[SPOILERS] Woden and ljubljana like boats

[ljubljana]

You are probably right, but the GA position is suspicious. He knows from my defense strength that there is an 8-move IC in Linear A...why leave the GA there instead of one tile away where I can't reach it? I could be jumping at shadows but I smell a trap...

I do also think the sacrifice/bluff caravel would be a good move even if I weren't worried about a privateer, to make williams think twice about pushing too hard towards your ships next turn. But if you are unconvinced, I will save the ship and kill the artist with the IC.

[Woden]

You are probably right, but the GA position is suspicious. He knows from my defense strength that there is an 8-move IC in Linear A...why leave the GA there instead of one tile away where I can't reach it? I could be jumping at shadows but I smell a trap...

I do also think the sacrifice caravel would be a good move even if I weren't worried about a privateer, to make williams think twice about pushing too hard towards your ships next turn. But if you are unconvinced, I will save the ship and kill the artist with the IC.

He probably brought it up to see if our navy was in reach of him moving his units near Linear B. He was probably looking for a trap and actually, I think that is what he mainly is using his great people for, look to see if we are close and why I suspect a fleet when I saw the one down by Geneva. 

Maybe he will think your caravel is a trap and delay his advancement but it might be better to take out the western GA with your Caravel and the eastern one with your ironclad. Keeping him blind will make him more cautious.

[Woden]

Also, I did run into a privateer west of Loki and killed it. We was alone and I thin kit is safe to assume if he has a huge group of them, they are probably still south by Geneva, waiting for the ones that pillaged Freya to link up with them. Over all, I think he might be planning to pinch us. Bring his northern fleet down and see if we engage and then hit us on the backside with Privateers. If he continues to advance over the next couple of turns, I think my best option is going to go south and find his privateers or at least do a sweep of the area. Those will be easy to kill and should be able to work through them before his other fleet can engage. If I go for the northern fleet right away, it will take some turns to make real progress and give him the opportunity to pinch me.

All this is why I don't think there is a contingent of privateers near the GA. I don't think he would risk them and his best play is to hold back and wait from us to engage his northern fleet. He probably does have a a few random ones scouting the area out though.

[ljubljana]

Yeah, that makes sense - I'll plan to kill both scouts, and hope there is no privateer... There is a pillaged mine at Linear B though, so I know there is at least one with the northern fleet. It would be a smart move to put the GA where it is with a privateer next to it to bait my IC into leaving the city, it's just a question of whether or not williams thought of it...

Yeah, they are definitely hoping you will engage the northern fleet, fail to make progress, then get torn up from the south by privateers. Not sure what to do about it though...if you kill the privateers they will get to upgrade their frigates, but if you hit the northern fleet there is no way you kill it in time to avoid getting trapped. It is a very good move by williams, I am not sure there's any way to avoid the surround while also blocking battleship upgrades. And if they do get battleships I think williams' northern fleet will have the edge vs yours due to the numbers and promotion advantage...

[Woden]

Yeah, they are definitely hoping you will engage the northern fleet, fail to make progress, then get torn up from the south by privateers. Not sure what to do about it though...if you kill the privateers they will get to upgrade their frigates, but if you hit the northern fleet there is no way you kill it in time to avoid getting trapped. It is a very good move by williams, I am not sure there's any way to avoid the surround while also blocking battleship upgrades. And if they do get battleships I think williams' northern fleet will have the edge vs yours due to the numbers and promotion advantage...

I have an idea of what to do. I have the fleet ironclad coming up from pillage duty at his southern island and he is taking the long way around my city of the small southern island. Next turn, I will inch him closer north. On T187, my plan is to shot him north to help find the privateer pack near Geneva. If he can't find them, he will look like an easy target. If he dies on the intern, I know it will take quite a few privateers to kill him and will know where a big chuck of the privateer fleet is located. Then, I will sail my fleet down and take them out. 

As for my battleship group, they are going to go south to move away from the northern fleet and give me time to find the privateer fleet. If I can't find them in a couple of turns, I will engage the northern fleet but hope I can use the island of Akkad strategically.

[Woden]

He hasn't finished Radio yet and if we can prevent him from getting any Campus or IZ pillages, we will have at least 6 turns until he reaches Refining, maybe 7.

Edit: Refining is 1,644, so 986.4 boost. At his current rate of 162, it will take him just over 6 turns (6.09 turns). I think he can easily get the small amount of overflow to get it to 6 turns (14 beakers of overflow). He would get roughly 90 per pillage, so it will take 2 pillages to shave a turn off of it.

[ljubljana]

Turn 186 - Phoenicia

Leading with the one major mistake I made this turn...



CHINA of all people has enough for the next GA after the pass discount, and will claim it before Russia. That means they are getting Nelson anyways and I just shut myself out of 500 gold  Damn, that's a bad break. Although I guess it means we never had a way to deny them Nelson anyways, since if I had taken this GA he would still have fallen right in their lap. Just a bad break on that luck-wise - it will hurt big-time for them to get probably 2-3 more strength on all their IC on offense...

Do I dare to dream that China will use it to lead a fleet to kingmake in our favor? Well...no, not really

Anyways, armed with my new best friend, the number 37, I am finally able to execute on one of my tactical plans without some major mid-turn screwup:











14 ships available, 13 kills  I even got one uncertain kill on the half-health caravel fleet and one below 50/50 kill(!) with my last ship who had no better targets. I did make one screwup anyways, actually, as it turns out moving a GA next to an enemy drains all its movement points, unlike a regular ship which can keep moving later in the turn after the enemy ship is sunk. Luckily it didn't cost me anything, as the GA ended up on the tile I wanted it anyways.

I am pretty vulnerable here defensively if Russian privateers show up - they ignore ZoC so there was no way to keep them out, and it would probably only take 4 or 5 to do a surgical strike and kill my GA. But I'm willing to just kind of hope they don't do that for this one turn.

Scoreboard is now 33 Australian ships sunk for 2 Phoenician ships (and 2 Russian + 1 Norwegian). I'm okay with that ratio

He hasn't finished Radio yet and if we can prevent him from getting any Campus or IZ pillages, we will have at least 6 turns until he reaches Refining, maybe 7.

Edit: Refining is 1,644, so 986.4 boost. At his current rate of 162, it will take him just over 6 turns (6.09 turns). I think he can easily get the small amount of overflow to get it to 6 turns (14 beakers of overflow). He would get roughly 90 per pillage, so it will take 2 pillages to shave a turn off of it.

Wait, just 90 per pillage? Wow, I thought it was much worse than that, that's good to hear. Although they are likely in raid given the 6ish pillages they are getting...literally every turn from me 

[Woden]

Awesome job taking out that many ships! I figured you would only be able to remove the southern fleet.

As for the pillage science, I am basing that on the 133 culture I got from the camp and quarry. I don't remember if you get more from districts. He should be getting around 360 per gold pillage (4x science pillages). Not sure if he could run Raid or Total War. Twilight of Valor is a Dark policy and takes up his wild card slot. He would be stupid not to run Press Gangs for a total of +200% on privateers, and I still think he is using War of Religion. Therefore, no slots for Raid/Total War. I think he is going for quantity over quality for pillages.

And for the GA, you still might get it. Some funny stuff goes on when a bunch of people exceed the needed GP points due to a discount. In PBEM18, I couldn't get a GS even though I had enough points and should have been able to recruit him. It went to someone playing after me (don't remember who).

[ljubljana]

Yeah, I hope so. Maybe I will be luckier than I deserve and the rule will turn out to be that after a pass, the next person who gets a chance is the one with the most points over the maximum

It's our thread (and I can rant if I want to), so I'm not going to sugar-coat it - I'm REALLY mad at myself for blundering with the GA there. I feel like I'm juggling dozens of plates in the air, and every success is accompanied elsewhere by some catastrophic new reversal. I'm...a little exhausted, and my attention is so scrambled in the attempt to hold this together that I'm making unforced errors all over the place. I wonder if this might be one one-billionth the amount of the same kind of stress that drove all those Great War generals to psychological breakdowns...

Next up, Russia will re-mass almost immediately with 20 privateers and get a guaranteed first strike because I won't be able to see them coming. They gained another 200 milpower last turn = 4 more privateers, so it will take all of 5 turns to completely replace Australia's losses here. On the bright side, at least this game will almost certainly be decided by your clash with Russia off our west coast, from which I have just maybe diverted some of their nearly infinite forces...

[ljubljana]

Ok, sorry about that, I'm better now

Sorry, those big turns take a lot out of me

While it's true that Russia will re-mass almost immediately, disrupting the privateer flow is exactly what we need to have a chance against them on our home island. And if they do send privateers for me en masse, I am not totally helpless since I don't need to advance into them - I can just have a few caravels whose job it is to run back and forth and see if they find any privateer blobs. Probably there exist sufficiently sparkling tactics that they could use to sneak up on me anyways, but it is far from guaranteed that they will use them. I have to say though that I never really considered how much stronger a first strike you can get from using only privateers - maybe something I should consider in future games.

The downside is that the promotions on those things are garbage, nothing worth anything in combat until +10 vs naval units at level 2. Instead of mass-producing LoB frigates, which they could be doing with Victor 3 in Borodino, they are making weaker ships in larger numbers. It is a good move but not game-ending and means their milpower numbers are a little inflated now (a 50-strength ship is definitely not worth 5/6 of a 60-strength ship).

You are also right that they shouldn't still be in Raid. I forgot they are probably in Theocracy still with its mediocre policy slots - you are right that Press Gangs and Letters of Marque are inviolable, and I can confirm that they are still in WoR from the 51-strength privateer above.