So is France Busted Now?

[Fenwicked]

Currently playing a random-start deity game on standard/standard Communitu_79a and on the latest patch (March 31st I believe). I rolled France...

Turn 50 and Mongolia is already dead - they didn't stand a chance. I have 23 military units, and I'm pretty sure I'll own the continent before turn 200. Reminds me a lot of the old Huns~
So granted, a big part of why Mongolia dropped so easily was that I caught their first settler a turn before it could found. Then I also got lucky with Pyramids, and that, along side focusing quick expansion and going Authority -> Imperium meant I had a pretty big advantage in production/unit count anyway, but still: France's new UA seems very breakable. Especially when you consider that, even if the captured units may be relatively weak, just having more numbers for flanking and surrounding means that you'll continue capturing more; it has big potential to snowball.

This isn't necessarily a criticism though, I'm mostly just wondering what others think about it (also when was the change implemented?). Some considerations:

• While gaining extra units may not provide a lot of long term benefit itself (particularly considering that they cost supply after upgrading), the ability to rush down a neighbor early grants access to a lot of additional resources and territory, which potentially confers massive long term benefits. So long as the additional land can be expanded while maintaining reasonable stability, it can provide you with a base of many more strong cities than most/any other civ on the map, which means more yields; faster tech and culture, more wonders, guaranteed religious hegemony in the region, guaranteed wins on World Congress projects, and probably the biggest military in the world by a lot. Altogether I find that games which start like this are almost always easy wins.
• I've yet to play against an AI as new France, but I'm willing to bet that they don't make the greatest use of the new UA, given that it involves a lot of careful positioning and combat optimization. If that is the case, then the new UA is a much bigger boon for players than it is for the AI.
• Gaining +1 culture in each city for every 10 military units is also especially powerful when you're able to expand rapidly. Coupled with the happiness from military units in Fealty it can provide both a lot of progress and a lot of stability, which just means more snowballing.
• I've not actually compared France's new UA to other civs yet, and plenty of other civs are pretty busted in their own ways of course ;P

Screenshot of France's UA attached for ease of reference.

Also note that France's new UA was discussed in this thread: https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/7-79-france-ua-rework.689106/ back in February, though the discussion focused primarily on shoring up France's performance in the hands of the AI with its performance in the hands of a player.

 

[hokath]

Key information is that in AI tests France is one of the worst civs in the hands of the AI. It might actually be tied worst if I remember correctly.
So this point

I've yet to play against an AI as new France, but I'm willing to bet that they don't make the greatest use of the new UA, given that it involves a lot of careful positioning and combat optimization. If that is the case, then the new UA is a much bigger boon for players than it is for the AI.

Is an important one.

 

[FinMc]

I think France is ridiculously busted in human hands.

Capturing units allows you to snowball early because your first war is guaranteed fast victory when you have 15 barbarian warriors. It makes mid-game wars against AI trivially easy because you get endless free meat shields, and there are no end game wars because you've already won.

 

[Heinz_Guderian]

In my last two games I have played against AI France (immortal difficulty), first as Siam where they completely rolled the entire contitent, I dont know if I would have managed to win but it would be really hard and tedious to deal with like hundreds of their units so I just abandoned that. Now as Spain I completely crushed them by forward settling them and stealing a settler, and they became my vassal as soon as I hit medieval. I think the first game was a more fair showing of course since they didnt spawn near to me and just obliterated everyone easily.

 

[Bryan317]

I'm curious how a Human would fair using them on Diety because I haven't tried it. I don't think gaining extra units would be too game breaking because you can rarely afford to have too many. They need to be used to gain something or disbanded to avoid paying for them.

I've definitely seen the AI run out of control with them once. But then I've seen another game where I kept them relatively contained. France was my one and only Ally for a large part of the game until they got cocky too and I had to wipe them out.

 

[Fenwicked]

I'm curious how a Human would fair using them on Diety because I haven't tried it. I don't think gaining extra units would be too game breaking because you can rarely afford to have too many. They need to be used to gain something or disbanded to avoid paying for them.

I've definitely seen the AI run out of control with them once. But then I've seen another game where I kept them relatively contained. France was my one and only Ally for a large part of the game until they got cocky too and I had to wipe them out.

To clarify, I am France in this deity game ;P
So far the most busted thing about it has just been the ability to completely overwhelm an AI civ early (Mongolia, no less). Like I hadn't even intended to conquer them, I just kept gaining new units as I tore through their reinforcements and it became surprisingly easy. I had 3 or 4 archers before even researching archers lol

Still not sure how it'll fair in the long run, but it is worth noting that France also gets a 25% unit supply cap bonus, and also gains culture in all cities from every ten units, so going big is more plausible and does pay out. What I'm looking forward to most is getting to capture some unique units~

 

[Bryan317]

To clarify, I am France in this deity game ;P
So far the most busted thing about it has just been the ability to completely overwhelm an AI civ early (Mongolia, no less). Like I hadn't even intended to conquer them, I just kept gaining new units as I tore through their reinforcements and it became surprisingly easy. I had 3 or 4 archers before even researching archers lol

Still not sure how it'll fair in the long run, but it is worth noting that France also gets a 25% unit supply cap bonus, and also gains culture in all cities from every ten units, so going big is more plausible and does pay out. What I'm looking forward to most is getting to capture some unique units~

I think it's definitely an early game advantage but tapers off in the late game. It's been a while, but they don't keep any promotions right? If not, by late game this isn't very beneficial. You're probably producing units that would be far better than any of these. And by then you're probably maxed out on your unit Supply so gaining more isn't necessarily an advantage.

 

[pineappledan]

You're probably producing units that would be far better than any of these. And by then you're probably maxed out on your unit Supply so gaining more isn't necessarily an advantage.

the captured units are supply-free

 

[SuperNoobCamper]

This thread encouraged me to start a game as france on immortal to see what's the fuss about since i have not tried france eversince it's UA got swapped with the Huns and i gotta say it's doable to start with just three warriors and a pathfinder and never build another land unit ever again -well, at least until mid game which is where i left off- .
Barbarians especially archers are a godsend, once you clear first couple of camps -and ensuring you capture the units- you can pretty much ignore producing units altogether and go to war almost all the time crippling your opponents economy while your empire does not really do anything other than minmaxing yields and building better infrastructure.
With only one downside..

the captured units are supply-free

I think he is refering to their gold upkeep which is partially correct; it's very hard to have enough GPT to cover the expenses ofa 20~30 units-army in ancient and classical eras especially as authority which you will be playing anyway.

 

[Rick Drayson]

Its a shame but also predictable. Some bonuses are very cool but can be useless in AI hands but op in human

This appears to be one of them... who's up for an mplayer, ill pick first lol

 

[Bryan317]

the captured units are supply-free

Oh good lord. Well I do suggest that as a change, you should at least have to pay for them.

Edit. Well according to another poster you at least have to pay the gpt. But I honestly think that they should count as your supply units as well. And they can still be quite useful with that. But they should be used to accomplish a certain goal and then they should be disbanded if you can't afford them.

 

[pineappledan]

The stated intent of the UA was to basically make France immune from supply constraints. There are lots of civs with powerful abilities, and this seems fairly tame in a vacuum.

 

[azum4roll]

Supply-free only lasts until you upgrade the unit. It's really just there (after early game) to act as a prevention for rebels and provide culture. Very unlikely they'll become useful without promotions, especially now that the XP quest is gone.

 

[FinMc]

I think it's definitely an early game advantage but tapers off in the late game. It's been a while, but they don't keep any promotions right? If not, by late game this isn't very beneficial. You're probably producing units that would be far better than any of these. And by then you're probably maxed out on your unit Supply so gaining more isn't necessarily an advantage.

Mid-late game captures units are useless as regular units due to no XP. HOWEVER, if you just use them as meat shields to soak up damage/chip damage the enemy line/reveal enemy units for your +1 range/logistics archers they are incredibly potent.

Suicide meat-wave captured units does damage/soaks up enemy attacks leaving your elite units at full strength to deal out more damage. This battlefield edge compounds because the more of them you kill the more captured units you get. This means you'll quickly achieve a breakthrough on their lines which leads to more captured units which you use to intercept their reinforcements.... The cycle continues.

 

[pineappledan]

Suicide meat-wave captured units does damage/soaks up enemy attacks leaving your elite units at full strength to deal out more damage. This battlefield edge compounds because the more of them you kill the more captured units you get. This means you'll quickly achieve a breakthrough on their lines which leads to more captured units which you use to intercept their reinforcements.... The cycle continues.

As Napoleon intended.

 

[CppMaster]

HOWEVER

So... They are not useless

 

[FinMc]

So... They are not useless

Useless as regular units to be integrated into your army.

Extremely effective as suicide charge attrition fuel.

 

[Rekk]

Doesn't this sky-rocket your war weariness?

 

[Fenwicked]

Useless as regular units to be integrated into your army.

Extremely effective as suicide charge attrition fuel.

I likely have been underestimating the significance of lacking XP on so many units, though at least many of them are grinding out their first 2 levels on barbarians, and the most recent barb captures have been higher tech units (free knights!). I'm still really interested in capturing other civs' UC's though; I think it'll be worth babysitting them up to reasonable levels.

Probably worth mentioning some caveats with the meat shield wave here: captured units start damaged at only 25 hp, and can immediately move but not attack. This means that you can't constantly advance just by chaining captures, and creates a potential logistical issue with advancing seasoned troops, as the captured unit takes the hex that the attacker would have ended in (not sure how this will work with the overrun promotion but I'm looking forward to finding out ;P ). You also have to be surrounding the unit in half or more of its surrounding land tiles in order to capture. There are of course still benefits though; the captured unit can soak a hit or 2 if you don't retreat it, which preserves the hp of better troops. It can also potentially convince your opponent to keep feeding their own melee units into your line as they see the opportunity for easy kills on units you don't care about, where typically advancing puts the units you do care about at risk.

 

[Fenwicked]

General update: it's turn 134 and I have 55 units, providing 5 culture per turn to each of my 11 cities (still expanding too). I only built like 8 of them... A lot of these are pretty weak units that I won't be able to upgrade for a while due to supply cap issues, but they still serve the role of protecting literally every inch of my empire from barbarians very well. Even with Authority -> Militarism my current unit maintenance cost is 134 gpt, but still, I'd trade ~100 gpt for 50+ culture per turn any day. Actually that's kind've amazing to think about: each of my military units is currently providing exactly 1 culture per turn, just by existing.