[SPOILERS PB71]Krill: By the numbers, when the walls fell (on everyone else)

[Krill]

I don't think there are many great Classical era defenses in RB games.

There have been some fantastic invasions. I'll put my PB27 attack of Exploit up there (shame about the rest of the game but RL comes first). But defences only happen when the attacker is, generally, over confident and reckless. With HA coming earlier catapults don't tend to get into the picture until late classical/early medieval because of the tech cost. Cats and HA just kill everything except giant war elephant stacks.

[greenline]

Are swords + cats + stack defenders really an efficient method of conquest compared to either the all in HA rush or just waiting to tech knights? I've been really burned on one movers and it seemed like people only really liked swords when they could stuff them on boats.

[Krill]

The short answer is that pure HA rushes are hammer expensive because you must expect to lose at least one HA for every opposing spear, but it can get worse.

Catapults against a player with no horse can't be flanked away, and if and when I take Sipper I cut off all trade from to Bing from everyone else. He would not even be able to trade for horse. Catapults bombard away culture defenses, CR cat or two get odds on most things after the first battle and swords then clean up (keep a multitude of various units like a couple of HA in the stack to fight the best combinations of battles). It is potentially the most hammer efficient way to remove a player from the game. This can be a sledgehammer, or a vice, or sometimes an anvil.

This does not stop me having a small stack of HA to then attack at Opis a few turns later after the main stack moves in to try and backdoor a quick victory. The same units can act as a quick response force for defensive purposes. But by the same token war wlephants and cats, until I promote them, are the core of any defense against Samurai so I need to build them anyway.

If I just used HA for an attack, I'd still have to build the cats to defend at Rhubarb

This map is so low yield I can't afford to build that many units, and then have to build a new army to defend against Pin and Com. I need to keep units alive for as many battles as possible.

Waiting for knights is also handing all initiative to my opponents. I border everyone. I am the best target to get dog piled, I need to think the heard and the number of vectors players have to attack me. Bing dying gives me a safe back line.

[Krill]

Popcorn time for the lurkers has now arrived. SD killed one of my scouts and Pin just landed his GE, later than expected. One of Pina or Thoth landed IW and the other got a classical era tech, I suspect Thoth took IW because he has a worker on the sugar jungle he wants to chop. Makes me wonder what tech Pin took though, I would have thought he prioritised IW for Xbows but maybe not.

Construction due in 3 with some wealth builds or four without

[Krill]

...Did Pindicator not bulb Machinery?

He could have built a wonder in Staunton or in Morphy this turn. He didn't. The 21 point increase from T96 can't have been anything to do with the GE, was a 12 point (classical) tech and 9 point pop. Land points come at turn roll...my main concern with defending from Samurai is if Pindicator was able to rush out and crack Rhubarb before I could get defenders (as in couple of catapults and actual hitters) but if he doesn't bulb Machinery in the next few turns then that whole scenario goes away, (the rush scenario, anyway, the "whip as many units as I can and sit them on my doorstep" scenario still exists but I can win that one with Construction and Currency in the bag. It just takes numbers, and I'm pretty sure I have more considering some of the whip cycles I can do in the new cities).

I need to take a step back and look at this from Pindicators point of view:

I'm down a city. My first five cities are extremely limited in two food tiles but I have good MFG, so if I want to build an army I have to build it, not whip. But that means I telegraph the power increase, but not a target (Ed: Thoth is a bad target but has a front city that has two calendar happy, moving beyond that doesn't give much). I lack grass hills so can't even windmill them for two food tiles. I hooked horses late (Ed: did he just tech HBR? MC landed T59/60, but I might be wrong, now i look at PBSpy and he got end of turn 62, forge eot63...which would line up with the GE on T97. Ooops. T72 something happened with score that could have been a Classical era tech...but then the next tech is T97? That is really bad, but with no cottages, libraries and working scientists?).

Ouch, that might actually be just the point, the same problem I have but I have GW to keep unit costs down...

The problem on this map is not actually building a small to medium, size army (say 20 units in a stack).

The problem is that we can't afford the gold cost of the units, never mind the cost of moving them outside our borders. I have one Zigg down and AGG to help with city costs. Pindicator doesn't even have those. Perhaps he is wary on building the army and wrecking what economy he has. Look at Bing: Vicky has an economy alsmost as bad as SD's Mongolia because he has built units he now believes he needs but lacks the tile improvements to make it work...

I need to take a step back and watch Pin. Let's not make any hasty decisions.

[Krill]

OMG, OMG, I am a moron.

I thought about this a month ago and promptly forgot it. That's what happens when I don't write things down (literally, I use a notepad for constant list making in work and home life).

Bulbs give 1000 beakers plus 2 beakers per pop (GS give 1500 beakers and 3 per pop, just so some lurker isn't pedantic). Normally I assume that everything up to and including Machinery and Feud are always completed by a bulb but that isn't the case.

Machinery, on these settings, would normally cost 1046 beakers, but because of Sevenspirits tech cost scaling implementation it costs 1217 beakers. Pindicator has less than 30 pop total so he is over 150 beakers short, so even if he has bulbed it he can't complete it. And now I have Currency I can watch his tech rate, as he is currently saving gold at about 27gpt. I will probably get to Construction before he can get to Machinery! "Crisis" averted, but now Pin can play silly buggers and make everyone second guess what he is doing (and makes me finish the two Ziggs I have in construction to try and get research visibility ASAP).

[Krill]

Preface to this post: I expect Bing has done "diplo" with SD and SD might backstab me (because why wouldn't he?), which would be the reason for the scout kill earlier. I have eyes on the quick route to Olive, and on the eastern approach.

Bing has finally come to justify not taking peace. It's not really a concern but can tie down a few units.




Because these are the defenders:




Bing does not have another force trying an end around to the north, I've already checked that out. This is pretty much what he is bringing to bear. Shame it isn't a turn or two later so I could more easily chop/whip two cats out, but this will suffice to defend.

Technical note: I think that promoting two HA to C1+shock will let them defend against axes before the unpromoted vultures, until the vultures get too much fortification. The greatest challenge is not letting the spears get shots at the horses, but I think in reality Bing has to either say "screw it" and wander the stack in further (so I chop the forests to give him a hard path, and then get out 3-4 cats before wiping it), or he retreats. Just sitting on a forest inside my culture does nothing but give me an opportunity for a GG. I think some players would give a random. The issue is defending at Pomegranate if SD decides to backstab me, but walls are almost compelte there and I can get out a couple of units in the next 2-3 turns. I think it takes longer for SD to heal units and move them up to be honest.

[Krill]

I wonder how many posters on RB have a career where they have the responsibility for organising things.

Here is one

Second comment on this game: we are all going to get rolled by mack, but I am the player with the best leader/civ pairing so I should fair worst in the lurker evaluation.

Mackoti that scary or are you just rusty?

Both, I haven't played a Civ 4 MP game since before Covid, and mackoti is ruthless. I would need to be operating at peak to put up a challenge, and I doubt that challenge would succeed.

Fortunately for me, mack dropped out so the roster for this game is: Yuri (soon to die to SD), SD, Pindicator, Bing, Thoth, myself and Commodore (and that is the playing order). The difference in skill between me and some of these players is probably similar in the skill gap between mack and myself (not intending to be arrogant here, just realistic).

[greenline]

How did I never know that bulbs scale with pop? I thought they always provided a flat beaker boost.

[Krill]

Now you know the scaling is so minor it doesn't do a massive amount, for example map size has a far greater affect (yes huge maps can hold more pop, but the extra pop doesn't make up for the increasd tech cost generally IMO; I am sure T-hawk can show a way to abuse corps to to get a high score that wouldallow one bulb to complete Future Tech)