Gavagai climbs the chaos ladder

[Gavagai]

He doesn't have any pikes?

Considering he saw how easily you cut across me with your knights, he should have gotten a dozen pikes ready at the very least to stop any 2-mover actions.

He has Pikes but very few of those. And agreed, he should have built those before he got access to Muskets.
Instead, he was building Knights until the very start of the war, even though we both are close to Rifling which makes them obsolete for practical purposes. Muskets, on the other hand, can be upgraded to Rifles at a reasonable cost.

[Gavagai]

Concerning Piccadilly's strange choices - I think his entire strategy revolved around dynamic defense with the idea of luring my stack inside his territory and then annihilating it with cats, Knights, Elephants. Theoretically, he even had enough units to make it work but positioned them badly. Knights and Elephants were scattered between different frontlines and, on top of it, his cats ended up in the range of my Knights after his border cities had fallen.

[Gavagai]

Couldn't sleep, so decided I might as well play.

That's what I am moving against Delhi. Delhi currently has 8 Knights and a Warrior inside.

[Gavagai]

Btw, there is an outside chance Piccadilly recaptures Madurai (with Varanasi units) but I should be able to take it back immediately next turn.

[klops]

thanks for detailed reporting!

I guess it was smart to catch these turns and remove a potential threat.
Even if you lose a couple knights, probably still better than waiting. Sad to see horses defending a walled 100% hill...

[Gavagai]

thanks for detailed reporting!

I guess it was smart to catch these turns and remove a potential threat.
Even if you lose a couple knights, probably still better than waiting. Sad to see horses defending a walled 100% hill...

I would not mind trading all my Knights for the destruction of Piccadilly at all, I will not have much use for them after the war ends. It will (hopefully) be mostly amphibious warfare after that where mobility comes from the navy.

[Gavagai]

I expected Piccadilly to gather everything he can in his capital and give me a battle here. Napoleonic mistake. He evacuated the capital, leaving only a freshly-whipped Musket there, and used some of his Knights to recapture Madurai. Madurai now has two Muskets, one whipped (he is second is the turnsplit, so he can do that - recapture his own city and whip it right away) and one moved up from Varanasi. Most of his army, however, is lurking in the north, where you can see "16 Knights" sign.
I think it's a brilliant play, the most annoying thing he could have possibly done. I took his capital but, once again, spent three Knights on this. Here a defender's advantage for you, at full power. He is defeating me in detail, wearing down my army, while he can just recapture his losses back as I don't have cultural cover or enough units to defend everything. Well, I said this war will not be easy and given how intelligently he plays I now do not think I'll be able to break him until cannons.

So, this is how I responded. I evacuated Vijayanagara garrison to Madras and moved my main stack to the tile 1NE from Madurai. This is a flexible position: next turn I should be able to recapture Madurai and recapture and raze Vijayanagara, assuming he takes it back. The idea here is that I refuse to play the game of attrition he wants to force upon me and instead just try to consolidate my modest gains and wait until cannons for the major offensive. Delhi I razed. Not sure if it was the right thing to do objectively but trying to hold it seems like folly and I definitely want to deny my opponent such a powerful city. My hope was that it would delay Rifling for him, but no, still three turns. By the way:

 Superdeath is still not in the war and is just standing there with his huge army. It starts to piss me off. The thing is, he could have captured Lahore by now and maybe that would be enough to have Rifling delayed. So, Superdeath's non-participation is kind of important here. Was there ever a case he was not trying to fuck with his allies? Or I am just unlucky? In any case, he is definitely right next to Piccadilly on the chopping block.

[Gavagai]

Hopped into the game and offered Piccadilly peace for Madurai and Varanasi.

[Gavagai]

In international news - Commodore is going for Communism, he researched Lib and SciMethod. I do not understand what Pindicator is thinking and I think his window to stop the monster player right next to him has passed: Commodore has a real army now.

[Amicalola]

Hi Gavagai. I just wanted to say that I think it is a significant achievement to be a frontrunner from a start that was arguably even worse than mine. Unlike me, you successfully played your way out of the hole (although I think I saw some popped silvers too ). But seriously, I am really impressed!

I'm also really enjoying your posts this game. But I wish you had reported in this detail for our PB64 as well.