20-07-2003 02:08									#1
	Operation Mercy: The Destruction of CDG - Military Planning Support Apolyton, pre-order Civilization IV

Okay, since it seems for better or worse we're going to end up getting involved in this war, we need to start preparing for it.

I have to leave soon, so I won't be able to type up much now, but there's a few things I will point out first.

Obviously, in order to attack we will need to upgrade Swordsmen. We have enough gold to do 4 of them right now. That means next turn we will have 6 Swordsmen up and ready to go with more on the way. We will not consider NMs since they would trigger our GA and we want to save that for GCA.

Now that we have a force ready (6 Swords next turn, 8? Swords a turn or two later) we have to decide what to do with them. We have to main options:

First, we can keep all of them in one stack and move from one CDG city to the next, probably starting at Cuido and ending at the chokepoint. The minimum number of turns to do this would be 11.

Second is to split our stack into smaller stacks and have them work independently. If we split into two stacks then we can finish with the chokepoint in 8 turns. Clearly, splitting the stack is more risky, since one stack is bound to have only 3 units, and a particularly lucky defending Spearman could take all three out.

An alternate version of the stack splitting would be to have Galleys ferry units over to the chokepoint and attack when we're ready. This would take only 2 turns to complete the entire campaign, but this requires Galleys which we do not have available.

I'm in favor of keeping all stacks at at least 4 Swords each. A single bit of luck for one CDG Spearman for one turn means that a great portion of our forces are destroyed and we won't be able to finish them off as fast as we want to. If one stack fails, then it will take a long time to rebuild unless we go into full military mobilization.

GCA has announced that they will not try to capture any CDG territory north of Elucidium, and we can do with the rest what we please. In the chat Lucky mentioned that GCA would prefer if we wait until they were finished CDG before we attacked - just two things to keep in mind.

Last edited by Trip on 20-07-2003 at 02:15

	20-07-2003 03:15									#2
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Lucky does not dictate our policies. If we're going to do this, let's not take him on good faith that they won't go north of Elucidium. Let's grab the northern cities immediately, and then time our GA, Republic, and the return of our victorious armies to hammer GCA's new cities.

I think we should push now, although I prefer one group rather than two- we can always send a major group via Ciudad and then send it through to Chokepoint, while we detail a few newly produced swordsmen to go and finish off the northernmost town (don't remember the name right now.)

Let's punch through, take the chokepoint, and grab the isolated city later- they wont' be able to reinforce it after we cut it off. Low value town; let's grab the bigger ones first.

	20-07-2003 22:52									#3
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Turn 92 we will have 8 Swordsmen in the Apolyton region. I am leaning towards putting them in one stack and pounding our way through CDG, slowly yet surely. As long as we suffer no major setbacks, it will not delay the AltSp by more than 10 turns, and we will not have to expend extra resources to take down CDG.

	21-07-2003 00:03									#4
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If they lose Euclid, then they only have 3 cities, chances are the chokepoint at least is very lightly defended.... I suspect all three are though.

	21-07-2003 00:36									#5
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I did a quick analysis on the map for a potential invasion route, one thing I wanted to see is how much using a galley to get to the choke point could effect the total length of the war.

The red route is a proposed land route which hits the border cities, then moves on the choke point via land. The yellow route is a hypothetical galley invasion. Unless I missed up it will take us 10 turns best case to finish the war by land alone. Adding a galley can cut that in half to 5 turns (assuming the invasion set out at the same time).

Last edited by wervdon on 21-07-2003 at 00:52

	21-07-2003 00:55									#6
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I think you can't attach pictures here- you have to upload it first, and then put link (with the *img* command)...

I also support keeping our stack together- you have to keep attacking until there are no wounded units left- remember that they can heal up by the time of our next attack, so we have to be able to deliver a deadly blow in one turn to each city we approach.

	21-07-2003 00:59									#7
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Yeah I figured it out Zeit

Also I made a bit of a mistake on the turn counts on the red route, If we split our forces up then there is no need to pause on turn 1 before moving onto the hill I have labelled as turn 3. I think I support splitting our forces there since its close enough to still support each other if needed.

PS: The red line covers it up but I didn't number the hill west of possum because it's roaded and won't take up a turn to move past once we take the city.


*bonk self* Trip pointed out that I have the galley route going over sea tiles :P (sheepish grin) I think staying close to the coast will add 1 full turn to the sea route, but someone might want to confirm that if we seriously consider adding a galley.


In any case, I think its pretty clear that a galley is not worth it pre-invasion.

It buys us about 4 turns if the galley is ready to go at the same time as the rest of the invasion. The cost is building a galley + the risk of splitting our forces.


Post war though it maybe worth considering having one around to make it easier to shuttle units to and from the choke point faster, also we'll have the added benefit of having access to the in-land sea via the choke point.

I also think we'll want to get the path from Karina to cuido roaded asap once the area is secure to make the defense of our new cities easier to accomplish without moving mercs directly to the front line.

Last edited by wervdon on 21-07-2003 at 01:28

	21-07-2003 01:27									#8
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Here's my take:


Turn *0
-Delare war on CDG
-Move all Swords and Elite Warrior(8??) to Red #1
eleite Warrior will be used to attack damaged CDG units of two HP's or less in order to try for GL

Turn *1
-attack Red #2 until it is ours
-garrison Red #2 with the Sword that took it and one extra from stack at Red #1
-move remaining Swords at Red #1 to Red #3 if there are 3 or more Swords available to move that way.

Turn *2
-attack Red #4
-garrison Red #4 with remaining Swords. If there are 3 or there, send one or more back to Red #2 to Garison.

Turn *3
-Rest and Recovery
-Should be two more Swords available from Apolyton area; move them to Karina
-move at least 2 workers to Red #1 to road.

Turn *4
-Rest and Recovery
-upgrade Warriors as allowed by treasury.

Now we have to check what is happening. We may want to gather forces and head towards Elucidium. Or the Chockepoint city. We will have to evaluate the situation at that time.

	21-07-2003 01:31									#9
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quote: Now we have to check what is happening. We may want to gather forces and head towards Elucidium. Or the Chockepoint city. We will have to evaluate the situation at that time.

I didn't realize we were still considering grabbing Elucidium before GCA does, if so then obviously its a much better high value target than the chokepoint, but also a harder nut to crack. We'll also have to worry about counter-attack from angry GCA forces already in the area.

I like BF's plan though, quickly gobble the border cities, reinforce & road, take a turn to heal any damaged units, and then plot our next move.

I don't think anyone else is going to beat us to the chokepoint anyways, its a long way for GCA or CFC and they are worried about each other right now.

	21-07-2003 06:20									#10
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I just uploaded an updated map.

The yellow potential galley route was corrected to not end turns in sea tiles. There are two alternate (maybe more potentially) ways to get a minimum of 6 turns to the choke point via galley travel.

The red route was adjusted to take into account the lack of a need to pause between taking cuido and moving onto the hill next to possum. This reduced it to 9 turns minimum.

I added a blue hypothetical route which is the best route I see to march from cuido to Elucidium, and a purple route which shows the corresponding fastest way (again that I see) from Elucidium to cuido (ie. the route of a likely counter attack). I assume they get the benefit of the roads in the purple route, but that we don't in the blue. The river really helps us here since without it they could reinforce cuido from Elucidium in just 2 turns, whereas with it takes them a minimum of three turns.

If anyone notices any mistakes or better routes, then please point them out.

Also we might want to start looking at optimal city placement in the gaps between possum/elucidium and the chokepoint since its soon to be ours.

	21-07-2003 10:49									#11
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Heh, we could always leave CDG with just the chokepoint city....

E_T

	21-07-2003 14:22									#12
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Keep them around till they puke out that free Tech at the next age! Boy, wouldn't they love that. If I were them, I'd resign instead of just being someones whipping boy.

	21-07-2003 15:01									#13
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This is Operation Mercy.

Have a heart.

Wervdon: I don't think we'll have any Galleys available for landings yet. We're gonna have to slug it through the mountains.

	21-07-2003 15:34									#14
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So far it looks good. Your analysis certainly convinces me against a Galley, wervdon.

I would say stuff the chokepoint for the time being. Let us get Cuido with the first available troops, then reinforce and head for Elucidium assuming it is still in CDG hands. The new troops from Poly (plus one or two of the first available) should take Possum, and once we know what to expect from Elucidium, then we can plan for the long trip to the nearly worthless chokepoint.