War Academy: Strategies for Case Pink

Harovan · June 25, 2002, 06:30

Here's the first discussion for our War Academy. The subject is our approach in Case Pink, the upcoming war with France. There are the following questions:

1) What are our objectives?
2) Should we send our soldiers scouting before they attack?
3) In what order shall we attack the French cities?
4) At what point shall we declare war?
5) What should our cities build after the strike force leaves?

Discuss!

Edited to add the link.

Harovan · June 25, 2002, 06:31

My proposed approach is:

1) We should capture the French capital. It's usually the only city to capture, because the others have no culture to expand and the AI will poprush units, so they most likely will be size 1 and autorazed. We should take the capital, raze 1 more city and try to make peace for 2-3 techs and 1 more city. This will leave the French with about 2 cities. Vassalized, that's enough, case closed.

2) Yes, the archers should scout, but carefully. We do not want to delay the attack, because 2-3 archers have gone too far. The 2 spearmen shall stay home till the army is complete, as 2nd garrison, to ensure a size-3 production.

3) We should attack Paris first. If forces remain, leave 1 spearman and 1 archer in Paris, and turn the rest to the new city the French are about to build now (we've seen the settler). Raze this city. Make peace immediately.

4) We declare war, before we cross their borders. No need to take diplomatic penalties at this point. The French borders will expand again at 1500BC. This makes, that we'll have at least 2 turns to go inside their borders. We shall not attack from different directions, but keep one stack, and make sure our spears can protect the archers in counterattacks during this time. While it may be tempting to take sidesteps to capture workers, don't. They will flee in the city and we'll take them with the city, in due time.

5) Be careful, as the cities will revolt, because we take away 1 police unit (the spearman). Make 1 entertainer or other specialist, depending on size. Prebuild 10 shields and then poprush a temple. This should lower the production to size 2. Build a settler then. Be aware to switch it to archer, if enemy warriors are spotted.

civman2000 · June 25, 2002, 07:40

DOes just declaring war not hurt your reputation? I know that going into the diplomacy screen, removing the peace treaty, and saying never mind doesnt, but does a normal declaration of war not either?

Kuciwalker · June 25, 2002, 08:06

No, I'm pretty sure it doesn't do anything. Ask uber. He would know

.

Guardian · June 25, 2002, 08:13

To the best of my knowledge, declaring war does not hurt your reputation as long as you do not violate any treaties.

In other words, if you have any kind of lasting agreement with your intended victim, such as a Military Alliance, Mutual Protection Pact, Right of Passage, or just a simple trade agreement, then you will hurt your reputation by declaring war unless you wait for the agreement to expire first. Otherwise no.

However, this does not necessarily mean that nobody's going to get mad...

(If civs A and B both have a strong friendship and trade with civ C and you attack civ C, then this could also harm your relations to A and B...)

civman2000 · June 25, 2002, 08:19

1) What are our objectives?
2) Should we send our soldiers scouting before they attack?
3) In what order shall we attack the French cities?
4) At what point shall we declare war?
5) What should our cities build after the strike force leaves?

1. Paris, and if there's a city near the mountains with iron or any city with horses those too.
2. A couple. Barbarians could be trouble for our warriors in the jungle or out of it at this level (they're stronger at higher levels right?), so it would be nice to have 1 or 2 warriors out there.
3. Not sure. If we take the capital, raze another (like you proposed) will they then give us a city right next to us in the treaty? I'm not sure, but I bet that by then there will be a city in the jungle pretty near us. If we do't think we can get it in the treaty, attack it first, otherwise Ralph's plan modified to put resource cities also as top priorities is the way to go.
4. As soon as we get our troops one square outside their borders and about to attack.
5. ROtate temples between the 4 cities (iirc). First do the ones that'll be in most happiness trouble, then the next two, with the others building military during htis.

civman2000 · June 25, 2002, 08:20

I'm pretty sure that attacking without declaring war also hurts it.

Guardian · June 25, 2002, 08:25

Quote:

Originally posted by civman2000
I'm pretty sure that attacking without declaring war also hurts it.

Ah, yes. Could very well be.

The allies were outraged when the Germans did that...

Vlad Antlerkov · June 25, 2002, 08:39

Quote:

Originally posted by Sir Ralph
1) What are our objectives?
2) Should we send our soldiers scouting before they attack?
3) In what order shall we attack the French cities?
4) At what point shall we declare war?
5) What should our cities build after the strike force leaves?

1) Deliver a knockout blow to the Frenchies by taking Paris as soon as we can.

2) Send the early archers out scouting, but not too far. We don't want to delay our invasion too much.

3) Paris, then any mountain cities. Wouldn't hurt to leave a few cities alive-- leave the French bastardized/vassalized (whichever term you prefer). If all goes well, we'll be in a position to dictate the terms of the peace.

4) Once we have our army ready and on their borders.

5) Temples and other cultural improvements. (Or maybe we could rotate temple production while building soldiers, as Civman proposed.)

UnOrthOdOx · June 25, 2002, 09:23

Just a question as you guys seem better at the math than I.

The way I see it, there is a good chance that France could have swordsman by the time we attack. Will we still be able to take two cities? And should we pillage roads to help prevent their advance?

Harovan · June 25, 2002, 09:39

There is a chance to face swordsmen. But it is not very high. The AI emphasizes settler production between 2000BC and 1000BC and doesn't pay much attention to offensive units, especially the "peaceful" French. Also, they shall have iron and have it connected, another thing they don't emphasize their early effort to. So unless the iron is right "below" a city or very close, the chance of facing swords is low.

UnOrthOdOx · June 25, 2002, 09:41

I see, you understand the AI much more than I...

I did join mostly to learn.

Harovan · June 25, 2002, 09:49

Quote:

Originally posted by UnOrthOdOx
I did join mostly to learn.

To learn from each other is one of the goals of our Academy. Thanks for raising interesting questions. Keep it up!

UnOrthOdOx · June 25, 2002, 10:23

ok, another question. I have not played a huge map before, but I have played emperor (but usually monarch), how likely is it that there is another civ to the NE? This could become troublesome if it is a more...aggressive civ.

Kuciwalker · June 25, 2002, 10:27

Declare war first and your reputation isn't hurt. It's only surprise attacks that hurt. Note that declaring war might still make other people mad at you, but your reputation will be fine.

Harovan · June 25, 2002, 10:27

We don't know the map shape yet, it's random. If we are at continents or a pangea, I expect the Germans to be not far from the French. If it's Archipelago, we might as well be alone with the French.

Captain · June 25, 2002, 11:06

Sir Ralph's proposal:

1) agreed, but no need to raze (see 3)
2) agreed
3) agreed but don't raze the city. chance of flip is almost zero and the placement is fine. cost to "resettle" is a waste. We could send our settler elsewhere. may be a moot point as it could be auto-razed.
4) agreed
5) agreed

Question: apart from being unnecessary at this stage, doesn't razing also make the enemy more furious? and thus less willing to discuss peace?

Question: Would using workers for bait be considered an exploit? Do we deserve to use all exploits since we are on emperor level and have a poor start? Is there an opportunity to use bait this early on?

Ninot · June 25, 2002, 11:12

Quote:

Originally posted by civman2000
DOes just declaring war not hurt your reputation? I know that going into the diplomacy screen, removing the peace treaty, and saying never mind doesnt, but does a normal declaration of war not either?

afaik, declaring war will only hurt reputation with the civ it is being declared on. And if there are no gpt agreements or formal diplomatic agreements, reputation will stay intact with other neighbors.

But, again, afaik, if we declare war WITH something like an ROP , MPP or GPT agreement still ongoing, it will hurt our reputation, and in the case of a GPT, it will be costlier to set up a trade of the same likeness in the future, cuz the AI will think we might declare war to get out of this kind of deal.

Harovan · June 25, 2002, 11:15

Captain: If we can capture the city, I will be happy. However, I doubt that we can. The city will be size 1, because if it reaches size 2, the AI will immediately poprush an archer if in trouble. And it won't have any cultural improvements that could save it from being razed. Hence, autoraze will apply.

1st question: Every war will make the AI furious. I don't think that razing makes it worse.

2nd question: Skywalker has beaten you with an own thread on this matter, I'd suggest to discuss there.

Sheik · June 25, 2002, 11:16

Captain I think you are right razing a city is bad. The AI might ignore us after we raze a city but I don't think it matters because they will have to talk to us some time.

Harovan · June 25, 2002, 11:22

The AI will 100% talk after about 5-10 turns of war are gone. I've done this many times. Once they approached a city I had taken from them with 2 elite and 1 vet warriors. It was defended by an injured to 1 hp archer. No chance for me to hold it. In this situation the AI made peace, gave me one more city, 3 techs, a worker and all its gold. Dumb. It's a cruel world, isn't it

.

GodKing · June 25, 2002, 11:39

this early, shouldn't need to worry about having to raze anything. Keep everything we can. Dont pillage unless we have to because we will just have to rebuild it later when we own the land.

Harovan · June 25, 2002, 11:45

The city will be autorazed, I fear.

GodKing · June 25, 2002, 12:43

True. We can hope though that they have a 2 pop and only one warrior guarding.

Kingof the Apes · June 25, 2002, 12:50

how many cities do you think they will have by then? If they still have 5-6 cities we should declare war again after our peace treaty expires.

GodKing · June 25, 2002, 12:50

An idea, early stages. If we attack one of the settler stacks before we are in positon. We get 2 slaves. Then we wait on a mountain top. When they send their offensive forces against us - we jump on them.

Problem - this gives the cities time to build defences.
Bonus - 2 slaves early, starting a road to our homeland
- can perhaps take out their offensive units early so no counterattack.

A gamble to consider at least. Probably not 100% worth it unless we have multiple stacks of archers to work with.

Inverse Icarus · June 25, 2002, 12:51

Quote:

Originally posted by civman2000
1. Paris, and if there's a city near the mountains with iron or any city with horses those too.

gee, it'd be nice if we could see horses wouldnt it...

Kuciwalker · June 25, 2002, 12:59

Still campaigning for The Wheel, uber?

Duddha · June 25, 2002, 13:01

1) What are our objectives?
-Destroy France. Who wants an unfinished enemy roaming around the continent?

2) Should we send our soldiers scouting before they attack?
-No. We know where Paris is and the center of their empire.

3) In what order shall we attack the French cities?
-We should aim for Paris by building the War Road. If our army encounters a French city on the path before Paris we should take it.

4) At what point shall we declare war?
-When we have a large enough army at their doorstep. Surprise is key.

5) What should our cities build after the strike force leaves?
-Temples to convert and subdue the natives.

Inverse Icarus · June 25, 2002, 13:03

1) What are our objectives?

The subjigation of the French people into a vassal state easily crushed should the need arise.
The rights to a larger parcel of fertile land
Several Techs and a city or two from the French
Some Elite Archers

2) Should we send our soldiers scouting before they attack?

Yes, but not much. I figure we could scout out the jungle a bit more without slowign down the attack plans (ie the first archers start scouting and start comming back when the last archers are being built.

3) In what order shall we attack the French cities?

Paris
Orleans (2nd city they build, we have a general idea where it is)
ANY city we see in direct opposition to our colonization plans (ie a bottleneck)

4) At what point shall we declare war?

IF we see a wandering settler stack, i suggest we declare war then and take it for two workers, as well as slowing their growth some more.
IF we dont, then before we invade their borders.

5) What should our cities build after the strike force leaves?

I'd like to see a few more archers, maybe 3. i'd like 1 for base defense just incase the french try to be smart and walk around our stack in the jungle. i'd also like 2 to "replenish" any archers we may lose
After that, i guess it's the culture mongers turn to build. I would sugegst several settlers to claim any areas where we raze french cities, because the AI will jump all over them, and just resettle. also i believe temples / graneries will be fine for our empire. EDIT: i'm also for building the Colossus in Apolyton, should the chance arrive. I am doubtful though, as case Pink puts it pretty close to the end of the Ancient Era.