Keep the Machine Guns or go Mech Inf?

Hello,

So I was faced with an interesting dilema recently. I got the Mech Inf tech late game, and couldn't decide to if I should upgrade my machine guns or not.

The machine guns I'm talking about were for city defense, not part of my offensive army. I like the ranged attack of the machine guns (particularly for coastal cities) and all of my upgrades were for their ranged attacks. But Mech Inf is more mobile and powerful.

What should I do?

Against a serious attack where the one unit is your only defense the machine gun is better as the Mech Infantry would only be able to attack every 3 or so turns and only targets it actually wouldn't kill (otherwise it would leave the city and then get destroyed).

FeiLing said:

Against a serious attack where the one unit is your only defense the machine gun is better as the Mech Infantry would only be able to attack every 3 or so turns and only targets it actually wouldn't kill (otherwise it would leave the city and then get destroyed).

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Hmm interesting points. This is the first non-UU that I haven't instantly gone "Upgrade!" with.

Although I'm generally not that hard-pressed for a strong defense, the general utility of the machine gun really gives me pause when tempted to upgrade. It's a ranged unit that kicks butt in a melee situation.

It's even better if you are playing as England and upgrade from Longbows as then you get the extra range.

Cicerosaurus said:

It's even better if you are playing as England and upgrade from Longbows as then you get the extra range.

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Or get the mod called '+1 Range for Post Industrial Ranged Units' (aka: gatling/machineguns). Then they keep the 2-tile range of archers. Always thought it was exceedingly stupid that bullets couldn't travel as far as arrows, so I sensibly fixed it, at least for MG's.

In normal circumstances they're probably worth upgrading. The only exceptions I can think of would be if 1) they have range, 2) they have logistics.

On the other hand, if they're just sitting in your cities pulling garrison duty why waste the gold upgrading them?

Veneke said:

In normal circumstances they're probably worth upgrading. The only exceptions I can think of would be if 1) they have range, 2) they have logistics.

On the other hand, if they're just sitting in your cities pulling garrison duty why waste the gold upgrading them?

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^This. Don't bother to upgrade a garrison that is sitting in the city for happy points. If your army is on the move, don't worry about it. You can rushbuy/rushupgrade if need be.

If you don't have a whole lot left to build in one or more of your cities, another option is to upgrade the machine guns & replace them in garrison duties with artillery. Your newly upgraded mech inf would then become your cannon fodder for any conquering you're doing at the moment.

I keep the Machine Guns... and I think they shouldn't upgrade to Mech Infantry.

I'm looking at this problem form a general utility point of view.

Typically, the garrison units I possess have been with me since the beginning and haven't seen much combat, so they don't have range upgrades and the like. (And if they did they should be on the front lines, not a garrison, IMO). Similarly, I'd prefer to send my arties off to war than have them sit in cities, though that is a good suggestion I hadn't thought of.

I think I'll keep the MG for my coastal cities because they provide an extra attack that a mech inf doesn't against naval invasions, but it's a murkier decision for my inland cities. My thinking is that a Mech Inf can do as well defending an inland city as an MG, but has added mobility that can help it escape if the city is about to fall.

On the other hand, to defend the city, the Mech Inf has to melee and thus take damage, making an escape harder than if it was at full health, whereas an MG can range attack and take no damage.

Also, if for some reason I need to pull my garrison units to go on the offense, an MG is going to have a hell of a time trying to keep up with tanks, helis, rocket artillery and the like.

I need to say that I don't remeber how much the upgrade cost is, but by this point in the game I don't usually see that as a big issue in my decision to upgrade or not. Not having to spend anything is good, just not priority over the usefulness of the upgraded unit.

This is pretty much 50-50 for me when I am that far in the game.

The debate basically goes back to a problem that we all encountered in vanilla: if I have ranged units with promotions that only affect a ranged attack, should I upgrade them into melee units at all? I usually made the blanket rule that, well, no, I shouldn't, because it'd probably be easier just to hard-build the new melee units and make more sense to keep the old ranged units around (or delete them in my own territory for extra gold, even). After all, half the reason to upgrade is to retain promotions, and in this case you would essentially be upgrading the ranged units into promotionless melee units. Why waste gold on upgrading units I could build almost as quickly?

Here, though, I see many angles. If you are simply mopping up by the time of Mech Inf (a very common occurrence at that point in the game unless playing for a non-war victory at a higher level), then it probably makes sense to upgrade the MGs into Mech Inf and lose the promotions, since, as someone said, MG's won't keep up very well in the late game with other units.

On the other hand, let's say you are in a defensive position that late in the game. If you are, then a promoted MG might trump a non-promoted Mech Inf, which is essentially what you get if you upgrade that MG.

The only no-brainer is upgrading promotionless MG's: I'd upgrade them every time, which seems the obvious choice to me. On the opposite hand, the only time I would never upgrade a MG regardless of situation is if I am China (2-attack MG's from the Cho-Ko-Nu) or England (+1 range MG's from the Longbow).

i don't upgrade my veteran MG's as when they get a range promotion i also give them
the logistics one. and it's 60 X 2 attack strengh with no damage taken.
whereas the mech has 90 strengh (i think) and does suffer damage.

Thanks for all the input guys. It seems to me that the choice of upgrading or not really is situational. I would still like more input, and I hope the guys and gal at Polycast or maybe some really experienced players would give their words of wisdom on this - it's an interesting situation I can't remember being in before.

Smokeybear said:

Or get the mod called '+1 Range for Post Industrial Ranged Units' (aka: gatling/machineguns). Then they keep the 2-tile range of archers. Always thought it was exceedingly stupid that bullets couldn't travel as far as arrows, so I sensibly fixed it, at least for MG's.

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ridiculously overpowered. england with 2 hex range gatlings is dreadful were they not spending some tech for ships of the line. maybe you're not realizing how much "stopping power" turn-of-industrial have against equivalent muskets/cannons. i will tell you. nothing shy of artillery or another gatling remotely scratches these effectively enough.

there's a reason why range is an expensive promotion or incorporated in england's uu. play against someone with 2-hex gatlings sometime. you will ragequit.

on topic? by ballistics you should be preparing to upgrade gr war bombers to bombers. machine guns won't see much action, only chasing behind the 3-5 space melee capping bomber-hit cities, so it doesn't matter.

Adjuvant said:

ridiculously overpowered. england with 2 hex range gatlings is dreadful were they not spending some tech for ships of the line. maybe you're not realizing how much "stopping power" turn-of-industrial have against equivalent muskets/cannons. i will tell you. nothing shy of artillery or another gatling remotely scratches these effectively enough.

there's a reason why range is an expensive promotion or incorporated in england's uu. play against someone with 2-hex gatlings sometime. you will ragequit.

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By 'someone', I presume you mean a human player in a multiplayer match? I just play against the AI, and I've used this mod for sometime without noticing any serious imbalance caused by giving them a 2-hex range. The AI certainly doesn't ever come close to enraging me with their use of them. Sure, they can seriously hurt my units if I let them plink away at them unmolested. By I am a skilled molestor, so no worries

During the eras in which I use those units, I find them to be not at all any more 'overpowered' than archers and crossbowmen are, in their time. And they fill a necessary niche that is left empty with those units unmodded- intermediate range 'melee' units. In olden times, you have melee, archers, and catapults... and their similar follow on units that they evolve into. Then suddenly with the evolution from crossbows to gatling guns, suddenly you lose the mid range and have only melee and long range artillery. I'm enjoying having the use of a latter-day midranged unit, and don't find it imba at all, either for me or against me.

I actually don't miss the two hex range on gats and mg's. I find their melee defense strong enough to front line them and that the new range better reflects the reality of their use. It comes down to balance I guess, b/c it's decidedly unrealistic to have 2 hex range on archers but not mg's. But an archer is instakilled by melee so it needs the range or is unusable

When you get into modern wars, numbers usually matter more than type. I'd consider keeping as machineguns any you have with heavy promotions (I'd say with Range bonus or Logistics) anything less I'd consider upgrading or turning into cannon fodder.

I hear the Chus Logistics gets carried over and translated into Mech Inf "Blitz" promotion, so it might be worth to upgrade some of them for such a role.

Other than that, keep the (Chu) guns.

Adjuvant said:

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It's a single player game. Many different people prefer to play it in many different ways. No way is better than any other way, including yours. Please remember that before you start tossing unnecessary insults at other posters, thanks.