Turn 145: 290 AD

[Arrian]

I just opened the save and had a look:

The good news: We have an ungodly number of units to upgrade, giving us a TON of hitting power. I didn't go in and upgrade them during the production phase, as I'm not playing the turn for real. Many of them are outside of cities anyway.

The bad news: We need to get those units to the front pronto, and I'm kinda dubious about this attack up north. Plus, we've got those ND galleys in the south, with only 1 of ours nearby.

ND has a big stack next to the Alamo... yikes.

A couple of things:

If we switch the citizen in dissidentville that's working the iron mountain to the bonus grass, we can still finish the warrior next turn, while getting extra growth.

We can upgrade many, but not all of our troops. I went with mostly mounted stuff, and ran out of cash.

Some of the galleys have un-upgraded guys on them... they need to disembark and be replaced by upgraded troops.

I think Arashi should switch to a marketplace. Yes, I know we're going to abandon it eventually, but we're a ways from that, and what with us running at max tax right now, it will pay off.

Tempest is *just* over 20 shields/turn. That's good for 1-turn cats, or 3-turn knights with some short rushing. Not sure what to do there.

Can we turn a citizen from way up north (the voice?) into a scientist, to at least start cutting turns off of Astronomy? I don't think it would hurt.

As soon as we can, we should add 3 workers to Elipolis.

Shall we consolidate our Southern Bobian forces at Merida 6, 6?

-Arrian

[Harovan]

Hmmmm, a good discussion going on. I think this turn is going to be very important, for various reasons.

- First we need to decide, where we will operate next and thus, what units we will upgrade and where.
- Second we need to decide, what to do with our galleys. We need to split them off to sink the ND ships in the south, and to support a massive landing in the north, if we decide so
- Third, we need to decide, what we will do with our forces on Bob. May be we should aim to start a deception 1 or 2 moves before a possible landing.

Further, we need to decide whether we go for Astronomy or not. Caravels would certainly prove useful for a landing operation due to 50% more capacity.

I'll go to bed, it's getting late here. I can play the turn in ~8 hours, may be we can find an answer for the one or other question meanwhile.

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by Theseus
I will be able to discuss it this evening.

nye, did I read somewhere that your idea of the northern attack would be to send EVERY unit currently on Stormia?

Not every unit. the coast guards would stay. The idea was to land across the straight and gradually grind GoW into the dust. That would take most all fo the units in Stormia plus a few more I would imagine.

It was not my plan. It was discussed at length by DeepO and Vel, I think. At the time it was a good plan. However, we now lack the element that was required to make it work. That being a credible threat in the South of Spain.

Maybe we should be reinforcing the South with a view towards finishing GoW and ND off in that theatre and then pushing ND out of Western Spain. Perhaps we could use a number of our boats as a decoy in the North to pin GoW down up there while we clean ND's clock.

You and Arrian are the generals. I would like to hear what you two propose.

[zeit]

Deciding where we want to strike is our top priority- GoW, ND, or the defense/offense in southern Spain?

This war can't be won in the south, and landing there will only get us some time, or buy us some ground. We won't save Spain by doing this- like we've said before, Spain will be safe only when its enemies can no longer threaten it. Leo's is in GoW's hands, and every turn we waste not hurting GoW warproduction is another turn they crank out cheap Riders. The same goes for ND, but they are near the end of their GA, and without that awesome wonder.

If we can cripple GoW or ND, we've gone more than halfway towards securing ourselves a position on Bob. Spain is in our hands, our allies/vassals. We just need them to hold a little bit more, and keep a credible diversion- what is going on in the south is a wonderful distraction, but we mustn't be tempted by it ourselves...

Use our forces to destroy GoW, and we've nearly won the war.

[Arrian]

We have two options:

1) Upgrade in the north, and load it all on the galleys up there, and land up by GoW, and do as much damage as possible.

Advantages: our ships are up there, and we might just be able to hurt GoW.

Disadvantages: we could be throwing a ****load of units into a doomed attack. Spain could be destroyed if we don't counter ND/GoW down south.

2) We scrap the northern invasion, and re-route to the south, including operations vs. ND's galleys (if possible, I'd like to see if we can hit them with cats from the coast prior to attacking their ships).

Advantages: more limited goal, and thus higher chance of success. Might save Spain's life.

Disadvantages: more limited goal. No damage done to GoW's homeland. Most of our ships have to move a while prior to being in position.

I'm torn. My heart would like to hit GoW. My head says it's too risky. Theseus, what do you think?

Non-military thoughts:

If we are going to turn research back on, I think we ought to build some libraries, and maybe a Uni in Hurricane. We have more units than we can afford to upgrade for a while. During the time we need to raise the cash to upgrade them, we can be building the improvements. Then we can turn science on. This appeals to me, honestly. Our economy is rockin', but we're pouring it all into the military... and meanwhile Lego sits and builds. Plus, there is military advantage to be had in getting Caravels.

I'm gonna load the save up again and look at the map... I want to think about where I'd land if we do go with an attack up north.

-Arrian

[Arrian]

Hmm... for hitting GoW, I think I'd land on Yellowknife 332, if it's open. If not, Y333 or Y223 would have to do.

For ND, I think Mavdad 699.

If we do it, I say go for broke: pure knights.

Another thing we could consider: land a large stack of pikes/med inf, and immediately send the galleys south after that. Meanwhile, horsemen from the north move down into Stormia proper, while we upgrade fastmovers down there. The galleys assemble in a few turns and then bring a horde of knights to S. Spain.

-Arrian

[Arrian]

Game mechanics question: now that iron is hooked back up, will the cities due to complete warriors/wcs/horsies/spears next turn automatically switch back to medinf/knights/pikes before they complete the lesser units? I think, from my experience in SP, that they will. Thus, some build order switches may be in order.

I will stay online, but will be back and forth between the computer and the cribbage game I've got going with my gf (yeah, wild a crazy guy I am, playing cribbage on a Friday night).

-Arrian

[notyoueither]

I think they will stay on the set builds unless some condition or other is filled. I have heard that that condition is trading tech. I am not positive though.

[Arrian]

Ah. Well then, we leave them be.

Any thoughts on my other comments?

I apologize for my rather rambling posts... I actually came up with 3 options:

1) Full-on knight invasion of GoW or ND (so 1a and 1b)
2) Med inf/Pike invasion of either, and galley re-routing to the south (2a, 2b)
3) Abandon northern attack, go all-out in the south.

I kinda like 2, come to think of it. Northern diversion, maybe we do some damage, at least we tie up some units and inflict some casualties, and perhaps buy us & RP some time.

-Arrian

[Arrian]

Forces up north that could be upgraded:

Miller town: 1 vet WC. There is also an elite WC which I assume we don't want to upgrade, and 3 knights in there.

Beta: 2 WCs, 1 horse, 4 spears. Also 1 elite WC.

Witt: 2 horsies.

Eli: 2 spears.

So 6 upgradeable fastmovers (540g), 6 spears (120g). Plus 3 knights and a couple of pikes...

8 galleys in the vicinity... 16 units we can carry. 9 knights, 7 pikes.

We also have a number of units sitting around in the interior (not blocking coastal tiles). I think these should all be put in cities. Sitting in the open, not on the coast, serves no strategic purpose.

-Arrian

[notyoueither]

I like going to the South. With the force we have built we have to be able to do some serious damage.

As for feints to the North... send 6 empty galleys sailing along GoW's Northern coast and I'm fairly sure we will distract them.

[Arrian]

We'll need those galleys to move troops, though. Although I note that two of our coastal towns (O.G. and Whirlwind) can build galleys in 3 turns each. I'd do that.

Maybe a 4-5 galley feint in the north (maybe with a few pikes on them to take advantage of any opportunity to land & pillage) would do the trick, and everything else moves south?

-Arrian

[notyoueither]

Sounds like the basis for a plan.

[Arrian]

I'm signing off for the night... it's late. I'll try and check in tomorrow (today, heh) when I get up.

-Arrian

[zeit]

I know things are tough down in the south, but can we really allow ourselves and RPto not try and end this war? I'd rather wait some more and land 40+ units on GoW soil than to throw them to the stalemate in the south. We once said we will feint to the south, and strike their heart, but now it seems we're rather content with bashing one anoter in the south, letting this war go on and on, letting Lego grow bigger, and wasting our production on a more costly war.

The way I see it, not landing in the north in 10 or so turns means a very long war, one that we will lose in the long run- when Lego joins in.

If you fear for Spain's life, I suggest we ship those very few units we can allow to spare south, to help us hold ground, and use the rest for the manuever that could win the war...