[Spoilers] 0x49-y: Marxist-Joaoist Praxis

[Oxyphenbutazone]

Any questions people want me to address in the report?

[Tarkeel]

Any questions people want me to address in the report?

How do you win from here?

Retrospectively, what was your tech-path and why?

[T-hawk]

How many ships do you have, where are they, and what are they doing?

[Commodore]

Any questions people want me to address in the report?

When are you going to revolt to Police State and hit the "murder everyone" button with 45h whips boosted +60%?

[Oxyphenbutazone]

How do you win from here?

When are you going to revolt to Police State and hit the "murder everyone" button with 45h whips boosted +60%?

[Tarkeel]

Hey, I tried to give you something to answer :P

[Oxyphenbutazone]

And yet you couldn't give me any resources on Hanoi island 



I just know there was a jungled gems and double fish there before you got your hands on it!!!

[Oxyphenbutazone]

Turn 90 Report



The People's Incan Republic on turn 90 stands strong and tall. 13 cities, 42% of the world's population, Hampstead, the grandest city in the world by far, all speak to the superiority of the Marxist-Joaist system over the despotic barbarian continentals. Since last report we've leapt to first place and, even with some coming storms on the horizon, I feel good about our ability to keep pulling ahead.







First in GNP while saving gold (it jumps to ~350 when I turn full research onto compass), well and away top in CY (tho this is in part because scooter has been whipping up a huge army lately). Somehow I'm 3rd in soldiers despite being on an island and mostly having just garrison forces.

Let's take a tour of the empire:

The Heartland



Ironically for Jaoa, my greatest strength this game has actually been vertical expansion. Utilizing the massive food bounties in my starting 3 cities, I've been able to grow Hampstead and Coyacan to healthy double-digit populations and my early diligence on cottaging this area is now starting to pay off with massive commerce being generated in the Hampstead-Coyacan-Gori megapolis.



Just look how pretty she is! If this game lasts past galleons (it won't) Hampstead could easily rack up major points on the Ottawa scale, but even at t90 this capital is an absolute beast.



Coyacan is starting to run out of tiles to work, but with a healthy +8 food surplus has room to grow onto 4 more rep-specialists. Hampstead and Coyacan together are responsible for half of the entire research output of my empire. Unlike Hampstead, Coyacan can't produce anything naturally, but fortunately Kremlin-whips turn any food surplus city into a repsectable hammer producer.



Gori recently completed Moai and I'm now going to lay off the whip here to grow it onto all these great Colossus-Moai water tiles. Gori has the potential to pull 28 hpt at max size, which would normally make it my main shipyard looking ahead, but really with the Kremlin all of my coastal cities with seafood will be respectable galleon/frigate builders. Nonetheless, Gori is an awesome city which will contribute greatly to the empire.

The Western Borderlands



Kuntvesto and Trier give us a glancing view at the hottest kinetic conflict in the world right now, with scooters triremes hovering around the byzantine coast and his unseen army laying siege to Yuri's final cities. This turn 2 great generals were spawned so we know something big is going on over there. Even with cataphracts, I expect Yuri to fall within 10-15 turns, at which point Scooter will be bordering me with circumnav + viking UB ships and, if he's able to consolidate his holdings quickly, a superior land base for his empire.

Beyond that my cities here are going to grow onto Colossus coast until Astronomy hits and then will be brutally converted into whipping posts to mass up a navy and army to take on the Viking threat. Given the asymmetries of naval warfare, I don't want to invest too much in infrastructure here because if Scooter really wants to raze one of these cities in the future, he probably will be able to.

The Southern Colonies



Another place where we border scooter, Westminster with pigs and copper will be a solid border fortress whose fate will also be a 4->2 whipping post for guns and ships to defend the empire. Hanoi is a sad city on a sad island, but it locks down the important channel that opens up to Gori and thus my core, so it is worth settling for the defensive advantage.

The Eastern Archipelago:



Havana and Biran are both good cities made great with The Colossus. The continent to their east is the Luddite-Cairo one, so I'm expecting less action here, but I'm still going to build a small fleet to keep an eye on things. I'm sending a settler party to the island to the southeast here which hopefully has some seafood. If not I'll have to find somewhere else for them to go. Unlike Scooter, I definitely am starting to run out of expansion areas, unless I want to stake a claim directly on the eastern continent and hope Cairo doesn't roll his musketeers up to it.

How many ships do you have, where are they, and what are they doing?

1 Galley ferrying around units to my islands. 6 triremes, 4 on the western coast keeping an eye on Yuri/Scooter, 2 to the south guarding Westminster. Once Optics comes in after Compass, I'm planning to whip Caravels in most of my coastal cities, which will go out to scout the rest of the map and serve as deterrents against any galley-berserker action from Scooter. Longer term they'll be great sentries to make sure there are no sneak attacks waiting for me. My geography against Scooter is pretty favorable: it's impossible for him to hit any of my important cities out of the fog.

How do you win from here?

Well Luddite and Mr Cario are continuing their grinding death match with no cities changing hands, so as before my only compettition is Scooter. He has 12 cities to my 13, while Cairo has 6, Luddite 5, and Yuri 3. And because Scooter borders me, there's no point in trying to peacefully outrace him or send a fleet east to conquer territory. No, this game will be decided by a naval duel between me and Scooter. Once galleons hit the picture, the fireworks will begin soon after.

All of my planning for this game now is how to win this duel:



Ever since the map was announced to be Big & Small I have been planning for an astro bulb as the way to give myself a mid game edge (this is why I was somewhat ambivalent on building the Colossus). I have been avoiding researching meditation or civil service so that I can leave the bulb path open. Current research plan is Compass -> Optics -> Aesthetics (for Shwedagon Paya) -> Polytheism -> Priesthood -> Monarchy -> Feudalism -> Alphabet -> Horseback Riding -> Guilds -> Construction -> Gunpowder -> Engineering -> Chemistry -> Steel -> Military Science (tho I think it's somewhat unlikely the game makes it that far). When exactly the Astronomy bulb slots in is still an open question. Obviously I want to hold on to my Colossus commerce as long as possible, but scooter did an early astro bulb in PB70 so I definitely have to be on the lookout for him also going for a similar gambit [EDIT: Ha, I just realized that Scooter's Civil Service tech pick totally closes off an astro bulb for him, hmmm this makes an early Galleon attack much more appealing].

I'm working on my next GP out of Hampstead who should arrive around the same time I build Shwedagon Paya. Once that GP is born, I'll pop a golden age and switch to Confucianism + Caste/Pacifism and get 4 GP out of my cities: 2 scientists for the astro bulb, and 2 mixed GPs for the next GA. Depending on how things are going, I might trigger that GA right away or wait a bit, but the goal for the 2nd GA is to research key military techs and then end in Police State/Vassalage/Slavery/State Property/Theocracy which will be my end game civics for the duel with scooter.

The open question here is really what are those key military techs? As Commodore points out, Kremlin whips with a forge + Police State + State Property are base 45 * 1.6 = 72. This makes galleons/frigates/knights/muskets/cannons all 2 pop whips with lots of overflow so whatever I'm building I'm going to be able to build a ton of them. Does that mean I should go for Knights + Catapults on Galleons t110? Or wait for Knights + Muskets + Cannons on Galleons supported with Frigates on t125? Caravel scouting will be useful here to get a sense of the strategic situation against Scooter. I'm also pushing espionage (Security Bureaus are pretty good when everyone else only has their palace) so I'll soon have research visibility on scooter which will be instrumental to making sure I have the upper hand in our coming war.

[Tarkeel]

Thanks for the great overview, that explained loads.

Retrospectively, what was your tech-path and why?

While you didn't cover this directly, it was covered in the Astro-beeline plan.

[Oxyphenbutazone]

Shit, since when does Paya require meditation??