Turn 133, 90 AD

[notyoueither]

Thank you, SR.

Can anyone figure out how all that got pillaged by 14 Riders, if 11 Riders made it to Pamplona 6 3 3. I am curious.

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by Shiber
I'll play it when I wake up.

I would appreciate waiting til later in your day for us in the Americas. This turn is very complex. We should all be at our best.

We are going to want to kill that lone rider. Start with a knight from NM. Use the second one if necessary. Add a pike or two for support once we kill it, but wait a bit for that.

5 k out of Toledo and onto the hill at 2 1 would perhaps be good. 1 MI from Toledo should kill that scout, or 1 pike. Toss up.

The 6 k at Pamplona 6 9? If we move them, it could get very much worse for Spain, very quick, right?

We will want to galley chain, that will get a knight, 3 mi, and 6 pikes down and able to move this turn.

The big questions will be what to do with the new forces. Scurry South to defend Barca? Brace for impact at NM? Send something to support the rider killing knight(s)?

I would say, the biggest favour they could do us would be to turn on NM. They will not do it. That leaves forces going to support the attacking knights, and forces moving towards Barca. On our next turn, we can move up to 14 knights to within range for a counter attack if they take Barca on their following turn. This turn, we can get 6 pikes and 3 MI into position to occupy it next turn. Perhaps we can prepare a grave for GoW there.

[notyoueither]

btw, I will be on after 20:00 GMT. Maybe the others will be around sooner.

[notyoueither]

One more thing. Should we save gold? We may need to buy a harbour in Sirocco soon, if we want to keep a lux or two, and keep iron and horses flowing to RP. Of course, if one more road gets hit, it may be a moot point. Rider in range of Barca 4 4, btw.

Perhaps we need to keep an eye of the slider too.

[DeepO]

I would lure them into Barcelona, if we can be sure they will lose a couple of hp/units in taking it. Keep it in RPs hands, don't rush walls but a pike, and prepare our troops to be able to recapture it instantly. GoW is not going to expose their riders out in the open, they need bait.

Further, we can't leave P69 undefended. if we're able to take out a couple of riders, we can move some knights out, but if we leave it open, RP is gone. One thing we have to realize is that we don't like attacking riders on mountains, and neither likes GoW attacking knights on mountains. But, the difference is that we need to take out their stack, while they can maneuver around us, and just go for the cities. We can however move more into their way, to direct them / force them to attack. If we move on knight to P99 and one to P6 (leave the other 4 at P69), we have a far better defensive position to secure Pamplona.

On the other side, NM is still under direct threat, and can't be left undefended. We probably don't have enough knights in the area to attack the rider stack this turn (11 riders on hills, with some 14 knights?). If we could, we should do that, I think, to avoid more problems, we can partly cover the bigger stack problem by defending the leftovers with pikes.

Other scenario would be to go towards Barca. If GoW moves that way, one of the most likely places where they will land next turn is S14. There, they can threaten 3 cities, and get the 3hp rider back into the stack, making it 12 of them again. It's actually not that bad for us, if we have enough forces at the ready. Otherwise, they will go for the hill B47, which we can't reach with MI if we don't move this turn. I would move a couple of MIs (like 4 of them) towards S11, so that they can cover that possibility. And it might be worth it to move a couple of pikes onto the hills too, but only if we have too many of them.

Toledo: that can be emptied, of course. We still have a road connection towards NM, no? And, that lonely ND MI is still scouting the mountain? We should start to prepare to take that one out, so we can scout for reinforcements by occupying the mountain.

DeepO

[DeepO]

gold: what about research!?

DeepO

[DeepO]

Another possible goal for the GoW stack is to move towards P223. From there, they threaten 4 of RP's cities, move out of reach of our troops, and if succesful take all 4 of RP's cities at once. GoW knows the South is poorly defended...

We can't reach that position with MIs, and if we have to keep the knights at P69 intact, we can only reach them with about 8 knights from NM/Sirocco. I think it might be best to forget about our losses for a moment, and attack those riders now. What we don't kill will be injured, and poses less of a threat. If we leave them going about their business, soon there won't be any RP left.

DeepO

[Shiber]

Attacking GoW's galleys in the north, since it's already agreed upon (apparently):
GS 4/4 galley attacks GoW 3/3 galley - WINS! 1/4
GS 3/3 galley attacks GoW 1/3 galley - WINS! 2/3
Shall I leave both galleys in Wittlich to heal?

Moreover, shall I attack the lone rider with knights? Or do we want to have a shot at him with a cat first?

[DeepO]

Great on the naval battles. Wait on the lone rider, though, we might need those knights elsewhere.

DeepO

[DeepO]

Oh, and those galleys need to be healed before we can really use them again... if it is possible to do some scouting, and still end their turn in Wittlich, do so. Otherwise, just retreat.

DeepO

[DeepO]

Further request: after the turn is played, can we get a screenshot of the new Vox land? I still haven't seen their new capital. Nothing there to see which is really strategic info, but a bit of nostalgia for our former neighbours

DeepO

[Shiber]

DeepO: sure.
Our used galleys can't travel enough to really see through any FoW. I'll move them in to heal.

[DeepO]

Shiber, are you familiar with how galley chaining works?

Further, I'm not sure how many galleys are on W11 (4?) but we need to make sure that at least a couple of knights get loaded into galleys, so they can move in, and attack next turn. Either we move one of the galleys at S11, or, in case there are more then 4 galleys, we move pikes out, and knights into a galley this turn.

DeepO

[zeit]

I say lets be daring- move the bulk of troops out of Toldedo- it holds no strategic significance anymore, and has a GW-powered defenses, if there's someplace they won't attack, its there. So, move the forces out of there, and 'expose' the cats on the hills. This might tempt GoW, but I doubt it, its just a move done to get our troops on T relevant, every turn we keep any unit inside is another turn that unit won't be used (especially cats and offensive units, which are meant to be part of the action all the time).

What do you think about an assault against Z? we have what it takes in Toledo, and unless ND has someone perched on that mountain, or any other scout around, they won't know we're heading to that mountain on Z66- we could seriously threaten their defensive efforts: we know they're low on pikes, and also average compared to RP, meaning their strethced very thinly. This could be our chance of doing something useful with these units, hold up ND's forces and perhaps score a some kills. The downside is of course getting those knights safely across that jungle, without pike supprot (we'll need to leave those at Toledo, to guard the Cats). Of course this puts Toledo in a very vulnerable position should their main stack make a U-turn and head back to T2 (unprobable, but we have enough pikes to make sure that won't happen- and there's no other use for those in Toledo anyway), but we might as well take that risk (or put a pike on T2).

A few more things I've noticed:

1) ND has sent a scout and he is on T44- we take him out with a Med. Inf. and he can tell us if the mountain is clear- if not, a move towards Z is not viable.

2) GoW cannot be allowed on P99- it lets them pillage the road on P6 and get back to the mountains on the same turn- a Knight there is a must have. If we take that lone rider and put a knight on P99 and a Pike on T2- those two riders have to backtrack or expose themselves.

3) There's a barb camp due north of Siroco- any ideas?

So for now, I'd suggest the following moves:
1) Med inf from T kills scout.
2) Knight from P69 moves to P99
3) Toledo's knights and Med infs. move either to T21 or to T44 (towards Z), depends on whether ND has scouts around, and whether or not we even want to assault Z.

[DeepO]

If GoW goes for P223, RP has little choice but to pillage the road at Salamanca 26, if they want to hold on to Salamanca and Merida. If GoW can use that road with their riders, we can never catch them, certainly as if they feel threatened, they will pillage the road after they have passed, further obstructing our moves.

The more I think about it, the better it sounds to attack those riders this turn, even at great losses. The more mobility we give to GoW, the harder it becomes to stop them rampaging throughout RP's South.

Plus, if we attack them with forces from NM now, we can ease up at the defense of P669.

DeepO