[Spoilers] Fintourist and Old Harry have nothing to see here

[Fintourist]

Combat I again?

I guess that's solid.

If you look at the last pic you can see the road out of the pasture goes SE, which only happens if there is a road there.

Yeah, you're right. That is and will be the most dangerous staging tile during the next 5 turns.

Even so I like being aggressive. There is always the chance that one of the chariots is in city 2, so we have more time than we think. I'd prefer not to be trading units at this point, but if that's the cost of acquiring land so be it...

Yeah, that area is valuable and losing couple of units for it is still okay. A game-long revenge war on the other hand...

This is a sandbox of our current position (the beakers are off for some reason, but you can patch in Currency in world builder) I'll have a bit of a play before playing the rest of the turn...

Sounds all good! I think the extra beakers have come from minimal known-tech bonuses that we have received. I'll be off within an hour and then with only limited internet access, but I'm looking forward to your reporting while I'm travelling!

[Old Harry]

So much for a peaceful retiring post at the sea .

You'd get bored! If possible could you try and provoke the spear to attack you?

Sounds all good! I think the extra beakers have come from minimal known-tech bonuses that we have received. I'll be off within an hour and then with only limited internet access, but I'm looking forward to your reporting while I'm travelling!

Sounds likely. Have fun with the trip! If you haven't gone yet there are two axes on the danger tile. What does that do to your thinking?

[Fintourist]

If you haven't gone yet there are two axes on the danger tile. What does that do to your thinking?

That increases the attractiveness of your variation! We would still have 5 units to fight his 2 axes + chariot in my variation so i'm not sure though..

[Old Harry]

Turn 93 fun bit

TheStick destroys Seville and gets 7 gold and we found Hastings straight away. I don't know if that will muck up anyone's C&D. If anyone else is still bothering. The bad news is that Suttree has two axes on the danger tile. I think this changes our odds for the flat ground.


Moving an axe and two bowmen onto the grass he'll get
CI axe vs Shock Axe 20%
CI axe vs CI bowman 65%
CI chariot vs CI bowman 73%
So I can add the warrior too, to make sure a lucky roll doesn't kill our workers, then we have two bowmen and any survivors to clean up injured units with. We also have our units on the road network to cover the danger tile.

Alternatively we stick to the jungle, put turns into a farm and let him kill TheStick () with axe or chariot. He'll then cover that unit and we attack from the jungle next turn. The advantage here is that the chariot doesn't get the (possible) attack bonus and we get more XP from attacking rather than defending...

I'm afraid I'm going to make an executive decision to do my version - if Suttree gets a lucky win he'll promo-heal and we'll only have two bowmen left to use. I'd like that road but we can't rely on winning one of those three battles... Sorry!


Currency comes in at the end of this turn, so we want to start on wealth in a lot of places next turn. Dunkirk whips this spear and can complete an axe with the overflow next turn then store 17 hammers overflow by building wealth for a while.


All your signs looked good to me in the light of a little simming and I moved Merovech and the Spear towards the front. I'll put Endor on Wealth next turn and finish the worker with the chop, then hold the overflow until the next chop can go into a settler.


Cannae and BoP will start wealth next turn. I'm wondering about running a turn of 0% or 50% to give us enough cash to get through currency. It would allow Cannae to grow a turn earlier if Bay of Pigs took the gold for a turn, but would mean BoP grew a turn later. I'll try to get it right in the sim.

France will whip the axe next turn. Then could build wealth, a worker or a lighthouse?


demos

[TheHumanHydra]

These are good reports, Harry; keep it up! Thanks for the clarifications about city locations, guys. For the record I like the nearer/westernmost "J" better. I would recommend proposing peace again if you haven't already ended turn.

[Old Harry]

Thanks THH

I ended turn a while ago, and I don't want to keep logging in in Suttree's half of the timer... But I'll propose peace again next turn.

The western J is a better city, but if we've just made a permanent enemy it's not on a hill and Suttree can fork it and Hastings very easily. I'm actually wondering about NW of the western J - because Suttree has a couple of cities on that body of water already and might decide to boat a coastal city. I don't think he's going to be strong enough to do that though, so I probably favour the eastern J. Still undecided though...

[TheHumanHydra]

Well, he forks the eastern J from the same tile as the western. Also the western J is three tiles from Hastings, allowing you to shuffle defenders directly between them at need with Engineering. But I actually like your NW of the western J idea a lot better than either option:
* On a hill
* Difficult to fork
* Can't be boated (and no crappy water tiles)
* Three tiles from Hastings
* Gets more of the river valley, including all the dyes, without losing the corn or rice
* Corn still can't be settled up on due to J's and Hastings' radii
* Only one tile by which rice can be settled up on (from the east), and it's a very risky plant

[Old Harry]

Turn 94

The tension is actually too much, I almost didn't want to look at the game when I got the email... And then you get something lovely like this!


I'll offer clam for fish to cement our obviously excellent relationship...


But enough of this frivolity. You want to know what's going on with the war don't you? Suttree seems to be massing his forces, he'll have another chariot that can hit the city ruins or our jungle this turn as well, and may be waiting for a detachment of axe to arrive from the south. Things that we can do:
- Move TheStick NE or NW, move everyone else into Hastings and send the workers back to chop jungle or forest
- Move TheStick SW and move a bowman so we have two bowmen and a warrior in Hastings and two bowmen and an axe on the jungle. Send the warriors back again
- Cover the workers with two bowmen - actually a bit risky as a CI chariot gets 61% odds over the river (an unpromoted chariot gets 31%, and that's all that's shown up so far, but the other might be CI) and put everyone else in the city.
- Something else?
I'm really not sure here so I'll save this bit until the morning, and hope you've got some good ideas...


In the west it turns out that Rowain is harder than Mardoc, having survived without a scratch against the spear. Isandlwana is founded and we whip the axe in France this turn, then I think he (the axe) goes exploring while Rowain covers France. The galley is off to the south and Lunch is just moving one tile at a time (unless you think that's a bit chicken?)


We have a new bowman, BaII, who I'd like to send over here as a lightning rod (sorry BaII) unless you had better plans for him? Also we're only running three wealth builds this turn, but will increase to five over the next couple of turns, so I'm running 70% science this turn, then will run 50-70% next turn when BoP has the gold and Agincourt the silver so Cannae can grow to size 7. At which point we should be able to run 100% until we're done.


The results of Suttree's whips (and ours too)


Demos

[Rowain]

.... Rowain is harder than Mardoc ...

Yeah at least 10 at the Mohs' scale

[Old Harry]

Turn 94 part two

So I decided to play it safe this turn, moving TheStick back to the jungle and Oxy back to Hastings. Brick has a Guerilla promotion, so the chariots shouldn't scratch Hastings. One worker is on the jungle tile poised to build a road, the other went back to chop near Dunkirk. If Suttree makes a move this turn I expect him to move to the jungle SE of Hastings. Depending on the size of his force we can build the road or move back into hastings. If he doesn't make a move we should add another bowman to the jungle tile and move the spear and bowman from the cow to Hastings.


I also sent this, don't expect him to accept though... Should we offer some cash?


Edit: Isandlwana puts two hammers into a barracks and will then build wealth until the chops come in and complete the granary, then will build wealth again until it can whip the barracks. If we don't put the hammers into wealth we'll have a lot of overflow after whipping the barracks that could go into a unit, but I thought the cash would be more useful.
Edit2: Suttree 1-pop whipped twice this turn, probably a couple more axes, which would mean he'll have two chariots and perhaps seven axes in total. Presumably he'll leave an axe or two in the south for YuriMack, but we should be ready for the worst case scenario. We'll have two spears, two axes and five bowmen in the area which should defend comfortably, but might not kill a stack roaming in our territory...