[SPOILERS] Cornflakes and Q Eat 'Em for Breakfast!

[Cornflakes]

Hey, we could rush Sistine Chapel in Blimp Sistine is worth 17cpt because of the Monastery and Merc specialist. Can easily build Temple for +5cpt Follow that up with Hermitage and we've got that border swamped

This might actually be worth it since it would flip the tile 1NE of SWAT and allow us to hit it with slow movers on T0 of the war (whenever the war is). This would be some immediate use that's beneficial down the road. Otherwise our tech pace is so slow now that we'd be sitting the GE around for ages just sitting there doing nothing.

It also prevents AT from getting Sistine.

[Qgqqqqq]

I'm getting more and more tempted by corps...

[Cornflakes]

Ok, here's the 2metra Hurt Plan.




Remember that we move 1st in turn order. All turn numbers indicate EOT locations. Also remember that our units on ship can unload in one of our cities or a fort and move the same turn, as long as they were loaded on the previous turn. In black I have the progression of 2metra's stack (assuming he chooses to continue advancing). Our latest intelligence indicates light defenses at all backlines 2metra cities, and 4-move galleys give us options.

– T172: I'll load the maces at the fort north of Doughnut next turn > drop maces in Mars > build a fort at YELLOW dot > Move all 4 galleys to YELLOW dot. I'll be able to see any units that can hit the galley tile, and I'll be sure to cover them with sufficient force. The galleys will then be loaded with our 7 knights and a Shock mace.
– T173: Fort 1E of YELLOW, moving the galleys through to WHITE > kill defending Spear and raze Turfan
– T174: WHITE ARROWS indicate our options with the galleys. We fork Karakorum and Hoth, and we also have the option to return to Sheep and unload our maces to attack 2metra's stack if he ends on flatland (he would be on a T173 tile). If Hoth is still defended by a single archer we have the option to capture the city > move the galleys in > unload and move the knights 2NE (ORANGE) > enough movement on the galleys to move back out of Hoth so they aren't destroyed when 2metra recaptures. Probably not going to happen, but it's possible.

[Qgqqqqq]

Can we get a tireme out to defend them in time?
If not, ans we see he's whipped something there, we should send one up empty to support (or add a galley to the stack).

[Cornflakes]

Since we have such superior mobility we can move one up to scout first. If no city is weakly defended we just return to Sheep after razing Turfan. If the city with the trireme is weakly defended we capture the city and destroy the trireme in port. If the other city is weakly defended we empty one of our galleys and send the others up to raze the weakly defended city.

I'll probably be online in an hour or two to play the turn. I checked status quick after Commodore played and grabbed a couple screenshots. Nothing occurred which merited posting another picture (which is a good thing ). He didn't move in and doesn't have a significant stack in range of our borders so we have at least one more quite buildup turn. Large stack in WhateverTheNameOfThatCityIs southeast of Paris, but it can't reach our borders this turn (it's about 10 muskets + 5 cats).

I really want to get our fort canal through to Commodore ASAP so that our galleys can go cause some havoc down there next. Commodore will know they are coming since he has city visibility (and most likely full city investigation ability as well). But it'll still force him to divide up and garrison some "backlines" cities.

[Cornflakes]

Ok, bad news ... the you didn't bring one of the forts to 9/10 turns I didn't discover this until after building the first fort, so we loose out on 5 hammers per turn in Mars, plus we alert 2metra to the fact that we're forting across. I was really hoping that razing Turfan and threatening his coastal cities would take some steam out of his attack. I wish you'd told me so that I could have had 3-4 more workers up to make quick work of it. Now I don't know that we can even use it because we'll have knights in range next turn protected by a stack. All our units are going to be hiding behind walls and I can't spare enough force to defend a stack of workers

In better news 2metra moved a knight into our territory to scout Google, didn't like what he saw, and retreated covered by a Mace. We had an HA, an Axe, and 2 muskets in the city (with another musket and a mace incoming) so I decided that it was worth it to try killing those units. The plan was to soften each by throwing the now-obsolete HA+axe at them first and clean up with the muskets. HA battle was 23% and we got luck and won, killing the knight I then threw a musket at the mace for 75% odds and won Maybe this was a bit rash on my part, but sometimes it's just better to be lucky than good




HA earned 5 XP, which was enough to tip the GG counter over the edge So what do we do with him?




Tiflis only has 1 knight + 1 LB inside. I drafted Google to get a 3rd Musket here, and then moved in every unit that I could. He doesn't have any units in sight that can reach Tilfis, but he can whip something. We may still be able to snipe this though. We have the wounded HA as a last resort cleanup if needed. The musket/mace pair currently in Google didn't have enough movement left to join the stack, but they can hole up inside the city next turn. It's so far out that I think we're safe keeping it. This also is a perfect location for our National Epic. Plenty of food. Lots of farms already. Far from any hot front.




Speaking of hot fronts ... 2metra moved in heading for Sheep. his slow mover stack will take 2 more turns to advance. We'll have 6 catapults in range, 8 knights (3 promo), 10 maces, and 8 muskets, with the option to draft 2 more on that turn if we want/need them. He has there are about 25 killing units in that stack. We'll have about that may ourselves. It would be best for us to attack out because we can collateral his stack rather than waiting for him to collateral us. I think we can wipe out his stack in one swift blow. If he advances 1 more turn it'll be too late for him to retreat




Down on the Commodore front things are a little more dicey. I'm prepared to move some/all the knights down this way if necessary. I'd rather not since they will form the core of my attacking force against 2metra's stack, but if I must I must. Good thing is that they have enough movement to reach this area in time even if moving from 2E of Mars. I'm worried that Commodore has a stack ok knights outside of our vision because I'm pretty sure his power is Rival Best.




Trade mission is all set up. One more turn of fingers crossed Hope AT doesn't decide that this is a good turn to declare war. Assuming we do get the Trade mission it's estimated at 1700 gold (that's what the last TM was, right?). 1700 gold plus the 650 we currently have in the bank is enough for 2350/350 = 6.7 turns of research. Steel takes 8 at max research. Hopefully we can factor in 150 capture gold from Tilfis. Too bad we cant raze Turfan next turn and I'm not optimistic that we'll be able to get the canal up and running in time for the raze gold from that to count. Bank in Grand Slam will complete in 5 turns. I think we're safe to finish up the bank next in Doughnut, which should take about 6 turns. This is perfect timing for running a turn of 0%. We may also need a couple wealth builds on the last turn or two in cities that don't need to build military, but I think that a 9-turn Steel research time is doable. We'll get it for sure in 10 turns (again, assuming that the Trade mission is successful).

Notice that AT has research set to Education. He has enough gold in the bank to research that.




Check out those Demographics, folks! That MFG is not in a golden age either! Chemistry added approximately 30hpt, and AT's golden age just ended. I'm pretty sure that AT is still Rival Best in GNP, but the graph will update in a turn or two and confirm. Sizable food lead, and we have many cities out west that are just getting underway. And power 200k above the Rival Best! And none too small either.

Our GNP is being propped up mostly by the last Trade Mission, and hopefully will be propped up again by the upcoming Trade Mission. I didn't check what we're at when we drop to 0%, but I'm pretty sure it's terrible. Break Even around 15-20% Hopefully this doesn't come back to bite us ... but then just look at the beautiful MFG!

[Qgqqqqq]

Wow I felt sure id put 8-9 turns into that fort - is it something to do with dumping the turns and then building the workshop!??
Whatever the case, I'm really sorry as I had no idea.
That GNP is disturbing if out of a GA...I really want our courthouses up ASAP.
Do we get "fighting with brothers and sisters of the faith"?
Is it expedient to sneak a galley build into Sheep?
Where'd the GG come out?

[Cornflakes]

I'm genuinely worried down on the southern Commodore front. If AT joins in the next 3-4 turns we're toast. If we can successfully repulse Commodore and 2metra before AT joins the dogpile I think we're looking looking solid going forward. My hope is that we can crush 2metra's stack in the next turn or two and then sue for white peace if we capture Tiflas or get Tiflas in a peace deal if we don't capture. Then we can quickly wheel our knights south to defend the Commodore front.

don't tell AT or hint at attacking us

Good new is that TT (err, Bigger) accepted Gold + Ivory for war with 2metra. He hasn't actually declared, but he did accept the trade and is already receiving Gold + Ivory. I honestly don't care if TT invades as long a he declares and shows some of his French Musketeers near 2metra border. That would be a great help in precipitating peace after we destroy his stack.

We're getting into happiness troubles because war cut off 1-2 happiness from 2metra, and on top of that we're getting 1-2 unhappy faces in key cities from "We don't want to fight our brothers of the faith" This has resulted in an unhappy face in Grand Slam.

Sorry for the all caps, but PLEASE DON'T SHUFFLE UNITS AROUND if you log in. The unhappy face is not really hurting us because we don't have any tiles to work anyway. It's just costing us a scientist specialist which isn't really much to cry about. Please don't move units around anywhere else either without confirming. Sorry if I'm being a dick about this, but I'm a control freak at times ... and war is one of those times.

[Cornflakes]

Wow I felt sure id put 8-9 turns into that fort - is it something to do with dumping the turns and then building the workshop!??
Whatever the case, I'm really sorry as I had no idea.
That GNP is disturbing if out of a GA...I really want our courthouses up ASAP.
Do we get "fighting with brothers and sisters of the faith"?
Is it expedient to sneak a galley build into Sheep?
Where'd the GG come out?

This was somewhat crossposted. Yes, unfortunately we get unhappyfaces from the brothers and sisters ... I was hoping this would be nullified by the fact that it was Commodore who initiated the attack.

Maybe a galley next in Sheep. In fact, that might be best. I'm finishing the worker now because it's only a couple hammers short and the overflow will go into our next build. I'll double check the fort again next turn, but my SHIFT to queue up the fort indicated 8 turns remaining. If this is the case I'm going to move the worker down into the jungle east of Doughnut so that we can at least get our galleys down this way. We already have those 2 caravels (now with C1 promo) and Commodore wasn't anywhere close to Optics last I checked. It's possible he may try stealing those techs off us since he's still investing heavily in EP against us.

GG came out in Apocalypse so it's far from the front. I moved it east tentatively. We still need to decide what to do with him.

[Cornflakes]

And we still need to decide what to do with our GE. I realized that Sistine Chapel would not be a good idea. The last thing we want to do is give AT another reason to declare on us, and Sistine in Blimp might just be the tipping point. I'm all for slow building it if we have the opportunity, but I'm not willing to give up that 25+hpt build queue at a time when we're pressed desperately for units. Maybe start it in 6-8 turns, finishing in about 15 turns.

I know I poo pooed Sistine a month ago, but I realize now how powerful that can be when placed strategically in a border town ... a good part of my reason is for denial, because I realized that if AT was to build it in SWAT we'd quickly be overrun.