.

Anyways, we got one caravel and three frigates down here in total. My other frigates by Jobs for the Boys were out of range, but they moved up after this into the following final deploy:



Big decision next turn with the southern fleet - east to Fort Lakton or NW to Kaiser's capital? Given the age disparity and the shape of the land here, with only two other Kaiser cities within 9 tiles, I imagine you should be able to hold the latter. Fort Miln is an option too, but I think it's a somewhat inferior one, since we would have to sail all the way around that peninsula to get at it and then back around for the capital. The answer may depend on what CMF does with his caravels, perversely enough...if they block us at Fort Lakton, we will only have one tile from which to hit it on this side and virtually no chance of making progress...

Two pieces of information relevant to our decision:



Fort Lakton is not in flip range yet, with a governor certain to appear here next turn to add the buffer Kaiser needs. But it will be once you take Open Government. If we want to conquer Kaiser as quickly as we possibly can, which we probably do, maybe we should just leave the cities that will flip to us eventually (this one and the inland fogged city to the NW) alone for now and avoid wasting time on them.



CMF's DoF with Kaiser is recent, signed between his DoW on Akkad and his razing of them, so we shouldn't have to worry about him sniping any Japanese cities. Time is still of the essence, though - we not only need to conquer Japan and the rest of England in the next 23 turns, we also need our navy to not be totally out of position with respect to our cities before war breaks out, which probably means on the east side of our home island. With that in mind, I think I'm leaning towards hitting his capital next, but I can be swayed either way.

We should also consider offering Kaiser peace in 15 turns or so when TAD is dead and he is down to his island cities. It may not actually be worth our time to around and siege them all down with the war deadline looming vs. CMF. Maybe he will take it and be content to play in his sandbox for a while, since he may not have the same degree of personal vendetta against us that TAD does.

In the north, I broke a rule of mine...



...and promoted this ship Rolling Barrage to give us at least one boat that gets good odds against TAD's capital. It will probably get to level 3 before the CMF war anyways, so I think it's okay. The rest are all getting Bombardment and Line of Battle, though, to give us the best odds possible against CMF. Well, other than the Ark Royal (the half-health frigate in the south), which I promoted before I realized how crucial LoB was, but it will hit level 3 very soon too and resolve that issue.

With Kaiser's southern fleet gone, I decided I could afford some offense here and killed Kaiser's wounded caravel and the exposed TAD frigate. If they coordinate, they could get one of my frigates next turn, but it would cost two of theirs to do so, which is fine by me.

China update:



Borna Barasic is gone, and roland is in some trouble in the NW with a trapped frigate at Mitla and in the E with Steve Davis rapidly losing health. But here is something good for us - CMF did have to raze BB, and that's probably not the only city for which that will be true. China also has a lot of inland cities that will be tough to deal with unless there are ground troops behind this - Connor Goldson and Glen Kamara are impregnable to naval attack, and the capital is pretty sheltered as well and will have medieval walls soon. Roland might hold out for some time here and force a bunch of city razes by CMF, which would be great for us since we are getting fully-developed cities in our war. It's a little less rosy with suboptimal given his dark age and CMF's golden age, but I think he has a fair few inland cities too that are blocked off from naval attack by the northern ice. These early conquests were always going to be fast, but I have some small hope that sub/roland will make CMF take his time here and prevent him from snowballing too quickly (or, uh, too much more quickly than he is already doing without any free cities )

Domestic update:



War weariness is really killing me here, and I offer suboptimal two of my extra luxuries for their only copy of one of theirs to try to do something about it. But I'm not sure this will really be fixed until TAD and Kaiser are no more...

I do get a super-TR in Demotic, and got one in Linear A too last turn. Demotic starts an aqueduct for Nsibidi's IZ, and because it's the Pingala city and is housing-capped lol. I might want to buy Nsibidi's lighthouse before any libraries, as its build queue is super clogged with aqueduct - +6 IZ - workshop all required after this caravel. I am also planning to start a questionable build next turn, a 17-turn shipyard in Geneva that will be worth something like 12 hammers when it completes - is that okay with you? I could also just buy it to make sure it pays for itself in ships before the war breaks out, but that costs gold that we don't really have (since I need to save the 750 I currently have for frigate upgrades). IMO it is worth too many hammers to just not build at all, but what do you think?

[ljubljana]

One more thing - ignore everything I said above about what infrastructure we should and should not consider buying. I think the one true use of our gold going forward, other than upgrades, is probably to buy factories and coal plants when Industrialization comes in. We won't have time to build them before we need to confront CMF otherwise, and they will be a significant accelerant to our naval building speed. They will not be cheap at 1320 gold per factory, but it may be the best way to convert our gold into more ships by the time we have to fight CMF, especially for you since you will get the tech well in advance of when you have to fight him. Similarly, once we find out where it is, I think you should go for Industrialization before Steam Power to find and hook up coal and perhaps get some factories online.

[Woden]

I think Fort Miln is probably the best next target. It is a little out of the way but could give me a city to buy a few berserkers in to help take his capital. Otherwise, hit his capital and remove the walls. It would be a bit before we take it as it has lots of juicy pillages that I will need to take before the city falls. If you go for the capital, the plan would be for you to take the walls out, then back off and I will pillage it for a few turns, then you come back with my caravel in position and help remove the health. While you are taking the walls down, my boats can pillage around Fort Miln and then we switch cities after the walls are down.

For your happiness, Harden's Grove has a second dyes I can buy and hook up next turn and will send it too you. It also has incense available that I can buy and give you. I don't think my happiness is too bad right now.

[Woden]

One more thing - ignore everything I said above about what infrastructure we should and should not consider buying. I think the one true use of our gold going forward, other than upgrades, is to buy factories and coal plants when Industrialization comes in. We won't have time to build them before we need to confront CMF otherwise, and they will be a significant accelerant to our naval building speed. They will not be cheap at 1320 gold per factory, but it may be the best way to convert our gold into more ships by the time we have to fight CMF, especially for you since you will get the tech well in advance of when you have to fight him. Similarly, once we find out where it is, I think you should go for Industrialization before Steam Power to find and hook up coal and perhaps get some factories online.

You are going to need science, so I suggest at least buying libraries.

[ljubljana]

I think I already have a dye under Nsibidi (though maybe I'm misremembering). The incense would be nice, though, although I'm not 100% sure it's worth buying a tile, since it probably won't buy me that many more turns of full production at the capital...really this isn't going to be resolved until we kill TAD and Kaiser. Could be a good stopgap though, IDK, whatever you think is best.

Agreed about Fort Miln and the capital being next. I think I should take out the capital's walls and health first just for logistical reasons, and then leave one frigate behind (probably the half-health Rolling Barrage one) to keep the health down while you pillage. I really don't want to have to sail my boats all the way down and around the peninsula to Fort Miln and then double back later. We will definitely need those 4 or so extra turns of travel time to reposition for CMF. I guess it depends on where CMF sends his caravels though - if he picks a city and blocks off the naval approaches there will be almost nothing we can do to stop him .

Okay, I can buy libraries at least - I only have two places to put them anyways . I guess you don't really need two factories either - I think the one at your capital covers all but one of the cities you'd get by buying both. But I do think that one could be a good use of gold for you, especially since that IZ has a decent adjacency bonus.

[ljubljana]

WAIT I just realized TAD's cities are healing at the beginning of the round, aren't they, not during his turn! So that's why you were able to take Economy Drive before I thought you'd be able to. Wow, that's not how I would have designed this system, but it works out pretty well for us since it does mean I can hit cities and you can take them without them healing in between our turns.

edit: I forgot Industrialization gives +1 hammer to all our mines! That is a pretty big deal, especially now that we are conquering TAD's mines as well (and presumably will have Monumentality builders to start repairing them soon) and is all the more reason to head there asap.

edit2: Random info about the era length: China is in the industrial age already via civic progress. CMF and you will be there within 20 turns, and hopefully with a dedicated beeline and bought libraries/unis I can get there in 30. That means the Renaissance will most likely last the same 40 turns as the previous two eras, unless China doesn't survive that long.

edit3: This is for future me as much as for you - my ships can't reach the next Kaiser target next turn, as they are just slightly out of range of both the capital and Fort Miln. But what I can do is fork both cities so CMF doesn't know which one to block. I think if he heads for the capital, I will conspicuously head in the direction of Fort Miln next turn while carefully remaining in range of the capital in hopes of drawing his ships away on his turn. If that is successful, I will then wheel around and go for the capital instead on the following turn. But yeah, the first thing I need to do when I open the save is scout with my caravels to see where CMF's ships went, and future me would do well to not forget to do this...

edit4: I will also have a badly wounded frigate up north next turn, which TAD will hit with both his capital and the crossbow. I think I will fix this by farming experience on the crossbow for a few turns, then promoting it. Not sure what the next target up north should be, but whatever it is will have to wait until the Official Visit frigates make it up there at least, if not the next wave that I will be upgrading once Mercantilism comes in. The capital still looks like a horrible, grinding slog, even though the frigate there is mercifully gone now, so I may go for Big Brother next for frigate XP and to buy time for the next wave to catch up.

edit5: Oh yeah, we gotta not let each other forget to build our spies before the war starts. If it takes 7 turns to get them to a CMF city, we need to have them finished by 160, which means I need to start mine in Cuneiform on like t155, which is right after my workshop! I will add it to the production queue next turn just so I don't forget. I will also slot in Machiavellianism at the next policy swap just to boost this build. My alliance will expire 10t before war can be declared, so CMF and I will have time to move our spies into each other's cities, so I need to be proactive about doing so. Please don't let me forget to do this because I am super afraid that I will and I definitely need both spies in Russian cities by t167 (assuming I can have multiple Listening Post missions active at once, which I can do, right?). I also have to check again to see if CMF is running any TRs to my cities - I don't believe he is, and it's too late if he's just starting now, but it's worth making sure. I really should have run my cash TRs to CMF rather than to China and am totally kicking myself for not doing so 40 turns ago, by the way - at the time we needed all the cash we could get to fend off TAD, but three trading posts in Russian cities would totally win this game for us right now...

[Woden]

Please don't let me forget to do this because I am super afraid that I will and I definitely need both spies in Russian cities by t167 (assuming I can have multiple Listening Post missions active at once, which I can do, right?). 

Multiple Listening Post missions don't stack diplomatic visibility, only only get 1 additional level (2 with a master spy). But, sometimes it is nice to have 2 running, especially if they run offset. I used multiple spies doing the Listen Post mission against Ichabod in PBEM18 so I could move one if I was going to nuke a city or when I captured the city, I wouldn't lose the bonus. If they start on different turns, you also don't lose the bonus the turn it ends (might not matter to you since you are Player 1). It can also be useful with scouting out cities, move a spy ahead of an attack and once that one is settled, move your other one to the next location.

[ljubljana]

Ok, that makes sense. It could also be nice to have an extra spy available to knock out Victor in case CMF has too many promotions on him (or to knock out Victor in Kaiser's cities so they will flip faster). But is all that worth the production I would have to sink into the spy unit? I am not sure...it will cost 150 base hammers ~= 1.5 caravels, which is pretty significant, and it doesn't help against CMF's navy which is what will decide this game. I will add one to the queue at Cuneiform, but I could go either way on this and am not sure I will actually build it. You definitely should make one though ofc.

Question for you - do we actually want war with CMF in 25 turns, or is it just inevitable? If it were up to us, do you think we want to fight him ASAP or catch up on infra and consolidate our gains first? Attacking ASAP has two big advantages, one being that he might still be bogged down in China/Indonesia and the other being that he might not have hit Nationalism/Steel yet. But I actually do think we might be able to outbuild him long-term if we manage to put off fighting for long enough to get campuses and IZs everywhere. I know he is probably coming for us as soon as he can regardless of what we want, but I'm not certain he will do so, especially if he has not wrapped up the war with China. We should probably decide soonish whether we want to pursue incremental DoFs with them in the hopes of catching up on infra first or just commit to an attack on t167 and go all-in on ships, which has implications for questions like whether or not I start my 17-turn, +12ish shipyard in Geneva next turn lol.

[Woden]

Question for you - do we actually want war with CMF in 25 turns, or is it just inevitable? If it were up to us, do you think we want to fight him ASAP or catch up on infra and consolidate our gains first? Attacking ASAP has two big advantages, one being that he might still be bogged down in China/Indonesia and the other being that he might not have hit Nationalism/Steel yet. But I actually do think we might be able to outbuild him long-term if we manage to put off fighting for long enough to get campuses and IZs everywhere. I know he is probably coming for us as soon as he can regardless of what we want, but I'm not certain he will do so, especially if he has not wrapped up the war with China. We should probably decide soonish whether we want to pursue incremental DoFs with them in the hopes of catching up on infra first or just commit to an attack on t167 and go all-in on ships.

We will let him declare on us. We don't want to give Australia +100% production for 10 turns. We build up our navies, prepare for war, and continue to build until he declares war. I think Ichabod is going to take over since I don't think we have heard otherwise. I am not sure if he will declare as soon as he can or wait until they finish off China/Indonesia. 

I am not sure if DoFs are the best option right now. Better to have flexibility (e.g. CMF's ships blocking). IMO, we don't sign anymore DoFs. We can plan and be ready for war in 20 or so turns.