April 16th, 2018, 16:26
(This post was last modified: April 16th, 2018, 16:51 by Chevalier Mal Fet.)
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Score report:
Interesting things:
1)Archduke's culture is also quite good. In fact, my culture is second-to-last! Well, that will come up soon, hopefully. It also maybe makes the others see me as less of a threat? That'd be nice. :D Pay no attention to the Korea behind the curtain! Especially that we have 5 cities when no one else has more than three. ._.
2)Weirdly, I can't look at the conquered Georgian cities on Archduke's trade screen. Obviously, he can't trade them for some reason. Why might that be? They can't still be under occupation. Is it a loyalty thing? -shrug- Who can know these things?
3)Rowain planted city #4 this turn, and started his government district there. There's no law that says you have to build at your capital, although that makes sense with Autocracy (Rowain is in Autocracy, Archduke in Classical Republic, and Alhambram in Classical Republic. Remember that I am in Oligarchy for legacy card purposes). Maybe his dot map demands it. Once again, I need map knowledge, and sooner is preferable to later (when there's a strong chance of thousands of wild Mongol horsemen to come howling out of the fog bent on murdering my poor scout).
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Turn 63
Well, let's jump right into it:
Operation Landgrab: Phase I is now complete!
Unfortunately, it turns out that there IS a character limit to city names, and Another Fine Product From the Nonsense Factory gets rendered as Another Fine Product from the No, so we'll curtail the name - for colloquial purposes only, of course. All of you reading my thread know the full, glorious, and gravitasful name of the city. My opponents will have to make do with the far less majestic Another Fine Product.
It'd probably be wrong to spend more time talking about what I named the city than the city itself, so I guess I'll explain what's going on inside. This city fulfills a couple of purposes. First ring tiles are decent but not spectacular, with the standouts being the bananas and the 2/2 forest hill. Second-ring, though, is a lot better - iron, a seowon hill, some wheat, and another hill. At Machinery this city will have great production with multiple riverside lumbermills - I don't want to go too crazy with chopping. However, even sparing those chops, the city still has fully 7 choppable tiles, with 4 more available if I want to give up riverside forests. Furthermore, every chop can be boosted with Maritime Industries for astonishing 400% chops. I don't even know what I'll spend all that production on at this point. Any wonder I want - although there's not many that I actually want - or a butt-ton (to use the technical term) of units? I'm a bit nervous about founding the city on the coast, with the Dutch right next door and their super-frigates, but this way gets me the Sailing Eureka:
That, in turn, grants me an envoy at Antioch (finally, 60 turns after I SHOULD have had one. Alhambram will pay for his effrontery, I swear it on my father's bones!  ), and an era point. Era score is worth chasing now. We dramatically failed in our mediocre attempt to be, er, mediocre, as we got a normal age despite our best efforts. So no Medieval Heroic Age, but a medieval golden age will do nicely. Poor Emperor never got to play with any of Georgia's abilities, but if we were Georgia I'd feel sanguine about our chances to set up a string of constant golden ages from now to the end of days. As it is, we'll just make do with our crappy normal Korean golden ages.
Speaking of Era score, I make a bunch more for meeting every civ on the map!
Woo! Well-done team! Pay no attention to the fact that we, uh, never scouted more than 5 turn's march beyond our own borders, we're the greatest! Where did Archduke show up? Somewhere to my northwest, apparently:
Maybe he's passing through that, uh, pass near In One Ear. Anyway, we get a look at his demographics, except for his cities for some reason, and I added those to a score report.
Other news quickly:
In the south, the area around the city-states is as flat as the north.
Is this normal for New Earth settings? Or did we not go with that setting? If we went with a normal amount of hills, as opposed to RB's fondness for lush maps, then my start is incredible. It'd be nice to know what everyone else started with me. Maybe I should send some scouts out? Eh. I'll get around to it. 
Overview and scores.
aetryn, if you wind up playing my next two or three turns, have no fear.
My intentions:
1)Expand out to 7 cities as quickly as possible.
2)Marshal the military for a strike at Antioch as soon as possible.
3)Develop the new cities with improvements and districts as time and production allows.
4)Prepare for a Colosseum build.
How I planned to execute:
1)Builder at OCISLY steps onto jungle due east, northeast, and the northeastern forest, chopping in turn.
2)OCISLY builds 2 settlers. What to build between that and Entertainment districts I have no idea.
3)JRTI builds, uh, builders.
4)The expansion cities should be okay. After the scout finishes at IBtP a seowon, monument, or builder makes sense.
5)Archers will assemble at OCISLY and move south to Antioch en masse. Warriors can scout a bit but should arrive at Antioch with the archers.
6)Research is directed at the Colosseum, assuming we will finish G&R with the Construction boost.
Feel free to modify these maneuvers as you see fit, within my intentions. Use your discretion on any situation I haven't covered. skanar, feel free to heckle aetryn/criticize him/conspire with him to seize permanent control of Korea from me. Whatever you two think best!
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Aye-aye, captain! I am locked, loaded, and ready to heckle.
In all seriousness: I think things look good. Plan is set for ~10 turns or so, so it's probably time to begin thinking about/scouting for a military strike against one of the neighbors around turn 90-100. I have nothing to contribute on the various Era Score/XYZ Age/Government building discussions, unfortunately.
Only move I've disagreed with, a bit, is the Seowon locking at IBTP. Wouldn't an Encampment there immediately have made more sense? Or is there a chance to get the discount on one later? Unless there's an offensive strike aimed at Japper soon, the Encampment there seems wise, and I would have thought to get that cost locked in first.
April 17th, 2018, 00:43
(This post was last modified: April 17th, 2018, 00:45 by aetryn.)
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(April 16th, 2018, 22:32)skanar Wrote: Aye-aye, captain! I am locked, loaded, and ready to heckle.
In all seriousness: I think things look good. Plan is set for ~10 turns or so, so it's probably time to begin thinking about/scouting for a military strike against one of the neighbors around turn 90-100. I have nothing to contribute on the various Era Score/XYZ Age/Government building discussions, unfortunately.
Only move I've disagreed with, a bit, is the Seowon locking at IBTP. Wouldn't an Encampment there immediately have made more sense? Or is there a chance to get the discount on one later? Unless there's an offensive strike aimed at Japper soon, the Encampment there seems wise, and I would have thought to get that cost locked in first.
We have a serious balance of power problem with a military strike on a neighbor right now. Striking Cree looks especially off the table, as that would leave us with a diminished/damaged army that the Mongols can sweep in and wipe out. We can't take a DoF with Mongolia because their superior mobility (and combat strength) would mean they would eat more of Cree than we would. Only if the Mongols were committed in the south would I feel safe about an attack on the Cree. Striking the Dutch looks more reasonable, but can Sumeria stop a Mongol invasion on its own? If the Archduke eats all of (early-peaking) Sumeria, that's a much bigger problem than taking Georgia's two cities - it might even be a concession. I think Holland has to be left free to aid Sumeria if they are willing. Once Mongolia commits to their next attack, we'll have more information about where our forces can go. If they attack Cree, we probably have to intervene unless a) Cree's lands are terrible and b) we think we can effectively defend their monster horsemen if we can just trade a bit of (buffer) space for time. Are we more likely to be able to defend against Mongolia in 40 turns solo or in 20 turns with Japper?
Were you thinking of the Encampment for the GG points or for the defenses? CMF suggested that walls are going to be useless against the Mongols - they'll just cut right through it with their ridiculous horsemen. Unless it's behind a bunch of rough terrain or a river they'll be able to strike it from the fog, and in any case it's probably only getting one shot. Is that worth the investment in a district? The Seowon kind of plays into the strategy of getting an entire military generation ahead of Mongolia, at which point we will have reasonable parity with them. Heck, that might not even be enough to stop their UU in the Medieval Age.
I 100% agree with you that we need scouting, especially if we are contemplating an intervention in a theoretical Mongolian Conquest of Cree. I'd recommend we use that window at OCISLY for a scouting unit or a military unit.
April 17th, 2018, 06:27
(This post was last modified: April 17th, 2018, 06:29 by Chevalier Mal Fet.)
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(April 16th, 2018, 22:32)skanar Wrote: Aye-aye, captain! I am locked, loaded, and ready to heckle.
In all seriousness: I think things look good. Plan is set for ~10 turns or so, so it's probably time to begin thinking about/scouting for a military strike against one of the neighbors around turn 90-100. I have nothing to contribute on the various Era Score/XYZ Age/Government building discussions, unfortunately.
Only move I've disagreed with, a bit, is the Seowon locking at IBTP. Wouldn't an Encampment there immediately have made more sense? Or is there a chance to get the discount on one later? Unless there's an offensive strike aimed at Japper soon, the Encampment there seems wise, and I would have thought to get that cost locked in first.
You're right, I do need an encampment there eventually. I had that planned for district #2 - there's a place one tile behind the river bank that would be good, I believe. Units would move up to the river on one turn, and get shot. Then they'd cross the river on their next turn, and get shot again, and only after that would they be able to attack the encampment. This might not work against Ordu-Great-General-Keshiks, but against any reasonable force it should be a tough nut to crack, especially if backed by my DotF-units. If I can grab a second city at the ONLY remaining city-spot in the northeast (seriously, check it out: )
- then I can maybe even put down a second encampment supporting the first. That one would have to be on the riverbank, though, which is not ideal since it could be attacked out of the fog from across the river. I delayed the encampment, though, for two reasons:
1)Like you said, I sort of want to get them discounted first. I have 1 Plaza, will have 1 Entertianment district, and 1 seowon at the moment. I have 5 districts unlocked, so if I can build two more seowons (or a holy site + 1 seowon), then my first encampment should be discounted. I think.
2)I want to get science up and running sooner. The Archduke really is frightening, so the higher tech I have to face him, the better. Same-generation is just about possible if I fight in my borders with a Great General (so yeah encampments ought to be on the priority list), but offensive action is tough to imagine. He's too far way for even a quick naval raid after Shipbuilding (I do like the idea of landing an army in his core while his forces are off invading someone, that might be a viable plan down the road).
(April 17th, 2018, 00:43)aetryn Wrote: (April 16th, 2018, 22:32)skanar Wrote: Aye-aye, captain! I am locked, loaded, and ready to heckle.
In all seriousness: I think things look good. Plan is set for ~10 turns or so, so it's probably time to begin thinking about/scouting for a military strike against one of the neighbors around turn 90-100. I have nothing to contribute on the various Era Score/XYZ Age/Government building discussions, unfortunately.
Only move I've disagreed with, a bit, is the Seowon locking at IBTP. Wouldn't an Encampment there immediately have made more sense? Or is there a chance to get the discount on one later? Unless there's an offensive strike aimed at Japper soon, the Encampment there seems wise, and I would have thought to get that cost locked in first.
We have a serious balance of power problem with a military strike on a neighbor right now. Striking Cree looks especially off the table, as that would leave us with a diminished/damaged army that the Mongols can sweep in and wipe out. We can't take a DoF with Mongolia because their superior mobility (and combat strength) would mean they would eat more of Cree than we would. Only if the Mongols were committed in the south would I feel safe about an attack on the Cree. Striking the Dutch looks more reasonable, but can Sumeria stop a Mongol invasion on its own? If the Archduke eats all of (early-peaking) Sumeria, that's a much bigger problem than taking Georgia's two cities - it might even be a concession. I think Holland has to be left free to aid Sumeria if they are willing. Once Mongolia commits to their next attack, we'll have more information about where our forces can go. If they attack Cree, we probably have to intervene unless a) Cree's lands are terrible and b) we think we can effectively defend their monster horsemen if we can just trade a bit of (buffer) space for time. Are we more likely to be able to defend against Mongolia in 40 turns solo or in 20 turns with Japper?
Were you thinking of the Encampment for the GG points or for the defenses? CMF suggested that walls are going to be useless against the Mongols - they'll just cut right through it with their ridiculous horsemen. Unless it's behind a bunch of rough terrain or a river they'll be able to strike it from the fog, and in any case it's probably only getting one shot. Is that worth the investment in a district? The Seowon kind of plays into the strategy of getting an entire military generation ahead of Mongolia, at which point we will have reasonable parity with them. Heck, that might not even be enough to stop their UU in the Medieval Age.
I 100% agree with you that we need scouting, especially if we are contemplating an intervention in a theoretical Mongolian Conquest of Cree. I'd recommend we use that window at OCISLY for a scouting unit or a military unit.
Right now, the central strategic problem I have is what do about the Mongols when their units are incredibly buffed and I'm on the other side of the map. Archduke eating Japper MIGHT be manageable, since we can fight him near the end of long supply lines (it'll take him a looong time to walk reinforcements all the way from Mongolia and Georgia, our reinforcements will be less than 10 tiles away) and close to DotF. I need a scout that direction to see if he's coming, though, because we'll have a very short window of opportunity to intervene. That scout is finished in 2 turns. We also could use a GG, both on defense and for potential attacks. That's the real strength of an encampment district, to start accumulating those. An attack on Cree should be more or less manageable. Archduke will be getting +8 against us, if we have a GG in place we'll slash his advantage merely to his +3 cavalry, which we ought to be able to handle ("he said blithely, unaware of the visions of blood, death, and galloping horsemen which lay in his future").
Hitting Rowain is a bigger problem. Rowain is big, developed (compared to the basically infant Georgian cities), and there's basically nothing we can do to help, short of sending gold - but upgrades likely aren't relevant in the coming war. The biggest issue that I see is that Rowain has no answer to +14 horsemen. I think his best chance is to attack the Archduke before he can send a trader, but remember Rowain has a DoF with the Mongols! He probably took it thinking he wanted no part of Genghis Khan, not expecting Archduke to so quickly conquer Emperor, but now that looks like a grave error to me - his war carts are aging rapidly and he can't first-strike Mongolia while his army's away.
Now, if Archduke sent his trader to Emperor, as I assume he did, and if he doesn't finish a Market, then Rowain might have a chance to avoid the visibility +6 buff, leaving Archduke with a measley (hah) +8 combat bonus. It depends on if Archduke sent the trader before his DoF with Rowain, or after. If after, it might take long enough to complete that Rowain can declare war when the DoF ends and before the trader gets sent. I'd also like to see Rowain's next district be an encampment and for him to start burning a wild card/production on projects for more GG points. Not only does it make Archduke's life harder, but it slows Rowain down relative to the peaceful easterners. 
He probably won't do that, though, Korea is not allowed to have nice things.
So yeah, I'm not going to go so far as to call Mongolia OP - they CAN be countered...but you have to bend your whole civ to countering them. You gotta deny their combat bonuses while stacking as many of your own as you can. Hopefully Japper and Rowain will do all they can.
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I was thinking to build the Encampment for defenses, ideally to set up a stable border with Japper. I agree that the Mongol threat changes that analysis.
How does one deal with a nascent runaway civ or overwhelming military power? I see two options: (1) coalition of the willing. Chevalier's Korea is singularly ill-positioned to set that up or lead it, since if it is successful most of the benefits will accrue elsewhere. Still, some AI diplomacy to feel out the others about containing the Horde may make sense. Option (2) is a tech advantage. Here, we are greatly favored. The Mongols are far away. If they continue to push against other civs, there is a chance to tech a generation ahead and make a decisive counter-strike while the Mongol army is engaged against another civ - think what suboptimal tried against Ichabod in PBEM3, only with much better execution. And Korea should be able to tech like nobody else.
To successfully execute (2), timing and scouting are key. We need to know what the Mongols are pushing with and set up for a teched unit that will crush that. Also, we need to know where they are attacking, so we can time the strike appropriately.
April 17th, 2018, 21:14
(This post was last modified: April 18th, 2018, 13:02 by aetryn.)
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Turn 65
The first turn I have to cover turns out to be more important than expected! Edit: Image size fixed. Thanks Woden!
I open the save to find that completing the scout from I Blame the Parent has boosted Mercenaries for us:
My instructions say that this city's next build should be a builder, a Seowon, or a Monument. I don't like the builder - this city has almost nothing to improve at the moment and Magnus isn't visiting for years, so no chopping. Both the Seowon and the Monument look tasty for different reasons. Our science rate is actually pretty close to the pack, so another Seowon shouldn't cause mass panic among the other players, and it will get us closer to the district cost discount. On the other hand, this city badly needs second ring tiles. There's two wheat tiles and a horse to pick up, and this city badly needs food. We've investing chops into new cities, rather than armies or districts. For that to pay off these cities need to get productive quickly, so getting those second ring tiles is important. I set this decision aside for the moment. The scout moves northwest and then will go around the head of the river and scout to the northeast, then proceed east into Cree lands.
At OCISLY, Magnus is here! Let us celebrate by chopping jungle down to the ground:
1 down, 2 to go. This boosts the city to size 6 (nowhere useful for the pop to work, but it's a few extra foodhammers) and cuts out settler build time in half. It also get us some faith, which is going to be important in about 5 minutes.
There's a new barb camp out in the Western Wilds. We don't have any forces to spare to deal with this at the moment as we assemble to take Antioch, but I've pinned it so we don't forget about it.
In foreign news, The Archduke attacked Granada sometime recently (it's in our gossip history). This might have happened some time ago and was never reported, or I failed to properly read the reports, but Archduke has hit 5 cities, so this could have been a one-turn snipe war with all of the Mongolian Chariots.
The other big news is that the Dutch have claimed a Great Scientist, and the replacement is none other than:
HYPATIA!
Chevalier emphasized that he wanted to try to snipe her if she showed up. Can we do this? Japper is now generating 2 Great Scientist Points a turn and will claim her in 9 turns if nobody else does anything. Sumeria is only producing 1 point per turn, so even if they do a district project (can only do one at a time), they can't get close. What about Alhambram? He's generating almost 7 points and could potentially snag it if he runs enough district projects, but that's a pretty significant commitment. However, if Japper thinks he's safe and doesn't patronage, there's a strong chance we can grab this with faith in 8 turns. We'd need 380 points. We're at 274.9 and the chops are producing 88. That means we can definitely afford this after the third chop, and might even be able to grab it a turn or two early. We could do it even easier by running a Campus Research Grants project at JRTI, but it takes 5 turns, would delay the Colosseum timeline and I'm not willing to do that when I think there's a strong likelihood we can faith-snipe this in 4-5 turns anyway. We will need 460 faith to snipe this when the forest is chopped, and we should be at 274+2+(2+88)+2+(2+88)=458. Just short. But 5 turns should be enough. The cost will drop to 440 and we'll have 460. In 5 turns, Alhambram will be at 35ish, and Japper will be at 53. Alhambram can't patronage it, but should be able to earn 30 in 3 district projects if he wants to. Japper won't have the cash, and would need 220 faith, which seems unlikely. So I think our chances are pretty good.
This decides me in favor of a Monument at I Blame the Parents, as we are depleting our stores of Faith and will probably not be buying a monument there any time soon. The Seowon would arrive too late to be any use in the Great Scientist race.
Finally, I peek at the accumulated culture for all players (this includes boosts):
The number of Domestic tourists = FLOOR(Total Notes Accumulated Including Boosts / 100). This means that all our non-Japper opponents are somewhere between 700 and 799 total notes accumulated (including boosts on civics that may not be researched any time soon, like Mercenaries). We are somewhere between 600-699, which is worrisome, but not too bad. Japper is between 300-399. He's either missing a LOT of boosts, has had a really slow start, or probably both. He also has basically no money, very low income, and a very weak army, so he may not be any kind of useful ally against the Mongolians anyway.
The bad news here is that since we lag both in accumulated culture and culture per turn, there's a strong likelihood someone has already beat us to Games & Recreation, and they could certainly grab the Colosseum if they want to. Let's hope we have a superior plan to actually build it.
As much as you might want to smash Alhambram for stealing that initial meeting envoy at Antioch, I think a longer-term friendship with him could make a lot of sense also. Japper is definitely going to have to turn his civ around really quick or he's going to be eaten up by a neighbor.
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(April 17th, 2018, 20:58)skanar Wrote: I was thinking to build the Encampment for defenses, ideally to set up a stable border with Japper. I agree that the Mongol threat changes that analysis.
How does one deal with a nascent runaway civ or overwhelming military power? I see two options: (1) coalition of the willing. Chevalier's Korea is singularly ill-positioned to set that up or lead it, since if it is successful most of the benefits will accrue elsewhere. Still, some AI diplomacy to feel out the others about containing the Horde may make sense. Option (2) is a tech advantage. Here, we are greatly favored. The Mongols are far away. If they continue to push against other civs, there is a chance to tech a generation ahead and make a decisive counter-strike while the Mongol army is engaged against another civ - think what suboptimal tried against Ichabod in PBEM3, only with much better execution. And Korea should be able to tech like nobody else.
To successfully execute (2), timing and scouting are key. We need to know what the Mongols are pushing with and set up for a teched unit that will crush that. Also, we need to know where they are attacking, so we can time the strike appropriately.
I think the plan is to dabble in (1) a bit while (2) comes online. We're already at about 138% of the Mongol science rate. Once we finish up the Colosseum and get more Seowons up, we'll pull farther ahead. However, the new rules of R&F (tech ahead of time costs extra) will negate some of this advantage. Hopefully if we land Hypatia we can really kick in the tech door.
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Nice reports, are you interested in the program I use to make the score / gpp forum posts? If so I can add some error checking and a guide.
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(April 18th, 2018, 10:18)Emperor K Wrote: Nice reports, are you interested in the program I use to make the score / gpp forum posts? If so I can add some error checking and a guide.
I can't speak for Chevalier, but I'm definitely interested. Also, if you know how to the screenshots show up smaller in the post, that would help too!
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