Turn 172 : 570AD

[Cort Haus]

Physics. Magnets in 5 turns.

[Cort Haus]

Physics.

Typhoon builds aqua, starts Harbor
Sufa builds temple, starts library
Sandstorm builds worker - start another, set for +4fpt, +3 spt for two turns


Monsoon builds Library (30bpt@70%!), starts mkt
Chop last forest into Typhoon - no bonus-grass . Rearrange wf in Typhoon & Sufa to give Sufa more shields.
Add worker into Sufa for size 11
2 Workers around Sandstorm go toward EotS. Maybe need to irrigate a mine when Hurricane takes EotS-9 in 2 turns
6 workers from Santa Ana build fortress on mnt @ SA-99
3 workers build fortress on mnt @ Inchoff-1

Magnets in 5 turns, -8gpt.

[Cort Haus]

Turn sent

[asleepathewheel]

jesus


We are coooking now. untouchable economically and scientifically until marines

Good job CH, you've really righted the ship. In the past one of these automatic turns would have taken the full 24 hours. (not saying that your job is easy, just that there are no "difficult" decisions to make, you know?)

[Cort Haus]

Yes, cooking nicely indeed. Cheers, sleepy. Now many of the decisions have been made, the patterns's been established and the plan is on course it's brilliant to see the pop grow, the commerce roll in and the libraries go up. If we get those science wonders it's gonna get very pretty. The only thing then between us and the ToE is Lego's GA.

For me, this is more fun than the war. Those turns were very tough. The challenge now is dealing with GoW, and worrying a bit about RP. Getting these awkward, slippery tech deals with GoW right could be vital for our chances, yet they can never fully be trusted.

If a GS-GoW tech partnership can keep GoW out of Lego's tech-sphere, so much the better. Let Lego help GoW militarily if the time comes for that.

[Arrian]

The economic foundation laid down in the beginning by Nathan & Dominae and the rest of us is definitely paying off now. And Cort has done a great job transitioning us from guns to butter.

The next problem comes with Marines. Once they show up, we're screwed. We can either a) devote a horrific amount of our economic might to defending ourselves; or b) hope nobody will bother with us, since we're no longer a frontrunner.

It's a catch-22. If we do well in the coming turns and manage to get ToE and/or Hoover, we will be painting a bullseye on ourselves. If we don't, we will have almost zero hope of winning.

If we get towards the finish line and we're actually a threat to win, somebody will hit us with marines. If we have enough of an army do defeat that strike, we will most likely have taken ourselves out of the running by building and maintaining that force. If we do not, we'll get conquered.

But that's all down the road. For now, we play smart and do our best, and maybe it's enough to salvage this thing.

-Arrian

[vulture]

How many units do we currently have acting as our seawall? If we replace them with 75% infantry as and when we can (upgrades, new builds) - assuming we get rubber - then how many units does that give us in each coastal city? We have something like 130 units? And about 10 coastal cities. We can get 9 infantry in each one and still have 30 fast defense units (not worth it if we are stuck with knights) or 'spare' infantry. How big a force is someone going to need to take a coastal town under those circumstances?

If we don't get rubber, and can't grab some on Bob in the event of a ND/GoW war, we really are screwed come marines - we make too tempting a target for everyone, but Lego in particular IMHO.

[vmxa1]

I have been impressed by the yeoman job you have done CH.

By the time Marines come around we will hopefully find a chance to get into someones land. If so we will have an ally of substance such as GoW or ND.

[asleepathewheel]

We might need to come up with a contingency plan somewhere around the time we are getting ToE.

we might consider, if we get that, to take atom theory and replaceable parts, rather than electronics.

We need to know early if we have no rubber, we need to know before other teams do. Even then, bob rubber might be in the heart of nd or GoW. Praying for a coastal deposit.

I can imagine us rolling either no coal or no rubber.

[Cort Haus]

What amazed me when I started playing the turns was how much much commercial output there was with very few improvements - even in the big core cities. The terrain was nearly fully developed in the early middle ages, which is why we can now add the workers to cities and micro-manage tile output for efficiency.

By contrast ND looks not-brilliantly developed, unless GoW's map was very out-of-date. Maybe that's why they gave it us. ND have to build settlers and zounds of workers to make the most of their bounty, while GoW's industrial workers should quickly develop their limited terrain.

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by vulture
How many units do we currently have acting as our seawall? If we replace them with 75% infantry as and when we can (upgrades, new builds) - assuming we get rubber - then how many units does that give us in each coastal city? We have something like 130 units? And about 10 coastal cities. We can get 9 infantry in each one and still have 30 fast defense units (not worth it if we are stuck with knights) or 'spare' infantry. How big a force is someone going to need to take a coastal town under those circumstances?

If we don't get rubber, and can't grab some on Bob in the event of a ND/GoW war, we really are screwed come marines - we make too tempting a target for everyone, but Lego in particular IMHO.

Excluding the 19 workers and 5 galleys, we have 90 units, or which 12 are surplus. If RP complete their own sea wall we get another 11.

3 warr
8 spear
27 pike
24 knight
8 cat
6 WC
14 MI


We have 14 coastal cities, though.

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by Arrian

If we get towards the finish line and we're actually a threat to win, somebody will hit us with marines.

-Arrian

How do Marines do against Mech Inf?

[asleepathewheel]

Originally posted by Cort Haus
We have 14 coastal cities, though.

dumb question at this stage, but is there anyway we could relocate a coastal city or two one square inland?

I'm thinking in a city like d'ville, we could stack a group of frigates the one adjacent coastal tile. Or even galleys, for that matter. Risky, but might loosen up the defense for a city or two. what I mean is, might be easier to protect from transports by blocking with 5 frigates than defend against 20 marines. I'm sure they will guard the transports, but they can't have lots of everything, you know?

[Cort Haus]

Too much investment now for relocating cities, I think.

[asleepathewheel]

Originally posted by Cort Haus
Too much investment now for relocating cities, I think.

yeah I think so too. our continent is just too coastal to do anything

I think we will just have to be careful about having pickets and we might have to declare a preemptive war to interdict transports.