[59] Miguelito and Rusten move stacks to berimbau rythms

[Miguelito]

I'll be away until sunday evening I think. Only had tine to glance at your post, but I will quickly add that we can draft macemen before gunpowder.

Btw yes I was aware of drafting macemen, I just don't think it helps a whole lot. With maces we counter his pikes, but he can just get (Pro) crossbows, and would still have to chew through castle defenses. The beauty of muskets would be to ignore those, and that he should have no real counter.

Regarding that corner of the world, I don't know yet how to explain this:


This is equivalent to the civac/Elkad border area on our continent. But where does a third party come from? Maybe this is a coppercorn island that Amica grabbed coming from the north/northeast?

Ok, this is a bit embarassing. I totally lost track of whose position corresponds to whom on our continent. Actually it's Commodore = civac, Tarkeel = Elkad and superdeath = us. Which means that those islands that I was wondering about are the copies of our own ones ! So probably Amicalola = Mjmd. I realized this only after moving the WB this turn, so lost another turn moving south. Will go back to moving eastwards next turn.




Last turn of the GA has us revolting. I must admit that I can't remember ever seeing somebody using pacifism outside a GA. But I'm following Rusten's idea here; not solely because I'm his mindless drone, it also feels fresh and interesting. I'm a bit worried that taking 1g cost per unit when we are building up for a war sounds like little sense, but I guess we'll be ok. Fwiw our total costs did not change at all due to the revolt. Even if we add some 50-70 units soon we could stomach that. Also F2, if I'm reading it correctly, shows 17 "free"  units exempt from the pacifism cost; is this related to vassalage somehow? I think we're paying just for 21 units right now. Fake edit: I logged in for the screencap.


I think after the next GA we'll want theocracy, in particular for drafts. Btw Corta Cana got a (useless) Tao spread right away. It is no annoyance either, since Charriu modded failing missionaries away (at least for our own cities)




During the GA I left a couple units near finished while waiting for vassalage. Not very many, I think <10, as most cities were still busy with infra, or are slowly prebuilding HAs (islands in particular).

[Rusten]

More time and bigger post later tonight, but yes, DZ looks like he'll be very prickly*. As much as I wanted to befriend Elkad this game he is such a natural target.

*But not much to fear in terms of him attacking us.

[Rusten]

We should probably head directly towards Nationalism -- the safer route. If we somehow miss the Taj we can get a merchant/engineer in CC after the scientist.

While the other continent is really weak I don't think this is the time to invade. One of Elkad/DZ should do. Sadly (for Elkad) it looks to make the most sense to kill Elkad with knights and then DZ with musketeers (and cannons if needed). I really did hope to be friends with him for most (if not all) of the game, but DZ is going full turtle mode. Most of Elkad's nearby cities are on flatland -- it's conceivable that we can rush those down before he reaches engineering.

I'm considering logging back in to change Bonfim to a monastery -- I think in that particular city it will be worth it. It has 66 base commerce and growing. We're only finishing a HA there right now -- could just let that turn into a knight instead.

[Miguelito]

We should probably head directly towards Nationalism -- the safer route. If we somehow miss the Taj we can get a merchant/engineer in CC after the scientist.

While the other continent is really weak I don't think this is the time to invade. One of Elkad/DZ should do. Sadly (for Elkad) it looks to make the most sense to kill Elkad with knights and then DZ with musketeers (and cannons if needed). I really did hope to be friends with him for most (if not all) of the game, but DZ is going full turtle mode. Most of Elkad's nearby cities are on flatland -- it's conceivable that we can rush those down before he reaches engineering.

I'm considering logging back in to change Bonfim to a monastery -- I think in that particular city it will be worth it. It has 66 base commerce and growing. We're only finishing a HA there right now -- could just let that turn into a knight instead.

I also think direct Nat, as the GS will likely take too long. It might also be that Cornflakes is going for Lib (into Nat) with Pericles bulbs. Does not mean that bulbing Edu has to be off the table. As I said, I think economics is an important milestone on this map.


I really don't like attacking Elkad, but I may have to come to terms with it. Reasons:

• Lots of culture to wade through. Any city has 3rd ring at least
  
• Widely spaced out dotmap. On the one hand I consider those cities impractical (even with Cre, which likely was his motivation). I guess we could burn 1-2 and refound 2 for each to get some overlap, but that takes away from the conquest. On the other hand it reinforces the first point - we'd have to march the long ways between the cities, through his culture
  
• As we said numerous times, it is a very safe border as is.
  
• We already made inroads into Dono with the Filho de Ogum plant, although it is expandable in the grand scheme of course.
  
• I very sillily renewed our fish/fish just recently . Bear with me. I would feel bad for it, but if we conclude it's our only way to get ahead I'd have to stretch my morals.
  

I shied away from monastery in Bonfim because of a feeling of having to concentrate on the war effort. The HA should maybe be changed to a catapult though, to upgrade to a knight later. In particular if we end up going for Dono we hardly can have enough cats. But I agree that monasteries are worthwhile there.
Also we have 3 Tao cities already, before the missionary. Maybe we'll convert to it in the end, in particular if we don't conquer Dono early.

[Rusten]

After thinking about it some more I think we can still attack DZ first. On my phone RN so I'll post some thoughts, log in and read your post more carefully when I'm back on my PC.

[Rusten]

Elkad offered back fish for fish when I logged in, so I guess that's another reason not to attack him. I pressed cancel, IDK if you want it to show up or not -- if you do you can reoffer.

I changed Bonfim to catapult temporarily.

DZ has:
Only 11 cities, many of which are marginal (island or size 2-4). Periphery is also on flatlands, except for the closest one which we can take on the first turn with (hopefully) just archers in it.
He currently has just walls and some archers -- bad power rating.
An abysmal crop yield.
He still doesn't have neither feudalism nor engineering. If he builds castles he won't have pikes in time and vice versa.

We are only ~3 turns away from guilds with HAs in queue. Our first wave of attacks should not face both pikes and citadels. I think our speed is quick enough to hit him so hard that his production will be cut to almost nothing. We can capture and keep the periphery, perhaps even making a move towards the capital and then finish him off with musketeers if we come to a halt.

New tech path: Guilds-gunpowder-CS-Nat
While drafting musketeers is far superior to whipping them we can do some whipping to start with. Can't really get too many of them.

Overall I think my vote is to hit DZ and see to which extend he folds. If he stands tall we can delay for musketeers, but if he's hit to the point where we can just brute force it that's an option. It will be hard for him to get both pikes and citadels up in time. His production is weak and it takes time, even with protective.

Bonus: Pikes should be the top defender vs catapults until he gets longbows unless I'm forgetting something. They'll be easier to wear down with catapults, even behind walls.

Alternatively (which I will ponder today): We hit civac immediately before he can recover his economy. But my initial thought is it just leaves us too vulnerable. I think we need to clear a path first.

[Miguelito]

Elkad offered back fish for fish when I logged in, so I guess that's another reason not to attack him. I pressed cancel, IDK if you want it to show up or not -- if you do you can reoffer.

I don't in fact if Donovan is monitoring our diplo very closely he might even conclude that we're falling out?

I changed Bonfim to catapult temporarily.

thanks.

DZ has:
Only 11 cities, many of which are marginal (island or size 2-4). Periphery is also on flatlands, except for the closest one which we can take on the first turn with (hopefully) just archers in it.
He currently has just walls and some archers -- bad power rating.
An abysmal crop yield.
He still doesn't have neither feudalism nor engineering. If he builds castles he won't have pikes in time and vice versa.

We are only ~3 turns away from guilds with HAs in queue. Our first wave of attacks should not face both pikes and citadels. I think our speed is quick enough to hit him so hard that his production will be cut to almost nothing. We can capture and keep the periphery, perhaps even making a move towards the capital and then finish him off with musketeers if we come to a halt.

New tech path: Guilds-gunpowder-CS-Nat
While drafting musketeers is far superior to whipping them we can do some whipping to start with. Can't really get too many of them.

Overall I think my vote is to hit DZ and see to which extend he folds. If he stands tall we can delay for musketeers, but if he's hit to the point where we can just brute force it that's an option. It will be hard for him to get both pikes and citadels up in time. His production is weak and it takes time, even with protective.

Bonus: Pikes should be the top defender vs catapults until he gets longbows unless I'm forgetting something. They'll be easier to wear down with catapults, even behind walls.

Alternatively (which I will ponder today): We hit civac immediately before he can recover his economy. But my initial thought is it just leaves us too vulnerable. I think we need to clear a path first.

I like the sound of it. In part surely because I really want it to be true, but it is also my rough idea how this can work - attack with overwhelming superiority while he's still building up defenses, then if need be counter his strategy with musketeers.

One thing though, I don't see a way to 0-turn his border city (from the fog that is), not even if he let us road that border hill.



sure!
He arrived in the SW, same direction as Cornflakes a couple turns ago.

For lack of anything happening, let's see stats:












Overall we're surely doing more than fine. TBS is in a GA, so we're actually* world top MfG. I would feel splendid - and far less anxious about the need to expand - if we did not have Mr. First Successful Conquest with world top CY on our continent. During the GA we have managed to follow his numbers, but that will collapse soon enough. Elkad and Donovan both have achieved respectable GNP spikes, and Donovan's GA MfG doesn't look so bad either. He's also adding some power, considering he has no engineering yet it's probably catapults.
TBS who has had to fight a lot, has been significantly increasing his city count lately (used to be 17 on t117). My theory is still that he has our newbie Joshy to his south, and is now breaking through despite Commodore's best efforts to bind his forces.
civac's vulture stack starts to lose relevance in the power graph. If he focuses on building up we might get a chance. Should we offer OB now? He will have no problems monitoring us while we're on the foreign campaign, so it might be smart to have the option to observe him.
I'm jealous because none of our awesome cities appear in top 5, damn culture whores.

* of course that is wrong. GAs are real, and in particular TBS's Mausoleum powered ones are more real than others.


3 turns to guilds. Today's discussion topics:

• I've come to the conclusion that it's smarter to get the first GS in Paranauê and the second one in Maré. It might be a bit faster (as both can cross the 300 GPP threshold on the same turn), but more importantly, Maré will not really want to start producing the next GP right away, while Paranauê definitely will. So that way it gets a headstart
  
• A couple of cities are finishing HAs. Do we want those, or should we put other stuff in queue while waiting for guilds.
  
• In Canoa I want to whip the trireme next turn for 2 pop, OF into an HA who will become a knight. Same in Madeira Boa?
  
• We need culture in Filho de Ogúm (Donovan colony) . Monument? A missionary from Paraná could do but I'd rather that city built military...
  
• Lurkers, of course I don't know the details of the multiway turnsplit between TBS, Comm, sd and company, but maybe it could be arranged to flip the turn order in one or 2 wars, so we get just two seperated block? Maybe it can be done when a war is not hot for a moment.
  

[Rusten]

A little pressed for time RN, I'll check in again tonight.

Mjmd offered fish for fish.
I sped up the Paranaue missionary by a turn, after which the capital can run more specialists (engineer minimum)

edit: I think Madeira Boa should just 3-pop the knight and nothing else. The trireme is not very needed I think, but if you want the trireme and plan 2x 2-pop that's fine by me too.
One cheeky use for the trireme would be to take Civac's pig island and then offer peace, but that might be getting too cute.

[Rusten]

With our new tech path I'm also inclined to change Paranaue from just 2 scientists to 2 scientists +1 engineer. Getting 2x GS is not so important anymore. We can afford a diluted pool in this city as long as Mare stays pure. It will also speed up the GPP process. I'm making the change, if you hate it you can switch back and blame me if we get the 1% GE.

[Miguelito]

So if it turns out an engineer, we use it for the two man GA or bank it (Mining, Kremlin, Pentagon, Redentor,... there are a lot of good uses. I still plan on on F6 turning Taj on chops).

Sounds legit. After all, bulbing is a bit counter intuitive to me, as wit spends GP to generate raw commerce, which is the one thing that we have more than anything else already. If there's a race, sure, but we can reassess if we really want to run those.

The triremes are because of my paranoia about civac backstabbing while we're engaged in Spain. Your opinion on OB with him? (Also should look up if he has MC, and in general monitor his research. He has priesthood now fwiw)