Napoleon, Alexandre and their friends

[DrFell]

I played on FW, and conquered all the objectives by Sept 331. I went for non-stop conquest and ended up selling almost all the improvement I captured (apart from a few temples). Annoyingly the Persians got pikemen late on, but by then I'd taken almost all their objective cities so it wasn't a problem. Although I took heavy losses, especially in the attack on Susa, Alexander himself and his companions were still alive when I finished (which was a little 'objective' I thought of when I attempted it).

[La Fayette]

XCom was great fun and hard fighting, as expected. I post my results on thursday, as stated previously.
(in fact, my main problem was not fighting, but travelling quickly, though facing some very nasty surprises)



(the guy to the left is solo, the one to the right is samson, the one in the middle is La Fayette, trying to improve his beaker counts)

[Marquis de Sodaq]

Let's talk strategies! In the Alexander scenario, it looks like we didn't get far in talking about what approaches to use, where trouble spots were found, or what it took to sack such-and-such city. Some of these scenarios might be easy, others might require better planning - and thus lead to more discussion than others. I still need to load up Xcom, so I might be a bit premature with my comments...

[DrFell]

Well, in my try of the Alexandre scenario, I went for rapid conquest without any building except at the end, when i built and sold off barracks in some of my old cities to help pay for bribing costs (I did this in Rome scenario too), and built caravans and sent them to Rhodes. Tried to keep my army going, only briefly resting in certain cities to recouperate, and build catapults to add to the conquest.

I ignored the Thracians and they played virtually no part in the game, apart from giving me a bit of help attacking the Persians (their chariots got as far as Ecbatana). Sparta was also ignored, until near the end when they nearly captured Athens - I never took the city, but it forced me to build an army in Greece to defend.

My first actions were to bribe the Greek cities in Turkey, and attack Sardis and Ancyra with my large army, my main goal being to get on the 'main road' to speed up conquest a bit. I split my army in two just before Nisibus, one half was sent to the west, the other half went east.

In the west, things were pretty simple, with me attacking each city one by one with catapults and archers and walking in, accepting a cease-fire then attacking the next city. Things were a bit more interesting in the east, after regrouping my army in Nisibus I continued conquering objectives, ignoring Babylon (too much of a detour and not an objective), all the way to Susa and Persepolis. Susa was difficult to take, and I lost most of my cavalry taking out the final couple infantry (Alexandre almost got killed too..). After taking Persepolis with newly built catapults, I decided to use diplos to bribe the small cities the Persians had on the road to India (Bactra and a new city, Antioch) and Bombay and Delhi (new cities in India, expensive to bribe). After that it was just a matter of sending Alexandre and his few remaining vet cavalry up to india to join forces with catapults build in India for the final attack on Sagala (Built a Diplo to investigate Sagala so Alexandre would have the 'honour' of killing the last unit ). By the end of the conquest the only improvement I had in my cities was a temple in Thebes...

I think in general for a fast conquest you should buy a few catapults in your Greek cities, split your army up into two forces, one to conquer the Greek cities in Turkey, then travel down to attack the Phoenicians and finally the Egyptians (send your slow moving units as there's less distance to travel), and another to take out Persia and India (use cavalry and a few catapults and infantry - the cavalry can be used to scout for enemy attacks while your moving your main army, the catapults are used to attack the cities, and infantry are used to defend the catapults and as city defence). After taking Susa build diplos to bribe all the further east cities, except Sagala which takes a few catapults. To fund the bribing sell all improvements and build caravans in your cities and send them to Rhodes when it builds the Colossus. It can probably be done a lot quicker than I managed it.

[La Fayette]

DrFell
Thank you for this long and clea

[La Fayette]

DrFell
Thank you for this long and clear post about your choices. It might help us a lot when having our second try at Alexandre next week.

[La Fayette]

X-Com

1) Strategical choices
All the aliens (except the sectoids) can move very quickly, making it impossible to protect X-Com units by scouting around them. That is why I decided to send away all my scouting units, hoping to find all 8 alien bases before having lost all scouts (it worked: I discovered the last alien base after less than 4 years, with 3 scouts still alive).
Balance between attack and defence: I decided to have a strong defence (more than 10 units/vessel) in the early game, then lighten it regularly (no more than 3 units/vessel in the end game).
This can certainly be improved (lighter defence all the way), but I didn't wish to take too many chances.
I meant to build ONE strong attacking force around my 3 strongest units (BAU?) but the Aliens managed to block one of them quite a while(I conquered the first Alien base with only 2 BAUs).
Path: I conquered in following order:
Sierra 3, S4, S6, S7, S2, Motherload, S1, Sierra 5
(this is probably far from optimal, but scouting is far from finished when one starts conquering, and that doesn't make it easy).

2) Results obtained
Sierra 5 conquered in march 2013 (game over). This can certainly be improved (especially since I didn't plan my reinforcements very carefully in the end game).



(the guy in the middle is La Fayette receiving good advice from speedy warmongers).

[Floris O]

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(this is only a test post. Reply didn't work over here. Just ignore this post)

[La Fayette]

X-Com

Losses
(if they are too heavy, you lose this game, since the building capacity is very low)
I chose not to care about losing scouts (but did care about losing other units). I lost:
BAU: 1
Alpha: 10
MOUT: 7
Heavy: 5
Scouts: 19



(the guy in the middle is La Fayette trying to learn how to avoid losses under heavy alien attack)

[La Fayette]

Alexandre (second try)

As previously stated, I shall be playing Alexandre from now on, making use of experience acquired during my previous attempt and good advice from Marquis de Sodaq and DrFell.
16 objective cities to conquer (or destroy), according to DrFell's listing.
Results next thursday.
Anyone willing to have a try (even without previous experience) is welcome (no one compells you to publish your results, if you feel shy or disappointed).
Nach Indus!



(the guy to the right is SG(1) back from the crusade, getting advice from DrFell, just before having a try at beating his record)

[Marquis de Sodaq]

Those pesky short people in the house have demanded later bedtimes, cramping my civ time! My Alexander has yet to march on Tyre since my last post. This weekend we will mount up and see what it takes to sack those objectives...

[La Fayette]

Alexandre 2

Very ugly mistake: La Fayette forgets the Nile

DrFell, you are safe.
I was planning to win in October 331 (1 turn from your record).
2 cities left: Sagala and Memphis. I take Sagala. The walls of Memphis are down. My first elephant attacks the first of 3 archers inside the city... and dies.
The Nile, my friends. I forgot the Nile

Nevertheless, here is a short log (cities conquered):
March 334: Ephesus (bribe)
April 334: Military camp
May 334: Sardis
July 334: Miletus (bribe)
December 334: Ancyra
July 333: Nisibus
October 333: Ecbatana
March 332: Susa
June 332: Aradus
July 332: Bactra
October 332: Tyre
November 332: Elephantine (close to Sagala)
December 332: Persepolis
February 331: Gaza, Halicarnassus
July 331:Rhodes, Pelusium
October 331: Sagala
February 330: Memphis

Of course, I should have beaten you, DrFell, since this was a second try, but I didn't; mostly due to some nasty mistakes in the endgame.
Main differences between what you did and what I tried to do :
1) Selling improvements (I did not sell anything before quite late in the game; I don't say I'm right; I say it breaks my heart)
2) Caravans (I had promised myself not to be such a trademonger this time, and I delivered only 4 caravans to Rhodes)
3) Diplomats (I built dozens of them and had a look at each city before each attack)
4) Losses (really not so heavy, mostly as a consequence of having a look before fighting)
5) Bribing (I had promised myself not to be such a city briber, and in fact I bribed only 3 cities)
6) Splitting the army (DrFell split after Nisibis, one army eastbound, one southbound; I chose to let Halicarnassus and Rhodes live at peace (for a while ), then same with Persepolis; this means I was fighting 4 different fights in the end game).

Have a nice time, guys (I stated previously that this is not a challenge, especially because of the slight differences between versions, but all records are to be beaten, even if our main aim is discussing strategy)

[La Fayette]

Alexandre 2 (losses)

I lost 29 units (7 chariots, 6 elephants, ...)
The AI lost 104.

[La Fayette]

DrFell
It seems that no one (apart from poor me who forgot the Nile )had anything to post mentioning results close to or better than what you achieved with Alexandre.
I grant you the golden crown of Emperor of the Macedonian Greeks ( cheers!: there is a bottle of Gaillac ready in my cellar).

It also seems that no one had anything to post mentioning results close to or better than what I achieved with X-Com.
But no medals are going to be granted now, because of the previously stated pattern: week #1, first try, week #2, discussion and second try.
Therefore, I shall have my second try at X-Com from tomorrow on.

(if someone has a good idea about what might be played after that, please let us know; SG(1) suggested that Napoleon or the crusades might be interesting, but we have got one week left to decide)


(those guys are Apolytoners who haven't tried the scenario challenge yet)

[Fubla]

Not to appear impertinent or incompetent or anything in between, but where might a person get a copy of the Alexandre scenario?