Turn 310 AD

[Theseus]

TURN 310 AD

I've been meaning to move us toward the ISDG way of setting up the turn threads, but...

New Format for GS' Lately Developed Style:

[Major headers to be shifted in order according to their importance on a given turn; intent is to cover the high notes.]

THE NORTH

Prep for an attack, tbd, on Bob. This means getting ALL (sorry for the past turn's mistake) of the 8 Galleys ready at Beta4. If memory serves, we should be capable of loading appr. 12 Knights and 4 Pikes. BTW, this means transit without an empty Galley for defensive cover.

The Galleys will be in position to move to one of two tiles on the following turn: 1) directly to a mountain landing threatening YK, or 2) the central northern sea (?ocean?) tile that provides access to both the YK mountain and a eastern hills attack on ND. This can be decided later, but plays into our politicking.

Note: An alternative would be to prep slowmovers for an attack on northern Bob, and move all fastmovers to the south. I am against this for a number of reasons, chief being our transportation constraint in the south.

THE SOUTH

More Galleys. A MM-master's plan for Galley transit of fastmovers and other units to Bob. Some MM re building.

10-12 Knights to Alamo 63.

The ND Galleys: I may be crazy, but I think it's a feint... no way they'd have 6 AWs tied up that long. I say risk it, and focus on transitting units from Stormia to Bob... maintain coastal forces to deal with it if I'm wrong.

Empty Sirocco to draw in the enemy... OH, HUMANS!!

ALLIES

F*ck, I don;t know how to respond to the idea of RP pulling an Alamo at Pamplona ( ). Ideas?

DIPLOMACY

I have floated an idea in the GoW thread: RP to North Stormia, GoW and GS take down ND, and then follow with a joint attack on Lego. Don't know the denoument. Ideas?

ECONOMY AND SCIENCE

Someone needs to take a look at MMing Stormia.

Also, I am very uncomfortable just not researching... Ideas?
____________

As Neo said on the rooftop:

HELP??!!

[Theseus]

AND, to extend the Matrix metaphor, we have been WAAAAY too reactive.

Our collective attitude and position must be rather:

"Dodge this."

[Arrian]

I agree with you on most points. I would switch much of Stormia to civilian improvements, but I think we need a tiebreaker opinion from someone else there.

I do think the ND galleys are probably empty. Their purpose is probably to shut down our reinforcements via sinking/threatening our galleys. I don't think we can ignore them for long.

-Arrian

[Theseus]

We have the save. I should be good to play it this evening, although if possible I'd like to have a chat with GoW first.

Also, if possible, I'd like Arrian to take a look after work, and provide civilian building suggestions for specific Stormian cities.

Re the ND Galleys: How about post-transport duties we task 3 Galleys to head after them, in conjunction with the 1 RP Galley?

[Arrian]

I will open the save after work. Of course, the first question that needs answering is that of the city gifting/unit teleportation, right? That's big.

That aside, yeah, I can list city improvement build changes that I think would be good. Some of the coastal cities (1 or 2) should build galleys, and many of the interior cities should build libraries/unis/aqueducts, with our FP city continuing to build knights for now. I'll get your a more exact list when I get home.

3 galleys + RP's galley... probably enough to sink them (though it has always been my experience that it's better to be on defense in galley v. galley battles. I have no sound basis for that, though, so I will grit my teeth and ignore it).

RE: RP to N. Stormia, destruction of ND & Lego... Interesting. Very interesting. ESPECIALLY considering the situation in and around Pamplona. It cannot hold. Even with teleported reinforcements, it might not hold.

Have we consulted RP? Do we get the sense they would go for it? I don't want to try and ram this down their throat out of the blue. Convincing them is one thing. Presenting them with an almost-done-deal is another.

If we *do* move them up there, then the FP move to Elipolis would obviously be cancelled. Our current FP city (is it Arashi? I forget) can build improvements too.

GoW gets the vast majority of Bob under this arrangement, I assume. We could lobby for a coastal town or two for luxury access, provided we agree to share that lux w/GoW (or somehow build cities such that GoW and we split the supply). And then we claim as much as we can of Legoland and pray to the RNG that we get a leader for a palace move.... or we hope that the general death, destruction and mayhem allows our Stormian cities to out-build GoW to victory somehow. I dunno.

-Arrian

[DeepO]

Re: improvements on Stormia: not too soon... so far, we have only wandered around on Bob, without doing any damage. If we know shift towards civilian production, we would have gained nothing, only spent a bunch. No... our superious production is going to shine, so build units, and tear up the continent...

ND Galleys: they don't need to have them filled with Ansars from the start, these coud easily have boarded on their way towards us. If we can, bombard them with cats, they are still confined to the coast.

RP city teleporting: if they don't lose too much production, do it. Any bit might help. If we can send in some relief towards P, do that as well (sorry, haven't seen screenshots in ages, don't know if it's possible). If they attack, they are certain to leave some wounded units behind, units that we can clean up after them. That's easier then going for fortified cities...

Deal with GoW: don't let any negotiations hamper the invasion, they have stalled us before. If possible, I prefer to land out of reach of ND... we might already have Lego to worry about.

DeepO

[Arrian]

Hmm, that's another vote against switching to more civilian production. It's now even between SR & I and Theseus and DeepO. Anbody else want to chime in?

I agree that if we can ping the ND ships, we will, but that depends on where they are, exactly, and if we have any cats in the area.

Re: support of Pamp, we have a pike/med inf team on a roaded mountain not too far away. The Med inf could help with mopup. I've already requested that those units move next to Pamp (though come to think of it they should go on Pamp 9, not Pamp6).

So DeepO is a for the city gifting/teleportation. I admit I'm unsure. My heart tells me it's an exploit, and wonders why we ever used it. My head tells me it's in the game for better or for worse and we need it. ARG.

-Arrian

[OPD]

I think we'll be able to get alot more of bob in a deal with GoW if RP were to be on northern stormia, probably about half of it. With RP staying on bob GoW would have to get a much sweeter deal. If they'd even agree to it.

Perhaps we should gift one of the cities on Northern stormia to RP to give them a feel for the land, maybe get them used to it.


In terms of palace, would it be possible to palace jump to a city on Bob such as Pampolina. It's kinda exploitive but we could get RP to capture EoTS and give it back straight away, if that would facilitate a jump to bob.

With there being distance of 6 between Pamp and other cities on Bob the rank corruption exploit would mean 10 of the cities on stormia would get rank #1 corruption.


I don't like the idea of unit teleportion again, I don't think GoW will attack Pamp as they won't want to loose the units although ND may do. As long as the city isn't razed, not much is lost as we can get the city back in any deal with GoW (assuming we can reach a deal with GoW). Also if Pamp were to fall RP would likely be more willing to escape to stormia.
The only problem is RP really want to teleport the units...

[asleepathewheel]

I don't know about the jump either....

if they did gift us those cities, would there be any lRP cities left besides pamplona?

That would be a quick way to end their game (or alternatively get them off of bob, a step in getting GoW to invade ND + we didnt betray RP then)

[Arrian]

In terms of palace, would it be possible to palace jump to a city on Bob such as Pampolina. It's kinda exploitive but we could get RP to capture EoTS and give it back straight away, if that would facilitate a jump to bob.

Exploitive... yeah. Further, it's dangerous as hell. First off, we'd lose any cultural buildlings in EotS (library, temple) and gain a capitol on Bob we would be hard-pressed to keep. We also would open ourselves up to the accusation of trying exploit something else: the FP corruption bug. If the unit teleporting is questionable (it is, at least to me), that one is beyond the Pale.

What do you think about the debate over military/civilian production, OPD?

-Arrian

[Arrian]

Holy ****, Asleep! I didn't consider that.

If they gift us Toledo & Madrid... yikes if they lose Pamp, they're all done! To be safe, we would have to give them a N. Stormian city first.

That's good, because it means we cannot accept those cities this turn, and settles the debate (I think).

Nope, just checked the screenshots... they have 1 more city: Barcelona. So it would be safe. The debate continues.

-Arrian

[Cort Haus]

I think that Tornado, Blizzard and Sufa should order/switch to galleys for completion in two, four and five turns respectively for an east coast patrol.

Lego's Power is rising sharply on the F8 - possibly musket upgrades but could be new units. They might be replacing units that they've put on Bob to protect GoW from us (according to Arnelos).

As opinion is divided on units/improvements, perhaps we should look at phasing in the most commercially productive cities for libs/unis, keeping the rest for military.

How about we build Unis in Hurricane and Tempest (two of the four big commerce-cities) and let Eye and Arashi stay on Knights for a bit then a library in Arashi? On the sixers, Monsoon would be a good candidate for a library, but I guess it's needed for galleys. The small inland cities are less commercially exciting than coastal ones, and it doesn't seem so worth doing libraries there as Uni's in the strong cities.

I think that Hurricane should definitely build a Uni - it's a waste of the Colossus otherwise.

I reckon the three ND ships (2 regs) at Fort-Liberation 2-2-2-2-6 are empty and for bopping our supply lines, so we should bop one of them now with our one, get RP to hit another and maybe move a Pike to the coast to keep an eye after we lose our ship. Taking their hitpoints is valuable to us as they can't repair. I see two cats nearby - maybe they could help.

RP Pike Teleports? - hang on, let me take a course in ethics before I comment. If its 'bang out of order' then I'm a bit concerned, but then didn't we just get attacked by our own catapults twice in one turn? Can we pretend that we're just, er, helping GoW fulfil their contract?

Would it be crazy to move the twelve knights to join our scratched Pike on the Mountain Pamp-22? I should check RP's screenies to see what else the enemy has around first, but it would make it harder for them to take and hold Pamp.

[DeepO]

exploit: I agree with Cort Haus, it's not the first time we do it, and we've seen other things happening as well. Further, it means RP is losing production in those cities, it does come at a cost.

Palace jump towards Bob: the only sane way of doing it is using a leader, we can't disband EotS and be done... it would most likely jump to another of Stormia's cities... So that one is not really an option right now.

OPD, I think you weren't involved enough in the first part of the game to really feel the same as I do towards GoW: They cannot be trusted. I rather take my chances with RP, knowing they're a pain in the ass to bring back to the living, then ally with GoW, knowing their word is worth nothing. They crossed us 6 or 7 times before, and are willing to backstab ND just for the fun of it. That's not a good basis to start negotiations on, certainly not if we would drop RP, which we promised to help.

cats close to ND galleys: if they aren't already, move some towards them, or let RP do it!

DeepO

[Arrian]

The knights are due to join our pikemen, yes. That's the plan.

Problem is that if Pamp falls, those knights cannot be in position to take it back for another turn. By then they can heal/reinforce or decide to abandon it if they choose.

I do not believe we've been hit by cats twice in one turn. What gave you that idea? I could have missed something, so let me know!

I like your idea of a compromise on city build orders. EotS & Hurrican on Unis, possible one or two other cities on other improvements (Dissville on aqueduct, for example). Arashi, on the other hand, is different. The plan for a while has been to prebuild a new forbidden palace up in Elipolis, and then build down/abandon Arashi & rebuild it. As such, we've avoided building much in the way of improvements there. However, if we're leaning toward accepting the idea of moving RP to the north, then Arashi stays put and we should build a library there. For now, however, I think it stays on knight production.

-Arrian

[Cort Haus]

I like the idea of offering RP a refuge in Stormia. If we give them a couple 'in return' it might look like less of a Pike-jumping routine in the short term. Just maybe.

The Voice has just completed a build, and Harry's Hideout has only put 1 shield in.