Warmongering 101 - A Tactical Primer

scoutsout

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Tired of being picked on by the AI? Do your spearman fall defending cities that just built a temple? Do you play Persia because you'd rather command Immortals than fight them? If any of this sounds like you, then read on fellow civ'er; it's time to put away the building blocks and go whack somebody.

Preface:

This article offers help to newer players building their tactical "playbook" and better use some of the more advanced articles in the War Academy. This article's scope is limited to ground combat "Tactics"; there is no big picture "Strategic" help here. Unique Units are excluded to emphasize tactics that can be applied regardless of the tribe. Tactics are presented in conceptual, not formulaic terms. Links to War Academy articles are given that further develop specific topics. The article is divided into parts:
  1. Game Mechanics
  2. One-dimensional tactics
  3. Combined Arms
  4. Defense through Offense
Part 1: Game Mechanics for new players

Each unit has military value, though military use of non-combat units is beyond the scope of this article. Ground combat units' power is expressed as a numerical Attack/Defense/Movement (A/D/M) value, and bombard units have Bombard/Rate of Fire/Movement (B/R/M) values. Comparing the 2/1/1 Archer and the 1/2/1 Spearman, we see the Archer's attack value is equivalent to the Spearman's defense value; these two are an "even" match - before considering terrain. All terrain gives some bonus value to the defending unit. For more on the CivIII Combat System, see Combat System Explained by Valant2. Once you understand these basics, go to the Civ3 References and Guides page and familiarize yourself with a Combat Calculator. If you want a good unit reference to keep next to the keyboard, LoneWolf5050 put together some nice Adobe Acrobat reference files available from the same page (one each for Civ3, PTW, and C3C).

Advice from "Corporal Punishment"

As new players learn the mechanics of the game they meet their Military Advisor, who tells them if the military is "Strong" or "Weak" compared to an AI Civ. This is based on the players number and mix of units compared to the AI's. Is it good advice? Not always. It is important to know that your Military Advisor "thinks" like the AI; who tend to:
  • Value offensive units more than defensive units.
  • Value quantity over quality.
  • Place a relatively low value on bombard units.
  • Recognize Veteran units are more valuable than Regulars.
  • Disregard the speed of fast units; the AI regards a horseman as no more 'powerful' than an archer.
Though I won't go into the math here, three veteran Archers are given more than twice the basic combat value of two regular spearmen under the AIs algorithm. For the math, see Study of Inner Workings of Military Advisor by ProPain.

While there are many ways to use this understanding, I offer some early-game pointers for new players:
  • Once the first few cities are founded, build a barracks in a town with good shield potential and have that city build units (and little else) in the early game.
  • Warriors, left as warriors, have limited military value.
  • Don't rely on Spearmen alone to defend your empire. There is something to be said for a good defense provided by good offense. (More on this later)
  • Build more offensive than defensive units; even if your best option is archers, and even if you don't plan to go to war (yet). The AI will be more respectful if you have a "strong" military, and you'll have something to counterattack with if the AI do come after you.
Part 2: One-dimensional tactics

Each age has a unit that is potentially dominant; one that attacks well and defends as well (or nearly as well) as its contemporary defender.

Ancient Age: Swordsmen and Spears both defend at 2
Middle Age: Knights and Pikes defend at 3
Industrial Age: Tanks defend at 8, Infantry at 10
Modern Age: Modern Armor defend at 16, Mech Infantry at 18.

These units are all capable of one-dimensional warfare. The campaigns involve simple, straight ahead attacks that get-in-the-AI's-face and charge. Essentially we're talking about building a good quantity of a specific unit, putting the units together in a single, simple "Stack of Doom" and invading somebody in a straightforward campaign using just that one type of unit.

Advantages: The campaigns are simple, and can be very effective when the attacker outclasses the defender. Players need to remember to use terrain to advantage (see "combat system") and keep the stack together. Avoid chasing "stray" isolated AI units, this usually gets your own units isolated and picked off.

Disadvantages: One-dimensional campaigns are can stall, even after success. Attrition is the biggest reason such a campaign may stall. As the offensive presses deeper into enemy territory, units are lost in combat and others are left behind to secure what has been conquered. It is important to recognize this point if it comes; if your offensive stalls, it's time to re-group or cease hostilities and consolidate new holdings. Such campaigns can also be extremely costly if the enemy's defenders are as strong as your attackers (examples:Swords v. Pikemen, Knights v. Muskets).

How much is "enough"?

Attack with insufficient strength, and one-dimensional campaigns stall quickly. On the other hand, assembling an overwhelming force may delay the start of a campaign to the point that an opportunity is missed. A stack of Cavalry that may have faced musketmen a few turns ago could face riflemen if invading a scientific civ that just got Nationalism. Key to waging successful one-dimensional campaigns is to recognize when it is successful, and when it is at risk of stalling. More key points:
  • Concentrate forces. Four swords attacking two spears in one location have a better chance of success than two pairs of swords attacking one spear each in two locations.
  • Focus on the objective. Don't "chase strays", or engage the enemy in ways that do not support the objective.
  • City defenders can heal between turns; attackers in enemy territory generally cannot.
  • Attackers must continue to capture territory. Taking casualties without taking territory spells the beginning of the end.
  • Repeated unsuccessful attacks on a city without taking it can spell disaster. If a second attack fails, it is time to stop playing and reconsider your position.
Some Early-Game Gambits using One-dimensional Tactics:

The Archer Rush: Simply build a stack of archers and go whack somebody. When successful, an archer rush can an effective means of grabbing a resource or simply grabbing some territory. The biggest drawback is that a failed archer rush can leave you militarily weak and vulnerable to counterattack. This tactic gets increasingly risky at higher difficulty levels.

The Warrior-to-Swordsman Gambit: This takes planning, and some gold. Since Warriors upgrade to Swordsmen, you can build warriors before you have iron connected, move the warriors to a city with a barracks, upgrade them to Swordsmen, and then simply whack somebody. When done well this is an extremely powerful early game tactic. It can fail dismally if you build nothing but warriors, learn Iron Working, and find you have no Iron. At higher difficulty levels the AI will demand tribute early and often, making it harder to accumulate the cash needed for the upgrades.

The Onslaught of Horsemen: Horsemen may be employed using one-dimensional tactics. Speed kills. Horsemen can attack cities from across the border at the beginning of a war, and the Horsemen's retreat ability helps keep losses lower. An advantage to using horsemen in ancient conquests is the upgrade path. A large number of horsemen upgraded to knights in the early middle ages can be a formidable force.

Part 3: Combined Arms - the human players' edge

Combined Arms is a real world military doctrine that uses different types of units or weapon systems to fight in a coordinated manner. Classic combined arms involves the use of Infantry, Artillery, and Cavalry. In Civ Warfare, Combined Arms concepts can be applied to give the human player an edge in force preservation; improving your kill ratio. Combined arms campaigns are fought more slowly and methodically; but can be just as decisive. Attackers win more often when fighting defenders that are weakened by bombardment. Combined arms warfare in CivIII will generally use combinations of units that meet these needs:
  • Units that defend well.
  • Units that attack well.
  • Units that bombard.
A note on "lobbing things at the enemy".

You don't have to fight many Civ battles to see an AI catapult lob a rock at one of your units as it attacks an AI city. While there is nothing wrong with using bombard units as part of a city's defense, this does not reflect the full potential of bombard units, and it is not really a good application of combined arms. Let's get one thing straight about bombardment units: Although they have defensive value, their classic role is as siege weapons.

Ancient Age Unit Mixes: Using 'classic' combined arms, a combined arms stack would include Spearmen, Catapults, and Horsemen. Archers are a unit well worth including in a stack, as are Swordsmen. Invasion tactics using combined arms are straightforward.


  • Move the units together in a single stack next to a target city.
  • Bombard the city.
  • If you brought fast units (that can retreat) attack with these next (depending on the success of the bombardment).
  • Attack with your highest attack value footsoldiers available, and finish the defenders. Use Swordsmen (if available) then Archers.
The concept is simple. By "reducing" the target (weakening the defenders) you take fewer casualties and have a greater chance for success. By following the bombardment with attacks by fast units, you increase the chances that your swordsmen or archers will attack redlined defenders.

Variation: If your goal is to raze the target city rather than capture it, attack the last defender with a fast unit, so the unit that finishes the job can retreat to the safety of the stack after sacking the city. (You did count defenders when bombarding, didn't you?)

Reinforcing the stack: Some combat losses will occur; fast units may be able to "catch up" to the stack uncovered, but slow units must move more deliberately. High attack/low defense units (archers/swordsmen) are easy prey if isolated. Consider a safe "rally point" to assemble a mix of defensive and offensive units that move to the front together. When assembling reinforcements, consider the archer/longbow defensive free shot in C3C.

The "Poor Man's Army": The most important strategic resource in is Iron. If you don't have it, you need to "acquire it". A combined arms stack of Spearmen, Archers, and Catapults is the "poor man's army" you can raise to go out and take it. If you look for the units that require no strategic resources you will find the components of the poor man's army in other eras.

A note on medeival warfare: Consider the cost of a Knight (70 shields) compared to the cost of a Catapult (20s) or Trebuchet (30s), Medeival Infantry (40s), Longbow (40s), and Pikeman (30s). While Knights are worth including in a Middle Ages combined arms stack, it is worth noting that you can build 2 units for the same 70 shields.

Part 4: Defense through Offense; Zone Defense and Skirmishing

There is truth to the adage "the best defense is a good offense". If an AI sends archers against a city defended only by spearmen, your city just became a punching bag. You can only wait and hope the spearmen hold. On the other hand, if you have 3 archers and one spearman in that city, there is a good chance you can kill some of the AI archers before that first attack on your city. This is "defense through offense" in a basic form. Learning defense through offense is critical to survive an attack by an enemy that is either numerically or technologically superior.

Consider Combined Arms in this scenario. If you have some Catapults in that town, you can knock a few hit points off the AI archers before your archers attack. Concentrated firepower is key to using bombarding units; whether in the offense or defense. The defensive value of bombardment units grows as the game progresses. Zagnut wrote an excellent article on How To Use Artillery Defensively

Zone Defense: A city's garrison should not be the only defense available to that city; nearby cities should be able to reinforce a city under seige. This is one reason that the city-tile-tile-city placement is popular among many players; a city under seige can be reinforced by the garrisons of more than one nearby town. Bombard units can often be placed in such a way that they can help defend 2 or more cities. Whether you pull from the center to the front, or shift units among the border cities; visualize troop movements within your borders so you can reinforce a city at a moment's notice. Fast units can be brought to the aid of a beseiged city quickly, and can be used to reduce the enemy's stacks before they can even close with your cities.

Skirmishing: This simple tactic can be brutally effective against slow moving enemy troops. The concept is simple: Use fast units (Horsemen, Knights, Cavalry) to attack enemy units within your borders, and retreat to the safety of your city on the same turn. If attacking an enemy stack just outside your border, do not attack that last enemy unit. This will leave your unit exposed outside your borders, where it can be easily killed. Ideally, you'll have a barracks in that border town, and all of the tiles within your cultural borders will be roaded. If the enemy comes within range of your bombarding units, then you can apply combined arms with skirmishing.

In Closing

Though most of the tactics are discussed using ancient age units, you will find that the principles can generally be applied with units from any era. I hope that the information provided helps newer players select their tactics wisely depending on their situation. Good Luck!
 
Good, no nonsense article Scoutsout :goodjob:


Ted
 
:goodjob:

First long article that I've read in almost half a year!

You didn't stress the importance of artillery pounding metropolises enough... ;)

Other than that, great article!
 
Thanks for the compliments guys, I appreciate it coming from you. @Ted: Good to "see" you again! @Tomo: Hopefully anyone who needs to know about pounding metros can pick up that pointer from your post. ;)
 
I appreciate the compliments.

@Microbe: Though I think 'kill zones' are beyond the scope of this article, I think those reading the article might benefit from some discussion in this thread... would you care to kick it off?
 
nice article scout :thumbsup:

i'll chip in a little and let the discussion start on killzones.

people probably define them in different ways, and seasoned all-war players can explain it much better than i can. they can also probably explain better how to use these zones efficiently.

for me, a kill zone is when you have a town(s) or a secured tile on highly defensible terrain (hills for towns or mountains for SoD's) with poor defense terrain surrounding it, ie, grass or plains. the town can also have walls built or be pop 7 or above to get the maximum available defensive bonus (hills+walls+fortified bonuses).
if your fighting defensively, then all the tiles around the killzone town should have roads to ease movement for your troops. stack the town with spears or swords, horseman, and cats for the Ancient Age.
let the AI units walk up to your town or, in the case of fast movement units, attack it (it's also nice to extend your borders culturally with a cheap temple so the fast units can only move next to town). then counter by hitting them with bombard units (cats, etc) to lower thier hp's, then kill them. build up some elites this way and you have an MGL generator.

if your in enemy territory, this can be done by moving your units onto a mountain (preferably roaded if you want to bring cats). AI will usually come at you one or 2 at a time (as soon as they are built) and you can defend or attack to pick them off.

the real key for either version is that your units have the high ground and the attacking units have poor ground. another thing that can be done is to place the town across a river from the attackers to get an additional defensive bonus. this works best after engineering is discovered, allowing fast units to move, attack, and retreat back into town. before engineering, it works just as well, but you may leave a fast unit or 2 exposed when you chew up a movement point crossing the river if you have to attack a unit with good defense and a lot of hp's left (you weren't considering attacking that 4/4 immortal across the river, where you :lol: ) of course, i probably missed a bunch of stuff so feel free to correct or add.

below is a sample of a kill zone from sgotm3 (basically XAWE), a loss for my team, but we killed a ton of units. red areas were the kills zones, but were poorly roaded which caused issues. yellows tiles were our achilles, those hills and mountains were unforgiving so we just bombarded the units and let them retreat. the other issue was that we were fighting infantry and cavs with knights, legions, and cat's. (this was PTW, not C3C). it's an interesting image, showing some fundimental flaws (lack of roads) and may add a little to this interesting discussion :)

 
You seem to be a bit behind in tech... ;)

An extension of the AW kill zone is to have a bait city somewhere (e.g., in your game, fortify the mountains and hills arounf Arretium and leave it empty, but make sure the Cavs can't get to it) so that your front, in essemce shrinks. Bait cities are normally considered exploitive, but are an Always War tradition.

I don't think anyone has mentioned to never leave a unit exposed by attacking the last unit of a stack with a horseman? Or did I misread gram's post?
 
Inspired by Scout and gram, I'll chip in a little as well...

The Killzone

The killzone is a defensive strategy that is easily maintained (once you set it up, it requires very little reinforcement), operates with a certain degree of repeatability (you can repeat the same maneuvers turn after turn and achieving the same result), that allows the human player to achieve high kill ratios against the AI.

The purpose of a killzone is not to capture cities (that will come later), but rather to kill units, at minimal cost to yourself. There are two instances where you may want to employ the killzone.

First, right after the declaration of war, you may use to killzone to destroy most of an opponent's army, before moving into his territory and taking his cities. This is a good strategy because of how the AI operates after declaration of war. The AI will first send all of its spare troops towards its enemy. If this AI has been at peace for a long time, and has been building troops, then there could a quite a few troops involved. If the AI has railroad, or if there is a choke somewhere in his territory, then you could see some of the legendary SoD's at this time. However, after the initial wave, the AI goes into "trick mode", where it could only afford to send the troops that it is able to produce that turn. So after surviving the initial wave, the human player is always at an advantage. The killzone is the most efficient way to deal with an on rushing of AI troops.

A second use of the killzone is where you wish to conduct a war while devoting most of your empire's resources elsewhere. This use most frequently surfaces in Always War games and games where the goal is a none-military win. This use of the killzone is important because, once again, of how the AI deals with war. In a war, the AI will devote almost all of its resources to the war. It will mostly ignore expansion, culture, etc. This is actually the reason why the human player can win in Always War scenarios, because the AI will ignore its infrastructure, while the human player can build libraries and granaries and fight off 4 AI's at the same time, with the killzone of course.

Here are a few key elements of the kill zone:

- Figure out what the AI won't attack. The AI calculates combat odds one unit at a time, so in certain situations where the odds are heavily in your unit's favor, the AI will never attack your unit. A good example of this is the C3C army. Other cases can be found through out the game (For example, an elite spearmen on a hill will not be attacked by regular swordsmen). Your unit's defense, hit points, terrain, and fortifying are all important factors.

Once you have found out what the AI won't attack, you can use this knowledge to your advantage to shape the battlefield. For example, if you want the AI to take 3 movement points to get to your city, then you know you need to fortify a certain unit. at a certain spot. If you want to station your catapult stack on a certain hill to be able to hit all in-coming units, then you know what you need to cover it with. If you absolutely don't want the AI to hold a certain plain tile that has no other defensive bonus, then you know you need to station an army there.

- Next you need to make the AI predicable in what it wishes to attack, and how it is trying to get to that location. Knowing what the AI won't attack certainly helps, because the AI will ignore those locations and go after the others. Leaving an empty city in the back will almost always do it, but that's so effective that it can be considered exploitive. Settlers and workers also make great baits, though sometimes the AI will find higher priorities than them. Most of the times, simply leaving one city more lightly defended than others will do the trick. The AI cheats. It knows what kind of defenders you have in each of your cities. So take advantage of that.

You also want to control how the AI is moving towards their target. This is where once again knowing what they won't attack helps tremendously. You don't want the AI units to end their turn on good defensive terrain, so you want to occupy those. You want the AI units to be within striking distance of your units, so you may need to occupy certain key locations to alter the AI's path-finding routes.

- The next key to a killzone is combined arms. You will need defensive troops, bombardment troops, offensive foot soldiers, and offensive mobile troops.

The defensive troops are used for creating "no attack points". Bombardment units help you achieve high kill ratio in attack by reducing enemy hit points. Offensive foot soldiers usually have the same attack power as mobile units, but at a much lower price. They can be used to attack units in a stack. Because mobile units do not retreat against units that have 1 hit point left, do not use mobile units in those situations, use the cheaper foot soldiers instead. The mobile units are used for kill that last unit in a stack, then retreating back to safety before the counter attack.

- The last key point of a kill zone is to attack, never defend. Whenever units from the two sides engage in a battle, your units should always be the attackers. This is possible because you have created points on the frontline where the AI won't attack, and the points in the back-line where the AI is trying to attack... they will never reach.

The main reason for doing this, is because there is always a greater chance of losing units on defense than offense. The fact that the AI is attacking at a certain point shows that there is a decent chance for the attacker to win there, otherwise the AI won't be attacking you there. However, on offense, with the help of your bombardment units, your odds of winning are much greater. If the catapults had a bad day on the job, then you could always hold your offense back until better odds come by.

Another reason for attacking is related to war weariness. You gain WW from: losing units, losing city, being pillaged, and being attacked. Even if the defender wins, 2 points worth of WW is added to your total. Therefore when waging war in Republic, it is always to good idea to avoid playing the punching bag.

* * *

So what does a killzone looks like? There is going to be a stream of AI units pouring into it, converging onto a single point in your territory. Along the path that the AI units are taking, your units are occupying all the high grounds. Sometimes there are forts being built where the nature defensive bonus isn’t enough for the AI to ignore you. Roads link your empire to all the defensive positions to make movements easier. Inside the defensive positions, there are fortified defenders, huge stacks of bombardment units, smaller stacks of your best offensive units, some are healing, and some are ready to attack. Then there are some of you best mobile attackers, after most of the AI units are destroyed, they come out to pick off the last few enemy units in the field, before racing back under the protection of the defensive troops. Overall on the battlefield, not one of your troops isn't inside one of your stronghold at the end of the turn.
 
Very informative and interesting post, thanks scoutsout (and everyone else!).

I have just started playing at Warlord level and some of the things the AI does are very peculiar. So any information helps.
 
Great articles, Scoutsout, Grahamian, and SJ Frank.
I knew about the way the AI counts military strength, but never made the connection that to defend my cities I should build more archers than spearmen. This not only allows me to defend my cities through offense, but since the AI thinks I'm stronger, it lessens the chance I'll get attacked in the first place.
Kill zones are a specialty of mine, and barricades are my friends. There are few things more satisfying than using a grand battery of artillery to redline a Stack Of Doom in 2-3 turns, as it trudges across wasteland to face my fortified units in barricades.
One thing not covered in the above posts is the idea of 'puppet strings', maybe because some people consider it an exploit. When the Stack Of Doom comes at a front-line city, if you heavily reinforce that city and weaken a nearby front-line city, the Stack will sometimes turn around and move toward the newly-weakened city. If it's under bombardment the whole time, often it will never get there.
 
@Pook: Generally the puppet string thing is an exploit, but it is an AW tradition.
 
One other note about how the AI attacks. This is just from my observation, no one has told me this definitively. When I as a player get units damaged to 1-2 HP, I will either leave them with the main body, or give them a strong escort back to a place where they can heal.

Unlike a human, the AI will retreat its weakened units by themselves with no escort. For example, when the AI has a stack of veteran 4 HP units, it will press forward with the units that have 3-4 HP left, but retreat the 1-2 HP units in a stack by themselves. If it won't endanger your own position too much, this gives you the opportunity to quickly take out a number of AI units. This could be with cavalry, or with bombers.
 
I'm going to have to come back to this thread tomorrow and re-read some of this discussion...lots of good stuff here! I really appreciate those of you who are posting some things that build on what I posted...

@SJ Frank: You could probably take your 'kill zone' post and develop that into a stand-alone article....

Something else that caught my attention:
Pook said:
One thing not covered in the above posts is the idea of 'puppet strings',
Ari calls this the "Decision Initiative Dance" in his War Acaemy Article, DID: the Perfect Plan to Master Civ by Ari
 
But hasn't the AI been altered in this point with Conquests? I remember to have read there was a change that the AI now not always (though still often) attack the least protected city? I have it experienced quite often that the AI attacks my heavy fortified and garrisoned border cities.
 
Pfeffersack said:
But hasn't the AI been altered in this point with Conquests? I remember to have read there was a change that the AI now not always (though still often) attack the least protected city? I have it experienced quite often that the AI attacks my heavy fortified and garrisoned border cities.

You're right. Finding out what the AI is trying to attack is not an exact science. One turn 1 of a war, the human player can't predict exactly where the AI will strike. However, once the war starts and the AI picks out a target, it won't change that target unless something else changes, like you moving a defender or capturing a new city.
 
Interesting stuff. I never tend to use killzones, but I can see why they might be useful in always war games/ Sid games.

Re the puppet on a string idea, I would refer folks to boobaboo's HOF games which describe the behaviour of the AI stacks in sid games in the ancient era.
As described above they will head towards your nearest undefended city but will turn back for home if you can get a single unit onto their home turf and start pillaging.

The key thing about war is to take/raze a town in the first assault, and this should be possible at any level. Provided you can hang on without losing a town until the AI will talk to you, the peace settlement will be in your favour.

I think concentrating your forces as much as possible is the key. The overall relative size of the AI forces to yours doesn't matter, what matters is how many attackers you have on the spot compared with the defending AI. It is possible to calculate how many attackers are needed to reliably take a position and if at all possible you should attack with the right number (it's more than you/I think), at least at the start of a war. Later on when you are mopping up AI remnants it is reasonable to take some risks in pursuit of speed.
 
I have a simple thing to chip in with your war article scoutsout. You always have to remember that attacking strong defensive units with weak units will just give the enemy free experience. However, since you want to attack with your more powerful units last because you don't want to risk them (which is why artillery is important), then it's hard to decide between the weak units and the strong units. At least, this is what I've noticed, I'm not sure how useful/helpful/true this actually is, because war is one of ym weak points.

Anyway, this thread is very helpful. Thanks for the info everybody! :goodjob:

EDIT: Oh, and a question I have for you experts here...is it better to use a horseman's speed or a swordsman's attack/defense? Or does it depend on the situation? Thanks in advance!
 
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