Turn 179 : 640AD

[asleepathewheel]

good enough

I think that now that lego has sealed itself off, gownd has a greater impetus to work with us to get ahead tech wise. hopefully. The worst would be if they get itchy and turn their attentions towards each other before the coming of marines.

[Theseus]

A couple of broad question:

* Why would Lego beating us to TOE be game over?

* Have we (and NDGoW) considered focusing on a Marine attack on Lego?

[asleepathewheel]

Originally posted by Theseus
A couple of broad question:

* Why would Lego beating us to TOE be game over?

* Have we (and NDGoW) considered focusing on a Marine attack on Lego?

1. I think its the fact that we don't get the 2 tech bump. And because lego would also then probably get both hoover and infantry before we could get marines. And it would be horribly disappointing to miss out on it.

2. Not yet, we should try to set up a chat sometime soon. I think everything we do should be focused on that goal (and self-defense) wonders built for science, prductivity. Churn out a navy and marines. Oh there will come a day of reckoning for lego.

[notyoueither]

Good that we have some ships out looking, but that triangle in the South between Lego and us... there could well be a couple of islands there. Maybe SP and maybe coal. Often tundra isles that will have at least one oil. It would be good to find them first.

[Theseus]

You know, I was screwing around with playing AU 501 yesterday and today. I thought my late-game was sorta boneheaded, and I was particularly intrigued by some of the earlier warmonger wins.

I prolly experimented with 3-4 different strats... I've gotta say, the "Power of Seafaring" is something that most of us don't really have all that much experience with. 40 Dromons? Jesus wept.

Imagine a truly determined and coordinated attack by the bunch of us:
* Naval bombard for both resource denial and unit damage.
* Marines for direct attacks... perhaps on weakly defended high ground rather than cities directly, backed up by Infantry defense.
* Conqs for pillaging.

I wouldn't mind GS being the naval power, and then perhaps air... rather like the British Empire and then American production, I think. In fact, the more I think about it... isn't our best chance to win maintaining our homeland production whilst, in turn, damaging/denying same to our opponents?

Dear g*d, I think I am proposing a re-play of WW 1 and 2.

[asleepathewheel]

Originally posted by Theseus
I prolly experimented with 3-4 different strats... I've gotta say, the "Power of Seafaring" is something that most of us don't really have all that much experience with. 40 Dromons? Jesus wept.

[drool]

I've won games on the strength of men o war bombardment nearly alone! granted against the ai, but still.... bombard infantry, land cavs adjacent, take. fun 50 mow's + 30 captured. scary ****.

Originally posted by Theseus
Imagine a truly determined and coordinated attack by the bunch of us:
* Naval bombard for both resource denial and unit damage.
* Marines for direct attacks... perhaps on weakly defended high ground rather than cities directly, backed up by Infantry defense.
* Conqs for pillaging.

Its how its going to have to be. sounds like fun.

[Cort Haus]

Message from MZ in log .

ND voted against military action against Lego. MZ also reckons that no way will Vox not give the freebie to their main benefactor.

The late industrial combined assault on Lego is looking like the only way they can be stopped now. If they beat us to ToE it will be a psychologocal blow as well as a material one.

GoW finish Mil Trad next turn. We finish ToG next turn. We need GoW to get Medicine when we have Electricity, so we're going to have to let GoW have ToG up-front so they can do it in time.

[notyoueither]

Do what has to be done, CH. Take us home.

[vulture]

ND got back to me on Friday to say that our offer on Physics was too high. I would have posted here before, but Thursday night my house was broken into and my laptop was stolen, so this is the first time I've been able to check in since then.

Do we go back to 600 gold, or go with some other plan?

[DeepO]

What about these two proposal to ND and GoW:

GoW:
ToG next turn in exchange for
- the medicine - steam swap in less than 11 turns from now (and I don't mind telling them we're going for ToE and we need them to block Lego, we're at a very tight schedule)
- coal for 20 turns in case we don't have it in our territory, and they have 2 sources or more. In which case we'll transfer steam up front (before Medicine). Deal can start at our request, and needs to be started within 21 turns after receiving steam or is the promise is declared void.

ND:
Physics and ToG next turn, for:
- 600 gold
- 2 lux for 20 turns
- Coal for 20 turns in case we have none, and they have 2 sources or more.

I think they might go for that, it's not a bad deal for them.

Further: we might want to tell GoW and ND that our analysis shows it is likely Lego is capable of a sea wall of their own...

DeepO

[asleepathewheel]

Hell, we might as well get Mil tradition out of any deal for ToG. It might come in handy. For that matter, it wouldn't be an awful idea to upgrade our current knight force to cavs if possible. We will need them eventually, and saltpeter might be readily available for now.

I've sent a note to Rhoth of vox to contact you CH while I'm away the next few days.

I don't have a problem laying out our tech strategy with GoW. They know that we don't pose a direct threat to them anymore, the green menace is what they have to prepare for. They can win without attacking us, they can't without attacking lego.


I suppose ND is in full out rex mode to fill out Bob (what exactly did they get out of that deal???)


I remember predictions that this game wouldn't reach industrial! Hahaha. Though in fairness, we are much too kind to our opponents, allowing them to survive, compared to other games.

[DeepO]

Mil Trad: if we don't go to Lego, cavs aren't worth anything at all. They can form part of a clean up duty when mixed into a inf/tank/marine force (as they have 3 movement), but it's not useful to build them, or pay good money on upgrades for them. I suspect that once we're thinking on invading, we won't bother taking cavs with us in our second, or even third wave, and only get used when avoiding flips and sushing rebellion. In that sense, Mil Trad is worth nothing at all to us, we don't even have SP to upgrade our (completely obsolete) knights.

So, GoW can do what they want with Mil Trad, if they want to give it to us: fine. But we shouldn't pay not even the slightest amount of gold for it...

DeepO

[asleepathewheel]

Cavs will be pretty useful for defense, otherwise it will be knights/guerrillas/artillery in case of a landing on stormia post-marines.

Have you checked out what hot_enamel did with a set of cavs and marines against tiberius in the marines thread in strat forum? quite devastating. It really depends on our goals. If our goal is to just suck up units into the west side, then marines/infantry are fine. If we want to penetrate and do damage, then we need some fastmovers.

[DeepO]

I've read the post by H_E, yes. I'm not doubting that cavs can't be useful, but all depends on circumstances. For us, we will be as fast to tanks as we can get to marines, in which case I prefer these if we're facing infs. H_E had a bunch of cavs from previous buildup which he could use. We don't... we have 23 knigths or something like that, which we could upgrade, but that upgrade is not worth the cost of us acquiring Mil Trad and SP.

If we would go to Lego, things are different. But it doesn't look like we're going to invade before tanks are available. So let's not waste money on Mil Trad... if I had to chose between my proposal (an assurance for coal and a decent shot at ToE) and Mil Trad, the choice would be easily made.

DeepO

[vulture]

But since GoW and ND seem to have no intention of invading Lego at the moment, and we have no SP, MT is completely useless to us. If we do need cavalry in the future, it is more efficient to build knights while we can, and upgrade when about to go to war - and we don't need MT until then, when it will be considered almost worthless by everyone else. For defense, we strictly need anything more advanced than workers until marines are around. Once marines are here, our defences concentrate in ports. Fast movers will hopefully be redundant on defence due to RRs and artillery - we won't need cavalry to launch a counter-offensive (guerillas are cheaper for the same attack, aren't they?), unless we lose a city - but if that happens, our core is pretty much gutted and all our best towns are history anyway, so it's a lost cause.

I'm with DeepO - we should pay no more for MT than it's worth, and it is currently worthless to us, and remains pretty much so even if we do get a source of SP.