"THERE ARE NO MALINESE SOLDIERS HIDING INSIDE AMERICAN BORDERS"
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, as everyone's favourite Malinese minister of information likes to put it.
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1.
FIGHTING THE WAR OF TERROR
Back again for another update, we're now in 1020 AD, and a lot has happened since the last update - some things concerning military matters, but also a lot of domestic/scientific improvements have been made, during a glorious ongoing period of prosperity for the Malinese Empire.
While these domestic issues will have a profound impact on the game in turns to come, I'd like to start off with some more militaristic matters, which took place somewhere in the late 800's/early 900's AD.
As has been illustrated during earlier spoiler posts, there has been an ongoing state of hostility between the Malinese and Incan empire for some time, and during this period Mali became a close ally of the Americans who went to war with us vs the evil Inca.
But in the meantime, Kemsa Mumal had not forgotten the troublesome negotiations with Darkness of earlier times, and was keen on letting China become acquainted with the Malinese military prowess. Thus, Kemsa simply couldn't find it in his heart to turn down this very reasonable - and impossibly well timed - request made by his eternal ally and friend Roosevelt:
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How convenient that since the destruction of Ollantaytambo, these veteran troops had rested and healed up on board a Malinese Galleon, which in the meantime had covertly positioned himself somewhere north of the Chinese lands.
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So when high-command gave the green light for action to begin, the ship moved in and the world witnessed a little bit of history repeating:
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And a turn later, a division of horse archers secured the same fate for the city of Alexandria:
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The macemen rushed to the scene came a few miles short to garrision the city in time, even though these foul villians managed to cruelly trick and murder my horse archer before they could board their ships again.
Just going to take a slight detour from the spoilers at this point, as I'd like to point out the extreme importance of managing to control the seas on maps like these, and the profound effect this can have on the game.
As it stands, not only have my 2 galleons with a mere 5 units been able to take out 3 major and a minor city of Darkness and grs/bclg uncontested, the psychological effect of these ships popping up out of nowhere is tremendous as well.
Since Darkgrss has no possibility of knowing or scouting out where my vessels are due to their lack of naval power/knowledge, they have now resorted to extreme measures trying to defend what remains of their coastal sites. Every coastal city that is explored now - 9 galleons and 2 caravels are active atm - contains defenses like these now:
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That's 3 top class units permanently guarding a city that darkness has no idea of on whether it will be attacked anytime soon, during a period where he is fighting a very tough war with America in the south. For BCLG, things are even worse as I've seen his coastal cities defended by up to 6 heavily promoted units, all being tied to that specific city site, not being able to do anything useful anywhere.
I've been making sure to keep a galleon into view of their borders from time to time to make sure the threat remains a reality to them, but so far it has just been the 5 aforementioned units - plus a load of naval power - that have been responsible for the havoc on the other continent. A war of terror indeed, and mighty effective at that as well I might add.
Finally, my galleons - as they have no match at seas atm, and if they do get a match, frigates will be around for cover - also provide a safe place to heal wounded units on, once they've made a landing to either attack a city or snatch some workers, making quick hit and run tactics possible even with slow moving infantry units like maces and axes.
Ok, enough of this small detour, just wanted to point out that naval power can be very potent in this game too, under the right circumstances.
Back to the spoiler now, where we left the northern raiding party enjoying themselves plundering upper china. The southern raiders, in the meantime, had decided that - due to a lack of opportune coastal targets - they could be put to much more use on land, and were ordered by the Malinese high command to disembark on American soil, using open borders there to easily move around, and - as was the original plan - provide cover for the northern American cities, which I expected to be under siege by Darkness by now, considering he declared war on them a few turns ago.
With no faulty AI moving them around, they were hoping to catch Darkness army either wounded or unaware at the right moment, striking unsees from out of nothing to take out several units, then running back into safe American borders again if possible*.
However, when reaching Boston, the situation was totally different to what I expected it to be:
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*Note that my plans of striking unseen where thwarted by the fact that Boston is a Hindu city, and unfortunately BCLG has Hinduism as a state religion and controls the Hindu holy city, making my units visible to him. Very poor American roading doesn't help much in staying hidden either.
It seemed that the roles were reversed compared to what I thought was the case, and Roosevelt was actively besieging Darkness. That sure puts the sight of 3 topunits protecting Nanking in the north in an even better light! Of course, witnessing such acts of bravery by their american comrades made the Malinese revel in bloodlust, and they jumped in to join the fray.
With such a setup, the disappointment was rather big when witnessing the same scene a turn later:
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All Americans wasted, and about the same defence for Darkness still in place. Since chances of capturing the city were small - I might have won 3 battles now attacking the city, but then I would be left with wounded units myself, open for Chinese counterattack - I decided to "choose eggs for my money" (Dutch proverb), also figuring that the threat level of my units being alive was worth more than razing that size 2 city anyway.
For the current turn, things have reached a stalemate again on the Chinese/American border near Boston, but I noticed that Darkness has - perhaps forced to do so - let his guard down again in Nanking:
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As can be seen on pic 1 of this post, my units stand by to board the galleon again, and team up with the northern raiding party to see if another coastal raid is possible. More on that in future updates, time to talk domestic matters now:
2.
OUR GREAT CIVILIZATION HAS ENTERED A GOLDEN AGE!
Already hinted at a lot during earlier updates, some time after the discovery of Liberalism and the free Nationalism, Kemsa Mumal - first having built up a big treasury - finally took the liberty of sacrificing 2 of his greatest thinkers of the empire, and witnessing such a spectacle enticed the entire population into a period of extra production, with the goal of stengthening the navy and building the Taj Mahal, while the minds of all researching in the empire focused on learning the secrets of military tradition.
And only after a mere 6 turns in Golden Age, Gunpowder, Music and Military Tradition had been researched and the Taj Mahal was finished, adding another +8 turns to our GA:
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In the meantime, Feudalism was traded for with America, while theology will be researched next turn to revert to Theocracy, resulting in level 3 cavs right of the bat. This makes for a total tech rate of 5 techs (worth nearly 7000 beakers total) in 6 turns - another factor, although non-military, which may greatly reduce morale for the opposition.
Production will now focus almost solely on cavalries, and around 15 should be ready when the GA finishes, more than enough to do very serious damage I think, while keeping the entire production and research capabilities of the empire intact.
The reason that this has all progressed so quickly is that production absolutely skyrocketed when the GA started, best illustrated by the following graphs:
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Note that neither Matrix nor Roosevelt really is an enemy of mine atm, making especially the mfg goods graph even kinder to Mali at this point in the game. Note that on the GNP graph, BCLG's line is rapidly taking a dive, which correlates well with the current power graph, where he is soaring:
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Also, he seems to be doing 100% tax from time to time, or at least I noticed him earning heavy sums of money every few turns or so... but that number has dwindled down from over 150gpt to 138 gpt now. Hopefully, these are all signs that the Incan empire may be collapsing under its own weight, much like the empire of Straland has done so much earlier in the game (looking at the gnp again, Matrix never recovered from that). It also means, though, that BCLG may be the toughest nut to crack military wise... which target our cavalries will pursue is so far undecided.
Translated to raw figures, this amounts to:
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Well worth the 2 great persons, I think!
Rounding up the domestic talks, here's a quick overview of the empire again. Notice the rapid growth in pop in some cities, especially Rome... While Timbuktu is still the GNP powerhouse, responsible for almost 40% of the research nationwide iirc, Rome - and to a lesser degree Kumbi Saleh and Niani - have started to rake in the gold and beakers pretty fast as well now. A good contrast vs specialized production cities such as Gao, Djenne Walata and Antium.
North:
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Middle:
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South:
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3.
WHAT THE FUTURE BRINGS...
Considering the current state of the other continent, it looks like cavalries might be just the final push needed to permanently tip the balance into Malinese favour for this game. However, as Kemsa will not whip away his own empire for mass production of cavs - not saying that akots's suggestion is a wrong one, but I simply loath to whip away my empire unless it is a necessity for survival - there might be the off-chance that they somehow survive the coming onslaught in such a manner that the war will continue to drag on for some time.
Should this happen, while of course military production will remain high for a long time now, research will steadily continue towards the next long-term military goal, which I think will end the possibilities to oppose Mali for the other continent for sure: Flight.
Since the seas are - and with the lack of coastal production undoubtedly will remain - in Malinese hands, a few carriers packed with fighters should be able to decimate the landscape rather easily, stripping them of all improvements and rendering their cities productionless, without any form of defense possible. Therefore, this is where reseach will be geared towards, and while we are talking modern age techs here, research levels look quite good, and a lot of these techs can actually be lightbulbed by scientists, making this scenario - while perhaps more of a musing on the future than a quick reality - not as impossible as it looks at first glance.
As far as Kemsa is concerned, this all won't be necessary though. All cavs aboard, next stop: the other continent!