Re: PTBS BTS: The Terrible Twos - Signups

**Munro** · 03-13-2009, 12:59 PM

Yes, thanks for the opposition hsoft! It's been really interesting.

Originally Posted by hsoft

(You were 2 turns away from getting a surprise attack on Bursa when it only had a single little warrior defending it. I knew I couldn't have kept it, but I would have razed it, you would have lost lots of income (religious capital). That's what my spies were for, making sure you couldn't reinforce until I could carry out the attack).

It wouldn't have been a complete surprise.

I thought I had all the options covered though. I'm curious what the plan was?

**hsoft** · 03-13-2009, 03:56 PM

Originally Posted by Munro

I'm curious what the plan was?

At some point, after I my cultural border grew to the point of being 2 tiles away from Bursa, I realized that you only had 1 warrior defending it. The tile separating my border from the city being a hill, I couldn't do a 1 turn blitz. It had to a be 2 turns surprise attack. So what I wanted to make sure was that you had no way of reinforcing Bursa in one turn, so that's why I sent spies. However, my first spy was caught, so it delayed my plans. When I finally had my spies in place, I was just about to launch the attack when you had the good idea to put another unit (a maceman I think) in there, so it kind of screwed my plan because what I had planned was to send just one axeman on the hill to supposedly escort a worker, when it fact it would have attacked the turn after.

I had started to plan an attack of a larger scale, but by the time I had the majority of my units back from a barb city raid, you were already starting to have a much tighter defense, and then your UU came along and everything went downwards from there

I guess that I should have just skipped the spy part and launch an attack as soon as I saw the lone warrior, but I wasn't sure at all that you didn't have units nearby then, so I felt it was risky to just rush in.

**emperor** · 03-13-2009, 08:06 PM

Originally Posted by hsoft

At some point, after I my cultural border grew to the point of being 2 tiles away from Bursa, I realized that you only had 1 warrior defending it. The tile separating my border from the city being a hill, I couldn't do a 1 turn blitz. It had to a be 2 turns surprise attack. So what I wanted to make sure was that you had no way of reinforcing Bursa in one turn, so that's why I sent spies. However, my first spy was caught, so it delayed my plans. When I finally had my spies in place, I was just about to launch the attack when you had the good idea to put another unit (a maceman I think) in there, so it kind of screwed my plan because what I had planned was to send just one axeman on the hill to supposedly escort a worker, when it fact it would have attacked the turn after.

I had started to plan an attack of a larger scale, but by the time I had the majority of my units back from a barb city raid, you were already starting to have a much tighter defense, and then your UU came along and everything went downwards from there

I guess that I should have just skipped the spy part and launch an attack as soon as I saw the lone warrior, but I wasn't sure at all that you didn't have units nearby then, so I felt it was risky to just rush in.

Looking purely from a game mechanics point of view, that wouldn't have worked anyway. Civ4 is different to Civ3 - if you declare war, your troops are booted back into your borders.

However, from what you wrote, I think there may have been a better option. Assuming you had some way of producing 5 XP troops (you just needed an extra 2 XP from somewhere - Vassalage, Theocracy, a settled GG), you could have just put an Axe 2 tiles away from the city, then suddenly upgraded him to Guerilla 2 and declared war. That we he could move the 2 tiles across the hill in one turn, getting to the city.

Anyway, that was my thought upon reading your post.

**Munro** · 03-13-2009, 10:50 PM

Axemen can't get guerilla promotions...

**emperor** · 03-14-2009, 12:16 AM

Originally Posted by Munro

Axemen can't get guerilla promotions...

True, forgot that. An upgraded Warrior or a couple of Archers then. Same idea.

**hsoft** · 03-14-2009, 03:15 AM

Originally Posted by emperor

Looking purely from a game mechanics point of view, that wouldn't have worked anyway. Civ4 is different to Civ3 - if you declare war, your troops are booted back into your borders.

I know. I'm not sure I exposed the whole thing clearly. When I say there was 2 tiles, I mean 1 tile mine, 1 tile theirs, and then the city. So I make sure there can be no reinforcement in one turn, I declare war, go on the hill, end the turn, Munro can't reinforce in that turn, then I attack and raze the city.

**emperor** · 03-14-2009, 04:59 AM

But he might be able to whip a defender, or send fast units (like Horsemen). Unless you were intending on moving twice in succession - aka "double moving", which is usually at least frowned upon and sometimes punished by a reload (depending on the game rules).

**hsoft** · 03-14-2009, 06:07 AM

Originally Posted by emperor

But he might be able to whip a defender, or send fast units (like Horsemen). Unless you were intending on moving twice in succession - aka "double moving", which is usually at least frowned upon and sometimes punished by a reload (depending on the game rules).

I had this covered as well. They didn't have engineering yet (You can see that in the "Can research" column in the diplo screen)and there wasn't any horses 4 tiles around. Ok, my spies weren't entirely covering everything, but I had a look around, and nearby cities didn't have lots of units either. It was possible that just after my spy went by, a chariot would have appeared, but I figured this was unlikely.

As for hurrying, I had this covered as well: Munro was on Caste system and didn't have the Spiritual trait (couldn't have switched to Slavery without a turn of anarchy first).

Of course, there was also the possibility that Bursa was currently building a unit and that I would be unlucky enough to launch my attack just on the turn that it would have completed, but well, there's no risk-less plan, is there?

**Ebenezer** · 03-14-2009, 10:52 AM

The opportunity probably did exist for a short time. With a g2 unit anyway. but I don't think you had feudalism yet, which would have meant an archer. vs 40% culture warrior (and 25% fortify and 25% city defense). I know I was concerned about you roading that hilltop, and had decided if you started to, I'd need to shift some of my units north or preemptively declare.

When all those CR2 swords came back from barbville, we were definitely on the alert already. And I had a spy following them.

Weak point you may not have considered. We were running a significant cash reserve to cover possible random events (over 500g at times). Given 1t of warning, that warrior would have gotten upgraded to an axe or mace.

Edit: There is also an obvious team abuse. Munro could gift the city to me, so I could whip defenders (spiritual). Would cost us all our cultural buildings (I think?) But better than getting a holy city burned.

**hsoft** · 03-14-2009, 11:46 AM

Originally Posted by Ebenezer

The opportunity probably did exist for a short time. With a g2 unit anyway. but I don't think you had feudalism yet, which would have meant an archer. vs 40% culture warrior (and 25% fortify and 25% city defense). I know I was concerned about you roading that hilltop, and had decided if you started to, I'd need to shift some of my units north or preemptively declare.

When all those CR2 swords came back from barbville, we were definitely on the alert already. And I had a spy following them.

Weak point you may not have considered. We were running a significant cash reserve to cover possible random events (over 500g at times). Given 1t of warning, that warrior would have gotten upgraded to an axe or mace.

Edit: There is also an obvious team abuse. Munro could gift the city to me, so I could whip defenders (spiritual). Would cost us all our cultural buildings (I think?) But better than getting a holy city burned.

True, I didn't think of all that, although I was looking at your cash reserve (through the diplo screen) and it didn't look like you had that much cash.

Although next game, I'll be much more careful about spies (keeping spies in my own cities to uncover enemy spies). You knew way too much

**emperor** · 03-14-2009, 07:39 PM

Originally Posted by Ebenezer

Edit: There is also an obvious team abuse. Munro could gift the city to me, so I could whip defenders (spiritual). Would cost us all our cultural buildings (I think?) But better than getting a holy city burned.

Cultural buildings aren't destroyed when cities are gifted, only when they are conquered.

Cultural borders would have retracted had the city been gifted though, which may have caused additional problems.

**Bernout** · 03-15-2009, 12:09 AM

Originally Posted by emperor

Cultural buildings aren't destroyed when cities are gifted, only when they are conquered.

Cultural borders would have retracted had the city been gifted though, which may have caused additional problems.

Are you sure about that? I could have swore cultural buildings were destroyed when you gift a city.

Bernout

**emperor** · 03-15-2009, 05:13 AM

Nope; I'm certain it was the case for earlier versions of the game, and I've just checked it in WorldBuilder on the current version. ALL buildings are retained if you GIFT a city to someone.

**Ebenezer** · 03-15-2009, 02:51 PM

And they don't lose their cultural production value (like captured wonders)?

Handy.

**emperor** · 03-15-2009, 03:33 PM

No, I'm fairly positive they don't. I'll test that later today.

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