Level prince?

[rilzic]

Is it normal for this level that units will be weak against enemy units.

For me it takes 2x the units to take a city and you have unrealistic outcomes. like a 15 gets killed by a 5 and it happends all the time?

i want a harder level but because of this i just can't take unrealistic battle outcomes.

it come to the point where i don't want my good units to attack cause even if they have a 5 or 10 point lead on the defending unit i have a 50% chance of getting killed. and that makes my best units job is to be mop up the weak units ....

And the worst part is the level under prince is way to easy for me.

 

[Petrucci]

I've always thought that perhaps the dice were always against us. HEHE I know many people have mathmatically proven that the AI units don't do this, so I'll belive them, but still.... perhaps its my human bias, that if my odds are 75% to win, I feel like I need to treat it like i have 20% odds! Only when i have 85% + do i feel like it's pretty much going my way.

I'm not sure how much tactics you have used on noble, but they still should apply here on prince when you play. I'm no veteran but i made my greatest war time accomplishments when I took in a few tid-bits of advice.

1) Know your enemy, and always mix your stacks accordingly. Bring along axes, war chariots, spearmen and swordsmen, of course bring along more swordmen if attacking primarly more city garison archers. I try my best to not go in against a foe that im unsure of the numer and types of their forces. Of course im using ancient units for examples, but this works with every era, know best which units will counter your foe.

2) Catapults, and further more LOTS of catapults if you are behind a tech! Talked about enough so i wont bore you more with this!

3) Don't promote your units immediatly. Save those promotions. If the top defender is a axeman for example, and the AI has just made an archer, it may come in handy when you promote your war chariot with shock, then you can suicide, or weaken the axeman. This has over all saved the more powerful unit (swordsman) that will benefit the most from living through the seige. Careful manipulation of shock and cover and city raider (and for more advanced promotions) REALLY makes your future wars more potent. This seems like something that isn't talked about that much, but invaluable if you ask me.

4) Think to your next conquest, yes the first one may be bloody or easy, but the units that walk away in the end with CR3 and then get upgrades will steam roll these next opponent.

5) Take out the leading military AI first. This im sure is debatable, but i know it seems to help out all future conquets even more.

Anyway I made the bump up from noble to prince about a month ago, and really learned a lesson in war, I follow these main guidlines i highlighted and I really do not struggle anymore and have a huge grin as I conquer continents far easier now, after knowing where i have been. I hope this addresses any of the concerns you had!

 

[carl corey]

I've had the same problem: getting beaten at good odds for me. Then again, I've seen the opposite. I attacked a city and first went in with only Combat I Immortals thinking I'll lose them but make some damage to soften his units a bit. I had around 20-30% odds. I won 2 out of 2 battles! That's life... If it's not 100% or 0%, expect the unexpected.

 

[Lollapalooza]

Remember the cats! Just be sure to bring a bunch of catapults to a city. Even undeveloped cities can be pesky with a few archers. Suicide cats to weaken defenders, and continue to churn out more catapults to replenish your losses.

 

[Zanmato]

For pre-cat wars CR promotions are priceless. Promote to the units strength, so if you have a Swordman give it another CR bonus and for Axes give them Shock, mounted units give them flanking to increase their survival odds then increase their strength using Combat promotions. Send in your weaker units first, protect your highly promoted ones as they are required for certain buildings and will become more deadly when upgraded.

Once you have catapults build enough to take down the defences in one turn then suicide them in the next, then your other units will have a easier time mopping up. Use terrain to your advantage when defending, even archers can have a hard time shifting warriors from forested hills.

 

[§L¥ Gµ¥]

Prince was the first level I learned how to warmonger on, primarily due to the necessity of it based on the handicaps the player has against the AI.

But as for these losses, Cats are the best thing. Bombarding the defenses then throwing them in for collateral damage can go a huge way in weakening a city.

If you are pre-cat in tech, then as was said, promote your units to their strengths. Swordsman with city raiders can pretty much make minced meat of any defense early on, except maybe a city on a hill with archers and walls. [those are always really bloody battles].

Also what I like to do, is in within my city raiding stack is place a couple pikeman or spearmen in with a decent amount of archers. The archers secure whatever cities I take and prevent a quick retake from the AI on their own city, while spearmen with at least one with a medic promotion keeps my raiders fresh.

Really the most important thing is to not rush into a siege. If you've only got 4 cats and it takes 3 turns to burn the defenses down, then do it. Fortify your attacking force, with those medics in the stack it'll go a long way to keeping your advance moving along.

And if in the end, it still give you a 50% odds of winning a battle, then you should either A re-evaluate whether you can spare the losses in your advance, or B you've made a mistake in your planning, and you should run home with your tail between your legs and get whatever war settlement you can out of the AI.

 

[binhthuy71]

Don't neglect pillaging! Try to destroy enemy mines first. In the early game (pre-gunpowder) that prevents them from building spears, axes, etc. And destroy all roads to the extent possible. This will deprive the city of resources from elsewhere in the empire and slow reinforcements.

When I go warmongering I always send a small stack or two of mounted units to pillage. The gold you get from pillaging improvements is a nice extra.

Even if the outcome is a draw pillaging sets your enemy's economy back.

 

[Sisiutil]

Good advice above.

Remember that the units' strengths alone don't tell the whole story. A Longbow only has a strength of 6, but give him a City Garrison promotion or two, then fortify him in a high-culture city on a hill for five turns or more, and you have a very formidable opponent to overcome, even for Cavalry or Riflemen.

Siege units like Catapults are, indeed, the key, as are City Raider promotions for the attackers that follow the Cats. Besides that, remember to right-drag the pointer from your selected attacker to the defender. The lower left screen will display the odds. Right-drag back to the attacker and release if you don't like the odds.

I will usually suicide a Cat or two, then check the odds in this way with my best attacker. If the odds aren't good, I throw another Catapult at the defenders; if they're promising, I attack. This allows me to preserve a few more Catapults on the campaign. My other units almost always survive, but I go through Cats like peanuts and never have enough of the darn things.

 

[DrewBledsoe]

Good advice above.

Remember that the units' strengths alone don't tell the whole story. A Longbow only has a strength of 6, but give him a City Garrison promotion or two, then fortify him in a high-culture city on a hill for five turns or more, and you have a very formidable opponent to overcome, even for Cavalry or Riflemen.

Siege units like Catapults are, indeed, the key, as are City Raider promotions for the attackers that follow the Cats. Besides that, remember to right-drag the pointer from your selected attacker to the defender. The lower left screen will display the odds. Right-drag back to the attacker and release if you don't like the odds.

I will usually suicide a Cat or two, then check the odds in this way with my best attacker. If the odds aren't good, I throw another Catapult at the defenders; if they're promising, I attack. This allows me to preserve a few more Catapults on the campaign. My other units almost always survive, but I go through Cats like peanuts and never have enough of the darn things.

Good advice, except holding "alt" and mousing over your enemy works exactly the same, and doesn't have the inherent danger of mouse slip and accidentally sending your knights on to the pikes, thus ruining your attack (yes I've done it)

 

[Araqiel]

Others have covered the in game mechanics of it. I have two things to add. First on the realism front, throughout much of history an attacker required 10 times a defenders numbers to take a fortress by assault. Otherwise it took long risky sieges to break them. So if its a culturally strong city on a hill, you'll need massive superiority and will lose a lot of men.

Second you're human. So you will remember all of your awful and unlucky strokes far more readily than when you have a bit of good luck. I've had many a catapult defeat a longbow with less than 1% odds to win. I usually say "huzzah" and forget it in 5 minutes. But if I lose an axemen to a warrior, I'll mutter to myself for days.

You just have to learn to not let it get to you. Games of chance can be really brutual when they don't go your way.

 

[The_Oakster]

Don't neglect pillaging! Try to destroy enemy mines first...This will deprive the city of resources from elsewhere in the empire and slow reinforcements...Even if the outcome is a draw pillaging sets your enemy's economy back.

Playing on Noble, I just had a war against the romans on their island and due to it being the later stages of the game, each town had 30+ troops garrisoned (Cannons, riflemen etc). I had my troops fortified on a forested hilltop as I just didnt have enough troops to take them on and I used gunships to pillage the surrounding squares and with 4 moves and no terrain movement costs, they are quite formidable.

In a few turns, the Roman towns were shrinking because the garrisoned troops destroyed themselves on my troops (unit promotions based on hill and woodland defence plus the 75% defence from the tile) and my gunships were destroying all the infrastructure causing the Romans to pop rush defences.

Even after I had to declare peace to attack the Americans, the Romans never recovered from the war and finished with the worst civ. They were the second strongest at the start of the war.

Ben

 

[lordofcivs]

I think there is something I found somewhere on this forum that must be discussed here. The Odds of winning are based on the Strength + Health + Diffense bonus (if any). But the First Strike chance is NOT included in odds and is not even shown later. But First Strike IS part of the combat. Let's say, if there had been a first strike, the odds won't be the same, as shown before.