I want war.

[GodKing]

I want war. I think it is the only way for us to win.

LEGO is by far the biggest LONG TERM threat to winning.

They are on a large landmass by themselves.

They have only to worry about an occasional barbarian, so are probably in major REX mode. When they are done, they probably will have 20-30 cities, well endowed with all those lovely things like markets, temples and libraries. They will be our long term threat. Look at the score. They are already ahead of everybody else, adn are only getting further ahead.

I see only one way to prevent them from winning by space ship and or domination (as they claim to be peacefull, I suspect space). We need to be able to out research and out manufacture them. In order to do that we need far more than the 12 or so cities we will have. We currently have a tech advantage because we can trade. That will not last forever.

We must have if not all of this landmass, the majority of it. We must be able to match them, or to invade them to disrupt them.

DISCUSS PLEASE

[astrologix]

Did you notice that Neu Theben has ONLY one spearman garrisoned ?

Maybe we could help Lux....

[astrologix]

GodKing, I agree

But it's a long way...

[Arnelos]

GodKing has raised a VERY interesting long-term strategy.

For now, we simply don't have the goods. But when we get iron and horses linked up and can start to consider this more seriously, this is a topic that we need to return to.

[Arnelos]

I've looked at the plan for Madrid... Personally, I think we should continue some form of the current plan whereby we use Madrid to found 2 more cities that are close to Madrid and thus have low corruption and waste to be used as military or REX production centers.

Once those two settlers are out of the gate, which has concurrent timing to the likely time our iron resource is linked up, we can use Madrid's superior production to turn it into a Veteran Swordsman/Veteran Horseman/Veteran Spearman factory for purposes of building a war machine.

I'm quite open to doing this and indeed other low-corruption cities arayed around Madrid could also switch to a war footing and build up a stockpile of swordsmen, horsemen, and spearmen for an eventual war.

However, at that point, we may want to re-assess whether waiting for Feudalism would be more beneficial. I've now played enough warmongering games with PTW to know that medieval infantry are the dreadnaughts of the early Middle Age. Stacks of medieval infantry and pikemen are cheap and will bowl over just about anything in sufficient numbers.

We could build swordsmen and then upgrade to medieval inf (20 gold each, I believe?) and spearmen to pikemen (also 20 gold each, I believe?) if that will help, but then we'll need extra funds.

I'm entirely open to the possibility of conquering Neu Demogyptica once we have an economy and production power able to actually build an impressive offensive force.

We'll know more about which plan we might go with once we have iron linked up and then can re-assess our situation.

EDIT:

Some might argue that we should just build huge armies of knights. This might seem like the superior strategy, but think about the actual numbers of shields and the value of units. A medieval infantry/pikeman combo has roughly the same cost as a knight, but the difference is that the 4 attack value and the 3 defense value are in two seperate units, while the knight combines them into a single unit with 2 movement.

The reason I personally prefer the medieval infantry and the pikeman to the single knight is that while the stack of pikeman is absorbing the counter-offensive strikes of the enemy while trudging into their territory, the medieval infantry are SEPERATE UNITS which remain undamaged. Then, when you reach the target (a large enemy city inside their territory by 2 tiles), you have your stack of medieval infantry protected by those pikeman still at FULL HEALTH to assault the city.

You can use knights, but may times it's more efficient to use medieval infantry and pikemen because of this dynamic and because borders most of the time extend 2 tiles beyond a city and even a knight can't reach the target city on the same turn as the invasion... thus forced to be attacked while still in the field just like the pike/medinf stack.

That said, the mobility of a smaller knight stack is impressive enough that it can make a big difference. Pikeman/Medinf stacks severely suffer from a lack of mobility in enemy territory and allow the enemy to combine as much firepower as he can on your one little stack of pikemen and medieval infantry.

So it depends...

[E_T]

There are two opposing poles to the current situation, REX'ing and Mass Military build up.

I think we can safely stear a course between the two. Yes, we need those cities, to have the research and tax base And the Production Throughput to build a lot of units and still have other things being built. Yes, we need the Military to be increased, not only for defence, but to be able to back our foreign policies.

We can acheave both, but not by reacting in outright fear to the current situation, but to think and plan through it. THAT is what will make us the ultimate winners of this game. If you notice, we have one of the top number of posts/threads as the other teams. We have a Chat Room that is almost always occupied. We are looking at things, not just for the next couple of builds, but up to 40 turns away from whatever time we are currently playing. We have a Diplomatic team that can't be beat. THese are our streinghts and we should use them all (and are) and not allow ourselves to be guilded by our emotions and glands.

E_T

[Togas]

One note that has been forgotten in this whole exciting mess:

We want to build the Great Library.

Can we continue to do so? Can it be fit into our plans? In 10 turns it will be available to us.

--Togas

[roadcage]

And if we listen to hemers and hawers of this world, we will never have the goods. We must be proactive. We must have a plan to be able to exploit that Iron when it is available.

[GodKing]

Knights are overated. I like the MI and Pike combo, particularly with all this jungle.

[Arnelos]

crosspost... my post has been heavily added to in an edit, which effectively answers roadcage's question, I hope. Please read the edit section.

[ruby_maser]

I say we make the end of REX a zero hour of sorts for a military campaign to open up more lands for settlement. This isn't anything new, but we will need to:

(1) identity and emphasize the necessary offensive and defensive improvements and infrastructure requirements,

(2) devise, assess, and re-devise a successful military strategy that will minimize the risk of a protracted war,

(3) quietly pre-build a large well-balanced, multi-functional military force capable of adapting and responding to changes in the scope of a conflict on the fly,

and

(4) find the general among us who can win.

I don't think we will be the only ones looking at the end of REX as the beginning of a new phase. If we could time our strategy well and keep the secret sufficiently hidden, we can prevent an arms race that neither team can win and, when they least expect it, break it to them gently

[Aidun]

About offensive wars, state development and becoming a superpower.

If we want an offensive war, we need an army first and it would also be very useful to have some improvements that strengthen our military like barracks and walls.
The third point is perhaps the most important one: having a strong economy. If we want a large army, we need a strong economy to support it. This can be achieved by: 1) building improvements that strengthen our economy by letting the workforce grow like aquaducts and hospitals; 2)improving the terrain for workforce- and productiongrowth; 3) builing improvements that keep the workforce happy and allow a growth of the existing workforce. 4) building improvements that let the production and trade grow: marketplaces, banks, stockexchanges, factories, powerplants, mass-transportsystems and recyclingcenters.

I don't mention luxuries to keep the workforce happy, because I think luxuries are not meant for such. They are meant to sell and to gain money by that so that you be able to support a larger army and a higher research. Luxuries should be used to gain money and improvements to keep the workforce happy and thus maintain workforce-growth.

Until now all seems very self-evident, perhaps unneccesary to mention, but it is good to let these points be very clear to everybody.

The fourth point is not so self-evident and I shall explain it under here.
While playing against AI players, one needn't to be concerned that other nations will attack you en mass, but humans think different on this point:
If you declare war on an other state and you conquer a large part of this state or even defeat the entire enemy, other states will fear that you are getting too powerful and will declare war on you. This is like we are acting with GoW towards ND.
There are two solutions to solve this problem: 1) signing an offensive military alliance like Germany and the USSR did at the start of WW II when they invaded Poland: both allies gain territory, both increase in power; or 2) having an attackforce that is stronger than the attackforce needed to just conquer the other state. With this stronger attackforce you can defend your neccesary attackforce from counter attacks from other states, so that the neccesary attackforce can conquer precisely that terrytory that you have planned to conquer.

Fifth point is having a strong defensive force. It is a very known and common strategy in chess that you threaten to counterattack a piece of your opponent that is of the same kind as the piece of your own that is threatened to be attacked by your opponent.
If your opponent decides to attack, you can counterattack and win and loose both a piece of the same value.
Of course it is better if you can threaten to attack a piece that is of more worth than your piece that is being threatened to attack.
Compare this strategy with attacking enemy cities in Civ3. It is important to have a devensive force that is AS strong AS your normal (not extra-strengthened as mentioned above) attackforce. IF the ennemy decides to attack, you remain your city, while he loses one to you.

Sixth point: information. Alexander the Great showed all military leaders that information is one of the keys to succes. Macedonia had the first Secret Service or Intelligence Agency that provided Alexander and his generals with valuable information like the size of the army of the enemy, his infrastructure, the size of his economy and the strenth of it and other useful infromation. With the conquest of the Persian empire he showed that information is a vital thing: the Persians didn't have such information and failed to defend their empire. Of couse this is but one onf the reasons of their downfall.

On the long term there is a seventh point: discovering technology and improving research by builing research improvements: libraries, universities and researchlabs.

Judging the current situation of ND getting in war with Lux on these five points, we get the folowing analysis:
1. ND has a strong offensive army.
2. ND has no or few improvements to strengthen their army.
3. ND has a weak or moderate economy. They have probably improved their land, but have a small workforce and no or few improvements for workforce growth and maintaining workforcegrowth (temple).
The economy of ND is too weak to maintain a stong attackforce as well as a srong defensive force as will be showed below.
4. ND has an attackforce that is strong and perhaps strong enough to defend the neccesary attackforce against counterattacks from other states.
5. ND has a weak defensive force, which makes them very vulnerable to counterattacks on their cities.
6. About the informationlevel of ND I can say but very little, but I doubt that they know a lot of their enemies: a large part of the land that is between them and their enemies, and the surrounding land. I think they know but little of their enemies military. They know one important thing: No one els except them posesses any iron yet.
7. ND's research is allright.

What we need to do to be able to start an offensive war or even become a superpower ourselves:
1. Having an offensive army.
2. Builing improvements that strenthen our army like barracks and walls.
3. Building up a strong economy by building up a large forkfoce and maintain the workforce growth by building temples etc.
4. Having an attackforce that is stronger than the neccesaty attackforce
5. Having a defensife force that is as strong as the normal attackforce (not extra-strengthened as mentioned above).
6. Maintaining that total military force to discourage other states that want to attack you, by conventional deterrence.
7. Gathering information about the enemies and keeping this information up to date.
8. Maintaining an acceptable researchlevel. Don't give this a low priority on the long term. Outdated weapons or a backward economy are not a good basis to start an offensive war with and let the conventional deterrence fail. On the short term, technological development has a low priority: research takes oftenly longer than the military preparations.

It has to be discussed what the order of priority of these points shall be. Every point is important, few can be developed at the same time. ND has made it's decision: they favor a strong army over a strong economy to support it, a strong attackforce over a strong defensive force and improvements to support the military are lower rated in the order of priority.

Aidun Cian the Younger

[Thud]

Silly war. It doesn't concern me, I intend to spend all my time with my nose in a book at the Great Library that we can and should build.

Though, I will have no argument with it.

[Aidun]

* Bump *

Togas and others, please post a reply, I intended to feed the discussion with this post, but it remains totally silent about this subject.

Aidun Cian the younger

[GodKing]

I am not sure if I agree with all of that. A small force doing a strategic strike, can do a civ significant dammage without causing problems. For example. If we were to send out 3 archers, a spear, and two warriors (something we could easily have now) towards the ND capitol, they will probably be able to take it. What would we do without Madrid?

Think along these lines.