Ancient Domination with Horses

[slowrider]

Have had good success with this approach on noble/pangea/temperate. It keeps the game simple and can lead to very early wins. Worker, clear cut, barracks, chariots, attack, repeat. Raze all cities except capitals to keep costs down and with captured workers chop and build roads to the next civ. I have rarely run out of forests as cities keep expanding to provide more lumber (mines are good too). Build archers for backline protection from barbs and maybe some axemen if they can be built close to the frontlines and copper/iron is available without building a settler. Only research the early basics then accumulate for upgrades to horse archers. Could be more powerful by sending a couple of fast units to worker snip outlying civs. They will eventually dispatch units but they just become target practice for your growing supply line. There may be enemy scouts buzzing around your back lines but they can’t attack anything. I also like the idea of using cheap scouts with the healing promotion for faster recovery on to the next conquest. I haven’t tried Persia but with two flanking promotions their UU’s would be quite Immortal. The other civ with chariots and +50% against archers could also be devestating as archers are the vast majority of city defenders early on. There is the occasional spearman but if you immediately cut off copper/iron they can’t even finish a unit already in production (different than civ3). You’ll take your lumps against cities on hills with spearmen or strong defensive UU’s but attacking in swarms with flanking allows you to nibble away and eventually land that first hit point (not actually not a hit point now) and after that it’s easier and easier to land punches. It's surprising but the new game actually favors rapid conquest as conquered cities are quickly productive and close the next point of attack.

If horses or forests are not available then of coarse this doesn't work. Don’t get me wrong, I like the longer games too but sometimes I just simply want to go on a rampage. No trading, no tech, no buildings, no religion too…there’s a Beatle song in there somewhere.

 

[phoulishwan]

This is especially useful if you have a UU Horse Archer...upgrade your high exp chariots to Horse Archer UU's and essentially dominate the Ancient Era. I played on the 18 civ world map as the Russians, and wiped out Frederick, Louis, Isabella, Caesar and Alexander by 1600BC, yes I ran a research deficit but from the gold pillaged by taking out cities I had enough to support this. To boot I had 12 size 4-5 cities and locked off my 'settling land' I built only 2 settlers and a worker but had 10 workers and a bunch of cities. With a strong army to dissuade any potential enemies, now I'm ready to settle down and build up until I get Kossacks. I have 4 27xp chariots awaiting an upgrade and a bunch from 10-20 making an already fiercely powerful force.

 

[Mujadaddy]

Further update from my Ice Age/Prince game... I've taken all four English cities and three of the Incan... The incredible distances I had to transfer the army from the SE (English front) to the Western Incan front caused my treasury (& research) to shrink to almost nothing for a few turns...but a city full of plunder sure salves that wound ...

Incas have 4 cities left (already took their capital) and juuuust teched to Longbows...but so did I ... and there's nothing like a promoted war chariot to take the sauce out of a Longbow trying to attack... I have about ten Chariots, 6 Catapults in the field, and archers/axemen/spearmen coming from my territory for garrison duty.

One of Genghis Khan's cities just flipped to me ... but he declared war soon after ... Time to swing the army back East

Above poster playing Russia: Nice...It'll be quite a while before I get cavalry, but I can see how that ancient XP will come in handy at that time... I'm not in a position to upgrade to horse archers--only 1 strength more than my UU-chariots, and every gold piece I save is more research Part of my strategy is to NOT get Horseback Riding until the last possible moment--because the Chariots cost HALF as much...

 

[slowrider]

This is especially useful if you have a UU Horse Archer...upgrade your high exp chariots to Horse Archer UU's and essentially dominate the Ancient Era. I played on the 18 civ world map as the Russians, and wiped out Frederick, Louis, Isabella, Caesar and Alexander by 1600BC, yes I ran a research deficit but from the gold pillaged by taking out cities I had enough to support this. To boot I had 12 size 4-5 cities and locked off my 'settling land' I built only 2 settlers and a worker but had 10 workers and a bunch of cities. With a strong army to dissuade any potential enemies, now I'm ready to settle down and build up until I get Kossacks. I have 4 27xp chariots awaiting an upgrade and a bunch from 10-20 making an already fiercely powerful force.

I saw somewhere that upgrades knock you down to 10XP. Can anyone confirm or correct?

 

[Mujadaddy]

Yes, they knock you down to 10 xp...but they don't take away the old promotions

 

[Heroes]

[*]Chariots, and mounted units in general, DO NOT GET DEFENSIVE MODIFIERS; therefore, they are ill-suited for garrison duty. "Stick and move."[/list]

Did I neglect anything? I tried to be thorough. Let's discuss this

Yeah, you neglect that there are 2 mounted units having defensive bonus: immortal (!!!) and conquistador.

 

[Mujadaddy]

REalllllly? Immortals get defensive bonuses? Wow...that's ... Uber

 

[Heroes]

REalllllly? Immortals get defensive bonuses? Wow...that's ... Uber

That's why they are immortal.
It's hard to find out, because you just see "no defensive bonuses" for most mounted units, and the lack of this phrase is hard to notice.

 

[slowrider]

Yes, they knock you down to 10 xp...but they don't take away the old promotions

That's interesting because it supports making multiple upgrades to reset the ever increasing number of XP needed for additional promotions.

 

[Vizzini]

Well, obviously you're not just sitting your two chariots in your capital while the worker is building a road. Besides, you haven't declared war until you have enough muscle to distract the opponent from anything except defense and counter-attack.

Once you DO declare war that worker on the frontier can capture that enemy capital.

The AI finds an undefended worker totally irresistable... so much so they'll weaken the city to go chase him down. Position your worker so that no unit, not even a mounted unit, could nail it in one movement turn (remembering that they'll have a movement boost if there are AI roads down)

The AI is almost certain to send out something to chase your worker down. If it's a foot soldier just have your worker lead it on a merry chase around the world. If it's something faster move the worker under cover of defensive units. In the meantime tho the unit(s) sent out by the AI to chase your worker have just sealed the doom of the city they left

 

[Mujadaddy]

@Vizzini -- Nice! Worker-Bait ... I usually get the AI's capital SO CHOKED up with chariots that it ACTUALLY sends two archers and a settler out of the city to expand its economic future ... but all that does is take out two of his capital's defenders ...

 

[Heroes]

Once you DO declare war that worker on the frontier can capture that enemy capital.

The AI finds an undefended worker totally irresistable... so much so they'll weaken the city to go chase him down. Position your worker so that no unit, not even a mounted unit, could nail it in one movement turn (remembering that they'll have a movement boost if there are AI roads down)

The AI is almost certain to send out something to chase your worker down. If it's a foot soldier just have your worker lead it on a merry chase around the world. If it's something faster move the worker under cover of defensive units. In the meantime tho the unit(s) sent out by the AI to chase your worker have just sealed the doom of the city they left

Ha, this kind of worker bait is present in civ 3, is that still applicable in civ 4? If true, emm ...

 

[Vizzini]

Yup - still works. One of my early conquest games my Persian Immortals got to my third victim and discovered 4 archers, 1 spearman, and 3 axemen holding that capital. Eeek! So while I was waiting for more Immortals to arrive to make sure of the kill I had more workers than jobs for them to do (already killed two Civs off) and decided to road the invasion route with two workers.

As soon as the workers got within about 3 tiles of the city out popped all 3 Axemen. They chased those workers in circles for the next 3 or 4 turns until the capital fell and they *poofed*

 

[King Ash]

Yes the Horse domination works...on a continants map with a few civs nearby. I tried it last night with Immortals. These guys are awesome BUT you must rush them out early before enemy civs get copper.
Immortals may not look very strong but they get bonusses against archers AND they can fortify. So if the enemy doesn't have copper they're screwed.

Immortals come early (animal husbandry?) so they're ideal for early rushes as they can hold on to cities as well.

One final note though. Don't get greedy and try to hold on to captured cities. Just take the capitol. I found out the hard way last night (on noble btw) and I quickly bankrupted my economy. And guard those workers building roads to enemy civs, nothing can piss you more off then watching barbs warp (they love to do that if you're at war) in and kill them.

 

[Mujadaddy]

Yes the Horse domination works...on a continants map with a few civs nearby. I tried it last night with Immortals. These guys are awesome BUT you must rush them out early before enemy civs get copper.
Immortals may not look very strong but they get bonusses against archers AND they can fortify. So if the enemy doesn't have copper they're screwed.

Immortals come early (animal husbandry?) so they're ideal for early rushes as they can hold on to cities as well.

One final note though. Don't get greedy and try to hold on to captured cities. Just take the capitol. I found out the hard way last night (on noble btw) and I quickly bankrupted my economy. And guard those workers building roads to enemy civs, nothing can piss you more off then watching barbs warp (they love to do that if you're at war) in and kill them.

I would say that it "WORKS BEST" before the enemy gets copper, but by no means is your rush over... In the (Prince Ice Age) game I'm STILL playing ( ), everyone's got Longbows, Swords, Axes, & Spears.... so I crank out Catapults (A side note---Siege in this game is VERY POWERFUL, but RATHER "EXPENSIVE" -- You MUST be prepared to sacrifice one catapult for every defender in a city...or you might as well not take the cities at all...)

Back on topic---sure, the enemy has bronze etc. etc. but if you can send in your cheap-cheap-cheap Chariots en masse, he'll be forced to abandon any dream of counter-attack and his economy will tank while the chariots wait for the catapults to weaken everyone in the city...

And, unless you're still in the INITIAL rush, there's no reason not to sign open borders with your next victim to scout out all his horses/iron/copper ...and something I found out doing just this: Park chariots on all the enemy camps/mines THEN declare war --- I don't know if it was a fluke or not, but my guys PILLAGED the improvements before they were banished from the territory!

To sum up:

Chariot/War Chariot/Immortal = 25 Hammers
Spearmen/Axemen (move of ONE) = 35 Hammers

Fill his territory with cheaper, faster units... choke his resources... wait for Catapults and final victory. (Or if you haven't gotten to catapults yet, just build a few axemen of your own to counter the spearmen/axemen still inthe cities)...



And on the "Raze don't Capture" front---I disagree, only so far as SOMETIMES the AI puts cities where you would put them... Bankrupt? Yeah, wait until Markets, Libraries, trade routes & resources kick in... I'm running 40% research, but I have so many cities (TWENTY) that are just on the early edge of booming that I'm only behind two or three techs from the AI with the next-most score...

 

[Adderax]

This is almost what I do when I play Mongols/Egypt/Persia/Greece. Mongols are my favorites though for the no movement over terrain penalty (UU). Using the basic concept of sending my units out and denying any iron/copper mines has won me alot of games on monarch. I'm trying to get a cultural win on emperor, so I have not done the basic war approach on emperor yet.

 

[Mujadaddy]

This is almost what I do when I play Mongols/Egypt/Persia/Greece. Mongols are my favorites though for the no movement over terrain penalty (UU). Using the basic concept of sending my units out and denying any iron/copper mines has won me alot of games on monarch. I'm trying to get a cultural win on emperor, so I have not done the basic war approach on emperor yet.

Woah, I did not realize that little tidbit...

On Emperor, the basic strategy should play out --- just bring overwhelming force before declaring war, as the AI's production bonus should start to bite back at you at this level---so make sure they can't spam Spearmen at you!

 

[Mujadaddy]

OK, edited the first post to add this:

Once your enemy has teched to Longbows, it's time to Strategically Withdraw. Even Combat 5-promoted chariots cannot stand up to the units that follow (Macemen, Pikemen especially)... It's not the Longbows specifically; it's just that the Longbows are harbingers of your impending technological inferiority.

Withdraw. Sue for Peace (if you must--yuck ). Consolidate your Empire. Build your infrastructure. Tech up. Prepare for future wars?

 

[dh_epic]

Agreed, mujadaddy. Longbows approaching is a time to withdraw. Another thing to be afraid of is if catapults start popping out. That's when you need to start wrapping things up.

Most of the time, though, if you do a horse rush properly, you should be able to kill at least one civilization entirely well before the medieval era.

The ideal horse rush should cut off your opponent before they've hooked up copper -- even if that means slowing down your own expansion. It's worth it to take an enemy capitol.

 

[Mujadaddy]

Most of the time, though, if you do a horse rush properly, you should be able to kill at least one civilization entirely well before the medieval era.

Medieval? You should have one BEFORE Classical and one or two DURING Classical

The ideal horse rush should cut off your opponent before they've hooked up copper -- even if that means slowing down your own expansion. It's worth it to take an enemy capitol.

Yes, I believe I advocated doing the rush ASAP.... In the (Prince, Ice Age) game I just ran, the only reason I built Settlers is because I couldn't find my neighbors' borders until I'd popped out two more cities (BTW, entering the Medieval Era, I had built four and captured SIXTEEN cities )