[spoilers]The Courts of Chaos: Thoth disrupts the Pattern

[Thoth]

Finally popped my Golden Age this turn and made some civic swaps.

Before:





After pulling the trigger and swapping to Rep/Bureau/Emancipation/Mercantialism/OR







(For those of you who aren't familiar with RtR, one of the changes was to Emancipation. It now gives the cottage growth bonus, does not give an unhappiness penalty to other civs, and adds 2 hammers per specialist. Very nice when combined with Republic, Mercantalism, Salons (free specialist), and in 4 turns the Statue of Liberty for another 16 specialists. With these civics even the lowly Citizen is a decent tile at 3 hammers/3 beakers. The
"free" Citizens are effectively 2 Food, 3 hammer, 3 commerce tiles that also provide +1 happy and +1 healthy at worst. Cities with specialist slots get better specialists.


I'll get some photos taken of my massively over infrastructured cities in a bit. I've been building a lot....

[Thoth]

Commodore wants me to go to war with Pindicator in a couple of turns.  I'm not quite ready to go to war yet.  Gunpowder completed at end of turn (150), Replaceable Parts will finish eot 151, Rifling eot 152, Music eot 153, Military Tradition either eot 154 or 155.  Chemistry will be 3-6 turns after Mil Trad depending on how much I want to get Frigates a few turns earlier vs upgrading obsolete units into rifles and cavalry.  At 100% cash I make around 350 beakers right now.  So around 400-450 with SoL (eot 152) and a couple more Salons and 5 Universities.  I should be making around 700 gpt at max tax by the time the GA finishes (I think, it might be a bit more once I've tweaked specialists ect).  6 turns of that would enable me to upgrade a lot of obsolete crap into Rifles and let me turn some of my absurd GPT into some badly needed hammers.

I'm aiming to exit the GA in Republic/Vassalage/Mercantalism/Emancipation/Theocracy.  Losing 40+ commerce per turn from Kolvir will hurt but I'll be saving 18 gpt plus inflation on civic maintenance plus 25 or so on unit support (plus inflation ofc) so a lot of that will be offset.  Then I can build a Heroic Epic enabling Cavalry as well as 6xp boats.  Not 100% sure when the HE will go, I don't have any amazing production cities.


Anyway,  here's some GA city screenshot porn for you:

Kolvir:




Courts of Chaos:




Arden:




Avalon:




Cabra:




Morgenstern:




Greenwood:




Primal Pattern:





Tir Na Nog Th:




The Black Road:




Rebma:





Corwin:




Random:





Oberon:





Benedict:





Bleys:




Brand:




Gerrard:





Fiona:





Merlin:

[Thoth]

Hmmm. I just noticed something odd when looking at the screenshots: Only my 1st 10 Harbours are benefiting from the Trireme quest. Not sure if by design or if bug.

[Thoth]

T155:  Commodore is taking cities from Pindicator who is whipping hard in a golden age to try and stem the tide.  Yuris is drafting 3 rifles a turn,  Krill is in a Golden Age (and has also been doing some whipping).

My golden age ended at end of turn after swapping into Rep/Vassalage/Emancipation/Mercatalism/Theocracy and completing Military Tradition.

I've got enough overflow beakers to tech chemistry in 2 turns at max tax.  (yes you read that right)





So I'm upgrading 3 Knights to Cavalry next turn and using the rest to upgrade 4 triremes and 9 galleys over the next 3 turns while my mature cities churn out Privateers, Riflemen, and Cavalry. 


Post Golden Age demos look decent:






Food looks weak but doesn't include the 2-3 "free" Rep/Emancipation specialists I've got in my cities.  Problem is city count and growth:  Krill has more cities and more room for vertical growth than I do.  A lot of my cities are at  or neat their pre-Biology max size.  Output per city is extremely high thanks to civics and wonders but I need more cities.  I'll get a slight boost of 1 hammer per Priest after Ankor Wat completes (if no-one else builds it on their turn but I doubt it's worth anyone else's while).  400 hammers with Stone, Forge, and Organized religion for most of the build means it cost a little over 200 base hammers.  With around 16 of my cites (and growing) with priest slots available the wonder is worth 16-20 hammers per turn minimum and pays for it's self in at most 15 turns. 

My most recent city of Dworkin wasn't originally planned but an event popped that grew a forest and added +1 food to a plains tile and the city became worth settling pre-Biology.  8 hammers, 5 gold, and 6 beakers at size one for a cost of 7 g x 1.3 inflation = 9g which is offset by 2 gold from the shrine +M/G/B for a net -2 gold/+6 beakers





Both Pindicator and Commodore have asked me to declare war on the other.  I've got Fish-Fish with Commodore until t165, Fish-Fish with Krill until t160 (plus Marble for future considerations in the form of a Marble-Fish trade).  I also still owe Pindicator for the War of Small Injuries.  My Fish-Fish with Pindicator ran out 5 turns ago.    So I'm aiming to take Pindicator's island cities and burn down as many of his mainland ports as I can to deny them to Commodore.  I thought about sending Commodore a land split deal (War with Pindicator + Fish for Cow or something like that) but he would be justified in thinking that me burning down cities he wants to capture violates the land split deal.

[Thoth]

Kolvir isn't quite the top city in the world, but it is the largest even without counting the 4 bonus specialists from Merc, SoL, Salon, and Blacksmith quest.





Once Oxford is complete I'll put the final turn into cottages on the two workshop tiles. 


Shiney toy is shiney.   

[Thoth]

Got Fish-Fish offers from both Krill and Commodore this turn.

Sent Fish-Fish back to Krill and followed it up with Fur-Sugar. Didn't send Fish-Fish back to Commodore.


Why?

Because I'd like to win the game and if Krill and I go to war then Commodore wins. And I don't want a NAP with Commodore as I want to deny him as many ports as possible. He's got relatively few good port cities in his homeland plus a few craphole filler cities. I do not want him gaining access to Pindicator's port cities.

So I'm invading Pindicator's island next turn and sending War with Commodore + Fish, Crab, Clam + 5 gold for same to Krill. Hopefully indicating "Lets go to war with Commodore in 5t and fuck up his naval capacity".


Still aiming for space.

[Thoth]

Sent Fish + 20g to Yuris for same. 

And sent Krill War with Commodore, 6g, Fish, Clam, and Crab for same.  That gives me enough time to get some 4 move Ironclads into the water and hopefully finish capturing Pindacator's island cities.

I dowed Pindicator and captured the two closest island cities via amphibious assault.  Cost me a few units but I'd spotted a large stack of catapults a few turns ago via a sentry explorer on a galleon so I didn't want to unload and then attack.   


Ending turn finished Steam Power (I have 1 coal and will have a second on the channel isle once cities come out of revolt).

And produced this rather nice event:





Bringing Kolvir up to 5 "free" specialists and an effective size of 30.  Uber capital porn next turn once Oxford finishes. 


I'm going to be running into a happiness crunch during the Industrial era as my Furs, Whales, and Ivory all expire.    But that's a few turns away yet.   Currently aiming for Factories followed by a run at either Electricity for the happy resource wonder and the (minor) commerce boost or Biology (if it looks like Commodore or Krill will beat me to the Electrical wonder.   I've got a bunch of forests on my northern island on tundra and ice that will never be worked and are getting pre-chopped.   I'd rather save them for spaceship parts but I need at least one of the Industrial era happy wonders and I'd prefer two if I can manage it. 

Electricity is also on the path to tanks.

Thoth want tank.

[Thoth]

Pindicator has built an impressive stack of Privateers that I'll need to dodge for a few more turns. 

Krill and Yuri echoed back my diplo and I've spotted some 3 move Ironclads in Commodore's southern waters.  A bunch of Pindicator's privateers were damaged last turn,which indicates that at least some of Commodore's wooden navy has been sunk already.  Unfortunately, I don't have eyes on most of the Commodore/Pindicator front so I'm not sure how overextended Commodore's army is but from what I've seen, his backline cities have token Riflemen as defenders and so may be vulnerable to amphibious razing operations.

Fun times! 


Ending turn produced a Great Merchant out of Kolvir which I'll hang on to for the moment.  Next GP due in 11 turns which should be about the same time as I start industrializing so I'll use a Great Prophet plus something to set off a GA once the next GP is born.  I'd like to hang onto the Merchant with an eye to founding Cereal Mills or Sids Sushi but I'm also hoping for an GE for either Mining corp as well.  I don't think Commodore has managed to spawn a GE yet but I'm not sure. 


And Oxford completed bringing me to a bit over 1500 beakers per turn at break even.





Once the Levee completes I'll finish 4 cottages on the hill, stone, and two workshops.

[Thoth]

Found Commodore's slow mover stack and I'm still dodging Pindicator's Privateer stack.






No sign of any mounted units from Commodore. I'm sure he's got some but I don't know where.

[Thoth]

Looks like Pindicator is pulling his mega stack of Privateers back to cover his remaining cities. I didn't catch sight of it this turn but there are only 3 tiles it could be on and they're all in that direction.


Found a 15 stack of Commodorian Cavalry garrisoning a nearby port. Glad I've got Ironclads appearing on the board.