Nopeola. No walls! Nyet. That's because you can spend the shields on units instead. You can use those units to discourage attackers, beat back attacks more effectively, and go on the attack.

Meanwhile, because all civs expand, at least at the beginning, you end up having to build walls in over half the cities to be effective. And in the part of the game where they most matter, walls are much more expensive than units. And you can't use them when you go on offense, which you need to do to win a war. Historically, the biggest walls were failures.

Even for places like Istanbul, I'd rather spend the effort on naval units or armies than walls. You don't need no stinking wall if both sides of it are your lake.

When I stopped building them, back in civ2, my games went much better.

the only usefull wall is the great one

THe one case where Walls are good is if there's a large army defending a town, and a larger army attacking it. Then it might be useful. Definitely a rush-build in one turn thing to do though.

Not exactly a "Strategy Article" :lol:
When clicking the thread, i expected sometihng more elborate - like some kind of info/machanic i have missed, to justify the "NEVER" in capitals...

I usually skip walls myself - i think most people do, btw.

But there are also games, where those help... Like for example when beeing Protective with Stone, where Walls will come dirt-cheap. Also otherwise - sometimes one more unit - even if beeing cheaper than the walls is not enought - while a boost the the units you already have, might actually help...
Also walls will often make the AI bombard, instead of attacking right away, and so buying you time, to bring in more/better troops to deal with the enemy stack with low casualties...

Oh and of course Walls are also prereq for Castle - which is not my favourite as well, but can still be of use sometimes...

Walls don't cost maintence so they can fend off would be attackers without you going bankrupt. And it will take a catapult a long time to bombard down walls buying plenty of time to reinforce if they do catch you with your pants down.

Walls are a time buyer on defense... it's also a pre-req for castles which provide free espionage and culture, along with the defensive bonuses.

Walls look ugly, so I never build them :D

I like walls and castles for border cities and, especially "citadel cities" that I use as glorified culture producing forts at strategic locations. I also believe that walls are included in the power graph, which may help the deter the AI from dowing you.

I rarely find occasion to use them, but if it's before gunpowder they can be whipped out fast enough, and the % bonus is way more effective than 1 unit (plus you can overflow some into a unit). Border cities and choke points only, unless you're shooting for castles...which since I only have warlords is never.

Yeah, I guess if you can whip a wall into a city that already has many defenders, and definitely has attackers coming, I can see it in that special circumstance.

CivDude86 wrote:
And it will take a catapult a long time to bombard down walls buying plenty of time to reinforce if they do catch you with your pants down.

IF they do bombard you first. *I* don't waste time with with bombardment because it's way too slow. That raises the interesting question - does the AI? I sure wouldn't know....

bestbrian noted:
also believe that walls are included in the power graph, which may help the deter the AI from dowing you.

Yeah, but so are the cheaper units. It's true that the wall's cheaper to maintain in civ4, but it doesn't cost much to keep a reasonable defence force. By just keeping 2-3 units on edges, at most 1/city elsewhere, and big stacks in the centers of things and in theaters, I've never had trouble conquering or dominating the world with the smallest per-capita armies, and thus lower per-capita defence costs than my neighbors.

Building walls in certain ways can also be used to generate a large influx of cash early in the game if you are Protective and have stone.

Walls ( and Castles ) add soldiers to the power graph... in fact they are a better investement of hammers in that regard than some units.... and they don't pay maintenance

As a prerequisite for Castle, and with access to stone/ being Protective (or both), they're OK. But seldom I see the effectiveness of them. Can be OK to rush them before a huge attack though.

There are times when you should build walls.
Les say that you are playing a leder that gets his UU only in late game (I go to ar when i get my UU because then I can really kick ass) and beside you, you have Montezonma that has a stong and very early UU thatcan kick your ass if he ge angrey.
I think in that case, you should at least concide building walls.

P.S.
Agian: The best wall is the great one.

Walls alone are not so great.

But the point is, they are the precursor to castles which not only give some defense but some pretty decent bonuses in other area, such as trade - and those bonuses don't expire.

Hey Wolf, I have to agree with you here. ;)

The Castles also give you that extra trade route.

I really like the idea of castles, but in my games, they obsolete too fast. Almost by the time I build them, they're obsolete. I guess Engineering is too low on my priorities.

The other thing about walls is they're awfully cheap compared to other buildings. They don't take that many hammers. It allows for less units to defend (at a higher winning percentage), for a longer period of time, which allows these fewer units to hog all of the xp's and get some fat promotions.

You need walls for Spanish Citadels. Citadels give +5 xp to Siege Units, which ain't too shabby. When I play as Spanish I definately build them if I have access to Stone.

build a wall in a city that is being attacked and already has 2-3 or more archers defending it, slave the wall too, the 50% defence bonuse on a just founded city will give 2 archers the power of 3 archers. so if you have more say like 10 archers, building 1 wall (equivlent of 5 archers) vr. 1 archer in a turn, no contest. i say archers cause in a city their defence value is 4.5 and can city defence upgrade so their the best early defenders.

You need walls for Spanish Citadels. Citadels give +5 xp to Siege Units, which ain't too shabby. When I play as Spanish I definately build them if I have access to Stone.

I always build at least one Citadel as Spain, and set it on constant siege production. If you can postpone Economics until after Railroad, all the better--plus 5 on Machine Gun is nice.

Find a friendly Barb city to play with for a couple of rounds, and you can be upgrading to CR3 Cannon or Artillery later.

Thanks for the tip; I never thought about the benefit to MGs.

Wait a minute, don't citadels obsolete with GP?

Thanks for the tip; I never thought about the benefit to MGs.

Wait a minute, don't citadels obsolete with GP?

If you with GP are thinking about the Great Merchant generated with Economics, then you are correct.

Shoot for Liberalism instead ;)

EDIT: GP also means Gunpowder. Silly me.

I build walls all the time, so I can then build a castle, and get that juicy +1 trade route. Especially in coastal cities :D

good idea lordkestrel i forgot they give out a +1 trade route, guess you always shoot for the Great lighthouse hu?

If you with GP are thinking about the Great Merchant generated with Economics, then you are correct.

Shoot for Liberalism instead ;)

No, what I was thinking was that Citadels obsolete with gunpowder (GP), in which cas you can't get the xp for mg's. But that's moot since they obsolete with economics.

wall also give you the event that you can choose between 1 gpt or spreading your religion. 1gpt is pretty useful when you aren't paying anything for thise walls. I get that event almost everytime.

Thanks for the tip; I never thought about the benefit to MGs.

Wait a minute, don't citadels obsolete with GP?

No, castles/citadels obsolete with Economics (whatever GP means)

In a game my friend and I are playing, my capital is a Great Engineer spam (one every ten turns or so, if I'm not mistaken), not to mention that it can crank out a wonder in 4-6 turns. I had nothing to do other than build a fair garrison, build walls, then switch to producing Research. XD

Correct me if I'm wrong but you can also build walls at the last minute to suddenly boost your defense after your city has been bombarded down to or near 0%, effectively making your enemy have to do something like three times the bombardment he was expecting to do. :)

But I have to admit I rarely build walls. However, in MP where attacks are usually a lot more threatening (humans are much better at mounting offensives) walls can be useful as a deterrent.

A golden rule for civ strategies is, NEVER say NEVER. The poster already is flawed from the start when he gave his title for his strategy essay.

Actually, it's not an essay at all. It is closer to a paragraph showing a one sided and poorly thought out statement. I suppose it is for the best though, if he were to expand on this, there would no doubt be more flawed information.

(I'm not impressed)

I build walls in border cities that may get attacked, most often i delay economics so the castles +1 trade route is a pretty good reason to build the walls in the first place.

Thanks for the tip; I never thought about the benefit to MGs.

Wait a minute, don't citadels obsolete with GP?

No citadels and castles obsolete with Economics. gunpowder units can just ignore the defensive bonus of walls and castles. Mysteriously this does not apply to cannon though. :lol:

No citadels and castles obsolete with Economics. gunpowder units can just ignore the defensive bonus of walls and castles. Mysteriously this does not apply to cannon though. :lol:

Yeah, I'd caught and corrected myself on that back on Feb 26. If you're going to revive a dead thread, at least read all the posts. :p

A golden rule for civ strategies is, NEVER say NEVER.

Beat me to it :(

I chalked this article (haha) off as soon as I saw the title, but these threads are usually such a rich source of laughs, I can't help but indulge.

For my tuppence worth:

Walls are rarely much use, but for the hammers, they're better value if the city is already decently defended. e.g. A second archer is better than a wall to defend the first, but a wall defending three or four defenders is better than a fourth or fifth archer. At a time of rivers without bridges, and two movement along roads, the additional time required by the enemy to bombard your city is time you can use to reinforce from neighbouring cities. This translates to less men, defending more, which translates to more men free to attack.

They are cheap after all, embarrassingly so if you have stone. I don't often build castles though as they more expensive, and for me the time between engineering and economics is quite low. I would never build them for the def bonus (only trade route) since if a wall is insufficient to defend the city (because you're facing a large stack with plenty of cats and trebs), a castle will also fall.

Is there anything you should NEVER do in civ?
Concentrate on your navy on a highland map (small lakes)?
Trust Monty?

NEVER, fight a land-war in Asia?

Gunpowder units ignoring walls is completely silly unless they introduce new city fortification, a lot of city fortifications were build at least up to the 17th century. I think it is high explosives that obsoleted fortifications, or at least much reduced their usefulness, so maybe it should be from infantry/artillery that walls go obsolete, rather than riflemen/cannon

Also, spies should only take away cultural defense, not physical fortification (and being at war with units garrisoned should make spy missions a lot more difficult). And siege should be able to return fire to siege...

Until that time, NEVER build walls! :-P

My view on walls.

1) They provide great defense early on.
2) Building military instead costs upkeep.
3) You need a wall for a castle which gives you 1 trade route and +25% eps. NOT trivial.
4) Reduces barrage caused by catapults and trebs allowing a better defence.
5) I believe they add to your power numbers, deterring an AI from attacking.

I was just thinking that a big reason for cities having walls was to defend the city from damage during an attack or raid. Maybe a city should be damaged (buildings / pop) with each attack, and wall prevent damage from unsuccessful attacks?

Walls are 2000 soldiers, same as a warrior. Axes are 5000 I think.

Somebody should do a no wall challenge!

Walls ( and Castles ) add soldiers to the power graph... in fact they are a better investement of hammers in that regard than some units.... and they don't pay maintenance

This is probably the best reason to build them. And rolo is right, that's sometimes why the AI (not monty) is so high on the power graph.

A no wall challenge is easy, play as Cyrus and spam Immortals, haha.

I hardly ever build a wall... I think I built 1 in a Churchill game, warlords expansion, aggressive AI where they all hate the human player, and I had 1 longbow defending against a stack of something like 30 units from 3 AIs all at war with me at once. He got something like 100xp before he died (and wasn't even a great general). So a no wall challenge is most of my games...

Well if you're Celtic on a Highlands map you should probably build *some* walls ;)

As others have said, I almost always build a wall if I get a city that's a key chokepoint, or if it's an important border city.

Other then that, yeh, I don't bother with them

A whipped wall glitches an approaching AI stack. Even with commanding #'s, they'll sit there and bombard it down, allowing you to whip or draft even more units. Very stupid. It comes with a penalty of a lot of anger in a city, but at the potential cost of their entire stack if you can reinforce with siege and a halfway decent stack of your own in time.

I've turned a war or two around this way. AI comes in with 9+ units, only to sit at the wall for 10 turns while I'm finishing up or taking peace elsewhere and rushing over. A couple suicide catapults later, I wipe out a ton of their stack. They're still beating their heads on that wall...not attacking.

Also comical is if you somehow kill the catapults, the remaining AI units tend to suicide into walls and even castles. That's a lot of kills for low WW.

Situational? Absolutely. Never? My !@#%.

Also, you need them for the "best defense" event, and +3 global AI relations can turn games by itself :lol:.

All made possible though intelligent use of Walls and later Castles. Incidentally, I was at war with Montezuma until the Industrial Era approaching modern -- but I didn't attack him until I was good and ready. That lonbow unit accounted for over 60 kills and much of that was because the AI had a horrible time taking down my walls and castles.

And the rest of my Civ kept on happily developing, building wonders, keeping Persia Jewish for the money, etc. :)

Nopeola. No walls! Nyet. That's because you can spend the shields on units instead. You can use those units to discourage attackers, beat back attacks more effectively, and go on the attack.

Meanwhile, because all civs expand, at least at the beginning, you end up having to build walls in over half the cities to be effective. And in the part of the game where they most matter, walls are much more expensive than units. And you can't use them when you go on offense, which you need to do to win a war. Historically, the biggest walls were failures.

Even for places like Istanbul, I'd rather spend the effort on naval units or armies than walls. You don't need no stinking wall if both sides of it are your lake.

When I stopped building them, back in civ2, my games went much better.

Are you an absolute noob or something? What happens when your only down to few units and you have a stack of 15 knocking at your door? You can't use world history as an excuse for being a defenseless noob. So what you're saying is if you build 50 units, (stiffling your ecomony), you can discount people attacking you? And the fact that I build walls and castles and never, ever lost a city with walls or castles on it, even with small stacks of units means that I can't win a war? Walls are more expensive than units, because it's worth it.

A golden rule for civ strategies is, NEVER say NEVER. The poster already is flawed from the start when he gave his title for his strategy essay.

Actually, it's not an essay at all. It is closer to a paragraph showing a one sided and poorly thought out statement. I suppose it is for the best though, if he were to expand on this, there would no doubt be more flawed information.

(I'm not impressed)

Amen, bro. I agree with you wholeheartly.

I'm playing as Gilgamesh of Spain, I have stone, and I'm going for domination.

If only I'd read this article before starting my game, I would have:

*Saved myself the tiny number of hammers it took to get Walls and Citadels :hammer:

*Given no bonuses to my espionage/trade economy :gold::D:gold:

*Avoided wasting my time building those all-conquering CRIII Trebs. :trophy3rd:

:rolleyes:

Dude,

Try playing some Muiltiplayer Civ.

Walls and Castles are the triggers for some random events, so if I've got no important buildings to build in a city, a cheap wall might as well get built.

Nopeola. No walls! Nyet. That's because you can spend the shields on units instead. You can use those units to discourage attackers, beat back attacks more effectively, and go on the attack.

True. I agree with this. However NEVER SAY NEVER! There are many situations (being a Celt, controlling a chokepoint, and gunning for a Castle) where building Walls is a smart choice.

Meanwhile, because all civs expand, at least at the beginning, you end up having to build walls in over half the cities to be effective. And in the part of the game where they most matter, walls are much more expensive than units. And you can't use them when you go on offense, which you need to do to win a war. Historically, the biggest walls were failures.

I don't see your logic here. In fact, I don't even understand this. I'll try to rewrite this to see if I get it:
Since all Civs, AI or Human, expand in the beginning, you need to build walls in half your cities to be effective. And in the parts of the game where they matter the most, walls are much more expensive than units. And you can't use them to go on the offense, which you need to do to win a war.

Where's the 'walls in half your cities' coming from? Also, Walls are 50 hammers. In the Medieval Era (when the AI starts fielding Siege), where they're pretty useful in stalling an AI until you can reinforce cities, the weakest unit (the Pikeman) is 60 hammers! With stone, even a weak city takes only 4-5 turns to build Walls, while they can take over a dozen for a Pikeman.

Even for places like Istanbul, I'd rather spend the effort on naval units or armies than walls. You don't need no stinking wall if both sides of it are your lake.

When I stopped building them, back in civ2, my games went much better.

I assume by 'places like Istanbul' you mean isthmuses and chokepoints. Walls are all the more important in these areas, since they stall an enemy advance and keep the AI occupied as you hammer them down. It protects the rest of your Empire.

Finally, Walls are the prerequisites of Castles. Castles give +1 Trade Route, +25% EP, and even more city defense! The economic boosts that Walls give indirectly are great!