Strategy Discussion - Metagame

[Swiss Pauli]

Originally posted by sunrise089 As far as galleys go, I tend to think they're not worth it. The problem is if we build 3 galleys and make them think we've filled them with 6 horse archers, all they need to do is position 3 spears to cover the boats. That's few hammers than the boats themselves cost, and I imagine we tip our hand earlier since we have to give them time to see the boats and react. The above is subject to change though if the terrain is more favorable to us for surprise from the boats...but in that case it would probably be better to have units in them rather than merely feint.

I think the feint would need Construction to work: make them think we're shipping in cats (and escorts) to bomb down J's defences from the safety of the jungle, while the HAs heal up and then move in. Seeing as we'll be wanting a decent navy later in the game, it might be worth the investment.

[Zeviz]

Actually, if we can take Iron City and Constantinopole with HAs, we will not need Cats, because we can use a spy to take down defenses at Jerusalem. (We should have a couple extra spies just in case two of them get caught in a row.) So we need only HBR + Music for this plan.

Further, if experiments show that Artist Bomb is ineffective against established culture, we can skip music and prepare an attack after HBR, while researching towards Cats and/or maces.

[ruff_hi]

To beat a human, we need to develop a strategy (horse archer or mace), tactics (how we use those units) and a method to neutralize their response. The galley ruse sounds good.

Remember PAL offered us some units when push came to shove - maybe they could use the galley ruse from their position to freeze some templar units in the East too.

That would have some long term benefit too ... when we attach PAL they wouldn't know if we weresailing empty or full galleys at them.

[mostly-harmless]

I am more worried about the overlap we will be stuck with and the cultural influence.
Jericho is only defendable if we capture Constantinople.
And Constantinople is only defendable if we take out or capture Jerusalem.
So this is really an all out war aiming at taking out Templars. Can we swing this with Horse Archers or Cats and Maces?

We are still in expansion phase and will not settle a new production powerhouse soon. Damaskus on the other hand will be a very good addition to Templars industry.

I am only worried that we might lack the industrial headway against Templars to drown them in numbers.

mh

[sunrise089]

@M_H: Do the Templars have copper in their capital, or is Constantinople their only source?

My goal would be to build 20 horse-archers and end the war in 5 turns by capturing Jericho, Constantinople, and Jerusalem. Against no cultural defense in Jericho, I would expect to loose 2-3 HA's there, 2-3 against the spear they will slave in Constantinople, and then most of the rest against the 3 spears they will have time to build in the capital. If we can cut their roads though and prevent them from making more than 1 spear in their cap things will work better though.

Keep in mind that even if the Templars know we're building units we don't have much to fear from anything except spearmen in cities. If they build a spear stack and place them all in Jericho we can move past the city and take their cap. If they place the stack between their cities we can take Jericho cheap and still threaten to split their cap and Constantinople (obviously we can't totally anticipate the tactics for taking 3 cities beforehand). If they build axes instead we will have decent odds on them, especially if we bring along the chariots we've built. If we place 6 chariots on boats and threaten their south (we can build those units while researching horseback), that gives us some more versatility. In the end if the diplo corp can throw them off balance (imply we're going to attack someone else, or tell them a barb city spawned, or get them to build axes and chariots rather than spears) I think we have a good chance of ending the war quickly if they don't have 3+ spears sitting in each city.

Finally, let me say we can still do things the one-move way if Templar defense is too strong (we can double-move scouts to check). Having a stack of 20 horse archers to flank with is going to be useful until gunpowder, and we can always upgrade the units later.I doubt all of the other teams appreciate just how important catapults are to later-game slow-unit attacks, and how crucial a flanking stack is to defending against them.

[mostly-harmless]

No Copper at Jerusalem. No Slavery for them yet. (Still waiting on civic swap from Templars)

So 20 HorseArchers? Right. How long will that take us in build up time?

Keep in mind, that after we successfully take out Templars the game is far from over. In fact we would have to dig out of a deep hole not having invested in infrastructure.
I am not sure it's worth the trouble.

mh

[Kylearan]

Hi,

the more I think about Sunrise's horse archer plan, the more I like it - although I find it very hard to anticipate how many HAs we might lose in the attack, as like many SP players I rarely use them. With Jerusalem having 60% cultural defense, don't we need at least a 3:1 ratio? I find it hard to believe that they will only have 5-6 units to defend their capital by the time we attack - maybe only if they don't watch our power graph, that is. But I'd be willing to risk it.

Regarding the double move, I know that using it would give us a *huge* advantage. But the argument that "lots of civs are doing shady stuff" boils down to the question of "does the end justify the means?". As a long-time member of Realms Beyond, I always try to play to the spirit of the rules rather than using loopholes, and would prefer to attack without the double move even if that means we lose the war.

-Kylearan

[sunrise089]

@Kylearan: I can't make any argument to rebut "RB tries to stay classy". If we make the decision that our style of play is representative of our community then you're right that we should avoid appearing underhanded.

As for the number of units Templars will defend with...my hope is they are a little slow to build defenders, they don't build enough spears, and they keep some of their units outside their cities. Remember, our horse archers will kill quetchuas and chariots in cities, and have about even odds on axes and archers in cities without much cultural defense (like Constantinople and Jericho). The cap will be toughest of course, but if we cut their roads quickly, they may only be able to build archers. If they don't revolt to slavery until we attack we may be able to prevent them putting any spears in the cap at all.

@M_H: I guess what I'm not sure of is how the alternative (maces+cats) is any easier to pull off. We would need at least as many units, and of course the techs are costlier.

If the problem is that we can build up more while waiting for better units then I understand the desire, but we can also build settlers right now while finishing our immediate tech goals and then researching horseback riding. Will the 2-3 settlers we can make in that time really not give us enough cities? Remember, the sooner we attack the sooner we own Templar cities and land as well.

Now, if the alternative is to not attack at all and just live without iron, then I leave it to the builder types to decide if that's the better option.

[sooooo]

I am not sure about the war one way or the other. However, I do agree HBR and mathematics are good techs to have and should be a priority after monarchy.

[mostly-harmless]

I am a builder hat heart. So a 20HAr stack is something I never built myself nor had to suffer in my SP games. That's why I appear reluctant. If our MP players think it wise to attack soon and even Kylearan is convinced ;-) I am happy to follow. C&D will try to give you every edge we can provide.

mh

[darrelljs]

What about Spies to incite a revolt and remvoe cultural defense?

Darrell

[mostly-harmless]

No way we will amass the necessary 700+ espionage points in time.
mh

[sunrise089]

Likewise M-H I'm a total warmonger these days and am used to the power of surprise HA stacks. All of our games are always war though, so I'm not the best buy for deciding how to balance long-term economic goals versus short-term military ones.

[Swiss Pauli]

Originally posted by sunrise089
As for the number of units Templars will defend with...my hope is they are a little slow to build defenders, they don't build enough spears, and they keep some of their units outside their cities.

If Jericho is a reasonable guide, then they seem to have a good mix of units so far: 2 axes, 2 spears and a chariot. I think their tech path will now be along the bottom of the tree: as they're FIN & IND and have Copper, Colossus must be tempting, and their long term goal (for all manner of reasons) is most likely Guilds. Finally, I think us learning HBR will ensure they keep training a decent number of Spears, as HAs are the only threat until Cats. They may not be MP guys, but we don't want to 'misunderestimate' them.

[mostly-harmless]

Colossus might not be tempting as they only have one coastal city with only a handful water tiles.
We can delay the research of HBR unitl it is really necesary and go for Maths and Cats first.

mh