[SPOILERS] Lewger goes for the Bigwyn

[Bigger]

azza founded this city a few turns ago (first time I've noticed it - I think we may have picked it up w/ xenus maps)


he has 12 now like us, but we'll have 14 soon and ours are more hammer ready our MFG is pretty much even w/ azza's, but keep in mind we are relying on the whip while he isn't .

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turn 158:
not a lot to report. more action next turn
1. I went ahead and 3 popped whipped the aeneid from 7>4 to finish the courthouse and overflow into mace. if I waited a turn I could 2 pop but much less overflow. not sure if I made the right call, it does have 7 developed tiles to work. quicker regrowth this way though.
2. we finished machinery and I switched to aesthetics and turned research down to 0%. we have +9 gold at 50% (breakeven+), gaining 150 gpt, and use 133 gpt at 100% science - which means the 7 turns of max tax until the academy is built will get us 8 turns of max science (combined with the 50 gold we start this turn with). we can finish aesthetics, lit, paper, and most of feudalism in that time . with beuro + big city w/ lots of cottages + 8 turns of max science it will be like a free golden age .
3. lots of workers moving around. chop came into mahabrata. I think I won't whip it anymore. food is too valuable in that city. I have granary and forge already, and enough forests to chop in courthouse, library, walls and probably market too. by then it will be a nice hammer city to pump out what it needs - with marble and 3 grassland hill mines. I'll just have to build a few farms. it will have a mix of farms and cottages, and be a hammer/commerce hybrid city.
4. gilgamesh finishes its catapult this turns and turns to mace duty. I think I can grow this city to size 19 long term (maybe 20 if we build aquaduct). it grows to 15 next turn - but at 16 i'll have to work a plains mine over a plains cottage to pump out maces, so won't be able to rush to 19 . but after the skirmish .

next turn:
1. start a settler in maths with chops incoming same turn maths grows to size 8. I think I can 1 turn it, but if we have to 2 turn it will overflow into military, not a big deal
2. 4 pop whip the market in the odyssey from 9>5, regrow on mace.
3. chop comes into song of roland, finish barracks and overflow into military
4. whip the forge in volsung, overflow into mace


this is at Max tax!! we have #1 GNP now at breakeven (50%). when we kick it up after academy is built we will have a healthy #1 GNP . serdoa has turned his research to 0 though (btw he gets 123 gpt, despite the massive buddhist shrine, so thats comforting). probably plako is at 0% research too.

[Bigger]

ok, its Friday, I got off work early and don't have to go to bed/get up early, so I have time for a large report .

First, with some creative tile working I was able to one turn the settler in maths

hate to starve it like this, but need to get to military quick, and I will likely stay at size 8 for a bit anyway. next turn I 1-turn the last cat, then start pumping out maces. I ended up moving the archer out here to scout the new city and eventually garrison it, I'll squeeze an archer out here for maths when I can.. I'll have maces to defend it while I gear up for war.

Gilgamesh is getting flat and bloated:

only plako (16) and commodore (17) have a bigger city. serdoa's is also size 15. if we weren't gearing for war I would take over the plains river cottage from the iliad at size 16. instead, I'll work a plains hill mine and let it grow to 17 exactly in 5 turns. that will put us at -1 health for a bit. we'll settle the deer city in about 9 turns, probably take another 4-5 turns to get it hooked up.
anyway it will stagnate at size 17 for a bit while we pump out maces. once we have peace and can slow down, I'll build an aquaduct, and work both plains cottages here, and try to grow it to size 19.

whip #1: volsung

waited until it was 1 turn to completion to whip to maximize overflow. I'll whip the mace when its close to completion as well. great scientist pops in 4 turns, so I can fire the scientists at that point and grow/whip volsung like crazy. going to get at least 2 maces out of this city, maybe 4. the market can wait.

whip #2: theodyssey

this was painful, but had to be done. markets are expensive :/. this really reveals the handicapp rbmod puts on whip-centric empires - in BTS I get the exact same hammers/overflow with 1 less population! . I borrow the corn from the aeneid for a turn so I can regrow to 6 this turn. the aeneid will need it back next turn, but I may borrow the sheep to get it back up to 9 asap. I'll grow the aeneid and the odyssey high and then do a series of 1 turn whips to pump out maces as we near combat. a worker is building a road on the plains tile south, and will build all but the last turn of fort (I'm hitting "stop action" after every turn so azza can't tell what I'm doing). then he'll do something else at king arthur until I'm ready to go.

micro in the east:

had 2 turns into a cottage, but had to move worker here. popol grows in 3 turns, I'll chop this forest to come in the same turn popol grows to size 6 and starts a settler. hopefully that will allow me to 2 pop whip it instead of 3 pop whip it, I'm not sure. we'll eventually have a city in this spot anyway so it doesnt hurt to chop it. thanks to the desert hill, azza can't reach me in one turn even with a 2 mover (and I'm pretty sure all his 2 movers are in A7x). if he does move a unit towards the worker, we'll have to withdraw, which will be annoying, but its worth the risk. if we're left alone I'll build a road here so a mace stack can move quickly from our borders to the plains hill.
The settler out of popol will found rama's journey, on the tundra/deer site north of mahabrata.


road to the marble was completed this turn (apparently lewwyn put a turn into that road earlier and didn't make a sign, nice surprise). worker on the FGH roaded, will complete road next turn so the marble worker can move in and help chop it. the following turn one will finish chop while the other starts roading towards rama's journey.
as soon as I can I'll chop out all these forests to build infastructure and once thats done can start building military here as well .


chop came in this turn. If my math is correct, I can one turn a mace next turn. I think it will have to move to mahabrata, to protect from serdoa - and also so the axe there can move north to clear out barbs for rama's journey. once the mine and both grassland workshops are complete we'll be able to pump out maces quickly here

demos:

we have #2 GNP at max tax! note that commodore and serdoa both are at 0% science, so the #1 GNP is either plako or slowcheetah. we're ~350 GNP at 100% science. the food, MFG, and population categories reveal why I'm so anxious to push against Azza again - we won't be able to compete in those areas until we kick azza off the mainland :/.
Also note how good we are doing in the trade route category. I can't even imagine who has the -60 GNP I guess merohoc? Or possible Xenu. unless its Scooter giving trade routes to everybody?? (since all his trade routes are intercontinental, they would be first for everyone, maybe he's giving so much away they out number what he's receiving even with The great lighthouse?? I dunno).

espionage screen:

I decided to put off getting graphs on commodore here. we have 12 EPT, and will soon have 16 when I get a courthouse in mahabrata and shahnahmeh. As you can see, I should be able to get city visibility on the presets, living end and muse, even without judaism in those cities. all azza's cities cost within 10 eps of the muse here. I'll also be able to get the "investigate city" option in all his cities that do have judaism (its about the same cost as city visibility on non-Jew cities). I think Azza has stopped putting any EPs into us, he's trying to get graphs on someone else, so this is very convenient .

[Lewwyn]

Yay, looks good.

Since we don't have tech trading and we don't have huge known tech bonuses, its entirely possible that we'll be behind the tech leaders permanently. I know we're caught up in tech speed but how far behind in current techs are we already? If that's the case maybe a full war on Azza is worth it. BTW, all his elephants will not receive defensive bonuses which is nice. The only issue it then, does he have cats? Can we attack and surprise him before he gets some cats in place?

[Bigger]

Yay, looks good.

Since we don't have tech trading and we don't have huge known tech bonuses, its entirely possible that we'll be behind the tech leaders permanently. I know we're caught up in tech speed but how far behind in current techs are we already? If that's the case maybe a full war on Azza is worth it. BTW, all his elephants will not receive defensive bonuses which is nice. The only issue it then, does he have cats? Can we attack and surprise him before he gets some cats in place?

ok, the tech situation:

I'm not sure about that. of the 4 teams ahead of us in score (we are slightly ahead of azza, and well ahead of all the other teams behind us)
well, its hard to judge slowcheetah and plako. slowcheetah is likely the tech leader and may stay that way. he's the only one in the game that has avoided combat and has had large amounts of land to expand into uncontested. (who would have figured catwalks team would be doing so well??). plako, otoh, has already had a MOM golden age, but he also has had a long, slow, grinding war against backwards merohoc - if he was really far ahead in tech he would be rolling over them, I would think.

the civs we know: I'm pretty sure we're ahead of commodore. at least we are very competitive. he revolted to beuracracy several turns after us, which is telling. serdoa is ahead of us - I can tell from his workshop tile yields he has guilds already .
OTOH, no one we have made contact w/ has paper (blank tech trading screen) which makes me think liberalism is still on the table. commodore bulbed philosophy, but I THINK with the massive costs of his huge empire he won't be able to compete for it.. we can always use a great scientists to bulb philo or partially bulb education.

anyway, we are getting really close to the point in the tech tree where quantity of land is more important than quality. serdoa has already reached it. if we can absorb azza we will have much more land than Serdoa and going to war with him becomes realistic. well, we'll see - azza hasn't cooperated so far.

the war situation: as far as I can tell, azza has 0 catapults. if he does, he is hiding them. our power has started to spike above him - I believe he is not building military now in anticipation of being able to build maces - he's 4 turns away from machinery. I'm not worried about that, because he won't be able to build nearly as many as we will - and he never bothered to build cats. (yes, w/ maces elephants become irrelevant, almost, which is why I haven't tried to retrade for elephants with commodore).

I don't think he will even bother with cats since he hasn't so far. once he finishes machinery he will just build maces, probably.

I do think we will surprise him. I'm hitting him on 4 fronts - I expect him to be surprised by that . I don't expect them all to work, but if he fails on 2 fronts only it will be a big blow .

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side note: neither plako nor slowcheetah have built any workshops, so I can't use that trick to tell if they have discovered guilds. I think thats a mistake - especially for plako, who could use the extra production to take out merohoc for good.

Commodore definitely does not have guilds, he has the same production from workshops that we do.

edit: serdoa with guilds means I need to get a spear into mahabrata . I really feel like serdoa could conquer that city and maybe all our eastern holdings whenever he wanted fortunate, I guess, that he has tense borders with 4 other civs as well, and has been at war with all 4 of them at one time. hoping he sees azza or xenu as easier targets.

[Lewwyn]

anyway, we are getting really close to the point in the tech tree where quantity of land is more important than quality. serdoa has already reached it. if we can absorb azza we will have much more land than Serdoa and going to war with him becomes realistic. well, we'll see - azza hasn't cooperated so far.

Damn it Azza! Give us your land!

the war situation: as far as I can tell, azza has 0 catapults. if he does, he is hiding them. our power has started to spike above him - I believe he is not building military now in anticipation of being able to build maces - he's 4 turns away from machinery. I'm not worried about that, because he won't be able to build nearly as many as we will - and he never bothered to build cats. (yes, w/ maces elephants become irrelevant, almost, which is why I haven't tried to retrade for elephants with commodore).

I don't think he will even bother with cats since he hasn't so far. once he finishes machinery he will just build maces, probably.

I do think we will surprise him. I'm hitting him on 4 fronts - I expect him to be surprised by that . I don't expect them all to work, but if he fails on 2 fronts only it will be a big blow .

Okay, I'm not sure 4 fronts is the best idea, though I'm open to it for the sheer chaos and fun factor.

I'm excited for whipping an army too since I think it will surprise him. Slavery may be nerfed, but its still powerful when compared to basic production. And Azza isn't in slavery.

Why not. Shock and Awe baby, shock and awe.

[Bigger]

yes, azza, just give up already and give us all your cities!!!!

how I see the war going:
worst case scenario:
we raze iron maiden. the other attacks fail. we accept a peace, but azza is permanently denied horses, king arthur can work them and we don't have to worry about knights

best case scenario: we raze iron maiden and presets. possibly we raze living end and/or maiden, or the threat is there so azza is forced to give us back beowulf in a peace deal. or azza is forced to retreat from A7x to defend them to the point we can take Beowulf back by force.

either way we're gonna put the hurt on him with relatively low risk (walls in all our border cities with him, plenty of spears and will have maces, and he has no cats).

best best scenario (unlikely to happen): Azza makes several mistakes and we are able to keep pumping out maces on all fronts and overwhelm his mainland

[Brian Shanahan]

best best scenario (unlikely to happen): Azza makes several mistakes and we are able to keep pumping out maces on all fronts and overwhelm his mainland

Best, best, bestest scenario: Azza cooks up a crazy scheme to invade former India and let's you capture his mainland free!

[Bigger]

Not a whole lot going on. Commodore Built the great wall (whee?)

I made a mistake :/

I think I was tinkering with king arthur and stole a mine from maths, and didn't fix it. so maths worked a farm instead of the mine and didn't finish the settler in one turn.

Not a big deal really, the overflow will probably one turn the mace that already has hammers into it. the mace can go up into the tundra and clear out barbs until the new city is founded and safe. as you can see, a barb warrior appeared on that border. I moved the archer onto the mine there for the barb to suicide into. still have 4 cats in maths so if the barb gets super lucky and kills the archer it won't be a big deal.

It also allowed me to give the pigs to El Cid, since maths can't grow this turn anyway.

Gilgamesh, King arthur, the odyssey, the aeneid, song of roland, volsung, the iliad, and popol vuh are all working on a mace .
the first 5 have a barracks, the last 3 don't.

El Cid is working on its navy and growing to size 7 before it picks up all 3 mines (in time to work the gold when we turn research on). it can 1 pop whip to 6 to get rid of hte cottage and still work the mines to get its navy quickly done.

shah and rah are working on buildings/infastructure. next turn a chop will finish courthouse in rah and shah will whip its forge. both building ligthouse next.

demos:


power graphs:


EP note: azza isn't putting any eps into us. we'll have vision on all his cities in 7-9 turns, and the ability to look in his jew cities . about the time for war, very convenient!