Grand Alliance to Undermine Lego (GAUL)

[asleepathewheel]

a few ideas

Are any of the outlying galleys in a position to gauge if there is a western lego naval picket line, say at about 5-6 tiles west of lego coast?

We need some answers from gwnd

1. What is the target date?
2. How they intend to get around picket ships/land blockers of lego.
2b. Lego is average to us, which would indicate that they can block at least as much land as us, and they are in republic, so no interior garrisons are needed.

How would we do it? Kill the picket ships then land a turn later, hoping that we killed enough pickets to create a large landing zone, thinking that they couldn't cover every single square?

Hmm. This is fun. What about shipping out a formation of galleys (in pairs or threes) like:

x
o
o
x
o
o
x


I would think that would spread the coverage pretty widely, especially if both ND and GoW do it.

And we might, even if we don't intend to drop anything off early, ship out a couple empty galleons just to tie up some forces for a turn or two (so GOWND could land)

[asleepathewheel]

I've done a rough count of lego coastal tiles, they have in excess of 100 not including city tiles.

We are average to Lego militarily.

Currently we have:

3 warriors
8 spears
27 pikes
24 knights
8 cats
5 galleys
6 war chariots
14 medieval infantry


As has been stated, Lego undoutedly has stronger defensive units, which would give them a boost, muskets instead of pikes. If they trigger there GA this turn, they won't have any use for their NMs anymore, perhaps they are already fully upgraded. Ditto on the cats, probably have them all upgraded to cannon. Probably have caravels instead of galleys.

So I would estimate that they could cover perhaps 60 tiles fully with units. Of course then we have workers to contend with as well. Can we spread the coverage thin enough to make a single landing, let alone 3?

I don't know.

what about vox as brutus? If we could get them to join us, they could open up a landing for us and we could brute force it through Invoice.

[Cort Haus]

Vox could make a possible land route for GoW if they can't get a toe on Lego Major. It would suck units into Invoice leaving space for other landings elsewhere.

About our Navy - it wouldn't be large enough to split up. Maybe one stack sinking a couple of pickets to leave them in the dark then head for the coast.

[Cort Haus]

Draft Message to GoW

We probably want to say something to GoW soon, to keep the diplo going. Here's a draft ... and it doesn't say anything about 'how many troops'.

MZ,

The chat was good the other day, and there has been much discussion since on our forum. We haven't reached a unanimous position on the proposal, and there is some opposition to the notion that GS troops are really needed to damage Lego, but at this stage there is a possibility that a GS majority would approve the sending of troops to contribute to a Grand Alliance to Undermine Lego.

Would you be able to offer an an indication of the timescales you had in mind, so we could consider planning possiblites? In the light of the window of operations, we expect you would probably want to get started asap after Mil Trad. For our part, we could deliver an Expeditionary Force to the West of Lego not before around 15 turns, before which we could assist with city investigation, were an eastern assault already under way.

Some at GS feel that Lego may be able to block an eastern landing, in which case a new threat from the west may help to divert troops, but there is also the possibility of landing in Lego Minor, chez Vox, and blasting through Invoice. The least effect would be to pull units into Invoice, making landings easier elsewhere.

[Arrian]

Good message, Cort.

The reality is that we are not prepared for this operation (deliberately so. We were settling down to build). We need time to set into position, and meanwhile, the Bobians need to get moving. Hopefully, between what you told him in chat, and this PM, MZ will come to understand that.

I guess Hurricane's first build after Copernicus (if we get it) should be a galleon, eh? Let's get our galleys upgraded ASAP. I think we're set on ToE/Hoover in Arashi/Tempest, so EotS could build a few pikes for musket upgrade.

Do we have another east coast city that could switch over to a galleon and complete it in a reasonable timeframe? Then, coupled with the 2 galleys coming down the east coast, we would have 4 ships ready. Hurricane can punch out a 5th (it can do 4-turn galleons, I think*), and we would have 20 units of carrying capacity. How does 6 muskets, 2 knights (our elites), and 12 Cavalry sound?

By the way, can we get rid of those warriors? What in the world are we saving them for, when we have enough units to cover the sea wall? Surely we don't intend to upgrade them to guerrilas?

-Arrian

* - Copernicus in 6, 1st galleon in 10, second in 14. Hmm, not fast enough, is it? See, this is where we get into trouble. The whole point of disbanding most of our fleet was that we weren't going off on any more adventures. No sooner do we do it then we get sucked back into an overseas invasion.

[Cort Haus]

When we get the next save, Tornado could switch to complete a Galleon in 3 turns (was CH in 5) and Sufa in 4 turns (was Lib in 8). Blizzard will complete Harb in 6 turns.

Sufa and Tornado have habors too.

We have 3 elite WC's but only 1 elite Knight, and only 11 units spare from the wall until RP build some more - assuming they haven't switched to mkts like we suggested. With the galley cover gone for upgrading and exploring, the only way our units can be safely replaced on RP's wall is if they take our catapults there in a faux war. Fortunately, our cats have been shuffling north.

[vulture]

I personally think building improvements is a far higher priority than military at the moment. Any contribution to ventures against Lego come out of what we can spare from our defences and from our build queues, without compromising our economic state.

I don't really care how well ND / GoW do against Lego - I just want the three of them to have to divert resources towards fighting a war in a major way. We can't make any significant contribution to that without screwing our economy for our third major war in rapid succession - so lets just make a token effort, maybe a few galleons, possibly even empty, to create a gap for ND / GoW to gain a beachhead. Then we get ToE, Hoover, and try and get a head start on finding the oil (I'm guessing replacaeable parts will be researched ery quickly once the war starts). We're going to need a bit of a lead to get enough infantry and tanks to mount a meaningful defence before marines arrive.

However, I think this war currently is our best chance in the game - we need to do everything we can to encourage ND / GoW to go for it, and then do the bare minimum once they are committed. But I think we're all agreed on that anyway.

[Cort Haus]

Yes, the faster option would be floating a few empty galleys out quickly to co-ordinate with GoWND to draw forces west and ease their landing. Once they're on, the only thing stopping them is fear of committing units from home because of each other and us. If Lego attack the galleons, we get a happy boost, and tell GoWND our fleet is sunk.

[Arrian]

11 units to spare...

Sounds like 3 galleon loads to me (2 upgraded galleys + a new galleon in Hurricane). 4 muskets, 1 knight, 7 cav.

I like that for a token effort. I totally agree that we should not compromise our economy for this. This is ND/GoW's baby.

-Arrian

[asleepathewheel]

token effort yes.

At this point I think we tell gwnd whatever they want to hear in order to get an attack going, within reason of course. We won't lie and say that we'll have 30 cavs to land, but that we will land a significant contingent on the west.

and if they don't give us Mil trad, I'm not opposed to landing mi's and pikes and knights. The garbage crew to divert forces from the east.



We build 2 empty galleons and send them 2 squares ahead of the rest of the fleet. Lego kills them with frigates. We don't lose more than the galleons but we can tell gwnd that they were full, thus our 28 unit army, wink wink, was reduced to 20 before landing.

[asleepathewheel]

my typing skills have deteriorated significantly. I make a post and everything in it has just been said! haha.

[Cort Haus]

One consideration is how to get GoW to be able to deliver Medicine by the time we complete Electricity. They won't have cash for ToG, as they'll still owe us 200, and need upgrade money. It doesn't make sense for them to research ToG, and we don't want to spend our ToG on Mil Trad, so we might need to give them credit terms on it. Us giving them credit on tech makes it makes it less likely for us to backstab them, so may help our cause.

I don't see any way they'll accept us demanding Mil Trad for free, so we could just say that we're going with Knights and Pikes because we don't want to shell out on a tech that was never in our plans. They might offer us SP for free though.

I thought of the 'Lego sank our fleet' excuse, but the powergraph would say otherwise.

[vmxa1]

Good point and we don't want to be in the lies are us business anyway.

We just give them the unvarnished facts. Here is what we can do and are willing to do. They will either see that as better than nothing or think we are trying to pull a fast one.

If they are serious (and they should be), then they should take what we can offer.

[Cort Haus]

Medicine is 2400 beakers. If GoW can manage 200bpt that's 12 turns, just under the 13 turns we estimate for Steam + Electricity.
They have evey incentive to finish Medicine if Steam Power and Coal visibility are on the end of it.

Maybe GoW sould save some cash after getting MT and then take ToG on credit or part-credit so they can keep up with us.

At somepoint we might want to ask GoW what rate they can put into Medicine.

[Cort Haus]

On the ND side, Vulture has hopefully flattered ND by sending them a counter-offer in German (800g for Physics). See log. Arrian, you had started doing the ND diplo but as Vulture has some German skills we should probably try to use that, if that's OK with everyone.

I think we should try and get ND cash for Magnets and maybe ToG too. There's no hurry for Nationalism.

Vox complicates things - MZ wants to try and get access to their tech but I fear bringing them up in tech level- especially getting them ahead of Lego. Apart from the Lego risk, it could screw up timing plans for trades and prebuilds.