Dimplo Scholia: - Vox Controli - comments

[DeepO]

I'd rather have well timed prebuilds on techs we discover first, or leaders standing by the moment we research a tech first. The way I see it, it won't be possible to get to literature first, but in this case it won't matter much, as nobody can have the GL ready in 25 turns from now... that would require a lot of growth (it was possible in the test scenario, by starting before we met Vox)

DeepO

[asleepathewheel]

Originally posted by DeepO
I'd rather have well timed prebuilds on techs we discover first, or leaders standing by the moment we research a tech first. The way I see it, it won't be possible to get to literature first, but in this case it won't matter much, as nobody can have the GL ready in 25 turns from now... that would require a lot of growth (it was possible in the test scenario, by starting before we met Vox)

DeepO

When are we planning on starting? Where is it to be built, hurricane? Is there a viable alternative if it is finished first? The lighthouse perhaps?

The plan is to, what, rush to Republic, then to literature?

[DeepO]

asleep, if we would go through with this strat, there is but one option: get to literature first, before bothering with teh republic. Build the GL in Hurricane (our least corrupted city, with most commerce (will help on keeping everyone happy)), and pump the city with at least 3 workers (which need to be build immediately). If it fails, we will have a number of things to fall back to, pyramids perhaps, but more importantly Collosus, or the lighthouse if Vox could get to MM in the mean time. But we can't fail, any half-meant attempt is bound to fail, it's all or nothing.

Oh, and the risk has increased on losing the GL over last time I proposed to think about it: we are some 15 turns behind in production, so we need to catch up in size if we want to be sure... this will cripple our expansion quite a bit.

DeepO

[nbarclay]

If we go for the Great Library, what I envision is to build about six workers, have them work on tile improvements while Hurricane is growing to size 3 (maybe adding as many as three workers along the way if we can spare them), and then bring the city the rest of the way up to about size 9. Let's see any other civ try to match that kind of production, even with a head start. We might even be able to grab a second wonder.

I already talked to Jon and BetaHound about the idea of going after Lux shortly after we get Republic, and they liked it. Part of the idea includes trading some of the territory we conquer for some of Vox's jungle cities, since part of Lux is a lot closer to their capital than the jungle cities are. (The other reasons I like Lux as a target are (1) if we could talk Vox into letting us preposition follow-up forces in their territory, the crossing would be almost trivial, and (2) Lux's score looks like they won't be a very powerful foe. From there, we'd have a beachhead on the other continent for further military action.)

Adding the Great Library trick to that plan would take it from powerful to devastating - especially given the relative timing of the UUs involved.

Edit: Note that the thoughts of war with Lux are still in a highly preliminary stage.

[nbarclay]

I have the chat log posted in the ambassador's office thread. I think it went well; I think all our people who were there felt a lot better about trusting Vox. (And the fact that the Iron Working for Alphabet trade is now completed helps a lot too.)

[asleepathewheel]

Nathan-

Since the cold war has thawed a bit, would they move their warrior so that we could view their land for ourselves, and vice versa, or would that still be a bad idea at this point. It would be nice to see exactly where our future insertion point lies across the sea.

I saw that they thought Lux only had 2 cities. Shocking, though they have always lagged in the score. Bad terrain? Are they similar to Vox on our island?


(I wish we could house units (galleys) in Vox cities, thus hiding our intentions more easily)

[Shiber]

I think that would be premature. Besides, we can build galleys faster than Vox can, so we can scout their territory from the coast, pretending that it is as an expedition to explore Lux Invicta's coast (which would be the truth, but not all the truth... ).

[nbarclay]

I just sent out what I hope is a correct draft border treaty map. (I sent Jon a copy, so he'll presumably let me know if it's not.) If this is ratified, Vox will have 11 cities to our 13, but theirs will be smaller, crammed closer together, and disproportionately water. If I'm counting correctly, we'll have somewhere close to twice as many tiles of dry land (although we do have a little higher percentage of desert and a few more mountains than we'll be able to use until railroads).

Nathan

[notyoueither]

I'd like to see the entire city grid plan. It is not in the common box.

Thankfully, the discussions were on tiles north of where I thought they were.

[nbarclay]

I sent a copy of what I'm pretty sure is the most recent city placement proposal to the GS box.

[nbarclay]

Problem: I just looked back over our old city placement map and realized I've been undercounting our number of cities by one (I missed the city that was missing a number on that map). That means we'd have 14 instead of 13 cities under the current border proposal. I notified Jon of the error, and it's up to him whether we have to start haggling again now.

Edit: Make that two I undercounted by; our capital also wasn't included. I'll be preparing a revised proposal for Jon's consideration reducing our number of cities back down to 14 and letting them crowd theirs a little less.

Nathan

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by Theseus


This is really a tremendous idea... If I were playing a PBEM game with, say, any of GS as my neighbor in this situation, I'd go for it in a big way.

But with Vox?

Don't think of it as Vox. Think of it as the only other civ in the game with an ancient-era offensive-oriented UU.

Seriously, I think everyone who participated in the chat is more inclined to trust Vox in such a partnership than they would have been before.

[Shiber]

Nathan, I understood and in fact supported your actions when you sent Vox proposals that the team hasn't approved yet regarding the tech trade, because that was an ultra urgent issue, but that is not the case with the city placement plans.

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by Shiber
Nathan, I understood and in fact supported your actions when you sent Vox proposals that the team hasn't approved yet regarding the tech trade, because that was an ultra urgent issue, but that is not the case with the city placement plans.

I sent the city placement plan during the chat with Vox, with the approval of the GS folks (including Sir Ralph) who were there at the time, and the talks went from there. It's not something I initiated unilaterally, and Jon had a clear understanding that anything we came up with would have to be ratified by the team.

[DeepO]

Originally posted by nbarclay
If we go for the Great Library, what I envision is to build about six workers, have them work on tile improvements while Hurricane is growing to size 3 (maybe adding as many as three workers along the way if we can spare them), and then bring the city the rest of the way up to about size 9. Let's see any other civ try to match that kind of production, even with a head start. We might even be able to grab a second wonder.

I think that we need to do it this way... in the test scenario, I got Hurricane up to size 8 (last pop was rather late, it should have been earlier), with not much gain from getting to 9... I was already using forests at that time, and had no growth left. But, IIRC, I got the GL ready in 35 turns or so. Size 9 would be better if we can make it work, but spending 6 workers on it would be a serious commitment! We definately need to have a border treaty with Vox, and we definately have to start planning on this if we want to do it. Already, last chop went to the Barracks in Hurricane, so we can only build a braacks or something like that in there, and can't switch to a palace now. That's already a waste.

With the 2nd settler pump in the works, we might be able to do it... this needs urgent discussing, as we'll have to switch to a prebuild asap (preferably in 1 or 2 turns).

DeepO