05-05-2003 14:23									#1
	Apolytonian Armament Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

After planting that embassy, a lot has been made clear.

CDG has iron. Right next to their capital. And they have a Barracks. And they already have one Immortal.

Their capital is better than ours. Access to iron, a river, forests, hills and that irrigated wheat means CDG has access to a very flexible city. They are currently producing a Settler in that city.

CDG is going 100% to build up commerce. Why? Why else... for upgrades. This may be why they hinted that they would be going the same route as GCA research-wise... they could always say later "oh well, we decided it was a waste to research the same thing as GCA, so we've given up on that... so don't expect us to have X tech any time soon..."

Within about 10 turns, CDG could make it so their capital could produce 10 shields per turn, which is either a Warrior every turn, or an Immortal every 3. Their other cities will be able to produce a Warrior every 2/3 turns. At full tax (probably ~12 right now, could possibly get up to around 20), they have the ability to upgrade quite a few Warriors, especially with that river. Within about 10 turns, CDG could gear their empire up to the level of production to allow them the equivalent of an Immortal a turn. Considering how early it is in the game, and how poor their land is, that's a pretty good rate. They could probably increase this over time as well, giving the possibility of seeing 15 Immortals before too long.

Needless to say, that's not good. Whether they go after us or GCA, that's bad news. CDG will not have a very hard time dealing with GCA before they obtain the ability to optimize their land and switch over to Republic if GCA isn't actively preparing for CDG. CDG conquering GCA would create a huge power void, which CDG would be quick to fill. And even for us, 15 Immortals would be a pain to deal with.

So what do we do? We have to arm ourselves for war.

At this point, limited armament is acceptable. CDG has 1 Immortal and is producing a Settler. They're not much of a threat now, thankfully. However, that will change as their buildup moves ahead, and we have to make sure that we can accomodate for that.

Our cities aren't very good production-wise. Apolyton can get up pretty high, but it will be doing Settler and Worker duty for a while. Bananatopia is relegated to producing a Granary for X turns, where X is a rather large number when looking at things in perspective. That leaves Mingapulco and City #4. Luckily, we have time to prepare, so it is imperative that we produce Barracks in both those cities ASAP. After that, we can focus on veteran Warriors or Chariots for upgrades in those cities along with an occasional NM, with Apolyton, Bananatopia and other cities spitting out NMs when they get the chance. However, this will require those Barracks to get up and get up fast. If it takes too long, CDG will be well into the production of its Immortal army, and our preparations may be too-little, too-late. We may have to pop-rush those Barracks if things are moving to slowly.

Ideally, we will also want to maintain a fairly large treasury. Building Warriors/Chariots instead of Swordsmen/Horsemen will allow us to fit more NMs into the Mingapulco and City #4 queues, which may help us just as much as vet Swordsmen/Horsemen will. Therefore, conservation and even limited buildup of our treasury should be fairly important. Luckily, we've knocked off some barb camps, which has given us some extra cash, but after building that embassy our treasury isn't very deep at the moment.

In the end it comes down to preparation. We will have to investigate the CDG capital some time in the future to check on the progress of their buildup. If they're progressing too fast, then we may have to alter Apolyton and Bananatopia's queues, but that's to be decided in the future.

Right now, production is our worst enemy. We can't get much above 3 or 4 in any city besides Apolyton. We have to start early, because when that stack starts moving, there needs to be something to stop it.

	05-05-2003 15:51									#2
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With these facts uncovered, we now have "proof" that CDG is not into expanding peacefully.

We should warn GCA and officially ask them to become our allies. Maybe even sign a Mutual Protection pact (out-of-game, of course). Something involving keeping a small stack of offensive units nearby.

If CDG attacks us, GCA can make a surprise attack from behind.

If CDG attacks GCA, they'll have a harder time dealing with them, and we can come in and grab some land from CDG.

	05-05-2003 17:38									#3
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::Searches for an old thread and prepares to bump it with enough force to put a crater in the boards::

Edit: Screw it, I'll make a new one.

	05-05-2003 21:19									#4
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I made that post before I saw that road that CDG was building. The threat is now even more real. I'm of the opinion we need to switch Bananatopia over to Barracks to compensate. Apolyton will handle Settler/Worker duty for a while, and our other cities will focus upon military production. CDG has quite a head-start on us right now, and they have the capacity to make more units easier, since they're at full mobilization right now. They can get their capital up to 10 shields per turn quite easily, while we won't have any cities with half that capability. We have to make up for that with our number of quality cities. Elucidia may be better than anything we can wield, but our cities combined our better. In the end, this balances out... CDG's poorer cities produce Warriors for upgrade, their capital produces vet Immortals. Meanwhile, we will have to make sure we get Barracks down soon and get cranking fast... we won't have the same upgrade capability that CDG has.

	05-05-2003 21:32									#5
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Can we get some of our number-crunchers to give us "Worst Case" estimates on the speed with which warriors could be upgraded? I'm thinking we have all of CDG's map in our hands now- we should be able to tell EXACTLY what their top-end production speed including upgrades is.... they can probably produce warriors faster than they can upgrade them. This is Dominae's sort of thing- any idea when he'll be back?

	05-05-2003 21:50									#6
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If CDG mined some of the hills to the southeast of their capital, they could possibly get their two "poor" cities up to 5 shields at size 3 (though some of these might be lost to corruption). Their capital can reach 10 shields per turn at size 5 (with the iron mined). As I mentioned earlier, their cities will probably reach that capability in ~10 turns if they have other Workers assigned to the task.

That gives them 10 SPT in Elucidia and 4/5 SPT in their other two cities. With Elucidia and one other city (5 SPT) assigned to build Immortals, that's an Immortal every 3 turns from Elucidia, and an Immortal from the other city every 6. If the other city produces 4 SPT, that's a Warrior every 3 turns, which could be upgraded just as easily as it was built (they currently have ~12 GPT, which could get up to 18 or 20 in ten turns).

So... with that rate we get just less than an Immortal per turn. If their production is better than I'm giving them credit for (unlikely... if they can get more than 4/5 SPT out of their little cities I'd be quite impressed), then they could just barely get to an Immortal per turn.

Of course, if CDG suddenly stumbles across a large sum of gold, that all changes, but those upgrades are quite expensive for the ancient age.

	05-05-2003 21:56									#7
	Enter the AD-FREE zone

Judging by the number of improvements they've made to their land I don't think they HAVE any other workers, Trip. Do the math on their Industrial worker, vs improvements made, vs the number of turns that have gone by- I'll admit I did the math REAL quick and dirty in my head, but I don't think they've got any other workers on the move. If they do, at MOST one more. Since we know where that worker is, we can downgrade their production a bit.

Add in the fact that they've got a lot of warriors wandering around the countryside, and that we've never seen a dip in the size of the smaller towns (and I don't know about the big one) .... I'm betting that worker there is all they've got.

So that's something... further question: if that warrior/worker pair DOES move north this turn- as in, with the intent of building across that river... I think that would effectively prove their hostile intents.

Which makes me just fine with an attempt at snagging CDG's only worker.

	05-05-2003 21:58									#8
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quote: Originally posted by Fried-Psitalon Which makes me just fine with an attempt at snagging CDG's only worker.

That's a good idea - force them to build replacement rather than mil. unit, and reduces their production a bit.

	05-05-2003 22:03									#9
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You wanted worst-case scenario, I gave you worst-case scenario.

However, I'm also of the opinion that's being generous. Getting their small cities up to 4/5 SPT will be quite a challenge... it's more realistic that they'll only be able to get ~3 out of them, which is 4 turn Warriors or 10 turn Immortals.

We don't know anything about the fluctuations of the size of their capital. Their city has been off the top 5 cities list for quite a while, so we haven't been able to track it lately. It's possible that they only have one Worker. A shame for them too... a few more Workers could make a huge difference for them now... much moreso than that extra city they're planning on building.

You're right, they do have quite a few Warriors. They probably just finished the Barracks not too long ago (after finding the iron), and had been pumping out a few 2-turn Warriors before that.

	05-05-2003 22:11									#10
	Inflate your Upload Space

:icks up a stone axe and bashes it on the ground, and then points at the square north of the worker/warrior's current location with a questioning stare::

Dey comes norf, we BASHES? GUD start war wif SLAVE! Wez need poll! BASH wif POLL! Err...nub, wait, we vote wif poll.


DEN WE BASH WIF AXE!

	05-05-2003 22:12									#11
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*Trip puts the muzzle back on F-P.

And if they do have another Worker or we lose the battle?

	05-05-2003 22:41									#12
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quote: Originally posted by Trip Their city has been off the top 5 cities list for quite a while, so we haven't been able to track it lately.

Yep. That's because they built it on the second turn; therefore, its culture is lower than that of the capitals built on the first turn. Yet another advantage to not building on the first turn...

	05-05-2003 22:45									#13
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Something to watch for: If CDG cuts the road to their iron...

	05-05-2003 22:49									#14
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quote: Originally posted by Theseus Something to watch for: If CDG cuts the road to their iron...

Even so, they won't have enough commerce to upgrade those Warriors. They can probably get up to ~15 GPT. That's one Immortal every 3 turns.

	05-05-2003 22:54									#15
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quote: Originally posted by Trip *Trip puts the muzzle back on F-P. And if they do have another Worker or we lose the battle?

At SOME point one has to take some risk. :P We can be relatively certain that they only have one worker.... the odds on that battle wouldn't be that bad, and potentially worth the reward. If we lose that warrior, we don't really lose much of our screening ability since we ought to build a city down that way soon anyhow....

::cough plug Goldville city cough::

	05-05-2003 23:02									#16
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Risk is good. Risk without profit is not.

Right now, what would we gain from attacking them? We would speed along their mobilization. They might change Elucidia from a Settler to an Immortal. They're not so far away from 10 SPT. It also slows their road towards us. Right now we don't have much of a military. We need the time to build up. They have iron connected, and our Warrior has no chance of getting it. We have a killed Worker to gain, but a war to lose.

	05-05-2003 23:07									#17
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If we can prevent them from building a 4th city in that manner, I'm all for it. 1 well developed city and two crap cities (which is what they'd have with no worker left to improve tiles) would be no threat to us. They'd have to stop to rebuild that worker at the very least, and that would slow them down even further. They don't have a significant military to throw at us yet, and if we can provoke them into launching their attack too early, so much the better. That's part of the reason I'd like to see their attack provoked- they CAN threaten us more seriously over time, but right now all they have is 1 immortal and a bad attitude. We take that worker, and they have 1 immortal, a bad attitude, and worse cities that they can't improve without derailing their military production.

BASH! BASH WIF AXE! It's not as though we couldn't find a use for that worker.... name him "Kentonio" and send him north to proper use.

	05-05-2003 23:13									#18
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Another element to consider: The sooner hostilities break out, the shorter their road in our direction is. (Even if we don't get the worker, we'll converge on that road with our warrior screen and pillage it.)

Edit: Neat - I just made King with this post.

	05-05-2003 23:35									#19
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Possible...

We will need to see where their Worker goes to be sure of their intentions. If he continues north then we can be sure of where they're going and plan accordingly...

	05-05-2003 23:41									#20
	Inflate your Upload Space

On another front:

Should we fire off a diplomatic message saying we are "Gravely concerned" with what we see/what our embassy sees and any northward movement of that worker/warrior pair would be taken as an even more grave situation?

Only problem there is that it completely casts off any possibility of surprise and capture of that worker, if they're really looking for trouble as we suspect they are- they'd move warrior 2 in with the worker/warrior and a spear onto the iron.

It might force them to declare very clearly and NOW whether they plan on going north or south with their force.

	05-05-2003 23:54									#21
	Enter the AD-FREE zone

F-P: It could work. It would give them the message that we'd be waiting for them if they attack. We can use city investigations to track their progress to make sure they're not up to no good.

On the subject of attacking the CDG Worker...

Now that I think about, I realize we have the most to gain from waiting a while before letting the war begin. Right now we have 2 NMs, with (hopefully) 3 Barracks on the way. It will take time for those Barracks to pay off, and if we were to attack now, we would have to skip the Barracks and go straight to military units. Right now, CDG has iron connected, Barrracks, and 100% tax. They will have the better short-term war capability, while we will benefit most from waiting a moderate-to-long amount of time before starting the war.

	06-05-2003 00:00									#22
	Support Apolyton or Terrorists Win

Someone shake loose Togas or Bigfree? That's not a message we need to delay.... Also, is there any possibility we could shift our warriors such that CDG would be able to see more than one? As long as we make it clear in the diplomatic channels that we are strictly watching and not preparing an assault, we could probably be safe with that. They're moving north- we have a right to watch.

	06-05-2003 00:59									#23
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quote: Originally posted by Trip On the subject of attacking the CDG Worker... Now that I think about, I realize we have the most to gain from waiting a while before letting the war begin. Right now we have 2 NMs, with (hopefully) 3 Barracks on the way. It will take time for those Barracks to pay off, and if we were to attack now, we would have to skip the Barracks and go straight to military units. Right now, CDG has iron connected, Barrracks, and 100% tax. They will have the better short-term war capability, while we will benefit most from waiting a moderate-to-long amount of time before starting the war.

Ponder this:

1. CDG moves their worker/warrior combo to another tile, to do some roading.

2a. The warrior on the Iron stays put, leaving the road "not in CDG's" border unguarded. We move our Warrior in and pillage it. It is not within their Cultural border's so we can pillage it without technically starting a war.

2b. The warrior on the Iron moves to the road vacated by the worker/warrior combo. We declare war by moving our Warrior on top of the Iron and if he's still alive next turn, we pillage it.

2a will most definately cause some hostilities, but nothin that technically says we started a war according to our NAP or the games own rules.

2b has the effect of either causing them to lose Iron for a bit unitl they can kill the Warrior (with their Immortal) and get it re-roaded and/or causs them to reach their GA very early when their Capitol has just produced a settler and it's production capacity is down. Their other two cities are sorry sites and can't be used for much, GA or no!

	06-05-2003 01:02									#24
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Big problem: The turn we move our warrior on top of their iron is the turn their Immortal in the capital city eats it. :P

	06-05-2003 02:36									#25
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If hostilities break out, or we become convinced they will, then our first priority (after securing our cities anyways) should be to park as many NM's on their iron(s) as fast as we can to cut off the immortal production. After that we should just have to work our way through whatever immortals they already have before the tied should start turning heavily in our favor.

	06-05-2003 03:37									#26
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quote: Originally posted by Fried-Psitalon Big problem: The turn we move our warrior on top of their iron is the turn their Immortal in the capital city eats it. :P

But if they have a very unproductive GA, we win that battle, no?

At the very least we prevent any other GA induced Immortal onslaught.

	06-05-2003 04:28									#27
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I'm not one to jump very easily onto the paranoia bandwagon, because it limits one's options and analysis of a situation. However, as I continue to analyze the information we have about CDG, I am becoming more and more concerned about their atypical decisions, settlements, and expansion priorities.

Assuming I'm CDG, and I'd like to go make a quick and easy Immortal rush kill ... I target GCA. I then begin to set up the strike:

I build south, establishing cities on the hills south of my capital and down next to the furs & 2nd source of iron. I use the furs as an excuse to settle this area.

I mine my bonus tiles instead of building a road north towards poly. I add workers to build roads to the south, but not connect the road fully until the upgrade time.

I make some sort of jungle pact/neutrality line with Apolyton and set up watchers to keep them from sneak attacking me.

I do the rest of what they've done -- set up camps to build vet warriors and in the end, connect the roads to those cities and upgrade the whole batch, then cross the border in the far south, go straight for GCA's capital, and send my 2nd squad to clean up the northern GCA cities.

What I DON'T do is cede the entire south to GCA, giving up some decent settlement spots for crap jungle spots.

I don't allow GCA to build cities right next to my capital (GCA wants to build where BigFree currently is).

I don't waste my time building a jungle road towards Apolyton that they could also use to travel back to my capital.

I don't waste time fighting Poly over the plentiful jungle when I SHOULD be fighting GCA over the scarse southern spots.


Add to the equation that GCA feels that CDG is friendly and a good trading partner, but CDG doesn't respond to our correspondences. GCA seemed ambivolent when we told them that CDG was building up. They had a "so what?" attitude that means they (naively) trust CDG not to attack THEM with immortals ... and maybe with reason when we study what decisions CDG is making with their settlements, workers, and diplomacy.

I hate to say this, but I am beginning to believe that we should be proactive with CDG. Not merely waiting for the stacks of doom, but doing something early to reduce their potency.

--Togas

	06-05-2003 06:41									#28
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quote: I hate to say this, but I am beginning to believe that we should be proactive with CDG.

I wholeheartly agree, we know they are planning a war. It doesn't really matter who its against, it's not good for us. We shouldn't wait for that to happen, we should go into full fledge war buildup mode ourselves and plan to eliminate the threat. Especially after reading the chat log with GCA, I think we can work with them in the long term and probally recover from an early war and GA. I also think it probable that GCA and CFC will stay out of a Poly/CDG war, CFC due to distance, GCA due to CFC. So the only real question is can we win that poly/cdg war and how.

	06-05-2003 06:44									#29
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Where that CDG Worker moves this turn will be very important. If he continues north... then we know we are a target. There's no reason to build a road through a jungle for any other reason.

I'm all for being pro-active while dealing with CDG. However, the problem lies in the fact that it will probably be a very long while before we're able to do that. We need Barracks to ensure our military is as strong as we can make it, and our production cities are all size 1. It's gonna be a long road...

	06-05-2003 09:55									#30
	Put an end to popups!

maybe GCA is trusting CDG for a reason...