Pacal of the Indians: How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love The Fast Worker

[WarriorKnight]

Knights aren't going to beat a pike, what we need is some maces or crossbows. But they can't reach the city in 1t, so either we'll need to get lucky that he can't reinforce the city during that time (not exactly reliable) or bring enough units so that even reinforcements won't be enough to save it.

In short, we'll need quite a few more units before we can think about taking it now.

[Shoot the Moon]

Musketeers could reach it in a surprise attack, something to keep in mind.

[oledavy]

Of course the turn rolls over right when I am about to be on the road for five hours to check back into school

@Shoot, I probably won't be able to get to the save for another twelve hours or so. So, don't panic when you see the clock ticking down, I will get to it. If you want to make all your moves, I can gift the gold to you and end India's turn.

[Shoot the Moon]

Of course the turn rolls over right when I am about to be on the road for five hours to check back into school

@Shoot, I probably won't be able to get to the save for another twelve hours or so. So, don't panic when you see the clock ticking down, I will get to it. If you want to make all your moves, I can gift the gold to you and end India's turn.

Yeah, go ahead and end turn for me when you get the chance.

[Shoot the Moon]

Dave, I'm not quite done playing India's turn, so don't end it. That being said, I'm going to need both France and Rome to end turn first -- I want edu done before my turn since I have a chop into my capital this turn I want put into a university there (and need Rome's gold for research).

[Shoot the Moon]

Haven't had time for a real update in a while, but the long story short is resettled my razed city, now have 3 pikes, 4 knights (with two more in support range) a LB and a cat to defend. Chopped out a theater to get the borders back, running an artist, about to whip walls.

Other than that, got a uni in my capital, building some libraries, military, workers for Dave/WK, a settler for my NE.

Oh, and after ending the last turn broke 400 beakers/turn for the first time!

Demogs after ending turn:

[Shoot the Moon]

Well, this turn was nice and fun

As I mentioned last turn, Luddite for some reason decided to move his pike out of Hangzhou. I couldn't help but wonder where and why (more on that later). It left three archers, a spear, and a warrior in the city.

Anyway, here was how I positioned my troops last turn to set up for the attack:



I had two knights and an HA in Bird. There were four knights and three workers SW of Bird. 1S of Hangzhou was a LB and HA that had been sitting there forever. S-S of Bird (and out of Luddite's view) were two workers. Those workers moved first, roading here:



Next, the other three workers chopped the jungle in Luddite's land:



Allowing my knights to attack!

I wound up getting a nice role on the spear to start and winning the ~35% battle without losing a single round of combat (that knight is now 9xp, very very close to HE status). The archer battles were then in the high 70% range, of which I lost only one fight.

The end result of it is losing one knight for this:



Somehow, only the lighthouse survived in the city (what are the rules for having buildings be lost? I thought granaries generally survived? Kinda weird to build a granary in a medieval game, but hey at least I am exp ). Moved a HA and LB into the city, in addition to the winning knight.

Oh, and where had he moved his pike you ask? As you can see in that previous picture, NW-NW of the city . Clearly he didn't think I could attack in one turn, likely forgetting you can chop in someone else's lands. He even had visibility on all six of my knights!

Finally, for a little bit of before and after fun:

Before:





After:





Yeah, our team is now 30% better than the second best team in both population and land. Of course, that can change with Sulla being in a double GA now and the teching possibilities that leads to, but this turn was still pretty awesome!

[Shoot the Moon]

Not a ton to note this turn. Found another Luddite city, but it will cost me a HA (not a huge loss to be honest).

Luddite also left a mace sitting on a hill E-E of Omar (the former city of Hangzhou). I attacked with my 9xp combat 1 shock knight trying to get it to 10xp. Lost at 70%ish odds unfortunately. Oh well, was worth taking the shot to get HE up.

Messed up my micro and the pike going to Omar will get there next turn instead of this turn. I kinda doubt it will matter, but we'll see.

Also, demogs after ending turn:



I am quite happy with that GNP stat considering Sulla is in a Golden Age. Catching up very quickly there!

[Shoot the Moon]

I figure I'll post this here since it probably most accurately fits here.

Lastly, you're probably wondering where that Great Artist of mine ended up.

When last we checked in with Virgil, we had agreed to use him in my north somewhere. However, by the time I will be ready to make use of a GA, I could have my second one from Sluys completed. So, we reconvened the war council and began discussing other spots to use him in the meantime. The four we discussed were: Hangzhou, Kararorum W, Bombing up on elo hell, and along the Chinese border. So, let me welcome you to:

[SIZE="3"]Whacking Luddite's Border Cities, For Fun and Profit[/SIZE]



I'll let Shoot cover the details, but basically we're going to found on one of the three spots, detonate the bomb, and see what happens. Baoding should flip, and Macau will be open to an attack from the Indian Knights. As a side note, if these two cities fall, there is nothing - save for a range of hills to the northwest - between Shoot and Beijing.

Also, Macau if founded on rice. I know dry rice is not a great tile, but you can spread irrigation to it - in the way that I'm spreading irrigation to my mirror of that rice tile northwest of Trafalgar. I cannot fathom why Luddite chose to give up a potential 5/0/0 tile. Perhaps it just worked better with his dotmap? I suppose I'll have to wait until the post game to find out.

I will settle on that northern fork of Dave's arrow. The crucial tile that the bomb needs to culturally control is the horses. If I have that, I can hit both Macao (the northern city) and Baoding from the fog. How you ask? The tile SE of the plains hills my LB and sentry knight are on is the staging tile. I have the plains hill already roaded. I move three workers to chop the forest either NE of Baoding or S of Macao (remember, workers can chop forests or jungle in someone else's lands! I don't even need cultural control over those tiles, although the GA bomb may very well give me that anyway). Then knights or musketeers can attack from the staging tile out of the fog. Essentially by GA bombing there, I am establishing a permanent fork on the two cities which I can utilize whenever I so desire with absolutely no notice.

[Shoot the Moon]

Alright, so on just the wrong turn, Luddite's borders popped:





So now we need to decide where to settle/if we should use the GA somewhere else. If we want to do it in the same area, I think the best spot is 3E of Baoding as it is a city site that is actually viable and should still get us the all important horse tile. WK and Dave, thoughts?

Also, in what order do we want to end turn? We have something like 30 beakers left in gunpowder. I don't need it this turn so I should probably end turn before Dave. However, do we want WK to end first to partially fund me (I assume you don't have 200 gold expenses Dave) or have me end turn first so WK can utilize gunpowder a turn earlier?