Turn 244: 1270 AD

[Cort Haus]

text of email exchange, copy in log :

to MZ:

We chained 8 arty over, pounded the 3 BBs outside the otherwise-naked Quanto and slammed 9 transports (and a destroyer) against them. We broke through! I'm not sure yet what we do from here but DeepO reckons we might get a shot at taking out the FP.

and his reply ...

Wow that's great news!

I'm all the more convinced now that GoW has to take a shot at taking Fort whatever-the-name-is if enough troops are still there. I don't think Lego could have built more than 15 tanks to be honest as they also built additional infantry and didn't rush all the Cavs. Hopefully our tanks are still standing and if they are, I think we do have a shot.

[Jon Shafer]

Get on with the turn, man, this is the climax of the game!

[vulture]

Should we tell GoW that if they give us troop numbers once they get the save, we can give them odds of taking Fort whatsit to aid their decision?

[Cort Haus]

Good food takes time, Trip

As I recall, Aeson asked the question "Do we have 8 Artillery we could chain across?". He needs to see this.

[DeepO]

Sorry guys... right when I was eating, some friends dropped in unexpectedly. I couldn't move them out the door any faster.

As to rushing along: no way, Trip. I know you're anxious to watch the show, but this turn will not be played tonight. It takes time to see all options, and we need that very badly right now, this is too critical.

DeepO

[OPD]

Wow!!! nice one!!!

I guess Lego were a bit too daring leaving the city completely undefended.

Don't listen to Trip, take as much time as is needed
Perhaps clear objectives and feesability of possible strategies is needed.

Looks like 4 transports can make it into port!!!!!!!

[DeepO]

Originally posted by vulture
Should we tell GoW that if they give us troop numbers once they get the save, we can give them odds of taking Fort whatsit to aid their decision?

No... we should do something else. MZ is talking about if the tanks survived, he attacks... if none of the tanks survived, he should still attack. There is no choice here, GoW must put everything they got into the attack, no questions asked. They will never get such a chance again.

He thinks to use the tanks, and marines perhaps as they are no use anymore (again wrong assumption, btw), but that's just plain wrong. Every attacker is a chance of taking out a defender. Whatever is left of the tanks can take out (bombed) infs, after which the marines go for it, after which the infs do their thing. And even if the stack is very badly damaged, they will be a lot better off going for Fort Stanwix. In their wettest dreams, GoW did not anticipate to take 8 Lego cities in one turn. And if you put the anticipated cost of that in shields, it is easily worth the units they put into it.

But no worries, I'll write them a convincing report After all, we just used transports to take out BBs...

DeepO

[DeepO]

Okay, transport capability. We've got 4 transports which can end their turn in Quanto (with chaining of course). This will leave 2 4/4 TR in the open (NI 8). Further, we can use one more to deliver units to Quanto, but without mp left. (that will normally be the 1/4 TR already at Quanto 4, and we need another 4/4 TR at NI 8)

So, in total, we've got a maximum of 40 places, of which 8 have moved.

We need 1 marine to take the city, being one of the moved units.
We need all our settlers (4), moveable.
we need at least 4 tanks or MI.
we need all the explorers we can get (2).
So, that leaves us with 7 non-moveable places, and 22 moveable places.

If we decide we want to get in, do our damage, and get out, not all of those places will be needed. Also, we will have to raze Quanto, most likely, so we will have slaves which we can use to construct fortresses, radar towers, or roads. There are 3 workers which would be an easy catch, but we can only go for them if we're sure about what we're there for.

Something else: our stranded marines of last turns come into play again. We have moved one to scout Quanto, and another one is damaged. But that still leaves 6 full health, and 1 3/4 M that we get "for free". Not bad I would say...

Now, I'm going to see what we know of the terrain, and where we think the FP is. I remember some discussion about this in various threads, so this is going to take a while to compile. We should also consider that now that we don't have to expose any spies (at least if we can convince GoW to go for it), we will have enough cash to steal Lego's map (338 gold, safely)

DeepO

[Jon Shafer]

You should know by now to take my prodding with a grain of salt.

Originally posted by OPD
Looks like 4 transports can make it into port!!!!!!!

I see 6?

[DeepO]

A bit of a cross-post with OPD here... apolyton (or my connection) is lagging terribly.

First things first: we need a situation report on what we know of the layout of the land. I'm on it

DeepO

[DeepO]

Trip, it's best if those transports also transport something

DeepO

[Cort Haus]

With the 4th BB naked in port, our transports (who had already completed their job) have just knocked out half Lego's Battleship fleet (rounded down). We hoped the naval luck was due to swing round to us.

We could probably recoup the map costs from GoW and ND if we did steal Lego's map. Another thing is that GoW might actually like us to have a spy so we could tell them their unit status in advance. MZ asked us for the info in case we had it this turn.

IF we could knock out the FP and IF GoW can break through Fort Whatsit (great name, MZ should call it that in their propaganda) and destroy much of their northern core then it would be mission accomplished. I hardly dare believe it possible.

On the Resource front, Lego has 1 Rubber and 2 Oil. One of the Oil is next to Jackson, and the other is probably in that thar desert we're looking to cross in the Quest for the FP. Depriving them of one or both of these might be useful - though Vox could sort them out if needed. Is there an explorer available who might pillage the second oil if we see it? Lego wouldn't know their Oil was gone until after Vox's turn.

Speaking of Vox, I wonder if RP fancy a little diplo mission. The RP fleet is on the Stormian coast, possibly unsighted by Lego subs. It might not be too late for RP to feign an air of neutrailty in an approach to Vox.

[DeepO]

CH, I've been drawing maps for the past hours or so (results nearly finished), but maybe you could ask something to GoW. If they are interested in paying us for our map, we could do it right now, without any guessing. That most certainly would make life easier...

I'm not sure we want to pay for it ourselves, we can get pretty far with striking out what we know, and we do have 2 explorers we could use. Once we've got Quanto, we see a bit more as well...

DeepO

[DeepO]

oil: we've got 2 explorers, but they can only pillage one tile per turn, right?

DeepO

[DeepO]

Legend following

DeepO