[SPOILERS] naufragar and Rusten get nickel-and-dimed

[Rusten]

You should only wait if you're convinced he has siege. I really wouldn't know as I haven't studied his GNP or development. I would've thought no, but it's small map size, so I leave it to your judgement.

And I just re-read your calendar comment. We do not know that he has calendar at all. He could've simply chopped the forest with spice on it for the hammers. This does make it more plausible for him to have researched (or be close to completing) construction.

[naufragar]

I don't know that he has Construction. Here's the GNP from this turn.


He's Creative but still seems to have had a few more beakers than us. We're up Metal Casting presumably. We need to account for those beakers. Can't remember how many, but I think more than Construction. I can't tell what he's been whipping. Cats are 5k; pretty much everything else is 4k. Plus pop growth makes it confusing. He was 2 pop whipping last turn. If those aren't cats, I can't imagine what they are. Horse archers?

If I go 1SW with an axe, I should be able to see if he has a bridge built, right? Might try that.

I'm headed to sleep, but I'll puzzle over this in the morning. I suspect I'll have the turn by then. Part of me assumes that since he knew he had Phi Japan for a neighbor, he would've beelined Construction.

[Rusten]

Imagine if we lived in a world where superdeath didn't harass us with axes and razed a city. Imagine a world where we didn't have to attack into hwachas. It's a nice thought.

Sadly we live in a world where we already have one clearly defined natural enemy and we can't afford adding another one on top. IMO this just highlights how poor SD's move was, because piling on an overextended and maintenance-burdened MSCC would've been nice right now. All SD did was piss off his neighbour and put the target solely on him -- he didn't actually delay anything. If we both go down from this so be it. I hope for success, but not taking anything for granted.

If I go 1SW with an axe, I should be able to see if he has a bridge built, right? Might try that.

Not crazy about sacrificing an axe for vision, but could work. At any rate looking for a bridge is a great idea. That could make 1SW better than 1S, yeah. If no bridges you can move the whole stack.
I wonder if we see an outline of a bridge in post #337 screenshot. But I can't remember what normal roads look like entering river from fog.

[naufragar]

Woke up sick, so I can't give this turn the report it deserves.

Moved here and saw this:



So moved here and saw this:


Apparently didn't take a pic, but our army followed the second axe.

Note this:


Earlier sign said "a million hwachs." Could still be a gigantic horse archer army in fog ready to strike.

And also this:


Shock horse archers get ~35% against combat 1 samurai. Remember Superdeath has yet to lose a battle where he has a 20+% shot to win. I promoted a spear to combat 2 and one samurai to formation as a hedge. They get ~72% odds. We're back to depending on the rolls breaking the way the stats suggest they will.    First scout axe could be dead, but I'd happily trade an axe for a horse archer (I'm trying to avoid "horcher" but man it's quicker to type). Plus if he kills that scout, we can get a 5th xp on one of our axes.

The power coda:


If not hwachas, what? He's still got an awe-inspiring amount of power.

[Rusten]

Those archers are a very good sign. Surely he wouldn't have 7 of them sitting in a random city the entire game. They're likely recent whips which means less of an intent to counterattack. They're terrible for taking out our stack. I'm sure he will try to put together a HA stack, but I doubt it's ready right now, and if we keep making units we should be OK. Maybe add some more cheap spears to the mix when convenient.

You've struggled to put together 7 samurai for this. Putting together 7 HAs isn't easy either.

[naufragar]

Seeing what we do now, do you think we should go for Draft Dodger or Adolf Twittler first? I'm tempted by Draft Dodger because then we can ship units in via the coast.

[Rusten]

Draft Dodger might be better for supply lines, yes. Given his defensive stance I like it more. New units can safely follow roads all the way into DD (or by galley) and then get to the capital via hills. If he's relying on archers it's just a question of when, not if.

How long until we get treb reinforcements? Will need it for the capital I think.

[naufragar]

We whipped a treb in Pajarocu this most recent turn. We'll get it next turn, and it takes 4 turns to arrive at the gates of Draft Dodger. I expect Superdeath will whip walls in Draft Dodger, so bombardment might take some time. The samurai can attack the city at something like 72% chance of success. It's worth thinking about whether we want to blitz the city down with minimal bombardment and eat the loss of a couple samurai to get the city gone faster.

[Rusten]

With the caveat that I like to log in and see before giving war advice I will say that if our stack is unharmed when you log in and we plan on attacking DD, then you probably don't want to send the units lagging behind onto the flatland. He can wipe it with minimal units and retreat hurt horse archers out of retaliation range. You didn't say anything about it (unless I missed it) so just making sure. It should be better to send the stragglers via the jungle 2NE of DD.

[naufragar]

The horse archer vanished. This made my paranoia shoot through the roof. I guess Superdeath is assembling a stack of doom in the fog to try and hit us. Note also the two axes going to reinforce DD. Rusten, I absolutely followed your advice:



You can see our next treb just barely in frame. Getting it down requires thinking about how we escort it. I assume I can be safe by just leaving a samurai on the jungle to walk it down. (Note that Draft Dodger is one of these mythical cities with more than one food resource. )

I respect that Superdeath will not go gentle into that sweet night.


Just let me kill you. The fact that this power is as of yet invisible is playing havoc with my nerves.

Interesting event log:


Magic Science decided he could only get 12 cities peacefully and needed to pry the thirteenth from Cairo's cold dead fingers. Never thought I'd say that I hope Cairo is close to Cho-ko-nus.