Turn 162 : 470 AD

[Arrian]

Sleepy,

I'm glad to make a contribution of a military nature for once. I feel like I made (or allowed to be made) a bunch of mistakes in our Bobian adventure. One of them led to the final slaughter of our slowmover stack (I'm the one that ordered it out onto the flats southeast of the Alamo). I also failed to notice Toledo2 (probably the single biggest oversight we've made in the game), and argued for massing our knights for an attack on the Alamo, which led indirectly to the 2nd massacre near Pamplona.

I agree that any future unit builds should be of the footslogger or bombard unit variety. I also pray we have coal (and rubber). My current long-shot hope is that there is Coal inside Hurricane's radius for the Ironworks. Probably more likely is Dissidentville, but I can dream, right?

-Arrian

[Tall Stranger]

Originally posted by Arrian
In short: unifying Bob would be very difficult, because logic would dictate that Lego would intervene to prevent it. Unless Bob is unified, it makes no sense for a Bobian civ to invade us. It also makes no sense for Legoland to invade us. So, unless one of the Bobians manages to conquer the other, fighting Lego at the same time, we will most likely be left alone.

For Lego, I agree with you. For the Bobians, not necessarily. They must understand what our most logical strategy is: namely, we turtle up, encourage/ support a clash between ND/ GoW and Lego until both sides are devastated, and then try to make a move. If you're a Bobian, the last thing you want to do is plan a brilliant invasion of Lego, destroy much of the Legonian threat, only to be outmanuevered and beaten by those hot-shot strategy forum guys. They may feel that they don't dare make a move on Lego until they know that their flank (Stormia) is secure. In fact, both ND and GoW may very well know that, at some point, they will need to fight each other if either is going to win. It wouldn't surprise me if they agreed to postpone such a battle until we and Lego are out of the picture.

Sadly, I can think of no way to trick them into thinking that we won't try to stab them in the back. I don't see any other choice for us, and they may know that.

Just some thoughts to depress everyone.

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Cort Haus
If I recall from my tile-counting days during the GoW negotiations, it's :

Stormia : ~ 200 tiles
Bob : ~ approx 750 tiles
Lego : ~ 400 tiles (exluding approx 80 New Voxia)

So Lego plus Stormia is not enough. Bob plus Stormia is. We can be sure that if ND eat GoW then come for us, we will not be facing ND alone! Count Vondy won't have it.

Aeson did the same when we first had a world map... no, Bob + Stormia is not enough for domination. I don't remember the exact tile counts anymore, but it was some 20 or so short... more if there still are unexplored islands out there.

BTW, would it be possible to share maps with ND or GoW? Lego will never do it, but the others might. we could learn something

DeepO

[DeepO]

At first, we set D-ville up as a settlerpump, I don't know if it had its granary built, and what the current status of that town is. Maybe it can build a few workers?

DeepO

[DeepO]

I'm not so sure on us being a target for invasion. Sure, marines could help, but if we take appropriate measures (i.e. not leaving our inner cities defenseless, and covering most mountains with defenders), they will not be able to succeed with an invasion easily. I'm not sure if we don't need to keep that seawall present even after marines, it will be a burden for them.

The one thing we have to do is to scout the seas, and not allow any foreign boats in our neighborhood. And we might need to go for Maggelan, to prevent the others from using it against us, even if we don't plan on building huge navies. Besides, it will trick them into thinking we do have a large fleet, hidden somewhere.

One thing I think is going to become quite interesting later on are spies, and spying... we'd better safe on cash by the time we get there

DeepO

[Arrian]

TS:

Damn, that does make some sense.

So where does that leave us? Exactly where we started: anything can happen. We look to our defenses as best we can.

-Arrian

[asleepathewheel]

One thing we have going for us is the itchy trigger fingers of GoW. Can they sit on their army of riders (and Nd their ansars) until marines?

How many turns estimated for marines? They are more than a full age away, so maybe, 75, 100 turns? thats a long time to keep the peace. With aggie in charge, they could make it. with zen? Why can't Hotenamel be in charge there in this phase

(its funny how an otherwise mundane turn thread has turned into an epic long term strategy session )

[DeepO]

good point Re: itchy trigger fingers. And there's another factor: they used Leo's well, so far, but if they want to take it further, they're going to need to upgrade their riders. Next upgrades are far away, apart from the defenders.

So, they need cav, and they need to use them if they want to use their leader well. If ND and GoW keep sharing techs towards Mil Trad, we know the next target: Lego.

DeepO

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by DeepO
At first, we set D-ville up as a settlerpump, I don't know if it had its granary built, and what the current status of that town is. Maybe it can build a few workers?

DeepO

DVille has mountains all mined now, so after its aqua (11 turns) it can irrigate the grass and let rip - it's got a lot of land. In fact it can get irrigated next turn to speed up growth and the aqua build, I think. I just noticed the wheat - hmmm.

22 workers now plus 25 from Cyclone & Sandstorm in the next 30 turns (ETA for Industrial Era)...

7 workers and 4 settlers will take the first three aqua cities (Monsoon, Sufa, Blizzard) to size 12 (sea-commerce bonanza). That'll be within six turns.

The next 3 (OG, Typhoon, Diss) would take 15 workers (9 to 15 turns from now) - which totals our initial 22 - and we'll still have about 25 with maybe 10 turns until Steam.

[DeepO]

Steam is a bit of a problem, though. If we want ToE, and have a shot at Hoover, we can't research it ourselves before going for ToE. OTOH, we can use the production... tricky.

30 turns for Industrial era looks nice, however it could be speeded up considerably if we can get some trades going with Bob. But I agree with you we have enough workers.

Oh, and the wheat was of course why D-ville was going to be a settler pump, once we had half of Bob secured

DeepO

[Cort Haus]

I don't understand, Deepo. Everything goes through Steam except Hospitals and Rifles. Industrialisation is the heartache, as that's not in the path of the ToE.

If anyone fancies the diplo with ND/GoW to get tech deals then by all means. My efforts haven't got anywhere so far so I'm thinking they don't want to know.

[Cort Haus]

D-Ville:

As I said, it's got potential to be a big boy - unlike Cyclone and Sandstorm, but it could pump 2-turn workers - adding another 15 to our estimate.

If we did that, and eased off on some of the other city-boosting (leaving some at 10/11) we could have over 50 workers when steam arrives. Think what we could do with that...

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Cort Haus
I don't understand, Deepo. Everything goes through Steam except Hospitals and Rifles. Industrialisation is the heartache, as that's not in the path of the ToE.

Oops... of course you're right... it shows it's been a while since I last played, I switched the two

DeepO

[Cort Haus]

Assuming Coal ... (if not, we go merc, I say!) Could our strong commercial & research power, plus 50 industrial workers give us an edge - a short-lived but potentially sharp edge? Not enough, I expect, as Lego will have had their Smith's GA and probably been there and done that and built the Hoover Dam before we get to say "Charles Darwin".

We might get a jump on the Bobians, though. We could build the rail spine in a few turns then jump from one city to another, turning them almost overnight into powerhouses and praying to the RNG for rubber.

[DeepO]

Something else might give us an edge: we're religious, and democracy is near. The others will have to spend ~6 turns in anarchy if they want to benefit. I doubt Lego will be doing it if they want to build Hoover, which means that for all their might, they won't be the best researchers. If, we can get demo asap, it wouldn't surprise me if Vox wants to cling to it.

DeepO