[PB73 SPOILERS] scooter's Oracle

[scooter]

Ok first off, Oxy counter offered 25T NAP until T120. I offered it back. I'll have more thoughts on this later. I have been thinking a lot about Oxy's position relative to mine, but I've been focusing more heavily on Yuris as none of this matters without ending him. Anyway, I did say I was going to get Optics rather quickly.





Big coup. But enough of that, we can talk about tech later. As for the actual war...



Well, I did say there needed to be a mistake or two. His Horse city was not reinforced.





I squeaked out a horcher awhile back in a city that lacked production capacity for something else because it seemed like a useful utility, and here it's giving me a 72% chance to wipe out his horses.





ARE YOU SERIOUS. Ok. It's ok. Fully normal result, deep breath. I did say "a mistake or two." I did also point out that he was going to have to consider leaving his workers all exposed. He did not.





He covered with both Phracts, leaving the brand new one to complete end of turn and leaving him with 4 units. Here's the thing - the C2 Phract is the one that matters. The promotions are insanely painful on them and swing combat massively. This one is unpromoted, which puts it in range of a highly promoted Zerk. My Zerks are all healthy now because crucially units on moving boats still heal, and I had a medic on board. (Medics are like Spears - nobody builds enough despite everyone knowing nobody builds enough.) The unpromoted Spear/Axe may as well be Warriors vs Zerks as they have no promos and no fortify bonus. So that just leaves the C1 Axe which is fully 25% fortified, but my odds would be much better this time as my well promoted Zerks are now healed. So... let's check out Vodka.





The battle basically boils down to first combat. That's not totally true, but it's 5 attackers vs 4, so I can only afford to lose one, so the first one is the vast majority of the result. If I win the first one, victory is highly likely. So what does that look like.





You see what I mean by this being almost the whole thing. Combat log time.

Code:

C1 CR2 Zerk vs Phract 70% WIN
C2 CR1 Zerk vs C1 fortified Axe: 70% WIN
C1 Shock Medic Zerk vs Axe: 80% WIN
Unpromoted Zerk vs Spear: 99% WIN

BOOM. Burned to the ground. Decent chance another city falls next turn. Let's look at the situation.





It all comes down to what he does with his Phracts. One of them is going to have to kill my Zerk on the hill. That killing Phract will be stuck there for a turn. The other can reinforce one of his cities. Antioch is threatened by 4 Elephants (3 healthy), with a couple units a turn behind. That one is in the most trouble, and it's possible it falls even if he puts a Phract in there. Will really depend on what he's able to whip. However, a Spear/Phract would be enough to save it for at least a turn.


Thessalonica is more interesting. My Galley up north is in range, and if it still has just a single Spear next turn, it will die. I think it's somewhat unlikely he can whip as it surely had a Phract in the queue, and at size 3 it cannot dry whip anything. I guess he could whip a scout to buy a turn? The point being I think he has to pick his poison here. He also has no real path towards building Phracts now with Iron gone and his cities blockaded. I would bet he puts everything into Antioch and holds there, but we'll see.

[Krill]

Ooof.

[Zed-F]

Better to get the bad result out of the way on the city that mattered less!

Are we sure we can afford to let Oxy do stuff unmolested until T120? Not long ago we were saying we needed to crimp his ears back, and we do have an army we are going to want to do something with. Yes we need some time to recover from our whip anger, but I’m wondering what he can do with that amount of time left to his own devices. I suppose these non-enforced agreements aren’t really binding, though… is this more of a tentative ‘until something changes, or I see an opportunity’ kind of agreement?

[scooter]

Ooof.

Oh I’m not bothered. Overall the results are fine. If I had to pick a 70% fight this turn to drop, it would have been the second attack on the capital (which would have meant both cities fell), but this would have been my second choice. Cracking the capital just means the rest is mop-up. Kill the last 2 Phracts, and the continent is conquered.

Are we sure we can afford to let Oxy do stuff unmolested until T120? Not long ago we were saying we needed to crimp his ears back, and we do have an army we are going to want to do something with. Yes we need some time to recover from our whip anger, but I’m wondering what he can do with that amount of time left to his own devices. I suppose these non-enforced agreements aren’t really binding, though… is this more of a tentative ‘until something changes, or I see an opportunity’ kind of agreement?

Yeah so this is complicated. The answer is I’m not quite sure. He has more Triremes than me right now, and my islands are lightly defended, so he could be super annoying in the next 5 turns if he wanted, but he wouldn’t be able to deal a killing blow or anything. As for me, I could try to press now, but I’m still a half dozen turns away from having Caravels in the water in good numbers causing damage. I think I could try to press now and win, but I’m not 100% sure I could. The crucial thing is war now means I have to go on the offensive as I’m behind on growth curve and economy overall. He does have Kremlin already and much less whip anger and more population, so it would not be as easy as you might think. Honestly the biggest problem is the whip anger. I’m at 2-3 angry faces in nearly every semi-mature city. Whipping out a round of Caravels and whipping out more Zerks sounds nearly impossible right now.


However, T120 sort of flips things around. What he means by T120 is he’ll have Astronomy by then. However, I will too. Critically, my “Colossus” will not expire when that happens because I’m FIN. I also have way more land to expand into. This entire continent will be mine, and it’s green and ripe for cottage spam, not to mention the southeast island that are still available. 25T would give me time to do a worker/settler burst and boom a little while also getting infra up everywhere which is badly needed. Basically we’re roughly even on cities right now, but the numbers favor him because my cities have been all war for awhile. 25T would reset that a bit, and his traits/civ would be nearly a null by then, and all he’d have is Kremlin. Which is still a lot. But the larger point is by pushing conflict to T120, he would become the one who would need to go on offense to win rather than me. I think that’s pretty meaningful. Plus SPI means easier access to boat promos. Theocracy will get me one promo, and Vassalage (once I get Feudalism) would get me a second.


So, it’s a tough call. If I were to be finishing Yuris right now I think straight onto the next war would be the right call, but realistically I probably have a few turns left, plus a few more turns to reposition. The other problem is when it comes to Triremes, I’m legitimately outnumbered right now which is a problem, and I’ve been pumping land units because I’ve gotta crack these Phracts somehow. Also, generally speaking I have way more scaling advantages, so that does favor me waiting a bit.


That said, I also don’t fully trust these types of deals, so I have to be on guard regardless.

[Zed-F]

I was thinking 15T was enough of a rest, but I suppose we shall see. 25T at least lets us see if we can find a way to get in and raid his core from an angle he’s not really watching. Of course we will need to keep eyes out for the converse, but with our mobility being so much better, we should have the edge on sneaky plays.

[scooter]

I was thinking 15T was enough of a rest, but I suppose we shall see. 25T at least lets us see if we can find a way to get in and raid his core from an angle he’s not really watching. Of course we will need to keep eyes out for the converse, but with our mobility being so much better, we should have the edge on sneaky plays.

I agree 15T would be enough, but Oxy apparently did not, and I'm OK with giving 10 more turns in exchange for letting me integrate my conquests first. That was basically the thought process.

[scooter]

Some more stuff since we've been so war-focused for awhile. First off, the graphs.





Not going to lie, I was a bit despondent after that downward spike I had, but I feel better now. All this military building has had costs though.

So, how to get out of this? Well, I have a lot more claimable land than him, so let's start claiming. Here's a rough stab at some dotmapping.





I really should have not have used the same color for Fish/Corn as I did the water/Fish city. Anyway, Fish/Corn is a high priority site despite all the jungle. Wet Corn + Fish + Lighthouse Lake means there's oodles of food here, which means I can get it online quickly, and then share its food as necessary. The two spots west of this are both likely to be profitable, but overall lower priority. Orange we'll talk about in the next section.





As in right now. Orange will require heavy worker labor, but it's a beautiful FIN site. In tandem is Yellow which is similar, although a bit faster starting because it can share a riverside grassland with Stewy and cottage already clear grassland north of it.


These two are the most moveable of everything here. I figured Orange is pretty sensible where it's at, but Yellow I've changed my mind on a few times already. I considered putting it 1W of the Pigs and sharing tiles with Kendall instead, but I wondered if it makes sense to bridge to Antioch? I think this is the right config, but I'm super open to an alternative here. Important info to consider is the final section.





Yurisland. So, I'm going to try my absolute hardest to keep Antioch and Thessalonica. The reason is, well, basically I'd really like to save 200h. As a result, I really need to settle Constantinople back where it was, even if it means preserving the Fish orphaning. Part of this is just that it fits better with the other two cities which I'd like to keep. The other thing though is I think the hill defense on the Oxy front is genuinely valuable. I can fort 1E and have a position where I could hit Trier from inside my city while Oxy could not do the same. I think it's worth it. Similarly, I'm moving his former razed city 1S onto a hill also for the defenses. Stick Walls/Castles in both cities, and they'll be really tough to crack.


Anyway, that's my rough thinking. Settling all these spots would take me to 22 cities. That does not even count that south sea island that could support another half dozen or more judging from the size of it. 25T would be enough for Yurisland to be fully integrated and contributing, while the other dots would be coming online shortly after, or maybe even before.


In theory I have a NAP with Oxy now, but I'm still going to try to warpeace him next turn. If he accepts that, I'll go full bore down this path. If he does not, I'll consider myself stabbed and see if I can burn some stuff.

[Zed-F]

Given that we don’t yet have CoL, what’s the priority for interior cities on our continent as compared with island cities to our east & west? I tend to think having a few more island cities for visibility & GLH routes would be a good idea, but distance maintenance is a thing, so maybe we can’t afford a ton to our east yet. Covering the western approach to our core a bit better might be a good idea though, assuming there’s adequate seafood on whatever islands are in that direction. I don’t think you’ve shown anything uncovered by the trade mission galley.

[scooter]

He chose to defend Thessalonica over Antioch. So, let's go. Got time just for the assault on Antioch.





Flawless win





LOSS - that's what I get for being greedy hoping I could promo-heal afterwards.





Antioch has fallen. I kept it. More to come later when I can actually finish the turn, but I think I can finish him off on T98 or T99.

[scooter]

As for the rest, Oxy picked up Optics this past turn, 2T ahead of me. Good to know. I offered him a warpeace again.





Here's the tactical situation in the north. Things are generally lined up for a T98-T100ish attack. It will take the Galleys until then to circle around the northern peninsula, which conveniently gives those Zerks on board time to heal. So that makes for 3 Zerks, 2 I believe will be full health, and the 3rd will be somewhat wounded still. I have a 4th on the boat adjacent to Thessalonica, and a 5th coming by land that Yuris could elect to kill, but likely at the cost of losing the city on T98 for sure.

The advance Galley can pick up an Elephant next turn to join the amphib force, and honestly probably 2 Elephants given that it should be safe to drop the Zerk onto the plains hill 1N. That's because Yuris would not be able to kill it and retreat it 1T. So that gets me to 6 units participating. From there I guess it just depends on how my sims look. The other units streaming in through the jungle could join an attack on T99 or T100 depending on the unit, so I can get there eventually. So we'll see.





Here are those units. 4 Elephants and a Spear, with another Zerk just under the interface. Let's talk post-war though.





The build queues have changed. Logan is doing a quick 2T settler, then I'm finally gonna do MoM which will take 5T. Will be going back to OR most likely for that. With Roman/Kendall I'm gonna grimace and triple whip out settlers, while Shiv/Connor are gonna slow build them. This is mostly because the latter cities are more production-focused anyway, so wearing down the whip anger is more valuable there, while Kendall/Roman I'm just gonna live with it. I've also ferried in a couple workers from the east islands while building some more to get the jungle cities up and running in a hurry. Thankfully I haven't pillaged anything in Yurisland, so those cities won't actually need any worker labor initially.

Here's what this plan looks like roughly on paper - all turn numbers are give/take 1T.

Code:

97: settler out of logan -> settle Const T101
97: settler out of roman (whip) -> settle purple t101
98: settler out of kendall (whip) -> settle teal t103
100: worker out of connor
100: worker out of tom
100: worker out of gerri
100: worker out of greg
102: settler out of shiv -> orange t106
103: settler out of connor -> yellow t106

t95: 12 cities
* 5 settlers for 2 resettles and 3 new sites
* 2 captures
19 cities by T106

Basically the goal is 50%+ more cities in 11T. I picked up the first one this turn in Antioch. I sort of wonder if that's all I'm going to be able to settle. That would give me 14T after to then get ready for Oxy NAP expiration.


Tech-wise I'm considering rather strongly running up for the Music Artist and using that to kickoff a MoM Golden Age, and generating 2GP during that for 24 turns of GA. Heading up that way also gets me Heroic Epic which I've unlocked via combat, so I can build that.


I'll be honest, I'm slightly considering sticking Heroic Epic in Logan. Obviously Oxford is the "right" choice there, but I'm not so sure it's the right choice in this game which is going to come down to an Astro duel. The ability to just churn out 1T units like crazy in the capital should not be underestimated. The alternative is Shiv/Connor which are both solid but unspectacular production outputs.






Zed-F asked about this the other day. I'm going to try to meet Cairo and then fill in the gaps to my west.