Key factors for UUs and UBs.

Iwo Jima said:

I could say, that Oromo with single promotion is twice better (9+50%) than Cuir with single promotion (12+10%) if they meet each other in the clear field.

It seems, that UUs guide has absolutely no sense, because there is the only uber-unit for all times is Cuirassier )))[/COLOR]

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Not sure what you mean with that first line... Cuirs ignore first strikes, so a single promotion Oromo is max 9+25% vs cuir in open field.

The cuir is not the only uber unit in all times, but it is still a unit that must be considered when evaluating UUs. The power of the UU should be compared with other options you have around the same time. Quechuas are of course ridiculously overpowered in this category, no other unit can easily conquer several cities before building your first worker (assuming difficulty monarch or above), which make Quechuas the one UU to rule them all. WCs and immortals also have a great advantage over other units you can build at the same time. It would seem that they shouldn't have such a long life span, because HBR is only one tech away, but HBR is an expensive dead end tech that you want to avoid early if possible. With WCs and Immortals you can do so, because while weaker than HAs, they are still strong enough for the task. Praets are also very strong compared to anything else you could have at the time.

Then if you look at a unit like the impi, whenever you can build impis, you can also build aggressive axes, which are a lot stronger when it matters (=when attacking cities). Later in the game you have more options and no UU is clearly superior to the alternative anymore. Oromos are good units, but they are competing with CR maces, which do the job fine. Samurais might have clearly better odds than maces when you look at just a samurai vs longbows in cities, however, the odds are still so low that you would usually want some siege to go with that. Once the siege has done their job, there's not that much difference between samurai and regular mace anymore.

Cataphracts are clearly better than knights, but cuirs are clearly better than cataphracts. This lowers the ranking of cataphracts a lot, since cuirs can usually be reached almost as fast as cataphracts. I have played a game where I conquered the entire map with cataphracts. It was fun and they did quite well, but I still prefer cuirs. And btw. the slight increase in strength does not always lead to a massive increase in odds. For example vs protective longbow behind walls, a typical defender against these units, the knight has 22.46% odds while a cataphract has 23.7% odds. Cuirs would have 34.78% victory odds and 44.5% survival odds.

Regarding legacy, I'd put more value on what the units upgrade to than what bonuses are carried on. Once again the WC beats the impi, I'd rather have a bunch of war chariots to upgrade to cuirs than some impis to upgrade to pikes (and eventually a veeeery long time in the future to mech infantry with mobility promotion).

Iwo Jima said:

This game is NOT about gaining land. Not only. You could win with different ways, even without expansion or war. For example, founding early religions (most of players do not like it, but I like) has similar cumulative effect as grabbing lands.

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Unfortunately, it is mostly about gaining land. You can win in different ways, but the key to winning fast is to gain land early. And please do not bring up such ridiculous claims about religions, it will only derail this thread.

Iwo Jima said:

While Knights are not very dangerous for cities, they still very strong in open field. So, they can real threat for your CR-stack on its way to the target city. And you need mix your maces with pikes to be effective against it. There is also catapults/cannons threat for your CR-stack, that could do a lot of collateral damage. So, you need additional units with drill, or very good medic. Otherwise you could achieve your target with very damaged units. You also should bring with CR-stack some bows, for guarding city when you take it. So, its a very complicated task to gather good CR-stack and moreover, to keep it effective for a long time. For, example, if you lose your pikes in enemy skirmishes, you need wait, until new pikes will join your stack...

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A knight might kill one of your maces. So what? It's not like the AI will build a stack of 20 knights to wipe out your stack. Bringing a pike or two to counter the occasional knight attack is not that much of a hazzle. If losing a pike means that you wait for another pike before continuing your conquest, then you are making a huge mistake and should work on your war strategy. No need to bring bows either. Conquered cities usually don't need any other city guards than whatever units you have that need healing.

elitetroops said:

some impis to upgrade to pikes (and eventually a veeeery long time in the future to mech infantry with mobility promotion).

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I know that when you upgrade an impi to a pike it loses the mobility promotion,so what your saying is the upgrade to rifles/infantry also dont get the promotion but mech infantry do?(eeeeventually)as you say.I never knew that.It also throws out an interesting prospect-mobility mech infantry with the commando promotion-the perfect nuke chasers-very .

I rate the oromos highly because they are a 1 stop shop unit,and easy to get early.No need for messing around with pikes for theses boys,the drill line takes you to formation with the second promotion,this massacres knights/war elephants and even give cuirissars a run for their money.

Numidians are better than HAs on deity imo, where AIs always have metals when you attack. With 3 metal types around usually (swords too), i find those rushes much safer with them

Not sure about Immortal, i think archers might be more present here and value of Numidians decreases.

Iwo Jima said:

This game is NOT about gaining land. Not only. You could win with different ways, even without expansion or war. For example, founding early religions (most of players do not like it, but I like) has similar cumulative effect as grabbing lands. Or finding a strong and stable neighbor and playing his vassal, winning with the only three cities with culture victory. Or you could play Portugese style, be small and weak, until you colonize all continents, free you colonies, and win with AP or UN.

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If you don't even understand something as essential as this about the (early) game play, then there is little point in us trying to convince you of the errors with your approach. It also seems fairly obvious by now that you're not very open to different opinions. Three people with not exactly little experience between them have tried to explain to you why in particular three UUs are so much better than everything else, but you're not open minded enough to grasp it, it seems.

Therefore, continued participation in this thread is a waste of time. Thankfully this thread isn't in the War Academy at least; there are many other articles with poor advice, and this would be yet another if it was in there for some odd reason.

Yes,Im sure Absolute zero proved this on 1 of his lets plays,Hannible is his favourite civ I think.Ive tried to make Numidians work on EMP level with little success,although they are great for taking out AI stacks in the open field.

Fippy said:

Numidians are better than HAs on deity imo, where AIs always have metals when you attack. With 3 metal types around usually (swords too), i find those rushes much safer with them

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Interesting to hear that from you. I know AZ made similar claims in a Hannibal video. I haven't done any deity HA rushing, so wouldn't know... But the numbers I've seen in HoF games, like the stats from WastinTime's game I posted above, are quite similar to what I've seen on lower levels. Roughly 3-4 times more archers than metal units. Though that game was marathon speed, which probably makes a difference. I assume pillaging metals is a lot more effective on slower speeds.

Do not forget that HoF games are cooked, you will not have an evil Ragnar with copper + iron boxing you in there

Everything i write goes for normal games, i am sure Numidans have no place in HoF top winner games cos it's bad if you face tuff opponents there no matter with what unit.

1 or 2 years ago when I was fond of Numidians, you explained me exactly the things that we explained to the OP this time, so that Numidians are weaker against the main opponents, which are Archers.

The Dog Soldier ought to be rated higher due to its guaranteed anti-barb effectiveness on very high difficulty levels. It allows SB to skip Hunting and Archery in the very early game, saving valuable turns. It's also extremely powerful on Prince and below vs. civs that don't start with Hunting. Admittedly though, they are weak specifically on Monarch and maybe Emperor when all civs start with Archery and barbs aren't that big of a deal.

The Camel Archer is also a somewhat underrated unit in that its 15% extra withdrawal rate, combined with Flanking II, allows a pretty good chance of flank attacking an invading Medieval stack and surviving. With enough Camel Archers with Flanking II, you can decimate the stack to the point where it lacks any siege at all. With that, the stack will be forced to attack through a weakly-bombarded PRO wall and maybe castle against full-HP PRO longbows. This effectively makes Saladin possess as much Medieval-era defensive prowess as Sitting Bull.

The advantage Numidians have against metal units compared to regular HAs really shrinks as defensive bonuses increase. HA and Numidians have virtually the same odds against a fully fortified spear in a hilled city with 40% culture defense.

In that situation:
6 str HA vs (4*2.9) = 11.6 str Spear. Spear has 1.93x str
5 str Num vs (4 *2.4) = 9.6 str Num. Spear has 1.92x str

And the extreme example in the other direction would be open terrain with no defensive bonuses. This is the absolute best case for a Numidian against a Spear.

6 str HA vs (4x2) = 8 str Spear. 1.33x
5 str Num vs (4*1.5) = 6 str Spear. 1.2x

I think it's more favorable versus axes and swords, but the +100% bonus for spears really nullifies a lot of the advantage that a Numidian should have due to the way that combat is calculated in Civ 4. And of course they are quite a bit weaker against Archers.

The Numidian does have the free Flanking I promotion though. IMHO that's the best thing about it. You don't have to actually use NC's in combat to benefit from them. Later on, as cuirs/cav, they can get Combat I, Combat II/Pinch, and Flanking II with only 8 xp. Or they can get Flanking II and Mobility with 4 xp and gain some of the utility of Keshiks but also retain it when upgraded.

They are also good at pillaging, worker stealing, and counter-offensive action vs. opponents without horse. The time window for this lasts until the opponent gets Feudalism, which is pretty good. The opponent can even get Machinery and Construction but you can pillage their iron and ivory.

It's too long ago I did anything relevant with Numidians (might even have been Warlords?) but there is one more thing: The synergy of their native flanking with Hannibal's Charismatic trait. So even with unfavorable odds, quite a few are bound to survive and get promoted quickly.
That they are so weak against archers is a problem, of course.

Kallikrates said:

It's too long ago I did anything relevant with Numidians (might even have been Warlords?) but there is one more thing: The synergy of their native flanking with Hannibal's Charismatic trait. So even with unfavorable odds, quite a few are bound to survive and get promoted quickly.
That they are so weak against archers is a problem, of course.

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That's a great point; experience is determined by strength ratios but survival is determined by victory chances as well as withdrawal chances.

This is also why Oromos (or their upgrades) are so great; their victory chances are increased by their first strikes, but their experience is determined from their relatively lower strength ratio vs the opponent. This makes "to 5 xp" experience boosts from Vassalage, etc. less valuable and drafting Oromos more valuable. GM from Econ -> Draft Oromos -> Upgrade to Rifles is my preferred way of using them. The drafting should be finished just before Rifling is finished, so prior research won't be adversely affected.

OP, I would like to point out that you missed out the passive effects of some UUs in terms of demographics. I am referring to some UU that gives bigger soldier values compared to their vanilla ones. An example of such are (BtS Patch 3.17):

Bowman and Skirmisher - 4000 Soldiers instead of 3000 Soldiers
Praetorian - 8000 Soldiers instead of 6000 Soldiers
Berserker - 10000 Soldiers instead of 9000 Soldiers

So how are these numbers relevant? Take for the case of Bowman and Skirmisher. If you are preventing a DoW from a neighboring Shaka or Ragnar, you might as well increase your soldier strength. In the process of building your UU, it is also saving you . Why? Normally it would take 8 archers to boost soldiers to 24000 Soldiers but with that UU, you only needed 6 UU to attain the same value. In a way, you are fooling the AI of your military strength.

Since your rating system is an objective type, so what category should we put this at?

elitetroops said:

Regarding legacy, I'd put more value on what the units upgrade to than what bonuses are carried on. Once again the WC beats the impi, I'd rather have a bunch of war chariots to upgrade to cuirs than some impis to upgrade to pikes (and eventually a veeeery long time in the future to mech infantry with mobility promotion).

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This is excallent addition!

It's also good example Samurai or other Maces, that could be upgraded into two different units.

I will insert this point to post for sure. Thanks!

elitetroops said:

A knight might kill one of your maces. So what? It's not like the AI will build a stack of 20 knights to wipe out your stack. Bringing a pike or two to counter the occasional knight attack is not that much of a hazzle. If losing a pike means that you wait for another pike before continuing your conquest, then you are making a huge mistake and should work on your war strategy. No need to bring bows either. Conquered cities usually don't need any other city guards than whatever units you have that need healing.

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My experience, that when your CR-stack goes through enemy lands, you have a very big risk to find one or two enemy stacks, attacking you. So, it's not a single knight.

Possibly, you play so good, that you quickly outproduce your opponent and have an army of 50 units, when your opponent has only 10. But this is not military factor.

Pangaea said:

If you don't even understand something as essential as this about the (early) game play, then there is little point in us trying to convince you of the errors with your approach. It also seems fairly obvious by now that you're not very open to different opinions. Three people with not exactly little experience between them have tried to explain to you why in particular three UUs are so much better than everything else, but you're not open minded enough to grasp it, it seems.

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Where is your logic? You say that this game ONLY about expansion, and I say it's NOT ONLY about expansion, i.e. about exapnsion and smth else. So, what point of view is wider - mine or yours???

Don't ascribe me wrong point view. I never wrote that expansion is bad thing. I also play for early expansion. But it is not the only way to play CivIV. Do you feel the difference?

Also, to be absolutely correct, this game not about gaining lands (because half of lands is futile, and gaing a lot of useless lands could even ruin your game), but about gaining right lands, some key-points. Sure, you know it, just making a correct statement.

Kallikrates said:

It's too long ago I did anything relevant with Numidians (might even have been Warlords?) but there is one more thing: The synergy of their native flanking with Hannibal's Charismatic trait. So even with unfavorable odds, quite a few are bound to survive and get promoted quickly.
That they are so weak against archers is a problem, of course.

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This!!!

My experience says that average Numidians easy get 4-5 promotions, while HA has only 2 or 3.

pandamancer said:

OP, I would like to point out that you missed out the passive effects of some UUs in terms of demographics. I am referring to some UU that gives bigger soldier values compared to their vanilla ones. An example of such are (BtS Patch 3.17):

Bowman and Skirmisher - 4000 Soldiers instead of 3000 Soldiers
Praetorian - 8000 Soldiers instead of 6000 Soldiers
Berserker - 10000 Soldiers instead of 9000 Soldiers

So how are these numbers relevant? Take for the case of Bowman and Skirmisher. If you are preventing a DoW from a neighboring Shaka or Ragnar, you might as well increase your soldier strength. In the process of building your UU, it is also saving you . Why? Normally it would take 8 archers to boost soldiers to 24000 Soldiers but with that UU, you only needed 6 UU to attain the same value. In a way, you are fooling the AI of your military strength.

Since your rating system is an objective type, so what category should we put this at?

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Can't understand, what you wrote about

GreatProfit said:

That's a great point; experience is determined by strength ratios but survival is determined by victory chances as well as withdrawal chances.

This is also why Oromos (or their upgrades) are so great; their victory chances are increased by their first strikes, but their experience is determined from their relatively lower strength ratio vs the opponent. This makes "to 5 xp" experience boosts from Vassalage, etc. less valuable and drafting Oromos more valuable. GM from Econ -> Draft Oromos -> Upgrade to Rifles is my preferred way of using them. The drafting should be finished just before Rifling is finished, so prior research won't be adversely affected.

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This!!!

Definitly, this article needs drafting factor to describe!

Iwo Jima said:

Can't understand, what you wrote about

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On the Info Screen, there is a "Power" chart. Power represents a civ's number of "Soldiers." Roughly, every max 1 is equivalent to 1000 Soldiers. So one Archer represents 3000 Soldiers. There are exceptions though; one 5 Axeman is actually worth 6000 Soldiers.

Skirmishers are worth 4000 Soldiers each, but cost the same 25 each as normal archers. So you get more Soldiers per .

Interestingly, purely in terms of Solders per , Axemen are still better than Skirmishers (171 vs. 160).

For more info on Soldiers, see here:
http://www.civfanatics.com/civ4/strategy/demographics.php

GreatProfit said:

On the Info Screen, there is a "Power" chart. Power represents a civ's number of "Soldiers." Roughly, every max 1 is equivalent to 1000 Soldiers. So one Archer represents 3000 Soldiers. There are exceptions though; one 5 Axeman is actually worth 6000 Soldiers.

Skirmishers are worth 4000 Soldiers each, but cost the same 25 each as normal archers. So you get more Soldiers per .

Interestingly, purely in terms of Solders per , Axemen are still better than Skirmishers (171 vs. 160).

For more info on Soldiers, see here:
http://www.civfanatics.com/civ4/strategy/demographics.php

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I see. Thanks. But don't know how to connect this with the main topic.

Iwo Jima said:

I see. Thanks. But don't know how to connect this with the main topic.

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What he meant was that you can prevent DoWs by having high enough power. Unfortunately, the power usually has to be very high to prevent this, and it is only an on/off switch (higher power doesn't make you a less likely target until you pass the threshold and become immune to attacks), so this is not a very efficient way to keep yourself safe. Personally I wouldn't give any extra value to the higher soldier count on some of the UUs.