Siam's elephants underwhelming

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Silverfuturist

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DISCLAIMER:
This is my opinion at the moment, subject to change if a more creative way of utilizing them can be discovered...:scan: maybe somebody can find a way to leverage them better than I just did in my first GK Siam game (multiplayer though) and I can learn something. If there is a thread on this maybe the admins can merge this or somethin'

So... 3 movement vs 2 in vanilla is really nice but... they just don't seem tough enough. When fighting vs xbows in rough terrain and behind rivers (where my opponent made sure to place them there), they don't seem to pack enuf power. I mean they are not a bad unit, but they didn't make much of a diff in my game, xbows were still the era's unit of choice for me.

However - the legalism trick still worked, :goodjob: BUT I forgot to check if the Wat's were maint free!:mad: although they "felt" maint free. Maybe somebody like MadGeanie can clarify that. Anyhow, the extra culture was nice (6 cities so +12 extra) and the CS bonuses were nice also, but I have to play them a few more times in GK to get a better idea of where they stand in relation to other civs. So happy Austria wasn't in game, cud see my UA becoming useless.:cry:
 
I've had Austria in several G&K games when I've played as Siam, and she doesn't seem to make a lot of difference on levels at least as high as Immortal - mostly, whoever I play, she just makes diplo victory easier by reducing the votes required, while never really seeming to go for any victory condition herself. MT can often be slow to annex CSes even when she has the gold, and doesn't seem to put a great deal of effort into allying with them. Siam can reap massive rewards in later eras with just a couple of CS allies, and ideally others as friends, since as you note the per turn bonus is high (and higher with allies than with friends).

The elephant is relatively speaking a lot weaker than it was (although it was possibly too good in vanilla). Musketmen now have the same strength and I very rarely go for Chivalry before Gunpowder; gone are the days when elephants were unbeatable until Rifling. They're about equal to the new pikemen, so can serve as front-line troops, but unless you rush Chivalry for some reason you won't get them early enough (and because the AIs love spamming pikemen and now upgrade their units, the AI spams Lancers like nobody's business, making cavalry still less attractive).
 
IAmOzymandias said:
compared to india's war elephant, they're not that bad.
Click to expand...

I don't think India's elephant is that bad, except possibly it takes a few more hammers to make them than I would like. If somebody did a "strength vs hammer" analysis of them vs similar era units, then I could be easily swayed in my opinion.
 
They have the highest strength of any unit in the era excluding UU (almost including UU). It's strong enough that it can deal or at least not be countered by pikes and the horse unit promotion lines are really good. It's just not a unit you really want to mass produce but I always find it useful to have a horse unit or two when I'm pushing into a Civ, Siams is just more resilient and less likely to die to a left over pike.
 
Anything is underwhelming if your expectations are high enough.

But Naresuan are 1.25 strength, they're great. (They were better in Vanilla when pikemen were more wimpy, when calvary could take on cities, when the 10hp system meant trying to finish one off with melee units after crossbow bombardment was more risky.)
 
I just finished a Byzantium game a few moments ago - Diplo Win, no cheesy war decs on the last turn - and I was allied with Belgrade, a Militaristic city-state which gave me at least 8 Naresuan Elephants (it was quite a lot because I delayed Military Science for a LONG TIME).

Those elephants were quite good for me: Attila insisted to declare on me every now and then, and it was helpful to destroy their crossbows and their trebuchets. It helped me to even stand side by side with Musketmans and some Lancers against Japan. :goodjob: I was focusing more on gold, so having those elephants to help me take down some units was quite helpful. Gotta love their high strenght (25! 25% more than the regular knight!).

This was on single player, by the way.

EDIT: One more thing: curiously, I didn't build a single cataphract (didn't have horses, got them only after chivalry :( ), so having another UU to help me just made my day. I really liked it :)
 
The huge advantage of Siam's elephants is that you only need a 4 horse tile(or 2x2) to produce an infinite of UUs.

When i play Siam, i don't build 4-5 of them...i build over 20 of them :eek:

Do i need to explain how? I'm sure you know. Still one of the best medieval UUs.
 
since you're playing MP, you have to get the horsemen out early to fight barbs, then shift to Stampy.

The mounted unit promotions are the best (when added to their higher movement and move after attack).


You can get 4 move Stampy's with a promotion. You do need march to make them 'awesome', or at least a lot of them. Primarily march as defense is based upon the straight combat strength, whereas offense can get you to a very high number with all of the promotions - depending on promotions, that can be up to 2.5x their combat strength. So Stampy is greater than a musket, whereas a Knight will get beat by the musket. That's the core difference (other than stampy owning knights).

If you find your opponent using bows a lot, mess with them by grabbing the +movement promotion, or shift your own bows in to wound them and follow with a charge (+33%) Stampy. Surrounds are important (Honour really helps) but a herd will get you further than just a few.
 
I tested the phant rush. We can't produce horsemen with Chivalry anymore even if it's a ressourceless UU...means less powerful than vanilla. Still a very powerful unit for defense against other mounted units. With 6-8 horses available maybe enough for offense.
 
Tabarnak said:
I tested the phant rush. We can't produce horsemen with Chivalry anymore even if it's a ressourceless UU...

THIS has been an annoyance for me for ranged chivalry units (keshiks/camel Archers) esp if opponent has great wall. IMHO in Civ, if a player has a UU they should also be able to make the unit their UU replaces. For many UUs you would never make the other unit (like a LS instead of a samurai) but I could see making a regular knight to go with those camels...
Click to expand...
 
MadDjinn said:
since you're playing MP, you have to get the horsemen out early to fight barbs, then shift to Stampy.

The mounted unit promotions are the best (when added to their higher movement and move after attack).


You can get 4 move Stampy's with a promotion. You do need march to make them 'awesome', or at least a lot of them. Primarily march as defense is based upon the straight combat strength, whereas offense can get you to a very high number with all of the promotions - depending on promotions, that can be up to 2.5x their combat strength. So Stampy is greater than a musket, whereas a Knight will get beat by the musket. That's the core difference (other than stampy owning knights).

If you find your opponent using bows a lot, mess with them by grabbing the +movement promotion, or shift your own bows in to wound them and follow with a charge (+33%) Stampy. Surrounds are important (Honour really helps) but a herd will get you further than just a few.
Click to expand...

4 move elephants, sweet. :cool:

Perhaps the stampy rush is dependant on terrain... in my game I had awesome city spots (river hills everywhere) but the drawback was "sticky" terrain for mounted units to maneuver around.
 
No iron needed for Siam's elephants, so if you are iron poor and have been able to hold off an enemy that has iron, the elephants come in with great strength and are death on knights. The composite bowman makes defense a much more secure thing in GK, so if you are Siam, instead of beelining iron working, you can use the time to develop culture and religion. The elephant bonus in vanilla city attack made early military expansion way too easy for Siam. GK has it just right.
 
Petiscator said:
I just finished a Byzantium game a few moments ago - Diplo Win, no cheesy war decs on the last turn - and I was allied with Belgrade, a Militaristic city-state which gave me at least 8 Naresuan Elephants (it was quite a lot because I delayed Military Science for a LONG TIME).
Click to expand...

Still playing a game as Persia, on a continent shared with England and the Mayans (Japan was wiped out by all of us early on). England keeps DOW on me, and I was getting so annoyed I counter attacked to try and take a city and knock her back a bit.

She not only has plenty of longbows and support units (trebs and swordsmen), but she has also managed to build the great wall :( I build knights to counter her longbows and attack in a golden age (for Persia's movement bonus). I get shot up badly by the longbows on the advance, but kill or drive most of them back with a few knights. Knock the city defenses down low enough to take in a couple of turns. Golden ages runs out as I am trying to move a melee unit in place to take the city (first couple died to longbows and the city attack). Then Lizzy's reinforcements appear 2 tiles north of my siege force - another 6 longbows marching behind 4 Naresuan elephants (gifts from her Ally Budapest I think). Sued for peace.... :crazyeye:
 
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