Official Military Debate Thread

[Kuciwalker]

Let us have World Peace rather than World Domination

World Peace on Deity??!! Is that possible? Deity MGE??!!

[cavebear]

A Diplomat attack on an AI city reqires one Dip for every structure built because (in my experience) the city walls always come down last. And it costs another Dip just to find out how many structures there are in the city.

Ironclads are brutally lethal to land units (well, I'd rather use Battleships, but those aren't available yet). Still, Ironclads are extremely effective against the kind of units our enemies have.

We are maybe 6 turns from Steam Engine (Ironclads), and then we have to build the darn things and get them to Thebes. So I propose to just advance our civ tech to that point, finish Marketplaces and such to improve productivity, and build a few more Caravels to carry land troops. A few more Caravans, too.

[Bear]

Ironclad attack..?

It'll be like the charge of the Light Brigade..

My plan:

Pillage their land, siege a city, destroy everything possible with diplomats, and wait.

Just wait.

And some more.

And a bit more..

Ah ha! Civil disorder!

Now bribe 'em

Ok, its not as quick as Ironclads, and a bit more complicated than diplomats, but at least our casualty stats stay pretty low..

Remember, once the siege is set up, we can put all our effort into flattening the evil Egyptians.

[Bear]

One more thing..

I've brought the idea up of inadvertedly creating a new super power by destroying the wrong people.

The Americans have 4 cities, and we can see 2, right? If we destroy 2, as someone suggested, it would leave the Americans with just 2 cities. That would make them very weak (a formidable opponent to us, but who knows what kind of army the Romans/Babylonians/etc are building up?), so another civ could march straight over them. That would give them a foothold dangerously close to our core, and open up a whole new front for us to fight on. Basically, we'd be pretty much surrounded.

So, we have to take one of their cities, or all of them.

If we take one, we have a beachhead with which to attack them if they are aggressive in the future, and also to attack anyone who might invade the Americans (i.e. Romans).

If we take them all, we open up a whole new border, stretching our forces dangerously thin. Our casualties would be high to take 4 well defended cities, and we would still be fighting the Egyptians. It could take us *centuries* to build up a formidable defence force for the "liberated" American land, by which time the Romans may have invaded. Then, like I said earlier, they would have surrounded the core of Apolyton.


If you, President Cavebear, and Supreme Millitary Commander MrWIA, are willing to take the risk of creating a massive war in the future, go ahead. But to my eye, the only option is to take one American city and defend it well.

This is the same for the Egyptians.

Heres an example (just made up):

The Romans are to our north. The Egyptians are to our south. The Americans are to our east. The Carthagians are to our west.

We take the American and Egyptian Empires. We've now opened up a new border, to our south and our east. We would have to withdraw defending forces from the North (defending against the possibility of Roman attack) and the west (defending from the Carthagians) to defend the south and east. That would, like I said, stretch us thinly. Too thinly.

Keeping one city on the American land and one on the Egyptians would work beautifully. If somebody became aggressive, we would have a beach head to attack them from. If the Romans became aggressive, and allied with the Egyptians or Americans, we could easily attack their allies.


In conclusion:
Take ONE Egyptian city on the coast. Take ONE American city on the coast. Become good neighbours, and hopefully build up relations to get alliances (so they can defend our East and South for us).


Sorry to ramble

[civman2000]

get alliances ?? And pillaging is a waste of time, you just have to rebuild it and it diesn't hurt them much unless your besieging a city for like 20 turns, in which case it's better to just have a huge army to put on every square of the radius and not have to pillage!

But I only remember having units weak enough in comparison to some ultra-defender in scenarios (when they have an unbuildable defensive unite given).

[JCP]

Originally posted by H Tower
Votes for the Diplo Plan
JCP

Originally posted by cavebear
A Diplomat attack on an AI city reqires one Dip for every structure built because (in my experience) the city walls always come down last. And it costs another Dip just to find out how many structures there are in the city.
Ironclads are brutally lethal to land units ...Still, Ironclads are extremely effective against the kind of units our enemies have.
We are maybe 6 turns from Steam Engine (Ironclads),

Well, I must specify things : several links deals with connected matters : Military debate, Egypt and America, Our world in 1640...
My contributions in these different links was not only a Diplo plan but a mix of diplos and military units.
I'm for a diplo plan against Egyptians : Thebes is the nearest city of them but has walls : I agree that wall destruction may cost several diplos, with assigned objective, but if we take it (by crusader after wall destruction) , the last Egyptian cities will be very cheap and easier to bribe than to conquer by force.
This plan take in account that Ironclads are not yet available and that the navigation to Thebes from our main productive cities is long (even via Panama Canal )!
But for Americans, due to our knowledge of them, the ironclad tactic is the one to be followed !

[Space05us]

Originally posted by H Tower
So far i've only seen a diplomat plan and a ironclad plan of attack on the egyptians and americans.

Votes for the ironclad plan:
Marquis de Sodaq
cavebear
-Jrabbit
H Tower

Votes for the Diplo Plan
JCP


Quite a few others of you say squish the enemy, but how?

I don't think we have enough information on troop locations to create a good plan of action. I think we should take a few crusaders and test the deefenses of the enemy, if they prove too much, say three crusader in a row get killed, then I suggest waiting for the development of metallurgy and sending 5-6 cannons at one city at a time. of course those units will require gaurds, but if we really have an excess of units in all of our cities than taking one from each of the three cities on the continent with A&E wouldn't require building more.

oh yeah and...

SQUISH THEM

[Space05us]

In my thread American and Egypt there have been a few suggestions:

1. Make peace with America and concentrate on Egypt

2.Bribe the non-capital cities, destroy the walls in Thebes and take it with Crusaders.For the Americans it has been suggested to just wait for better tech

3.and lastley fortify the area between America and us, instead of making peace, and concentrate on the Egyptians

[H Tower]

Originally posted by Space05us


I don't think we have enough information on troop locations to create a good plan of action. I think we should take a few crusaders and test the deefenses of the enemy, if they prove too much, say three crusader in a row get killed, then I suggest waiting for the development of metallurgy and sending 5-6 cannons at one city at a time.

thebes has city walls, so our crusaders don't stand much of a chance. i envision them attacking the city, and the damage explosions occuring only on our crusaders, that or our crusaders simply dissapearing because they were killed so quickly. so in my mind, we wait for the ironclads or the cannons like you suggested

[ixnay]

My vote is for the ironclad plan. I will have my science minions begin developing a working steam engine as soon as possible...

[H Tower]

the updated and clarified plan

Votes for the ironclad plan:
Marquis de Sodaq
cavebear
-Jrabbit
H Tower
Ixnay37
Xenozod
atawa
Skywalker

Votes for Diplomat attacks follwed by crusaders Plan
JCP

Votes for pillaging and a siege coupled with diplomat attacks on the city walls
Bear
Big Cash
Gen. Hancock

Votes for the Diplomat/Cannon Plan
Space05us


Quite a few others have mentioned squishing the enemy, but how?

maps that shed some light on the situation:

current military forces in theater
6 crusaders in heliopolis
1 caravel in heliopolis
2 crusaders enroute to heliopolis by caravel just north of shade
1 crusader and 1 musketeer 1 space NE of heliopolis on guard duty.
1 musketeer will be finished in heliopolis within the next turn.


Support for the ironclad plan(it would take approx 5 turns for ironclads to arrive off egyptian shores once they have been built)

marquis de Sodaq
keep plugging the idea of ironclads for two reasons:
1. They are unaffected by city walls, and should thus have a much much better kill ratio than even cavalry would, and
2. This effectiveness means we will need far fewer unit to conquer the desired territory.
Just a few ironclads to pop the defenders, and a few land units to move into the undefended cities. Voila! Conquest.
Using fewer units means there will be no need to alter production of improvements and camel breeding in our core cities. Ergo, our borders expand while our cities get richer.

cavebear
I agree with current Minister of War Sodaq. Ironclads are a great way to attack walled coastal cities. They ignore the walls, and they have 3 hit points to a Crusaders 1 hit point. Unless we through a half dozen Diplomats at the walls Crusaders will have a hard time getting past even Phalanxes, never mind Pikesmen.
And since Thebes is the Capital, we can't bribe it

-JRabbit
Further, as soon as our ironclads kill *anything* they will become vets! Hail Magellan!!!

Support for Diplomat attacks follwed by crusaders
JCP
For the following, as main cities are walled, let us not waste our brilliant units in front attacks.
As communist, bribing is not a bad thing if it is for a good goal !
The aim may be to conquer Egyptian Capital, by sabotage of the walls with diplomats, then attacking by crusaders and, after conquest, bribing their poor remaining cities. "


Support for pillaging and a siege coupled with diplomat attacks on the city walls

bear
Pillage their land, siege a city, destroy everything possible with diplomats, and wait.
Just wait.
And some more.
And a bit more..
Ah ha! Civil disorder!
Now bribe 'em
Ok, its not as quick as Ironclads, and a bit more complicated than diplomats, but at least our casualty stats stay pretty low..

Big Cash
I say we land cheap troops who set fire to their countryside, pillaging as they go till the infrastructure is ruined for both countries. Our shock troops then retreat to the hills, where they periodically swoop down to check down on the starving cities. Thereby they pose no threat whatsoever


Support for the diplo/cannon plan

Space05us
I think we should send a few diplomats to scout the enemy cities. Then I suggest waiting for the development of metallurgy and sending 5-6 cannons at one city at a time.



compiled from the America and Egypt thread, Our World in 1640 thread and this thread.

[cavebear]

Pretty much all our available forces are in Heliopolis at the moment, though there are 2 more Crusaders in the Caravel just North of Shade. There are also a Crusader and a Musketeer 1 NE of Heliopolis, on guard duty.

Heliopolis:

[Space05us]

that city looks rather ill defended

[cavebear]

H Tower, how did you get such a large image to post? I can't post anything larger than 600x600 pixels. I'm using jpeg files. Does something else work better?

[cavebear]

Originally posted by Space05us
that city looks rather ill defended

The Musketeer outside will stop attacks. And I will be moving the Musketeer to a Hill next turn to be more directly in the way. The Musketeer being built can be rushed.