War Academy: Plans for France

[Shiber]

If I understand the situation correctly we are preparing for a war with France to get our GA and hopefully take France's sources of iron and (now discovered) saltpaper. I understand we are to strike as soon as our peace treaty with France expires, which is in 6 turns (after the turnchat that is currently in progress is completed).
However, I haven't seen any solid plans yet. Can anyone who is in the loop provide some information for me and anyone else who is clueless about our strategy against France?

[GodKing]

When did this occur? Admitadly, I have been out of the loop for a bit, with a work load from hell and computer problems at home.

Where is the poll asking for a declaration of war?

What are our objectives? Iron and saltpeter? All of frances remaining territory? Just to get a GA? This needs to be specified.

What other options have been considered? Could we have peace for a few turns? Defence of our outbound cities such as Hole in the Wall? War with Greece (they are week, as of 20 turns ago [last save I was able to look at] they still had not bothered connecting to iron. Even if they connected the next turn, 20 turns is not much to build a large army). Aztec cities, they probably wasted much of their offensive might in taking them. Germany is more central to our empire, and its cities will benifite us greatly.

What is our military might? Offence? Defence? who can they bribe to come in on their side such as last time they brought in Germany and Persia.

How much will we be hurt production wise by not building courthouses, temples, markets, etc and going after more military units?

Our FP and Palace relocation is underway. How will this be effected?

Lots to be worked out prior to me accepting another war of expansion so soon.

[Shiber]

I don't think this will be a war of expansion. IMHO the wisest thing to do will be to sign a peace treaty as quickly as possible (after 5 turns of war). This way, we won't suffer a lot from war weariness. I think that 5 turns are enough to achieve the following goals:

1. Get France's iron.
2. Get France's saltpaper.
3. Get a Golden Age.

[joncnunn]

There's been discussion about invading France and England.

I'm not sure which (if any) has enough support to win a declartion of war poll.

We're going to have to fight Germany evenually. They'll be declaring war on whoever they think is their weakest neighbor soon.

If it's the Aztecs, the Aztecs would most likely lose a large portion of their empire, including occuplied America. (Assuming we don't intervene)

The English would also likely find themselves slowly crushed under the German weight if attacked by them if we don't intervene.

[Shiber]

Got the time of expiration of the peace treaty with France all wrong. I think it's 670 AD, but my headache prevents me from thinking straight... so if I've made a mistake please correct me. Thanks.

[Mr. Orange]

Originally posted by GodKing
What is our military might? Offence? Defence? who can they bribe to come in on their side such as last time they brought in Germany and Persia.

Why check the ADR! http://apolyton.net/forums/showthrea...threadid=64488

I knew this would be handy

[Meshelic]

For those who previously missed out on this discussion, it was mentioned in the war academy, and here are those plans for the French War drawn up by Aggie about 4-5 days ago. You can find the outline of the war about halfway down.

This is mostly assumed that the French military position has not changed much in the last 4-5 days, so is still a correct assessment of what we plan to do.

[Shiber]

Aggie, if you're reading this, can you please start a new thread on this issues and post your current plans and goals so that we can debate on this issue?

Speaking of debates, Apoc: if you're reading this, good luck on Friday!

[realpolitic]

While getting iron and saltpeter are good objectives, the value of a GA increases as we get more city improvements,so it's better to wait.. A good time might be when we get Military Tradition, so we can use oscillating wars to raze cities and keep our neighbors in their place.

[realpolitic]

While getting iron and saltpeter are good objectives, the value of a GA increases as we get more city improvements,so it's better to wait.. A good time might be when we get Military tadition, so we can use oscillating wars to raze cities and keep our neighbors in their place.

[Reddawg]

... I don't think this is formalized or approved. I for one and strongly against this. Six turns will not give us the time we need, as I've said in my Pax Apolytonia idea, to consolidate our gains and strengthen our nation internally. The Persian Annexation has brought about a whole new series of problems, which I will be addressing in an upcoming Economic Report.

I will not condone an attack on France in 6 turns or even less than 16 turns, unless the SMC can convince me that this war can be fully achieved without making demands upon our Economy or City Planning.

MoE Reddawg~

[Togas]

Gunpowder is now becoming widespread. If we are to attack France, it must either be before they get Musketeers, or after we get Cavalry.

I support a short war, and will make sure not to get entanged with any long terms deals in France so that we may attack at the time of our choosing.

--Togas

[Meshelic]

Aggie's current hypothetical plans (found in the French War link in my reply above) call for about an eight turn war. That figure could be lessened to about six I believe. And THAT's if we wanted to overtake most of their country.

In the time of a quick, limited military operation, we'll definetely need to grab that saltpeter and iron at the very least.

[Meshelic]

However, gunpowder in the hands of any enemies or foreign civs will make an operation like this very costly.

[Apocalypse]

About France and Saltpeter. Both of them are very close to our border. I think they are actually on our border. This means two things.
1. It would be easy to disconnect them if needed. This produces a limited supply of Mustetmen.
2. We can also get them through culture.

Also about Greece...they don't have Saltpeter connected yet but they could anytime they want to. I'd like to connect the Saltpeter near GeoFront and try to trade them it before they connect their own. This may allow us to get Chemistry relatively cheap early on.

Shiber: Thanks.

[Meshelic]

I think Apoc is now on to something here...

[Aggie]

I'll post tomorrow with a detailed plan of attack and a time table. First of all the time of attack is flexible, but as togas mentioned it must be before France gets GP. Currently I am planning a 15knight,3longbowmen attack. More details will be in a thread. I have not asked for a Declaration of war yet becasue it is over a turnchat away and like I said it is flexable. Reddawg I forsee no extra pressure on our infrastructure. The only expenditures of money will be for the other 6 upgrades and 3 archer to longbowmen. Of course 4 more Wc will be needed but that was understood from the beginning The wc upgrade will have to be saved for the intial war turn, since the wc will attack and get Ga that turn.
Aggie

[BigFurryMonster]

Time is running out for a Golden Age! Our chariots are becoming dusty and obsolete...

[nz_upy]

The reality is that although we would like to put off our GA until our infrastructure is up to standard, so that we can take full advantage of a GA, we pin this "perfect world" dream on the fact that we get Hoovers Dam or 20+ turns down the track we beat a lone warrior/archer/spearmen/pikeman/musketman with our WC's which becomes increasingly unlikely as time goes by and the advent of Gunpowder.

[WhiteBandit]

I've used a similiar method to this a few times during the past two terms in office. I hereby dub it the Lazy Worker Strategy (L.W.S) .

Basically, we can send workers into foreign territory. They will ask us to "leave or else" after one turn, but from everything I have ever played, or any scenerio I tried to setup, they would always forget about the workers. Perhaps I could send a cheap slave to sit and "guard" the Greek resources (and perhaps we can send others to guard other resources before they are connected). I'm not sure how well this would work, but if they do in fact forget about us, well we have succesfully blocked their strategic resource. If they were to suprise attack us, we end up losing a slave worker (no big deal IMHO).

Perhaps this would be a strategy to consider?

[Torkkeli]

[rp]
Hell no, we wont go!

Make love, not war!

[/rp]

No seriously.
Scientific progress has made our glorius chariots useless.
Lets build up our empire and take the french and the others a bit later when we have strong economy to back up our wars.

As one needs strong economy to build strong and effective armies.

[Meshelic]

Use workers to block their strategic resources? Couldn't say I've tried it before, but I think the Public Works minister might have a complaint about that.

[Donegeal]

Originally posted by Apocalypse
2. We can also get them through culture.

Although these resourses are bye our borders, we will not be able to aquire then culturaly as all the resourses are outside of our city radii and inside theirs. The only way I can see us getting these resoures by culture is by flipping and I don't think that would (or could) happen for a VERY long time.

Additionally, I have done some math on the defenses of the three objestive cities (Amiens, Lyons and Besancon). All three of these cities are on hills and defended by at least two pike in each.

Pike = 3 defense
Fortified = .75
Hill = 1.5
Total = 5.25

That would make 2 units at 5.25 defense vs ?? units at 4 attack.

An invasion of France does not look feasable at this time.

[Shiber]

We have veteran units, we have greater numbers and we have catapults.
Just remember that the first war wasn't much easier. They had spearmen as defense, which after the fortification and hills bonuses had a 3.5 defense against our swordsmen and their 3 attack.

[GhengisFarb™]

Reasons for war with France are pretty much the same as they were for Persia.

We have the ability to take them out now BEFORE they build their UU, musketeers as they haven't connected their Saltpeter yet. We would gain TWO saltpeter resources which are going to be HOT trading commodities for a while. We would connect Hole in the Wall to the rest of the empire. We would gain control of the strategic bottleneck. We would eliminate France from the game and no longer have to worry about French national citizens in our cities.

[WhiteBandit]

Originally posted by Meshelic
Use workers to block their strategic resources? Couldn't say I've tried it before, but I think the Public Works minister might have a complaint about that.

I am the Public Works minister.

(at least for one more day or so :P)

[Donegeal]

Originally posted by Shiber
We have veteran units, we have greater numbers and we have catapults.
Just remember that the first war wasn't much easier. They had spearmen as defense, which after the fortification and hills bonuses had a 3.5 defense against our swordsmen and their 3 attack.

None of the French Cities we took were on hills. They were fortified spears in small cities. That is a defensive rating of 2.75. That is .25 less then what we were attacking with. Against France, we would be attacking with a 1.25 deficeit. The Catapults, on the other hand, might (notice its small) make this possible.

[Shiber]

You're right donegeal. However I think you are underestimating the effect that three catapults can have on a battle to take a city. Essentially, a single successful catapult bombardment can turn an enemy veteran defender into a regular, for instance.

[Hot Mustard]

Let the Peace be!

Are we Apolytonians or Mongols?

We can still prepare for (inevitable) wars, but let's not start the next one.

Those fearing the lost opportunity for GA: there will always be that last spearman/archer/swordsman defending an enemy city, after killing all the musketeers/pikemen.

[Meshelic]

dejon - unfortunately, time is not in our favor. quick, preemptive strikes are necessary to prevent our enemies from becoming more powerful and thereby able to kill us later.