[SPOILERS] Woden and ljubljana like boats

[ljubljana]

I know, I have been a major contributor to the turn pace these past few weeks due to taking ages to work out plans of attack against Australia. Shouldn't be an issue moving forwards, though, now that my turns are less immediately impactful.

As for the turn, I am benefitting from one of those "interesting" Civ6 graphical glitches...



Wonder why I can't move the full 7 tiles in the north...



I am planning to kill these two ships this turn, though it does mean leaving some caravels a little out of position. It also looks like Australia is using their last frigate from the Anoch Sun expedition to try to kill that city state...I am thinking about sending a caravel fleet up there next turn to relieve them of that idea, and perhaps snipe the CS.

[ljubljana]

Or I can do it this turn:



I can get all 3 kills, but it will require a bit of ship splitting to do that and go for Illmatic. Still seems worth doing IMO (free kills are free kills), but I am open to counterarguments.

[Woden]

Works for me.

[Woden]

China and Indonesia are going for Have a Good Time. I haven't seen a declaration of war from Australia or Russia. Not sure if we should bother with it.

[ljubljana]

Turn 187, Part 2 - Phoenicia

Here is what I went for in Australia:



Got my three kills super easy with two one-shots at 50% odds and another one-shot with unknown odds against the low-health caravel fleet. Not too big a deal if Russia finds just 3 ships up here, and I may be able to counterattack even if they do. Illmatic walls will be down next turn barring a catastrophe...and I did merge another frigate fleet (from two LoB frigates, ouch!) just in case there is such a catastrophe. I don't really like doing that as it hurts my firepower vs. the Russian navy, but in this case I think it is necessary to have one more decent city-cracking ship.

At this point, my fear is that the city attack + LET field cannon corps will be enough to kill even the frigate fleet that I had to leave in range. As long as that doesn't happen, though, we should be good here as the fleet can promote-heal off any non-lethal damage.

Yeah, China/Indonesia can take Have a Good Time, I don't really care. It might be useful to swipe it from them and gift it to you in a vacuum, but that seems like a diplomatic mistake - I would rather have them thinking about desperate ways to hurt Russia instead of desperate ways to hurt us...

edit: If we do manage to take and hold Illmatic, it should suffice as the nuke silo base we are looking for...

edit2: Could you please leave that empty tile in range of Illmatic open next turn? I will need it to finish off the walls, unfortunately. You should be able to take your time with pillages before actually taking the city once the walls are down, though.

[Woden]

At this point, my fear is that the city attack + LET field cannon corps will be enough to kill even the frigate fleet that I had to leave in range. As long as that doesn't happen, though, we should be good here as the fleet can promote-heal off any non-lethal damage.

Don't forget that ranged land units get -17 CS against ships.

[ljubljana]

Right, but it will hit hard even with that in effect. 70 base strength + 10 (Garrison) - 17 is a still very respectable 63. Thank goodness it doesn’t hit at full strength or it would have a 20-25 CS edge on my non-fleet frigates...

My deploy was really sloppy this time too, ugh. Look at my half-health triple-promoted fleet sitting there practically in the open. I would not be surprised to see Russia trade two privateers for it this turn. In the future I will try to leave a gap between the caravels and the really vulnerable units...

[Woden]

Turn 187-Vikings start
Let's see what the turn brings us, starting by Australia...
   

Looks like Russia killed your Frigate(?) with some privateers. You should be able to kill them in return. Down by Illmatic, your boast look relatively intact. A little south of the picture, Russia has a Cossack on the horses and I can see an Australian chariot heading towards Illmatic. If you can, take out the walls at Illmatic and then hit the Cossack so I can pillage the horses. 

Russia did pillage my coal at TMMLP and now I have 28 coal coming each turn but need 35, actually 36 since an ironclad finished this turn at MBDF).  I have 6 ironclads I can merge this turn and another 2 next turn. I do have another new one coming out of (W)Odin next turn but also have a single there ready to merge. I might need to merge a few battleships but probably not this turn as I have a few turns before engaging Russia's main fleet, which looks to be retreating...
   

He might be retreating to upgrade in a few turns. According to the gossip, he did pillage a campus this turn and I suspect one of the free cities repaired it, then he pillaged it. Honestly, that seems a little cheesy since he already pillaged it when it was your city and is really close to the abusing city state rules. I don't think we make a fuss over it since it is technically not a city state. I just think we may have to think about adding this to the ruleset..."no pillaging stuff free cities repair if you have already pillaged it when it was not free."  Regardless, he could be 4 turns (+/- 1 turn) to Refining. 

He also may not be retreating and just make it look like he is retreating. Maybe his ships went NW, waiting for me to follow what I can see. Good thing I just finished a privateer out of Big Brother last turn that can scout the NW out. I think his best play now is to retreat to Asahi and upgrade. Maybe use his fleet to retake the free cities. I looked at what I can do and I can get to Asahi on T192 with my fleet. That is right when he upgrades. 

The question now becomes, do I go after his privateers? Here is where I think they are...
   

I can hit them with a bunch of stuff this turn, hopefully taking out a bunch and getting my ships some much need experience while taking minimal damage. This is important, since some of my ships were built with shipyards/seaports, it is only going to take a couple of attacks to gain a promotion and I will desperately need those promotions for stronger ships and it is the only way to help when I have no coal. Also, get to Asashi on T192 accounts for my fleet starting roughly where the "Russia Fleet?" pin is located. Interest thing here, it doesn't matter which way I travel, I get to Ashai on T192 either way around our island. Do I want to go south and cut off his retreat and clean up the seas as I go or do I want to chase him off from your north? If I go north, there is a better chance he will not retreat all his ships, maybe and I can clean that area as I go. 

Regardless, I think I do need to attack anything I find in the south because if I don't, I can see him pillaging the piss out of my coast.  It looks like Geneva got everything remaining pillaged this turn, so we know he has ships along its coast and I do have ships that can reach them. 

Thoughts?

[Woden]

One more thought, he still has 15 coal. I didn't check it last turn but it looks like he is not banking any, so when he upgrades his frigates, he will have a significant shortage.

This turn, I must have had enough coal to cover my maintenance since I don't show a low coal penalty. I will have to check its impact next turn and I can improve it a little this turn.

[ljubljana]

It is a shame about that frigate... I am down to just 7 now, a far cry from the pre-war 11. They are slowly whittling me down, probably smarter than an all-out attack. Russia was also smart and left most of their privateers out of striking range this turn, I will likely only be able to kill 2-3. I might have been too greedy last turn...

Russia did recapture Runic this turn, and will probably just upgrade there. I would be surprised if they left anything substantial in range of your units in the south...more likely they are just going to lead you on a wild goose chase around the continent that will prevent you from engaging the northern fleet before they can upgrade. But I would probably take whatever you can find.

The sad thing is, I don't think we can stop him from upgrading. Probably our best bet at this point is just to threaten a counterattack if he tries to take my capital with the resulting battleships... I do not know how we can force him to engage us, as he can flee at almost the same rate as you can pursue him.

edit: As soon as your fleet leaves our west coast, your TRs are going to get pillaged unfortunately. If you go around our east coast, the main fleet will come down and kill them, and if you go around our west coast, privateers will come up and kill them. With Russia's 7k gold and our combined negative income, I think that may be the biggest overall threat to our position right now...