[BTS] Charismatic. strategies? Best leader to play for this?

[Gumbolt]

I don't like defending in always war as the AI never seem to attack. They have to be invited in with weaker defences. Best form of defence is often attack?

 

[Fippy]

Had the deity AW games in mind from waaay back then
They are like cutting your nose off..forced to defend there for sure.

 

[Nick723]

I don't like defending in always war as the AI never seem to attack. They have to be invited in with weaker defences. Best form of defence is often attack?

Yeah the worst guys to deal with in always war are the ones with low attack courage…

 

[Gumbolt]

Just a note on CKN. I am in a game playing Churchill of China. Taken down 3 ai with CKN and pretty much no catapults.

So ai has just declared on another AI that had I had reduced to 1 city with 6-7 defenders and city wall. The AI has 10 units with 1 catapult next to the city. Plus another stack of 7 units just wondering about. AI stack just bombarding 4% a turn. (This is why AI fail in warfare.

So 7-8 CKN with barely lvl 2 drill pretty much took down 3 archers/4 other defenders even with 42% defences left. 40%+ odds on first attack.

In terms of xp not really proved anything apart from CKN are a lot of fun. Huge map and over 25 cities by 600ad. Main issue is most of the captured land is not near the AI I need to capture. Have captured some cities with settled generals so getting the AI to fight wars before you take them down can be huge. The reduced cost of xp is nice but I think I should of been letting the weaker units attack first like catapults and mop up. Getting barracks and 1 combat win can be nice for 2 quick promo.

Feels a bit like I shouldn't lose this now with 3 captured AI capitals and so many captured resources. Ai topping out onj about 12 cities. Engineering a must.

 

[Henrik75]

In my most recent game I played and posted, I got huge value from charismatic in a cannon attack.
Barracks theocracy vassalage - 7xp in every city
Every cannon gets city raider 3 after 1 successful fight (very easy against longbows). Set me up really good for later against rifles and infantry when I had a ton of CR3 cannons.

The other nice thing is you can get formation elephants and knights to protect you from cuirassiers, by building a stable in 1 city and using that city to pump out mounted unit. With formation elephants, knights and cuirs aren't so scary.

 

[Thrasybulos]

The best use of Charismatic is Catherine.

 

[Gumbolt]

CKN clearly work. Had a stack of about 10 of them with a medic axe and formation phant. AI attacked it with 20 or so units. Didn't lose a single combat. Next turn all units back to full strength. Lost 1 unit taking down a further 15 defenders. Backwards ai but still comical an ai losing nearly 40 units for 1 CKN.

Will look at Catherine.

 

[Fool's Gold]

Isn't Catherine IMP / CRE?

 

[Nick723]

Indeed, there’s actually no CRE/CHA leader

 

[Gumbolt]

Indeed, there’s actually no CRE/CHA leader

I assumed he meant for the imperialist trait. Or maybe to play with Cossacks as Russians? Hmmm

 

[Thrasybulos]

Sorry, that was just meant as a weak joke.

 

[Gumbolt]

Sorry, that was just meant as a weak joke.

Oooh now I get it.

 

[Orion Pax]

Indeed, there’s actually no CRE/CHA leader

I’ve long wanted a CRE/CHA leader for my conquest games.

 

[Gumbolt]

So is it better to build up units early game heavily promoted, Or better to have position where you can spam units from cities that are 8xp out the door? With maybe 1 city that is closer to 13xp.

CKN are great at defending. My 30-40 strong stack in a hill city took out a 40 strong AI stack attacking it. Only lost 1 unit on a hill. I don't think constant war mode on a map with 11-12 ai is great.

 

[floydmcw]

So is it better to build up units early game heavily promoted, Or better to have position where you can spam units from cities that are 8xp out the door? With maybe 1 city that is closer to 13xp.

CKN are great at defending. My 30-40 strong stack in a hill city took out a 40 strong AI stack attacking it. Only lost 1 unit on a hill. I don't think constant war mode on a map with 11-12 ai is great.

What did the AI attack with? Was siege involved? Mounted? Xbows are good defenders but you won't get the benefit of drill vs Knights.

 

[Gumbolt]

What did the AI attack with? Was siege involved? Mounted? Xbows are good defenders but you won't get the benefit of drill vs Knights.

AI had 12 HA, 10 Phants, 9 pults, 4 swords, 1 crossbow, 1 longbow and 4 chariots.
Defending I had 15 level 4 drill/C1 ckn. Highest promoted CKN was 37/38XP. With 4-5 at 25-28xp or so. Plus 10 or so C1/C2 phants. One phant was C4 with formation.

Most of the CKN defended vs phants and Phants vs the HA. The effect of 9 catapults attacking first barely seemed to matter. Thankfully no knights.

There was no way I could of attacked the stack as on forest. Albeit I had odds of 30% for first attacker.

 

[floydmcw]

AI had 12 HA, 10 Phants, 9 pults, 4 swords, 1 crossbow, 1 longbow and 4 chariots.
Defending I had 15 level 4 drill/C1 ckn. Highest promoted CKN was 37/38XP. With 4-5 at 25-28xp or so. Plus 10 or so C1/C2 phants. One phant was C4 with formation.

Most of the CKN defended vs phants and Phants vs the HA. The effect of 9 catapults attacking first barely seemed to matter. Thankfully no knights.

There was no way I could of attacked the stack as on forest. Albeit I had odds of 30% for first attacker.

Hmm, that seems pessimistic -- most of those units don't get defensive bonuses, and you have 50% against 4 of the 6 units that do.

But what you did worked out. For some reason it's very satisfying to watch a stack splat itself against your stronghold.

 

[Gumbolt]

Attacking into stacks unless you have uber units can be costly. Especially when on forest. I did not have enough units to take out all of the stack. So in some ways letting them attack was better. Better not to lose 6-7+ units at 30-50% odd attacks. All good fun experimenting.