After Lego

[Aeson]

This is by no means to overlook the job ahead of us, but rather to define how to approach the job in light of the fact that this is not "the game". Simply beating Lego won't help us win if in doing so we take ourselves out of position to accomplish what is necessary afterwards.

What are we looking to accomplish over on Lego? Set up a second core? Claim land to hopefully have the resources needed to win by spaceship? Or to continue on afterwards and conquer/dominate the world?

[asleepathewheel]

It really just depends what happens over there. I think our primary goal is a crippling strike against lego, levelling the fp site and surrounding cities and GoW levelling or holding the northern wonder cities. I'm not sure we have the means to take and hold a significant portion of legoland.

If we either eliminate or turn them into a rump state, and we have a leader (it wouldn't suprise me, due to all the fightin') then we could consider jumping the palace over there, since the FP is in Arashi.



It would be funny to "leak" a Legoland resettlement plan to the main forum after we attack. Maybe show the partition between us and GoW. Very Nazi-ish. (hopefully in fun, I don't want anything demeaning of course from us)

I don't think we can win by SS. I think the nukes will take care of that.

I think that if/when GoW commits troops to the cause, ND will move north on them. Its really a perfect opportunity for them, allowing lego to take a bit of a beating,but opening GoW up for attack.

[DeepO]

Too many variables, I'm afraid.

I concur that SS is not really an option, neither wil the UN. However, so late in the game, I don't see us resettling Legoland, and have a productive core over there either. We can claim the land for domination or resources (one of which is rubber, which Lego has one source of, and we have none), but I don't see us producing much over there.

Which is why I was asking to go for MAs, and turn our tanks in something exciting. But that as well holds problems: we can have the techs needed by the end of the Lego war, in case we somewhere find rocketry for Alu. We need Alu, of course. And, in case we would go after GoW, we are likely to both piss them off beforehand if we don't want to share our techs, and to run into MI defenders...

And the biggest problem of all: One of the main reasons in my mind why the Bobian invasion failed, is that our team had been fighting Vox for the past 2 months, and simply shipped all our units over. Too close in time to keep our attention, most of us faced burn-out. In case we go after ND or GoW immediately after Lego, we've got the same situation.

Game-technically, this is of no importance, but this game is much more then simply the rules coded into the program.

DeepO

[Arrian]

If we do too well vs. Lego, either GoW or ND or both WILL attack us. In the back of everyone's minds, we are still the 500-lb gorilla.

Therefore, I respectfully suggest that if we do get a leader, and are in a position to hide the fact that we did, that we do so. In this case, we do *not* immediately move the palace. We hold the leader out of sight while we resettle/fix up the terrain and maybe rush a few basic improvements, and consolidate our hold militarily. If/when we feel we've done that, THEN we move the palace with the leader. I know this removes the chance of getting more leaders. I think it's worth it, to gain an element of surprise vs. GoW/ND.

We will most likely still be in for a fight at that point, but we will hopefully be prepared for it. In fact, if there is some sort of partition of Legoland, and we get the leader, and we hide him, etc - we very well may need to initiate hositilities with GoW ourselves to get them off of Legoland and take out their eastern Bobian port cities.

-Arrian

[vmxa1]

Forward plans will be so "ify" as to be worthless, until we see who and how participates in the war vs Lego.

If no one comes in, it is lights out as it will be a repeat of GS vs all.

If GoW comes in lightly or even ND comes in lightly we will be hard pressed to tke advantage.

If GoW comes in hard and takes the brunt of the counter attack, things will be very different.

In the end I think we proceed on the basis that GoW comes in firmly. That is sends a serious attack, but not so much as to risk there homeland.

If it is 3 vs Lego and they all come firmly, then Lego is gone and how much damage they do and to whom will be the main factor on what is next.

I just cannot imagine that GoW and ND can bet their life that any alliance they have with each other is so reliable that they can ignore their home.

Only Lego can win with the status quo.

As to any leader and what to do with it, I suggest that if it is made on offense we use it quickly. If on defense then we can think about holding it a bit.

I don't see what we gain from hiding a leader. If we have a spot to drop the palace and it is secure, then we need to do it.

No just for production, but we want the shot at getting a second one.

[Aeson]

The consensus seems to be we can't win by Spaceship. I think we should make it our goal. No one will suspect it. Lets use that to our advantage.

The main problems are resources and nukes. The Spacerace isn't so much about production as it is about research and timing.

So we need more land for the resources. Aluminum being most important, so maybe we should research to it first to see what we need to claim in this war (if anything). Uranium we need too, but could conceivably get by with it for only 1 turn.

In fact not having it (but having a means to capture a source and switch a prebuild) might help. We don't want anyone thinking we are a threat for the Spaceship or we face a bunch of nukes. (but hey, so do the rest too ) So we go in as though it isn't an option. We prebuild everything (including Apollo) to finish within as few turns as possible.

(could someone post the exact costs of all parts? I don't have access to civ 3 or the editor and don't remember them all that well)

Solar Plants and Nukes work well for cheaper builds. The Palace gives us another prebuild that will cover any of them. A Leader works. Small wonders: Heroic Epic, Pentagon are probably out of the question, Battlefield Medicine is good, we need the Intelligence Agency. Cure for Cancer and Longevity may survive that long as no one researches for those.

So we research non-Spaceship techs. Trade for Spaceship ones, but let everyone think it isn't our focus. Go hard for the final tech, maybe steal the prerequisite if we have to. Time the prebuilds... Apollo finishes... the next turn the spaceship finishes. Don't give anyone time to react... hopefully GoW and ND will be at war trying to prevent the other from finishing first, and we take everyone by suprise.

I think it's our best shot. We've shown we can keep up technologically. We've convinced ourselves we aren't a threat for Spaceship, so maybe we've convinced everyone else too. The biggest problem (aside from losing to Lego ), as Arrian said, will be if we do too well on Lego, or get too big on Lego, and become a target. We certainly need to hit Lego hard early, but if the war goes too well, don't show it.

We need to claim Aluminum if we don't have it (we have decent terrain to have it... and no other resources to get in the way ). We need to set ourselves up for Uranium if we don't have it, but not necessarily claim it. Let GoW and ND split most of the rest, let us become the small "insignificant" one.

More later... gotta go now.

[DeepO]

Interesting idea... however, while we currently are the best researcher in the world, this advantage will soon deminish, even if we could take some land on Lego. If we go for the SS, we should have one thing, I think: the Internet.

Is it an idea to go for star wars first? I don't think we'll get there, but you never now.

Oh, and what about preemptive strikes with nukes, taking out as many ICBMs as possible (spies could tell us where these are, right?)

A problem, though, would be that it stretches this game even longer... who is going to hold interest for so long

DeepO

[Arrian]

I think Aeson has a good point re: SS win. I actually have been thinking along similar lines... research and MM are our strengths. War isn't (not that we're incompetant, just that we're better at peace). Diplomacy clearly isn't.

-Arrian

p.s. DeepO is right about the length-of-game problem, but I have to think that we're going to run into that no matter which way this plays out.

[Aeson]

At this point Conquest/Domination would come after Spaceship baring some horrible play on the part of at least 2 civs. The war against Lego, even if it goes as well as we can hope for, will have us 4-5 techs into the Modern Era at least. A military finish would also require a lot more time per turn.

I can't see getting MA before anyone has MI, and MA vs MI is a slaughter. It works against the AI because they stupidly take all their MI out of cities to form a SOD that you just avoid. Keep those same MI in the cities, with MA held in reserve to counterattack, and the defender should be 2 or 3 times more efficient with their shields though their production will get hurt certainly. The only way to really work against a player would be to kill most of the defense with nukes, while not getting nuked yourself.

Maybe we should try to make it look like we want a military victory. The other teams seemed to assume that would be our goal (Vox wanted to hit us first, Lego didn't want us getting on Bob). After (or rather during) Lego, make a pact (military and research) with GoW or ND against the other. Focus on the war as long as possible, but start the prebuilds when needed. Don't look like we are even attempting a Spaceship.

Maybe even attack the last major competitor before the last required tech is obtained, as a distraction. Make it look like we are desperate and weak, letting them roll through a good chunk of territory. Offer up Bob as bait. We just need to hold enough of Bob/Lego so that Domination is impossible.

Then we need to be able to hold them off long enough to launch. If we do it right, they will only have 1 or 2 turns warning of what is really going on. Like I said, killing MI is a slaughter (for the attacker), and even with nukes they'd have to kill a lot. We could disband coastal cities on the Bob side so they have to land regularly. Though Marines vs MI... even after nukes... might not work at all in any case.

Even if our prebuild cities get nuked, the prebuild isn't lost if we still hold the city.

SDI is another good prebuild if we get that far. We need to time it so that when the last spaceship tech is done the spaceship finishes that very turn though. If we run short on prebuilds, I would go so far as to disband Arashi (with a Settler and 11 Workers ready to reconstitute it so no one will hopefully notice) and use the FP as another prebuild.

[Aeson]

As for Nukes, remember that they don't have to be stored in cities. Subs can hold them, and they can just be stored on tiles that won't get nuked. I'd recommend we keep all our nukes 2 tiles from any city (with a Settler to build so they can launch), a few on Subs, and would expect the other teams to do the same.

I think a pre-emptive strike can be planned for and guarded against.

[DeepO]

Good points all around, except for the FP as prebuild: IIRC, a ICBM costs the same in shields (200). So no need to disband our FP yet

You're right about MA against MI, but it all depends on which tech we get: We can have MA before ND has MI, if GoW cooperates and trades us rocketry. Which might be the perfect diversion you're talking about: ally with GoW to take on ND after Lego, and meanwhile build SS parts.

I didn't know about the nuke-doesn't destroy build queue... it's logical, but as nobody has ever nuked me before, I just didn't notice We most certainly cvan use that, with the only problem remaining the Apollo program. AFAIK, that one can be destroyed by a nuke, so ideally it should be timed perfectly. That's going to be hard, though

DeepO

[Aeson]

Ok, so no disbanding the FP!

I'd test the nuke not destroying shields in a build first. Not sure on that. The plan would be to

The Apollo program only needs to survive the turn it is finished, so we can change the prebuilds.

[asleepathewheel]

If we get a leader, we should try to smuggle it out of legoland, hiding the unit that created it then create an army of 3 MI's in elipolis, our weak link. Granted, they can still nuke it, but at least then it will destroy at least one roaded tile (I think, not having looked at the map to check)

If the leader is spotted, then we should create either a MI army there (If we have MI) or a tank army, then we can build the two small wonders as well as MI armies.

I think those uses would be more prudent than a palace jump at this point.

[vmxa1]

I think it is fine to think along these lines, but we do not have to do much about until we get the war picture clearer.

The big problem to me is that after the war is settled, we are likely to be on everones list. We will have warred with all the civs and if lego is damaged badly or gone, we won't enjoy the protection we have now.

By that I mean no clear #1, we will not be restricted to our island and will be in full prodution. These makes it a better idea to come for us than it now does.

Right this moment we cannot help GoW or ND win by being eliminated. We can help them win by attacking Lego with them.

[Cort Haus]

Space Ship Parts

Docking 160s. (Space Flight, Aluminium)
Cockpit 320s. (Space Flight, Aluminium)
Engine 640s. (Space Flight, Aluminium)
Exterior 640s. (Synthetic Fibers, Aluminium, Rubber)
Stasis Chamber 320s. (Synthetic Fibers, Aluminium.)
Storage 160s. (Synthetic Fibers, Aluminium.)
Fuel Cells 160s. (Superconductor, Uranium)
Life Support 320s. (Superconductor, Aluminium)
Thrusters 320s. (Satellites, Aluminium)
Planetary Party Lounge 160s. (Laser, Aluminium)