The Spartan Academy

[Arrian]

Oh definitely: we play nice until we're ready (if possible).

My main concern right now is the size of the jungle. Jungle is bad for us (more specifically, for our WCs).

If I'm in Vox's shoes, and I have GS to my south and either Demo or Roleplay on the other side (assuming their knowledge of Cem Burial is via trade with one of those civs), I would right now be advocating an Immortal stike on us via warrior upgrade. During the GA, I would build either lots more immortals or a horseman force, and once we're finished, hit the other neighbor.

-Arrian

[FrustratedPoet]

How can we find out when Vox get Iron Working? I don't think the trade screen will tell us in MP. Or will it?

[Dominae]

If Arrian is right about Vox's Immortal strike, perhaps our WCs will be put to a good use after all, in a defensive rather than offensive role. Nothing stops an Immortal rush better than Horsemen.


Dominae

[Arrian]

I'm just stating what I would do. I don't know what they will do.

But having a neighbor with such a powerful offensive UU rachets up my STCOMOM ("Scares-the-crap-outta-me-o-meter"), and the nasty voices in my head start telling me to kill them before they kill me.

-Arrian

[Theseus]

I'll tell you what's got my STCOMOM flashing red... that mountain range is like a f-cking arrow pointed at our heart!!!

We'll need at least two Spearmen (if not Swords) to protect the two tiles where it bottlenecks.

[nbarclay]

Here's an idea for a possible game plan assuming the jungles don't look like an insurmountable obstacle:

(1) Get Pottery and turn EotS into an all-out settler/worker pump. That city gets used for nothing else until we finish REXing, at which time it becomes our main production center. In my experimenting last night, I was surprised to find that there was still time to get Pottery after The Wheel and build a granary before our first settler, which gets us in settler pump mode a lot more quickly and pays major dividends down the road.

(2) All other cities build a barracks and start pumping out war chariots (assuming we have horses) and only participate in the REXing process in that they build a settler or worker when they get up around size 5 or 6 (threatening to cause happiness problems and/or stop growing). Most of our cities will be founded directly from EotS, but with that city churning out settlers in five turns and workers in two, the time involved will still be reasonable.

(3) After Pottery, beeline for Monarchy. That way even though we and Persia can probably both expect GAs when our forces clash, our GA should be worth significantly more than theirs. (Another possibility would be to trade them Monarchy and declare war the moment the deal is completed, perhaps trapping them into at least a couple turns of anarchy just as we strike .)

(4) Keep relations peaceful and positive while we're building up our forces, with tech trades wherever they seem useful.

(5) When we're ready to strike, see if we can enlist help from one or more other of Persia's neighbors, assuming they have any.

It needs tested, but I think this approach would work quite well if the jungles aren't too hard to deal with. (It's pretty much within the range of strategies I use in SP.)

I wish this plan had room for us to build a wonder or two, but with Persia having such a potent ancient UU and the GA potential that comes with it, I think extra WCs are more important.

Nathan

[Arrian]

Yeah, I was thinking the same thing re: them marching Immortals down our mountain ranges.

I really think we need a city up there around where contact has been made ASAP. Build orders would be barracks (poprush assisted) & walls, and every so often a poprushed spearman or WC. We get a road through the jungle, and then keep a worker or two there to cut down the jungle immediately surrounding our fortress town so that if we do have to kill invading immortals, we will be hitting them with WCs on flat, open terrain. Jungle provides a 50% defensive bonus, IIRC.

-Arrian, who is probably thinking way ahead and/or overreacting.

[Arrian]

I agree with Nathan re: pottery and settler pumping, by the way.

Anyway, until we are ready to attack them, I want to set up SOME sort of barrier in the jungle to prevent them getting past and marching immortals around on our mountains. We will have to watch Galley end-arounds too. Dropping 2 immorts from a galley behind our lines could be devastating.

-Arrian

[Randolph]

IIRC jungle defense is 25% (could certainly be wrong)

I really don't like the idea of the GA vs. GA war. It would be nice if they got in a fight with someone else, but I suppose we are a likely target.

The plans so far should good, but nothing that really sets my heart to rest. If they have iron and really have their hearts set on us, we should be worried. Do you think it would be possible to "look mean" (carry a big stick) and thus redirect their wrath to another civ?

I definitely agree with putting up some sort of barrier, it won't stop them but it would be a small buffer, and let us know when their coming.

[nbarclay]

I wouldn't be shocked if the idea of starting a GA vs. GA war scares Vox at least as much as it does us. It certainly ought to, and doubly so considering who they would be going up against.

I don't like the idea of wasting an early settler building a totally corrupt city in the far north. Productive core cities are simply too valuable, and a totally corrupt city can't build enough quickly enough to do us much good anyhow. If we really want a guardian city up north, I think the better course would be to build it later and import its units from the core so all it has to build itself are walls. (Then it could build a rush-assisted temple to provide some cultural depth, and then workers to start clearing jungles.) In any case, if we focus our early growth in the south, it will be a while before we have much Persia could attack without coming down from the mountains first.

By the way, a variant of the strategy I mentioned earlier would be to build a granary and temple in #3 so we have two settler pumps instead of one. (The temple would be to control happiness problems with less need for the luxury slider.) We'd still have #2 to bolster our forces early, and in the long term, getting more cities settled faster could be useful. We need to test both variants.

Nathan

[nbarclay]

I just had a brilliant (I hope) idea for how to defend the border. If we can build a "road of death" in between mountain ranges to mark our claimed border, we can jump any Persian units that dare to tresspass on that road with war chariots. Given the likely width of the continent where we'd build it, the road would probably be anchored by a city on each end (at least eventually), but we'd road north of the cities so we can hit units as they approach. Eventually, the road would be cleared down to grassland to improve our combat odds.

Nathan

[alva]

I wouldn't be shocked if the idea of starting a GA vs. GA war scares Vox at least as much as it does us. It certainly ought to, and doubly so considering who they would be going up against.

Exactly!!
My guess is, there more scared of us, then we are of them.

So, let's not over react, for them to 'come and get us', franckly, I don't see it happen.
How many tiles would they have to cross, while in the mean time have to build immortals (40-50shields?), and to have acces to iron btw.
ATM we probably have more cities(soon), no one to worry about down south, I say, we are in the command position compared to them.

[nbarclay]

Immortals are 30 shields, same as conventional swordsmen, so at equal production, we can outnumber their immortals with WCs three to two. (Not that they'll have equal production if our economic experts can help it.) Of course if they're smart, they'll cover their immortals using spearmen, but we'd still have a clear numerical advantage. (Assuming, of course, we have horses. Want to bet what they're hoping for just as much as we hope they don't have iron?)

Nathan

[alva]

Are they that cheap..!! hmm, nice unit

Im' pretty sure NOONE will be eager to take us on, one on one...
But, you are right, if we don't have any horses, auch
Then again, we could still bluff our way out, me thinks

[Dominae]

I hate to repeat myself, but: Immortals trump War Chariots in Jungles and Mountains. We need to consider this very seriously in every military (or diplomatic) decision we make.


Dominae