Operation "Backstab"

[Dreylin]

Except we should be talking EDT, not EST. The UK is still 5hrs off from the US, so Europe is 6hrs ... so midnight.

[sooooo]

Go to the little blah chatroom - all the cool kids are in there right now.

[Kodii]

Operation Mehmed II has commenced

[MyOtherCar]

And succeeded!

[Swiss Pauli]

What should we do if Naldo asks for Jerusalem & Constantinople along with the MT for Edu trade?

I'd hand over Jerusalem, but keep Constantinople saying we need to heal our units in our own land to save away unit costs. Before handing over Jerusalem, we should slave it down to min pop to stop him whipping a defender when we backstab.

[sooooo]

We should rename Jerusalem so Imperio won't know which city to demand :P

[MyOtherCar]

How about " Navajada de espalda" ? Or "Ningun pólvora"

Spoiler:

"Stab in the back" and " No Gunpowder" respectively

[mostly-harmless]

I guess it is important for us to log in right after turn start and initiate the tech trade ourselves. That might slightyl increase the chances of them accepting.

mh

[Sullla]

Alright, now that our Military Tradition trade has gone through with Imperio, we can start thinking in earnest about how we're going to slip the knife into their back. I spent a while this morning looking over the map, and based on how Imperio has moved on their turn, I think we can pull off something pretty good. Here's the current situation (T166):



There are a couple of injured units in Damascus, but the bulk of their stack has moved (without healing) southeast onto the hill towards Acre. My best guess is that the Templars don't have very many units in Acre, and Imperio is just going to move in there and finish off the job quickly. That means we have to be fast as well if we're going to be in position! Fortunately, we can do all of the moves necessary with only two workers, leaving the other two outside Jerusalem to finish pasturizing the cattle there. Here's how I would play this:



We first move our exploring chariot SE onto the hill with the Imperio stack, so we can watch their battle against Acre in full. (I didn't bother to draw this in, but wanted to state it for clarity's sake.) Now Imperio should move either SW or S with their big stack, along the arrows draw in. We are only in trouble if they move SE, so let's hope that they don't move along the coast! Assuming that they go in the other directions, everything works out.

We gather all of our healthy units on the three "red" tiles around Constantinople, and combine them together into one large stack on the yellow circled tile. This is essentially the staging turn, in other words. Meanwhile, two workers move onto the boxed white tile located SW-SW of Damascus. Imperio does NOT have visibility on this tile, so they shouldn't see our workers moved into position there.

Next, on T168:



Imperio will likely attack and capture Acre on this turn, hopefully from one of the two tiles indicated in the picture. (It's not a disaster if they don't too, as I'll explain in a minute.) We begin by having our two workers road the tile in white, allowing our "red" stack of military units to move SE-SE-Se onto the arrowed tile indicated. This tile, three west of Acre, is the critical spot. Imperio again should NOT have visibility on this spot, and it allows us to hit every target we want.

Finally, on T169:



Our workers move SE and build a road on the tile where our military stack is located. Our units can then move along the former Templar road network and then hit Acre, Damascus, or either of the tiles from which Imperio is likely to attack. It's the perfect spot from which to backstab them! And if Imperio doesn't capture Acre on T168, we simply wait a turn and execute the plan on T170. This tactic is nicely flexible in that regard. We simply have to move the galleys in the north to the Imperio border on the turn that we expect Acre to be captured (this will likely be obvious, thanks to our chariot scout).

I'd like sunrise to vet this plan before putting it into execution. Comments and suggestions welcome - we have to make sure we're all on the same page before committing to such an important decision!

[sunrise089]

Good plan Sullla!

I've not logged into the game yet, but the only potential problems I see are:

1) Templars capture our workers with a 2-mover.

2) Templars tell Imperio about our units (unlikely)

3) Templars have very few units in Acre, and Imperio sends much of their stack home (probably unlikely).

4) Imperio decides to spend several turns healing their units in Templar territory (almost impossible, right?)

I also simmed out the naval attack and mounted unit attack, and found that if we maintain surprise while the naval units sit 1-tile off the Imperio border (by no means guaranteed unfortunately) then there is very little Imperio can do to stop our attack. If however Imperio slaves or drafts a defender in Chichen Itza than things are much less certain.

In the south, it is very much to our good fortune that Imperio hasn't healed their stack, and that Acre is on a hill. We should be easily able to kill more Imperio units than we loose, although any unwounded knights will present a problem. Have we decided in our goals in the south other than killing the Imperio stack? We can probably capture Acre in the cheap, but with very few available cats taking Damascus could be more difficult.

Finally, just so everyone is on the same page, the result of this battle would probably sink us down to third place in power if Banana had actually been competent about assembling an army over the past 50 turns. We will critically injure Imperio, denying them their army and two cities, but we may have very little army of our own left. While Imperio won't pose a direct offensive threat to us, we need to consider that PAL and Imperio will probably team up as soon as we backstab Imperio, and Imperio will receive technology from PAL and possibly PAL naval assistance against our coastal cities.

I'm still bullish about the attack, I just wanted to get everyone on the same page. We can keep drafting Oromos, build a round of Curaissars, and get a decent stack of cats within 8 turns or so of the backstab, but we will face Imperio city garrisons a lot more modern than the Templar ones when we move in on their core.

[Sullla]

Yes, those pointers are all well brought up. As far as the Templars having possible two movers in Acre, we'll be able to see whether or not that's the case as soon as Betty Hur moves at the start of next turn; hopefully we'll find that there's nothing in Acre and can go forward with the plan. Even if that's not the case, we can move one or two units current on the tile 1S of Constantinople up to cover the workers when they move forward. Actually, we probably should do this regardless!

For the other points, I also find it unlikely that Templars would tell Imperio we have a stack moving towards them. Frankly, they would probably think our units are coming to kill them, given the recent history in this game. So probably no need to worry about that... Imperio already had a chance to move their stack back home and didn't, sending almost everything forward onto that hill tile in Templar territory. And if they were going to pause for healing, they certainly wouldn't have moved into Templar borders! Therefore, I concur that #3 and #4 are unlikely to happen as well. My main concern is that Imperio moves its big stack SE next turn, which would make hitting them a heck of a lot harder. Crossing fingers that doesn't happen.

Finally, just so everyone is on the same page, the result of this battle would probably sink us down to third place in power if Banana had actually been competent about assembling an army over the past 50 turns. We will critically injure Imperio, denying them their army and two cities, but we may have very little army of our own left. While Imperio won't pose a direct offensive threat to us, we need to consider that PAL and Imperio will probably team up as soon as we backstab Imperio, and Imperio will receive technology from PAL and possibly PAL naval assistance against our coastal cities.

This is absolutely true, and everyone needs to be aware of it. We should wipe out the Imperio army, but we're going to get pretty well bloodied too. Don't expect us to go running through the Imperio core with anything like the ease we took down the Templars. At the global strategic level, however, I think it's the best move to make. PAL is going to be occupied with slogging their way through Banana for the next few dozen turns. They'll eventually win, but Donovan will make them bleed a lot. (We hope, anyway!) The only way to compete against PAL with any chance of victory will be to control our own continent - which means eliminating Imperio. And the best chance to do that is right now, when we can crush their army in one fell blow and knock out two of their best three cities. Remember, Imperio has never done any fighting of substance throughout the whole game. This current force represents everything they've produced over the last 100 turns. It will take them quite a while to replace it. Knocking out both of our current forces turns this into a war of production, and that's one that Imperio can't possibly win against us, especially if we successfully capture Chichen Itza and raze Mutal at the outset of the conflict.

sunrise, we may even manage to do better than you and I think if Imperio doesn't pause to heal its forces, and we smash into an army weakened by two city captures. Let's hope so! To go back to a point I made in the Turnplayer thread, do you think we should cancel the horses deal with Banana and swap to a cuirassier in Cape Town? I really think that would increase the odds of taking Mutal substantially, if we added one more cuirassier to that stack. (If I were playing alone, I would do it. Apologize to Donovan later!)

[MyOtherCar]

If something can be called a window of opportunity, this is it. Imperio not healing and moving in on Acres, is the best chance we get to crush their army. The alternative to the backstab, would be us teaming up with Imperio against PAL, and frankly I don't expect much from Imperio when it comes to war. As expected, I find Sullla's plan well thought out. Again, it's Sullla's plan, so count me in. And, if somehow, if things go awry, well, I will stand by what I say here, and point out that, you know, it was Sullla's plan.

Regarding horses, let's give Donovan one more chance to whip out some knights and then get them back.

[sooooo]

I like this plan.

Only thing I spotted is that there is no need to move 2 workers onto the white tile in T167, potentially allowing Imperio/Tempar scouts to discover them. They can be on the red staging tile with the troops, then move onto the white tile and road all in T168. Or they could even spend T167 roading the grass 2W of the white tile.

[Iamjohn]

Regarding horses, let's give Donovan one more chance to whip out some knights and then get them back.

If it was me I'd send Donovan a friendly warning that we simply have to cancel the trade a turn beforehand, but remind him that we should be able to send him another source of horses pretty soon (we should have a second source soon, right?), and then cancel it the next turn. We're in here to win, we know that ultimately Donovan isn't going to be able to pull this one out. We need the cuirassiers and any other advantage we can get.

[Sullla]

Only thing I spotted is that there is no need to move 2 workers onto the white tile in T167, potentially allowing Imperio/Tempar scouts to discover them. They can be on the red staging tile with the troops, then move onto the white tile and road all in T168. Or they could even spend T167 roading the grass 2W of the white tile.

Nice catch! I should have thought of this. Definitely do this and not what I suggested. A road on the tile 2W of the white tile could potentially be useful.