Our defense after marines

[asleepathewheel]

what about outside Hurricane. Pretty symbolic, our crown jewel, and the place from which our armada sails to its destiny. Plus its then a straight shot east to lego

[Cort Haus]

We'll need pickets to alert against enemy ships seeing the build-up.

[DeepO]

good point, CH

DeepO

[Theseus]

So, going back to the fundamental naval plan...

[BTW, on somebody's recommendation (nye?), I switched to Firefox a while back, and love it. It also has a great extension for zooming in and out on web images, which is very useful in perusing sleepy's map.]

First off, excellent first draft sleepy.

A quick review and a number of discussion points:

Transports in a first picket line. Did we ever resolve the forting trick? That will determine the spread. Do the Transports stand alone? I wouldn't mind some Destroyers for cover, and as a deterrent, and for mutual picket support (more on Destroyers below). Also, Carriers with say, 1xFighter and 3xBombers (hereafter referred to as 1+3 Carriers), could very well coordinate with the Marine attack, and retreat to picket strongholds.

Subs in various spots for second level coverage. Fine... are we all OK with having them 'uncovered'? Also, I am thinking about their primary and secondary missions... that is, support the first picket line, or attack enemy ships on the way in? What does that mean for placement? Does that also perhaps indicate two or more Subs on certain tiles?

Regarding 'Fleets' as sleepy indicated, those are the defense force, yes? We definitely need one more to cover Elipolis and WoC. I think it pretty critical that these fleets stand off the coast by two tiles, so that Destroyers can reach Magellan-enhanced enemy Transports at their staging area. Further, each fleet should include, if possible, one Battleship and one 1+3 Carrier. Thus, fleet positioning should also include consideration of interlocking ranges.

Regarding timing of getting all this stuff into place, the most critical bit is the first line, and the warning it sends to Lego. We need to telegraph a defensive posture, perhaps at the Sub line, sending out and returning investigatory Transports, until ready for our attack.

More thought needed on this, definitely. I also need to catch up on offensive naval planning, and prolly need some push-back on what we are capable of economically.

I have a further suggestion: If Arrian is still around, that we split up offensive and defensive responsibilities. Given, uh, ahem, our relative offensive track records ( ), I'll take defense, and thus primarily naval issues. To go one step further, we can Red Team / Blue Team things, so I will critique and try to find the flaws in the attack plan, and vice versa.

[DeepO]

Theseus, if you could give an estimate of what's needed, please do so. Currently we're building galleons (got 9 or so of them already, currently at +2/turn) until we can build something else.

Main problem I've got when thinking on defensive navy is that we don't want to alert Lego by building dozens of ships at once (they have to remain weak, so we can get a decent part of their picket line in a first blow), but we can't risk anything either: Lego is going to have marines soon, and we do not want to be attacked first!

DeepO

[asleepathewheel]

I was thinking that the eastern subs could also scout and locate the lego pickets, and then eliminate all of them on turn one of the war. I would hate for us to move blindly. That's hoping that they don't move their defenders every turn (I doubt they do that much micro)

Too bad privateers have such crappy move rates, we could take out the first line with them and force lego to declare war on us

[DeepO]

privateers where part of the first plan, but they aren't really practical. Plus, I strongly doubt that Lego is going to keep only transport - pickets when marines are present. They are going to have destroyers as well.

Correction to earlier post: we're making 1.5 galleon / turn

DeepO

[Theseus]

I'll be working on my initial naval thoughts on paper, and then I'll prolly scan whatever I come up with and post the image.

Have there been any discussion of land defenses that I should catch up on?

[Theseus]

How do Galleons / Transports show up in miilitary strength?

[DeepO]

Not really. Except the very obvious thing that Elipolis is our main weak point, if we have enough pickets posted. It's the only point GoW can attack without us spotting them first (by going through RP).

Other then that, we plan on garrison all hills and mountains in forts, but exactly how many defenders are needed for each fort / city is not known. And estimates would be handy to have!

DeepO

[Theseus]

OK, I'll work on land defenses too.

Anybody know where vulture's basic calcs on Marine : Infantry ratios are (or just what the are)?

I am particularly interested in several things:

* Success rates for 4 and 8 Marines against fortified Infantry, in stacks of 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 8, in towns and cities, and also on hills and mountains. A second run incorporating defensive Arty at a ratio of 1 for every 2-3 Infantry (might not be necessary... this is embarassing, but I honestly don't know whether Arty zero-bombard against Marines. Embarassing for Firaxis and the SP AI, that is! ).

* If it can be done, what about repeating each of the above runs with 2 fortified Tanks added to each city?

* Anybody remember if forts, walls, and / or coastal fortresses make a difference against Marines?

* Which cities already have walls? Do we have any coastal fortresses?

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Theseus
OK, I'll work on land defenses too.

Great!

Anybody know where vulture's basic calcs on Marine : Infantry ratios are (or just what the are)?

I assume we need vulture for that

* Anybody remember if forts, walls, and / or coastal fortresses make a difference against Marines?

I saw different reports, but the last I read was info from Catt on marines, in vanilla Civ. Can't help you there

* Which cities already have walls? Do we have any coastal fortresses?

I think Eli has walls, and Arashi has walls (they both have grown to city size, so they're gone). I don't know if we had them destroyed once we build the Great wall, though. None of the other cities were protected.
There are no coastal fotresses either. Do these work against marines? If so, how much do they cost, and where do you want them?

DeepO

[Theseus]

The Storm gathers.

Hold onto your hats.

[asleepathewheel]

[vulture]

Okay, lots of tables to shortly follow this post. Each table has no. of marines and no. of infantry as its axes. Each entry has 4 values, arranged in a square. These are the % chance the marines take the tile when defended by:

Just Infantry - - - - - - - - Infantry plus artillery

Infantry plus tanks - - - Infantry, artillery and tanks

No. of tanks is always 2. No. of artillery is 1 (1-3 inf), 2 (4,5 inf) or 4 (8 inf).

Hope that's clear... All defenders are fortified.

Work out the terrain bonus for the situation you want to know about, and find the appropriate table.

IIRC bonuses are:
flat terrain: +10%
hills: +50%
mountains: +100%
towns (1-6): +0%
cities (7-12): +50%
metropolises (13+): +100%

Max bonus is +150%, for metropolis in hills. I got carried away and did +200% anyway...