The New and Improved Evacuation Plan

[Beta]

The last note from GS would indicate that they want to take The Voice intact. So - that means war.

And it also means all Estonian cities down to size 1 which should not be an issue, given the results of the poll. We will be out of here in 4 or 5 turns.

[Beta]

The 5 point plan worked out with nye last night. Everybody OK with this?

(also posted in the FA thread.)

5 Points
.notyoueither. 1. Vox 126. vox gifts all cities on Stormia (Estonia) to GS, save the Voice, as well as Engineering. Accepted.
.notyoueither. 2. GS 127. GS accepts cities and tech. Declares war. occupies The Voice. GS offers peace and Miller Town back, accepted.
.notyoueither. 3. Vox 127. Accepts peace and Miller Town. Moves all forces into Miller Town. Offers Miller Town, unnaccepted.
.notyoueither. 4. GS 127. GS offers 60 gold and accepts.
.notyoueither. 5. Vox accepts 60 gold for Miller Town and all forces *blip* to their new capital. The peace is final.
.Beta. Its a wrap.
.notyoueither. unless you want your troops gone one turn sooner, in which case offer miller town accepted
.notyoueither. up to you
.Beta. If that works - we will do it.
.notyoueither. it would.

[Rhothaerill]

I'm good with it. The sooner we get things over to Legos Minor the safer we'll be...in the long run.

[HarryH]

I think step 4 should be GS 128, not GS 127.

Do we know what turn Lego will build the city and gift it to us?

Will all our pop reduction be done by turn 126?

I want to think about this a bit. Why do they want all the cities first?

[Beta]

Yes - it should be 128. nye corrected that before we signed off.

I will find out from Lego as to timing.

As to the cities - it was the original plan - and nye talked about ensuring the jump happened. Beyond that - unless you have a suspicious mind - I can't think why.

Are you thinking holding onto the two southern cities?

[HarryH]

I wanted to hold onto the two southern cities for about four turns after the teleport of our units to Legos Minor. That gives us time to get other cities established and minimize our gpt problem. Since we are planning on changing governments during that period some of the turns will be anarchy which has no unit costs. That will minimize the problem. I will finish the government tests I started using a plan of no cities on Estonia.

[HarryH]

I thought about it on the same home from work. I have a big on the deal.

What is the 60 gold for, engineering or evacuating early? Looks like they are getting one for free or really cheap on each one.

When they conquer Voice they will get some gold from our treasury.

With their plan we will go around 6 or 7 turns with only one city. With the number of units we have we will be running a good gpt deficit for those turns. We can reduce that a bit using the anarchy period of our government change but it will still cost us a lot of gold.

It looks like GS is getting our cities early, plus gold from our treasury, plus engineering for a measly 60 gold while we will be losing a lot of gold before we get new cities established.

[Rhothaerill]

He raises a good point. I completely forgot we wouldn't have more than one city for awhile ( ). What if we were to start the anarchy as soon as we gift the cities to GS? I just took another look at Vondrack's map and it will take five turns from The New Voice to actually settle five of the seven immediate towns around it (four for Irony and Poor Town). That is seven turns after gifting away the cities (six if you shave off the turn where the troops get 'ported to The New Voice.). In those turns we should be able to count on at least four turns of anarchy and free unit support. If we're lucky the anarchy will last six or seven turns and we'll come away with no gpt loss.

One possible addition to make to the GS treaty is to ask for our gold back when they conquer The Voice.

[Beta]

Hmm - so good points.

First - regarding the gold from the treasury - we forgot completely about that. Thanks for bringing it up Harry. Two options - the cleanest is what Rhoth suggests - they simply give us the gold back. The second is to transfer our treasury to Lego - other than a nominal maintenance amout to keep us from losing units - and then they gift it back to us.

Second - the cities - we knew we would be facing the issue of a limited number of a cities for awhile. The original deal Eli cut with Shiber calls for the same thing. I can see if they will delay receiving two cities - but also note we will have a pile of cash.

We have 108 gold now. Plus we get 60 from GS in a lump sum. Plus 35 from GoW in 3 turns for engineering. Plus 100 from RP in a lump sum for engineering, and 5gpt for 20 turns. That is approximately 300 gold in the treasury at the point of transfer - plus the 5gpt. We should be OK. In fact we can calculate the cash flow pretty easily based on the number of units - and the turns to city builds, etc.

btw - we still owe Lego 75 but that has been deferred until we are settled and have the cash to spare.

[HarryH]

OK. I re-read the peace treaty and I see where we give them Engineering. So the 60 gold is for the early evacuation. I propose this:

1. Vox 126. Vox gifts Miller Town and Engineering to GS, accepted. Vox moves all units adjacent to Harry's Hideout.

2. GS 127. GS accepts Miller Town and tech. Declares war. Occupies The Voice. (Voxian capital moves to new city on Legos Minor.) GS offers peace and the gold received from the Vox treasury when Voice was conquered, accepted.

3. Vox 127. Accepts peace. Moves all units next to HH into the city. Vox gifts HH to GS, accepted.

4. GS 128. GS accepts HH. (All Vox units in HH jump to new capital).

5. Vox 130. Vox trades Beta-by-the-Sea and Wittlich City to GS, unaccepted.

6. GS 131. GS adds 60 gold to the trade and accepts.

7. Vox 131. Vox accepts trade. The peace is final.

In the GS plan we have only the city on Legos Minor at the start of each turn from 127 to 131 for a total of 5 city-turns. With my plan we start 127 with 4 cities and the other turns with 3 for a total of 16 city-turns. That is a difference of 44 gold just in unit maintenance costs (plus commerce, wealth, and tax collectors). GS still gets the Voice (with its granary and food tiles) and Miller Town just as quickly. With HH they will have a road network from Elipolis to Voice. Our units arrive in Lego Minor on the same turn in both plans. If necessary, we can move steps 5-7 up a turn.

[Beta]

Proposal sent to GS. Thanks Harry!

For this to work - I need to keep WC from grwing to size 4 at the same time as the settler is produced. No problem - I can use an unimproved hill tile. Will cost 1 gold - but so be it.

[HarryH]

If we do not need the shields from the unimproved hill tile you could turn one citizen into a tax collector. It will cause a food shortage for a couple of turns. That should not be a problem as it will just use up a little of the stockpile.

[Beta]

The problem is that we need one shield, but not two food from that citizen. The hill tile fits the bill - but will cost us one gold. No big deal.

[Jon Miller]

looks like the vac is going well

Jon Miller

[HarryH]

I wanted to post a few notes about my government testing. It looks like Monarchy will be the way to go. The difference in corrupting in the close cities is small and the extra commerce of Republic does not overtake the free units of Monarchy until the cities grow. Many of the cities will be slow growers until the harbors are built. I am working on a plan that does this: We ask Lego for Theology just before we get Engineering so we can do Printing Press as our next tech. Lego works on Education (they may already have it) and Banking. After Printing Press we go for Democracy. During our resettlement we switch governments to Monarchy and stay there until we get Democracy. By then we should have our cities established, harbors built, maybe a few libraries, and the cities have grown enough to where the commerce benefit of Republic/Democracy over Monarchy will provide more benefit than the free units in Monarcny.

It looks like we will have 2 turns of anarchy (maybe we should plan for 3 turns just in case). Until our new cities are settled Despotism is best. So we count back 3 turns from when the cities will be settled and start our government switch then.