Artillery: almost always the most important game changer?

Why are AA-guns so powerful though? Those things are ridiculous really!

Their strength should be way lower, not for frontline usage as melee troops! AA guns should be used for their intended purpose behind the frontlines which is protecting assets like ground forces, cities, ships etc...

Spam of AA guns... carpet of doom which cannot be bombed, hard to kill even with melee attacks... the horror

At the risk of this principle stifling discussion overall, the "best" way to abuse a bone-headed AI is open-ended one. Basically, build units. Done.

If the question is two-sided though, I am not scared at all of an AI with Artillery. The reason is that Cavalry are a huge upgrade in this era over Knights, and they are good enough that my army has a lot of them for a few reasons. I mean, compare the 34 Strength of Cavalry relative to 16 of Artillery against the 20 of Knights v 13 of Cannon. Lancer is only 25 Strength, and doesn't upgrade well. Because of that gap, this tech level represents going from about a ~50% Strength advantage to about ~110% in the preceding era's counter unit. Not to mention Landships. I probably wouldn't have noticed this without playing as Austria, but decently upgraded Cavalry can one-shot an Artillery before it can even set up. They continue on with fragile bodies for the rest of the game, such that you shouldn't be able to use them very much at all without a strong advantage in the field. Emphasis, should.

The problem, of course, is that the AI is utterly stupid. What an intelligent person would do in this era is shield Arty from flank attacks by using Rifles and GWI in chokes. That makes historical sense. But on attack, the AI will march every unit it has underneath your city and promptly do nothing. On defense, it will send every unit it has underneath your ranged, and promptly do nothing.

Artilleries make war elegant. Especially when supported by frigates.

It still kills me that cannons don't have 3 range (no indirect fire), and Gatling gun/machine gun don't have 2 range. Whereas a properly upgraded archer has 3 range. From either a strategic or historical perspective. Just... Why.

Also, agree that city attack should be 3 tiles after researching a certain tech...
Artillery, battleships, bombers. Any of them will win you the game if you tech there first. Battleships are the only one that has significant tech requirements.

Perhaps a unit between cannons and artillery could be useful. Cannons look like renaissance weapons, and artilleries have a WW2 design. Maybe a rifled gun? Could have 2 range but indirect fire.
In the same way they added WW1 infantry to fill the gap between napoleonic-style fusiliers and WW2 infantry.

George Abitbol said:

Perhaps a unit between cannons and artillery could be useful. Cannons look like renaissance weapons, and artilleries have a WW2 design. Maybe a rifled gun? Could have 2 range but indirect fire.
In the same way they added WW1 infantry to fill the gap between napoleonic-style fusiliers and WW2 infantry.

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I myself plan to, at some point, move Artillery forward two levels and add a replacement between Cannon and Artillery exactly like you mention - was thinking something like a Mortar, which someone suggested a while ago. Haven't gotten around to it yet, because I have no experience with adding new units with everything that implies (new icons, new models, etc.) yet.

Agree, in-game artillery should be an modern era weapon. I think also strange that dynamite/artillery comes before railroads..

I feel that archery might be a better millitary tech, because if you couldnt get arties, you could always roll with planes and vice versa, but the ability to clear barb camps early is very nice with archers, and in bipolar MP games, ofc archery is mandatory.

for a science game, i guess education is very big also, aswell as plastics

George Abitbol said:

Agree, in-game artillery should be an modern era weapon. I think also strange that dynamite/artillery comes before railroads..

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Its mixed up historically.

British railways started around 1811, first intercity was 1830, and the golden age of rail was the 1850s.

Dynamite wasn't invented till 1867, but field howitzers were used in the Napoleonic wars in the mid 18th century, and the Armstrong Gun (the birthplace of modern artillery pieces) was 1855.

I'd say that despite being tied to Dynamite, the artillery in the games is really meant to represent Napoleonic artillery. Its great against infantry and fortified positions, its weak to cavalry. That sounds like napoleonic warfare to me. Of course it wasn't until the 1880s that indirect fire became the default, even if it was used imprecisely before then.

Tying it to dynamite doesn't make a lot of sense - the dynamite guns (firing with compressed air) weren't what allowed for long range indirect fire.

Broadly though, I think its okay for artillery to be about before railroads, but I wouldn't mind if artillery were broken down into more steps generally. I think there's definitely room between cannon and modern artillery for another unit type, perhaps one that has indirect fire but only 2 range.