Elkad killed off just 2 of the battered cataphracts, one with the W3 Holkan without a scratch, one with the pike that was on the jungled dyes and who has now escaped to the hill 2N1W of former Ox.
We can kill it and put 11 cataphracts in range of Chichén, maybe more depending on how culture is removed after we take Lakamha.
The pesky W3 Holkan can just rot on its forest for the while being. All other units of Elkad are out of sight. The 2 pikes should have moved through Cairo's territory, and can get to Chichén only in time if he thinks of roading there.
Lakamha has a fresh crossbow in addition to the axe, so we take it easily. The question is whether to storm onto Chichén with the cataphract stack. He still has his catapults in range, and we don't know what else behind. Otoh it makes sense to not let the pikes heal/get fortification. Also I think we really should kill off the pike that has 2 of our cataphracts on its belt by now before it can promote more (Elkad thankfully doesn't use autopromote). So rather strong lean yes on the cataphract push (caveat the first phract on the hill may see something troubling).
-Ruff is offering us spices for wine, which is a better deal than the one we have with SD, but we're stuck with that one for 6 turns anyway.
-F8 screen shows Chichen Itza having only 253 culture, so capturing Lakamha first will let you get the rest of your units in a better position. I probably agree with storming, but start off by killing the pike on the hill and have a look.
-Need to either do 5 turns of caste or immediately spread religion to our fishing villages in the ice region. If we're going merc+rep (I think we are) then caste has an added benefit of enabling a merchant/scientists for a lot of our cities that aren't matured. Better than running the vanilla citizen. Serfdom has some bonuses too, but I think I prefer caste, there's a lot of good 2nd ring tiles around. I'm OK with serfdom if you prioritize the missionaries, but I still think I prefer caste overall -- then probably serfdom once the 5 turns are up.
-Circumnavigating wb should head down to Spetznaz (bit of wasted movement with that last turn).
-Did Gira ever make it to Music? Apparently we're getting 0 KTB on aesthetics right now with him gone.
-Paper for the UoS is another interesting tech.
-Elkad's shrine is going to be nice. I forgot he had that.
We're starting to get a few too many shock cataphracts I think, I'd be wary of getting more.
We're also getting to that point where we no longer want to be whipping much, just reinforcing with natural production is good enough. The more likely whip cycle at this point is important infrastructure for captured cities. With the improvements coming to water/windmills/workshops and an upcoming GA we want to grow our cities to the max.
Cairo started his GA and revolted only to HR (and converted to Judaism), which tells me that Feudalism is still a bit away for him. Good.
Mjmd is attacking El Grillo again. I have not seen knights of his yet.
We took Lakamha without losses and kept it, although I do hate the location. Kept a granary, all the other buildings had culture.
Then killed the offending pike and moved onto Chichén:
No pikes in the city. Barring a huge surprise from the fog this should be a sure thing. I checked to see that no 1movers of Elkad's are in range of Lakamha. I have not seen a two mover of his yet.
I saw your dotmapping in the old Elkad /Cairo border region. I had slightly other plans but I like yours.
The settler can move onto the dot next turn (it remained in place this turn). I'm a bit wary of founding on Cairo's border, but otherwise he might refound it himself. We could as well plant the southwestern dot first.
I figured it's high time to think about what exactly we want to do with our conquered city, so I'll go through them one by one. Spoiler because lots of images.
The best thing this place has going for itself is that we captured it jewish. Its immediate mission is to get some missionaries out. Long term a subpar production city, with more farms after CS. Should it get a forge?
Not stellar either, but I pulled the deer from our self founded iceball back here. The forests will get the courthouse out, then the city can... exist?
I see it as a production hub. Sadly gira cottaged it and it will hurt to bulldoze over that. Maybe not necessary too soon. But farm that one grassland 2N; the hut 2N1E can go to the new city to be founded. Pretty nice city overall. Forge next? (galley was whipped last turn)
Obvious NE. Again, how do we reconcile this with the cottages in place? I guess at least the hamlets should become farms. Will need some infra, which will require some production. Library, market, the NE, a forge first?
3 lighthouse lakes and the tundra hill deer make for a food surplus of 4. Yay. Can then work the watermills and don't know what else... a workshop? Windmills on the tundra hills?
yeah...
you talked about cottaging this, but is there really time left in this game to have dry cottages grow? I'd think making it production focused makes more sense? Rather strong city.
Same here. Not that strong (the corn is shared)
we'll need commerce cities, and this one seems like an ok one?
The 3 blue dots above should all get a commerece focus I suppose. There are 2 fillers left to plant on the Russian west coast, who will not be great cities.
(December 16th, 2020, 10:59)Rusten Wrote: -Ruff is offering us spices for wine, which is a better deal than the one we have with SD, but we're stuck with that one for 6 turns anyway.
I offered him fur + wine for sugar + spice. If he takes it our wine is temporarily replaced by sugar. Once we cancel the SD deal it's a positive.
Quote:-F8 screen shows Chichen Itza having only 253 culture, so capturing Lakamha first will let you get the rest of your units in a better position. I probably agree with storming, but start off by killing the pike on the hill and have a look.
Thanks for the culture trick, had not occured to me.
Quote:-Need to either do 5 turns of caste or immediately spread religion to our fishing villages in the ice region. If we're going merc+rep (I think we are) then caste has an added benefit of enabling a merchant/scientists for a lot of our cities that aren't matured. Better than running the vanilla citizen. Serfdom has some bonuses too, but I think I prefer caste, there's a lot of good 2nd ring tiles around. I'm OK with serfdom if you prioritize the missionaries, but I still think I prefer caste overall -- then probably serfdom once the 5 turns are up.
Yes, sold on caste as well.
Quote:-Circumnavigating wb should head down to Spetznaz (bit of wasted movement with that last turn).
arguably yes. Sending it there, it will take 10 turns. But it's unlikely we get one built before.
Quote:-Did Gira ever make it to Music? Apparently we're getting 0 KTB on aesthetics right now with him gone.
I'm pretty sure that no artist appeared ever. I don't know what everybody else is researching, basically no movement on F6. Which might be a sig that everybody is getting guilds and we are the secret tech leaders
Quote:-Paper for the UoS is another interesting tech.
IWhich tech next is something we should discuss, but not tonight as it's getting late here
Quote:-Elkad's shrine is going to be nice. I forgot he had that.
Quote:We're starting to get a few too many shock cataphracts I think, I'd be wary of getting more.
Not planning for more. I felt they have been useful though against the pikes.
Quote:We're also getting to that point where we no longer want to be whipping much, just reinforcing with natural production is good enough. The more likely whip cycle at this point is important infrastructure for captured cities. With the improvements coming to water/windmills/workshops and an upcoming GA we want to grow our cities to the max.
So I guess you don't want to go ahead with these scheduled whips?
Switched them to market/grocer. I whipped Curiosi and Kruptoi Philoi though as a farewell to PS/slavery/theocracy, but only there.
Side question: If I whip a unit with PS, then immediately revolt out of it, the overflow hammers from the whip should not get debonified, or do they? (not planning to, actually.
-I think we should definitely go Aesthetics-lit-music first with that in mind (no great artist), but we can keep a 0% slider for a bit.
-Yes the hammers are already locked in after whipping. Changing civics won't matter.
-I think you can whip the cataphract in Magistranoi as the food surplus is so large, but I'd leave the one in Frumentarii alone yes (feel free to complete it with natural hammers though, you don't have to switch off it completely). Agree with market next in Mag (needs happy) and grocer next in Frumentarii (needs health).
-I don't feel very strongly about that dotmap, but it's nice to agree. What matters the most is that the northern one gets access to the wheat near Chichen Itza.
-I'm completely fine with Lakamha's location, what do you hate so much about it? improving an iron tile with a mine isn't that much better than modern "normal" improvements anyway, and we get the extra hammer for the city tile. Seems perfectly fine to me, unless there's some seafood I'm missing in the images.
I'll look through the city list later and put that in a separate post. And because I haven't mentioned it in a while, thanks for the regular and thorough reporting. Setting aside the time for it every evening is commendable, and it makes lurking very easy and enjoyable (coupled with sporadic logins).
Ito: Give it all of FSO's tiles. Farm the tile 2S and both grasslands and windmill+workshop the rest. That will put it on break even food working all tiles (Byz city east gets all the tiles it has access to). It can borrow the sheep to reach its max size quicker, and then switch to all the production tiles. If that's what we go for it's worth it to get a forge.
FSO: Just exist and run coast. Temple after CH for the bonuses.
Okhrana: Agree with production, but surely a watermill 2N and not a farm? Should've pillaged the cottages.
KGB: Just keep the cottages honestly, at least they're food-neutral. The city has such high food surplus+fresh water+coastal that we can easily just run both cottages and specialist and make it a size 20+ city. Windmill the hills for both growth and production. At least I'd keep the villages, I don't know how mature the hamlets are.
SVR: Windmills and workshops yeah. Possibly forgeworthy, but I think we get a temple and courthouse first at least.
Spetznaz: Granary+LH+CH+library and run specialists.
FSB: Yeah, I agree. Just focus on production.
Rostov: Yup.
Lakamha: Yes, definite commerce.
The new cities should get farms and watermills+windmills I think. They are all levee cities too, so they can transition into production once they've grown to max.
(December 16th, 2020, 19:05)Rusten Wrote: And because I haven't mentioned it in a while, thanks for the regular and thorough reporting. Setting aside the time for it every evening is commendable, and it makes lurking very easy and enjoyable (coupled with sporadic logins).
Quoted for truth. Yours has been a very rewarding game to lurk, and it's been extra nice to see SPI in action.
(December 16th, 2020, 19:05)Rusten Wrote: And because I haven't mentioned it in a while, thanks for the regular and thorough reporting. Setting aside the time for it every evening is commendable, and it makes lurking very easy and enjoyable (coupled with sporadic logins).
Quoted for truth. Yours has been a very rewarding game to lurk, and it's been extra nice to see SPI in action.
Glad you are enjoying the reports! Writing them is not half, but a good part of the fun, and also a great way to assess and rethink stuff (and yes, spend a bunch of time )
(December 16th, 2020, 19:05)Rusten Wrote: -I think we should definitely go Aesthetics-lit-music first with that in mind (no great artist), but we can keep a 0% slider for a bit.
Nope, have to decide now. We're entering Rep/caste/merc and there's going to come a bunch of beakers from that. I have to check in game, but especially with Rep I think that calendar is not going to be a priority. Which makes Aesthetics very appetizing, yes. But let's look at the options:
Calendar: we have 2 incenses and a silk and a dye to settle for. But as said the happy is not needed right now, and the tile yields are not interesting yet. However, if I haven't missed something MoM HAS STILL NOT FALLEN !? But we'd certainly lose it if we go for it now, right?
Aesthetics -> Literature -> Music. First reason is epics, second the artist, and I am also interested in Parthenon, being that we have several cities which are good for GP (Paya is a meme which theoretically could save us Philosophy but nah). The only caveat is that we really don't care for military tradition so this is a dead end pretty much
Compass -> Optics: Hopefully soon enough we'll have our continent for ourselves, but then we have to defend that huge western coast and also keep vanrober from getting ideas. Hopefully the new Mjmd-EG war will distract them for a while at least. But we mustn't fall behind in naval tech, and superiority would be good.
Engineering: roads. Huge empire which has to be defended by mobile stacks of cataphracts. In particular as long as Cairo is alive this is an issue.
CS: Do we care for bureau? Not sure, maybe we can leave Vassalage now that we're not building as many units anymore. We definitely want the irrigation at some point.
Meditation -> Philosophy: Pacifism could be useful, Angkor.... I think we just don't care about the shrine as much any longer? But sture it would still be nice, and should be fast enough with Pacifism. I actually briefly pondered just converting to Buddhism (because we're getting that shrine), but I fear it will just not work. In first place the AP build in Riparii would get cancelled. It's a shame that we never got a spread in our core, so we can'T get quick missionaries now. Do we want monasteries for the AP hammers btw? I imagine only in core cities that also get some commerce.
Paper: Would def do CS beforehand. Sankore I suppose is good? PP is not as huge for us, although if we manage to conquer Cairo we'll get a bunch of additional cottages. RP is huge though for our mill economy. The thing is I don't care a lot for rifling, would much rather go the gren/frigate/cannon route. I don't think I'm hugely interesten in Lib or Economics.
Gunpowder -> Chemistry: As said this is my preferred military route, but not at all an urgency right now.
Divine Right -> SM would be nice, but it's just so damn expensive that I think it'll come much later if at all. DR or Philosophy are the way to Nationalism, which is interesting.
In short, we want everything, now. This also shows that we maybe should give the Ren era first to bonuses a thought. Lib, economics, Taj... anything I'm missing? I think I'm only interested in the Taj, and only lukewarm on that as well. Of course Spi likes draft cycles. I get the impression that maybe we'll end up with rifling after all.
I think it makes sense to go for literature now, then reassess. Is the music artist alone worth the tech? Most probably yes. Then my lean would actually be Taj push, maybe after optics?
(December 16th, 2020, 19:05)Rusten Wrote: -I think you can whip the cataphract in Magistranoi as the food surplus is so large, but I'd leave the one in Frumentarii alone yes (feel free to complete it with natural hammers though, you don't have to switch off it completely). Agree with market next in Mag (needs happy) and grocer next in Frumentarii (needs health).
Mag only gets the huge surplus at the expense of Agentes' growth, so I actually think I'll leave them both unwhipped.
(December 16th, 2020, 19:05)Rusten Wrote: -I'm completely fine with Lakamha's location, what do you hate so much about it? improving an iron tile with a mine isn't that much better than modern "normal" improvements anyway, and we get the extra hammer for the city tile. Seems perfectly fine to me, unless there's some seafood I'm missing in the images.
No seafood. The iron is just the cherry on the top. What irks me is the wide spacing of Elkad's cities, which I feel will leave many tiles unworked for long. But I might be overreacting.
(December 16th, 2020, 20:31)Rusten Wrote: Okhrana: Agree with production, but surely a watermill 2N and not a farm?
I feel it's a bit low on food, in particular as INO also needs the sheep... maybe farm first, watermill later?
(December 16th, 2020, 20:31)Rusten Wrote: Should've pillaged the cottages.
. Epiphany! Now you tell me! Well at least there's one left to rage on.
(December 16th, 2020, 20:31)Rusten Wrote: KGB: Just keep the cottages honestly, at least they're food-neutral. The city has such high food surplus+fresh water+coastal that we can easily just run both cottages and specialist and make it a size 20+ city. Windmill the hills for both growth and production. At least I'd keep the villages, I don't know how mature the hamlets are.
Yes, I'll probably not have the heart to bulldoze villages. Gonna look at the hamlets. Windmills are a given, yes.
(December 16th, 2020, 20:31)Rusten Wrote: The new cities should get farms and watermills+windmills I think. They are all levee cities too, so they can transition into production once they've grown to max.
At first the southern one east of Rostov seemed like a good commerce city to me, but cottages will just take too long to grow so we'll go with mills yes. The eastern one (replacing Cairo's) will have a ton of commerce though!
Quick opinion needed: Settler to the northwestern dot on Cairo's border or to the southwestern one (east of Rostov)?
I had no idea MoM is still available, that's crazy! Surely Akritai or a different city could get some good production going for it, and we have marble now. Leaning calendar before music now. If we could somehow get MoM in time for our GA we'll easily get 36 turns of it with the Taj, and I'd imagine 48 could even be a possibility (although I think the game ends before that). It's possible some players are too busy making war, and calendar is useful in itself. There are a lot of things we want indeed, so I think it's better to reassess after music. But with GL+NE liberalism becomes a lot more attractive than otherwise. We can't really lightbulb astronomy anymore, so that's a very good liberalism tech for us.
I'd get monasteries in core cities, yes, and also in captured cities that are high on commerce (Cairo territory comes to mind).
Is drafting riflemen 1 or 2 pop in this mod?
I'm fine with settling on Cairo's border.
Upon inspecting the game I also see that we're able to get most of our units in range of Elkad's capital this turn. I'd be very curious to see what's in it. We can send the Rostov cataphract to the hill S-SE of the city for a closer look. I believe even the furthest south stack of cataphracts can get in position as Elkad will lose control of the tile 3SE of his capital once we capture Chichen Itza.
Holkan is a free kill with our axe.
Our crabfur region needs a lot of modernized improvements (watermills and windmills), but I see that we're spread thin on worker turns. Not urgent.
edit: Lakamha is size 8 (7 upon capture) and has a lot of hills. Decent candidate for the forbidden palace. Fairly central and will get it built fairly quickly. Best city IMO.
I allocated our EP on El Grillo for a turn, I'm a little curious about his graphs and how the war is going. Mjmd after perhaps?
But we'd certainly lose it if we go for it now, right?
. Epiphany! Now you tell me! Well at least there's one left to rage on.