Army or Navy
- Thread starter Khan_
- Start date
meatpardle
Warlord
- Joined
- Nov 4, 2015
- Messages
- 169
Me too, but the AI doesn't seem to want to play 
I agree.
The AI tries to fight at sea as it does on the land - it understands ZOC but not the relative strengths of the units employed. A privateer with logistics can have a lot of fun!
I used to build big navies (neglecting my land forces) and always play water maps, but I tend to play continents nowadays and so armies are just as important.
noto2
Emperor
- Joined
- Jul 11, 2008
- Messages
- 1,715
I always play continents or hemispheres and lately I just feel like I'm cheating when I get to the point of having a powerful navy. There are so many times when I go to war against an opponnent who's military score is double mine, but that's because they have 20 cavalry and 20 cannons, and they're on a different continent. My 5 frigates and 5 privateers end up burning every single coastal city of theirs, bringing their empire to an end, their big army ends up being completely useless. I wish the AI would focus more on its navy.
Yep once you get up to three range the writing is on the wall (well archers are a lot better too), still I like variety so I usually have random maps so I never know if I'm going to be going army, navy or both. Once in awhile you come against a costal city that is hard to attack from the water but that's pretty rare especially once you get the range upgrade whereas it seems more likely to find cities where you can't hit them with 3 range army units. There are times when I've thought of modding out the range enhancement to see what would happen.
If the AI knew how to use enhancements like this it would help a lot. It's also sad to come across Suleiman with all those cheap pirate boats that he never seems to upgrade, he could be a real naval power if he'd upgrade them (at least in my games I'm quick to get rid of pirates by the time the caravel and later stages occur so Sully captures very few newer boat types).
If the AI knew how to use enhancements like this it would help a lot. It's also sad to come across Suleiman with all those cheap pirate boats that he never seems to upgrade, he could be a real naval power if he'd upgrade them (at least in my games I'm quick to get rid of pirates by the time the caravel and later stages occur so Sully captures very few newer boat types).
Okay, this is why you were asking about donut maps!
My most satisfying watery maps have been on small islands or archipelago. That at least prompts the AIs to pay attention to their navy (as compared to their army).
But as others have noted, the AI is quite terrible at naval warfare. You can make up a bit for this by hand-picking your opponents, but not playing a naval civ yourself. Maybe bump the difficulty up a notch?
That said, after a good bit of watery experimentation, I went back to the usual continents or pangaea options -- because I was already comfortable w/ Deity play at that point, and the AIs just flounder too much on small islands or archipelago (and ring or inland is even worse).
Not only is the AI weak with naval combat, but when it comes to your navy abusing their coastline, it gets 10 times worse. AI will gladly suicide land unit after land unit which only feeds your navy with experience, which makes it even more terrifying with +1 range and +1 attack. In other words, the AI essentially speeds up its own inevitable death.
As for the question, I prefer land battles anyway.
As for the question, I prefer land battles anyway.
Trackmaster
Warlord
- Joined
- Jul 14, 2014
- Messages
- 258
The AI is pretty bad in a few areas that make some things obsolete in the game. They don't build mounted units or takes, so the Pikeman, Lancers, and anti-tank are worthless. They don't use fighters to clear the way for bombers, so air warfare is pretty simple too. I also feel like they waste their promotions on healing their units and not getting Superunits too (which is frustrating at the time though).
But mainly the no navy and no mounted unit thing is annoying.
But mainly the no navy and no mounted unit thing is annoying.
They definitely do. One of the ones I hate the most is the AI's polish UU can decimate my attack force because they knock them into bad positions. However you don't build anti units because they're simply bad and too situational, especially the anti-tank due to their bad mobility.
They build fighters but they also either move them around a lot or use them to attack which means they they can't use their intercept. I'm pretty sure it's a bug in the AI programming itself. Although in some cases they will kill your bombers.
I wouldn't say pikemen are useless, they are stronger than swordsmen and resource free.
This is so true. Which is unfortunate. Late game Navy units are my absolute favorite. Cruising up with some Nuclear Subs and Missile Cruisers to decimate all can be so satisfying. If only the guided missiles were a bit more powerful/useful to be loaded on them Cruisers
Trackmaster
Warlord
- Joined
- Jul 14, 2014
- Messages
- 258
Interesting, I usually play on Emperor, so maybe they come out more on Deity or higher. I've noticed that the barbarians tend to be Calvary units a lot. I feel like as you get more skilled in the game, they're a unit that you can definitely take advantage of. Great for flanking, pillaging, dealing damage and healing, and plenty others.
As you move to higher difficulty levels, you'll see barbarian cavalry less & less often thanks to A) much faster AI expansion, which prevents barbarian spawning, and B ) The AI directly eliminating barbarian encampments with their massive military. To make matters worse, it's extremely common for at least one AI in the area to have taken Honor, so they receive a notification when a new encampment appears. On Deity, they're *much* more aggressive about hunting down those encampments. The first time I saw a massive wave of military units coming my way I nearly had a heart attack, since on Immortal that's always a sign that they're about to attack you. But on Deity, they're often just hunting barbarians. Well... sometimes they're just hunting.
Trackmaster
Warlord
- Joined
- Jul 14, 2014
- Messages
- 258
Yeah, it's pretty eerie and ominous how when you have a massive scorched Earth campaign where you're going for domination and destroying cities that the world is overrun with Barbarians. But when you're playing peacefully and there's not much war in the game, Barbarians will be tough to come by.
Trackmaster
Warlord
- Joined
- Jul 14, 2014
- Messages
- 258
And me personally. I'm probably at the point where I do pretty well on Emperor and can usually win. But haven't been able to win on Deity. I say that's my incompetency level.
Will the AI use Calvary well on Immortal?
Will the AI use Calvary well on Immortal?
AI does use mounted units to kill your units on immortal or deity I'm sure. If the ranged unit is within 2 hex of a city, a mounted unit behind the city can kill it easily if you don't have units to block, sometimes you can't even see where they come from due to their high movements, especially some of the UU that have 5 movement. The Polish winged hussar deserves special mention, they normally knock back your units if they have higher strength, and if they can't knock back due to having a tight formation, they will very likely kill your units due to the extra damage they do, they're strong enough to even kill my riflemans used to soak damage city damage.
