Turn 141, 250AD

[Cort Haus]

The Front Line

Have there been engagements, or just dancing?

Are those RP cities full of pikes & cats?

Is our force around Barca mustering to (1) defend that area, (2) strike out at enemy units or cities, (3) advance and hold strategic ground, or (4) something else?

If the enemy have Leo's, was that a GL or a prebuild?

How close are they to gunpowder?

What's the assesment of enemy strength? Maybe about 15 * 3-movers each plus a second batch in the oven?

[Cort Haus]

Re: Re: Stealth Settler and City Plans

Originally posted by asleepathewheel
Its just a settler that has been renamed worker. As they have the same stats, the enemy won't know its a settler and not just a worker.

Cool!

That could start a trend!

[Cort Haus]

Diplomacy

Last question for now - promise.

Did anyone suggest to GoW that if ND take the whole of south Bob, they'd be next? But then, that would too rational for GoW, would it not?

[Theseus]

So far there has just been dancing... with us, that is. RP took some hits.

The plan is to use the stealth Settler (he needs a name, btw) to build Fort Liberation (AKA FL) at Barca 441. The ruins below are what was formerly Valencia.

The plan is constantly changing, but we are trying to force ND and GoW to commit... we want to take out their first wave offense in the field around FL, if possible. Either they come to us, or we go to them... the next few turns should determine which.

GoW has Leo's.

Your assessment is appr. correct, although I think GoW has a little bit less than ND.

[asleepathewheel]

Re: The Front Line

Originally posted by Cort Haus

Are those RP cities full of pikes & cats?

Yes, Pamplona, IIRC had 26 units, with 7 being cats given by us in a crafty gifting maneuver. They landed next to elipolis IIRC, declared war, captured said cats, made peace. We then gifted elipolis to them, and they back to us, thus cats were transported to pamplona. The turns are set up so that only vox or lego would see such things, and might get past them, as they have little business on our continent now. but lego saw something. they think we just let them move 2 horses, and have no idea of the cats.

Originally posted by Cort Haus
If the enemy have Leo's, was that a GL or a prebuild?

Prebuild, perhaps one of the longest I've ever see from a capital city. They kept eating shields, nearly building the great library and back to something else and etc. so lenghty prebuild, probably had to change plans when we got sun tzus via great leader.

Originally posted by Cort Haus
How close are they to gunpowder?

Too close for comfort. I'd say probably within 10 turns they will have it. not good for us.

Originally posted by Cort Haus
What's the assesment of enemy strength? Maybe about 15 * 3-movers each plus a second batch in the oven?

I think GoW has 8 or 9 left in the south, probably scouts and the rest in Alamo. ND has quite a few more I think, not to mention a slew of pikes and mi's in the region.

Hope that wasn't too bleak for you

[notyoueither]

Are the units on Stormia heading north to open a second front on the GoW, or is it something to do with an Iron switch - or both?

I gather the plan is to upgrade in about three turns. How does the iron work? I see we are supplying ours to RP, and that Lego has 'Fine Iron' (why is it named so?) available.

Do we trade with Lego for Iron, or, (I assume it's this one) cut the supply to RP? Do we then reconnect to RP and continue building cheapies for the next batch? How would this work - physically or diplomatically?

We intend to strike at GoW across the narrow channel. We will have 11 galleys in the area shortly.

We are currently sending our only iron to RP. When we are ready, we will cut a road in Spain, ending the trades. Then we will rebuild it the same turn to be able to swap the Luxes back and forth immediately. When we are done with the iron (have done our upgrades) we could send the sole sourse back to them again if we wish to do another wave.

RP is on side for the cut, reconnect, and wait a couple turns to get iron back. btw, we can send them horses the turn before we cut, so then they can upgrade that horse to a knight, and perhaps switch one or two cities to knight production.

Has anyone ventured that a marketplace in Arashi might pay for itself militarily?

Gold is part of the our military machine - if we are intending to use the iron switch long term, we might want to think of gold supplies.

btw - how did the FP get there?

Sorry if my dumb comments annoy, but I have to get a feel for what's going on somehow

Arashi will most likely be built down with workers/settlers and then disbanded so that we can move the FP to Elipolis. A marketplace now might not be so good as after we rebuild the city and pump it up with the workers that came out of it.

We built the FP there to increase productivity of the surrounding cities. That was an economic decision, so Nathan could better explain it I think. It makes quite a difference, actually.

Your comments and questions are in no way annoying. You have to know where we are if you are going to be able to contribute.

I noticed the fortified worker/settler unit at Barca 4 4, with a worker label and settler graphic - is it the 'stealth settler' someone referred to - if so, how does that work?

Is the plan to build a military-base city called Fort Liberation on the hill at Barca 4 4 4 1?

Is that granary in DVille a prep for some settlers?

Are we intending to build on the nearby spices by that ruin on the coast between Barca and Murcia?

Renamed settler to worker is something that some of our opponents already know about. I am not counting on it fooling them, but if it does I will count it as a bonus. It will only fool them if they do not look closely. If they realise that we have a 'worker' in excess to what is needed for completing tasks, they will discover the ruse.

Yes, FLib will go at the end of that line of hills. Once we complete walls there, our pikes will have a defense of 8.25 so they should be able to hold while the knights go about bashing on GoW in the field and in those cities.

Added: yes, with Diss we will have 3 settler/worker cities. We intend to replant much of Spain after we pacify the area.

How long have the enemy GA's been running?

How long has the war been going for us and them. Will their WW kick in before ours?

They both DoWed on us, so we have positive WW. I am not sure when WW will start to effect them.

ND attacked us on their 10BC turn (t128). Their GA started that turn.

GoW attacked us on their 30AD turn (t130). Their GA did not start until sometime around 90AD (I can't recall when we first lost a knight attacking a rider).

Have there been engagements, or just dancing?

Are those RP cities full of pikes & cats?

Is our force around Barca mustering to (1) defend that area, (2) strike out at enemy units or cities, (3) advance and hold strategic ground, or (4) something else?

If the enemy have Leo's, was that a GL or a prebuild?

How close are they to gunpowder?

What's the assesment of enemy strength? Maybe about 15 * 3-movers each plus a second batch in the oven?

Much dancing to this point, except... ND gutted Western Spain right off the bat. Spain fought back and significant losses were inflicted on both sides. After the failure of the counter attack on Leon (renamed, at 4 4 7 7 of Pamplona) RP retired to Pamplona and has holed up there.

GoW's riders rode through us to get to Southern Spain. We managed to get 3 of them on the way through. When they got to Southern Spain, the few Spanish units there were overwhelmed. ND also inserted a few ansars from galleys.

The city that is full is Pamplona. It has 8 cats, 4 knights, and about 20 pike/mi's

Our forces in Southern Spain are there to destroy the captured cities, and to retake Salamanca (renamed Alamo) in the long run. This action is intended to hold GoW's attention there while we prepare the channel crossing.

GoW spent forever building the Great Library, and then finished Leo's.

They are very close to Gun Powder. ND has 14 ansars known. GoW has 11 riders that we know about.


I noticed sleepy's response after I finished this. I'll leave the duplicate information in.

[Cort Haus]

Thanks for the replies, the picture is clearer now. How many Pikes are envisaged for FL?

I notice there's a 'counterstrike' thread for the northern front discussion.

I understand the past and future of Arashi now. Is there another city that could have a case made for a marketplace? I don't wanna sound all fluffy-buildery while there's a war on, but is there a role for the odd Mkt in the global military build queue, especially if Iron switching & upgrading?

That settler : how about 'Libby Fort'?

[Theseus]

And a bow in the general direction of nye... as always, you are courteous, thoughtful, and complete (unlike the quick jots of a certain general ).

Thanks for the input, Cort! Re Pikes at FL, we've got 3 there now which will be true-fortified next turn, backed by many Knights... I think we are OK for the moment, although I very much look forward to getting Cats in there too.

I am still pondering on the counter-strike, with a couple of turns to go. Arrian generally posts during the work week, so we clearly need to wait for him, but any input would be welcome. The general discussion has been oriented around a northern strike on GoW, but I originally and continue to be intrigued by a central strike on ND across hills and mountains.

As a further note, I'd like to say that the upcoming counter-strike will be another of our most major moves in this game. EVERYONE'S input is desired, needed, welcome, etc. Although we have been dividing many of our tasks / functions... fer chrissakes, we've got some great players here, and NOW IS THE TIME!!!

Heck, I was about to start naming names to get the 'economists' and whatnot thinking things military... then I realized that EVERY ONE of us can warmonger with the best!!

(and we have vxma1 )

In tune with nye's post about getting our turns done in a timely fashion, let us not wait for the next save to plan our actions, but rather discuss plans and contingencies now.

This is our Normandy... let's make the most of it.

[alva]

Just a small thing, but why don't we take over Spains workers? There would be no speed increase, but it should save them a few gold per turn , no?

[Shiber]

Enemy GAs - they declared war on 30 AD IIRC, but ND only attacked a turn or two later and GoW took some more time. I'm sorry I can't provide an accurate answer to your relevant question.
Both GoW and ND had about three more turns of war than we had.

[Shiber]

You asked about war weariness. Well, WW does not depend on the number of turns you've been in war, but firstly on who declared war; if you declared war then you're the aggressor, if war was declared on you you get some negative WW - we forced both GoW and ND to declare war on us to proceed with their campaign by getting cities from RP. Then it depends on the number of units that you have killed and the number of units that were lost, and where they were lost (your territory, enemy territory or neutral territory). For accurate information, there is a FAQ thread on war weariness in Apolyton. The search function is handy (I would have given you a link but I'm supposed to be working right now)

[Arrian]

Sorry I haven't been more active in helping with the turns, NYE.

I guess I should get added to the distribution list, so that instead of asking for screenshots and then asking what exactly I'm seeing in the screenshots, I can open the save instead.

mishlea /AT/ msn /DOT/ com

The problem is that I often don't log on from home. I will try to do it more often, just to check the status of things. My modem connection is painfully slow, though, so it gets frustrating.

-Arrian

[Cort Haus]

Yes, I couldn't cope with a slow connection to this site - esp with all the screenies.

Is there an offsite, text-based alternative forum that could be set up? Something like a private server newsgroup. Usenet has thread hierarchies which makes discussion easier to follow and organise too.

[Shiber]

Can we set up a secure Usenet server?
Still, it would be problematic in the sense that this game is sponsored by Apolyton, and we'll be betraying the site, in a way.

[Cort Haus]

It would certainly be polite to explain to Apolyton that we were considering it to facilititate DG play for low-bandwidth users and in case of down time.

I don't think we'd want to replace any existing communication channels, just adding to them without, hopefully, overcomplicating things.