Something that has always bugged me is deciding what promotions to take on the medic III unit. It's usually a HA or higher from a stable city, so I generally get 5 promotions. You need combat I to open up the medic I, then I also take medic II and III,

After that, where do most people go??? I prefer NOT to go combat as I do not want the unit targeted by counters, ditto pinch/shield/shock. Flanking seams like a waste as I rarely attack with it. I usually take leadership as I use the unit to clean up cities with very high odds and take the extra experience.

Ant better promotions here???

Well.... I tend to make them "infantry" to make use of the added jungle healing bonus.

On horse units I stop at Medic II.

If I was going to use them, I would add (after leadership) to movement, sight, Flanking is not bad as you can get a high retreat which I think is a seperate roll than unit defeat... if you choose to attack with the unit. Agree 100% on the counters and combat as you do not want the unit targeted.

drill, march?

Always wondered what march exactly did on a med3 unit :D

I generally use a chariot, if I can.

if I've got a great general, then I give the last one to the extra movement.

Morale, which gives an extra movement point. Very handy on a medic to catch up with the main stack after healing the wounded.

drill, march?

Always wondered what march exactly did on a med3 unit :D

Unfortunately march is only unit specific, meaning the only thing it would do is heal the medic while moving... I agree, very cryptic promotion description.

I usually take morale. I really don't see the point in taking anything else. Sometimes it's very helpful when you get first GG (from an axe rush, for example) and don't have any horse based units to attach it to.

I go for leadership after med 3 to help generate more generals faster by mopping up units, and I usually like to use the general to kill the last unit/capture the city because it looks cool, and if I plan to raze it the general(horse archer for me) can move back to the safety of the stack.

I go for the withdrawal promos after leadership to get rid of that slim chance of dying at 99.9%...

+1 for extra movement

If I can swing an extra promo, Sentry. Fits quite nicely as a support promotion that a stack needs only once and the unit shouldn't be fighting.

Otherwise Morale. Leadership doesn't generate anywhere near enough extra XPs to be meaningful IMX.

Morale, which gives an extra movement point. Very handy on a medic to catch up with the main stack after healing the wounded.

Me too. By FAR the most useful IMO. I don't even need to keep the general in the stack. I just let it hang out behind the lines and then run up to do it's job after the city busting has taken place. When you take the Morale promotion, and rush it up to the lines as needed like I do, you don't have to worry as much about it ever getting singled out in a counter attack.

Morale is useful to get an extra turn or two of healing out of the super medic before it catches back up with the stack. Leadership is nice for poaching the dregs of the enemy defenses. Sentry just isn't worth that much on a GG unit when you have spies, air power, or other sentries.

Generally though if I'm in serious siege based warfare (one move warfare), I'll pay my dues for a woody III/M III with any additional promos going to morale. Generally this means attaching to an early fogbuster who got woody III and splitting a gg with another unit (most fun being splitting a leadership privateer or heavy flanking mounted leadership); this makes for a decent shot of getting 40 ish XP on one unit.

If it's a mounted unit, Morale. The third movement point is very useful. Most often it lets the single GG medic quickly run back and forth between two different stacks healing them both. It also helps for pillaging, since the GG can move-pillage-move in enemy territory.

If it's a melee unit (usually a spearman), I'll try towards adding Woodsman III as well, and might make it to 50 XP for that sometime by 2000 AD. :)

Morale or march. On occasion I'm willing to 99% it vs badly damaged troops, which is where march comes in. Otherwise, morale is just about the only thing that makes sense if you're not going for the crazy (and somewhat overrated) woods III medic III.

+1 movement for me also. That way one medic can heal 2 offensive stacks.

I'm curious about the Woodsman III unit - it adds bonus healing?
This is in addition to the healing from medic, etc?
And does it work even when the unit(s) are not in jungle/forest?

I go for leadership after med 3 to help generate more generals faster by mopping up units,
I believe I read in an article that great general points are not doubled by leadership. The result of the combat determines the experience "earned" by the unit, which adds to the great general pool, and after that the leadership promotion doubles what was earned to the unit.

It may have been in a thread evaluating the utility of Imperialism coupled with the Great Wall. I'm not sure.

I love the Aztecs for great medics. Woodsman III + Medic III ftw :)

I often take leadership so they get more xp for easy kills. After you use siege there is always some 99.9% battles it can take.

Though I prefer to make other things than Medic III units with my great general. Having Combat VI or 80% flanking cavalry is just more fun.

Something that has always bugged me is deciding what promotions to take on the medic III unit. It's usually a HA or higher from a stable city, so I generally get 5 promotions. You need combat I to open up the medic I, then I also take medic II and III,

I would split experience in case of stables.

in general if you have hopes to get WIII on top go for it if now probably that promotion for general point milking.

I try to have just 1 GG burned;
So, Morale for the +1 movement.
Best regards,

I'm curious about the Woodsman III unit - it adds bonus healing?
This is in addition to the healing from medic, etc?
And does it work even when the unit(s) are not in jungle/forest?

The W3 healing works for all units on the same tile, no matter where they are. It gives and extra 15% healing to them, which is better than medic 1 (which is 10%). A W3C1M1 unit gives the same healing as M3 FOR UNITS IN THE SAME TILE. It doesn't give the healing bonus for adjacent tiles. W3C1M3 is the holy grail of medics: +40% for units in the same tile and +25% for adjacent tiles. When I play CHA leaders, I generally just build a few W3C1M1 units in the WP city (needs 20XP - except Boudica who gets them at 13XP - which is easy for CHA) and skip M3 units altogether, although it means that you're limited to a 1 movement point unit. You can have as many as you want, though. :)

Late game you can most effectively get WIII/MIII out of your Red Cross city. For a CHA leader you then need only 5 promos which is pretty easy. With either CR or a GA it can be worth it to drop into vassal + theo just to get out the high xp unit you want from the Red Cross and then go on from there.

You can also get there quick with a wood III MG (normally upgraded from a warrior or archer) against a backwards AA where you have a convenient wooded hill. Shaka and Monty are both extremely good at doing this for you.

3-move GG healers are pretty strong. Don't worry about using it to mop up. It basically always stays back to heal, then you can usually get him up to the front line for the last turn before attacking to heal whatever units the enemy has suicided against.

If I'm not going for the W3/M3 healer, this is my favoured strategy.

Isn't medic III different than Medic II in that you heal tiles adjacent to you? I've never really had a need for this as I usually have a single stack of units, not several next to each other. Suppose it might have its advantages from a bombard stand point to have multiple stacks though.

I usually go Medic II and then work on Woodsman to stack the healing capabilities.

Isn't medic III different than Medic II in that you heal tiles adjacent to you? I've never really had a need for this as I usually have a single stack of units, not several next to each other. Suppose it might have its advantages from a bombard stand point to have multiple stacks though.

I usually go Medic II and then work on Woodsman to stack the healing capabilities.

No. Medic 1 is same tile as you, 10%. Medic II is adjacent tiles, 10%. Medic III is same tile as you as well as adjacent tiles +15%. Woodsman III is also same tile as you +15%, but not adjacent tiles.

So if you can get a Woodsman III Medic I unit, you would have a unit that is +25% on the same tile as you, just like the Medic III unit, but it is doable without a great general. The downside is that, unless you are the Aztecs, this is a very hard unit to actually obtain without a general, and damn near impossible if you aren't at least aggressive. (Booty Call might be able to do it fairly quickly as well.) The other downside is that it will probably be a one-move unit for most of the game, which is less than ideal for your super-medic.

No. Medic 1 is same tile as you, 10%. Medic II is adjacent tiles, 10%. Medic III is same tile as you as well as adjacent tiles +15%. Woodsman III is also same tile as you +15%, but not adjacent tiles.

So if you can get a Woodsman III Medic I unit, you would have a unit that is +25% on the same tile as you, just like the Medic III unit, but it is doable without a great general. The downside is that, unless you are the Aztecs, this is a very hard unit to actually obtain without a general, and damn near impossible if you aren't at least aggressive. (Booty Call might be able to do it fairly quickly as well.) The other downside is that it will probably be a one-move unit for most of the game, which is less than ideal for your super-medic.

This is not that hard late in the game though with the Red Cross.

Building units in the Red Cross city need only three promotions to get Guerilla III. It is late, but having every stack with a Guerilla/Medic I unit is pretty unstopable. I do not know why but I never really thought about this before.

This is not that hard late in the game though with the Red Cross.

Building units in the Red Cross city need only three promotions to get Guerilla III. It is late, but having every stack with a Guerilla/Medic I unit is pretty unstopable. I do not know why but I never really thought about this before.(BTW, I know you meant Woodsman and not Guerilla.)

Even though it was mentioned right above me, I sort of ignored the Red Cross in my thought process. I was thinking about a way to get a really early 25%+ medic, and therefore was thinking about the woodsman warrior who got to woodsman III and then how much more it would take to get him up to Combat 1 Medic 1.

As for the Red Cross, I also never thought about it, but I can see how I could certainly crank out units with Woodsman II and medic one fairly quickly. Getting that third promotion to Woodsman III wouldn't be so bad at all with a charismatic leader, but getting all the way up to 10XP might be kind of annoying if I didn't have a couple generals settled in the Red Cross city. (Well, it would be for the way I like to run my wars in the period after the Red Cross is available.)

(BTW, I know you meant Woodsman and not Guerilla.)

Even though it was mentioned right above me, I sort of ignored the Red Cross in my thought process. I was thinking about a way to get a really early 25%+ medic, and therefore was thinking about the woodsman warrior who got to woodsman III and then how much more it would take to get him up to Combat 1 Medic 1.

As for the Red Cross, I also never thought about it, but I can see how I could certainly crank out units with Woodsman II and medic one fairly quickly. Getting that third promotion to Woodsman III wouldn't be so bad at all with a charismatic leader, but getting all the way up to 10XP might be kind of annoying if I didn't have a couple generals settled in the Red Cross city. (Well, it would be for the way I like to run my wars in the period after the Red Cross is available.)

A combo Red Cross/WP city is a distinct possibility, though the MS/Redcross combo for naval production is pretty decent as well. I'm not a huge fan of either the HE/WP combo (HE city normally has enough generals to get me to 10 XP of its own right) nor the IW/WP city (being able to quick drop the Hermitage into a late IW city let's you have an easier time of going for culture with the cap, NE, and IW being an easy triumverate), RC/WP is great for getting strong march units.

As far as 10 XP; pentagon, theo, vassal, rax gets you almost there with ease. Building RC in a capture AI city with settled generals is also a pretty easy thing to do. Getting a 3 promo RC is not that hard, even without nerfing your two (three) other main unit pumps it is doable.

There are a number of ways around the one move problem. Firstly you can go coast rolling. The medic only needs to be present in the stack, not actually have any move left. Shipping him up and down the coast easily let's you keep up with fast moving mounted armies. Another shot is to abuse OB with the neighbors and bounce him between stacks and only move forward when you have nothing left to heal adjacent to easy move territory or when culture collapses. Lastly, you can just run a siege heavy army and have him work with healing the stack during bombardment.

There are a number of ways around the one move problem. Firstly you can go coast rolling. The medic only needs to be present in the stack, not actually have any move left. Shipping him up and down the coast easily let's you keep up with fast moving mounted armies. Another shot is to abuse OB with the neighbors and bounce him between stacks and only move forward when you have nothing left to heal adjacent to easy move territory or when culture collapses. Lastly, you can just run a siege heavy army and have him work with healing the stack during bombardment.

1 word: paratroopers!

I was addressing:

So if you can get a Woodsman III Medic I unit, you would have a unit that is +25% on the same tile as you, just like the Medic III unit, but it is doable without a great general. The downside is that, unless you are the Aztecs, this is a very hard unit to actually obtain without a general, and damn near impossible if you aren't at least aggressive. (Booty Call might be able to do it fairly quickly as well.) The other downside is that it will probably be a one-move unit for most of the game, which is less than ideal for your super-medic.

For most of the game paras are not an option, eventually you can get paras and eventually everything should become MechInf. However, by that point you should be able to roll a war without having healing be such a huge issue. Producing either enough air power/siege/nukes to keep your attackers strong gratly diminishes the utility of medics.