A Handful of Naive Questions

commodified

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I can beat Monarch with ease, but take these questions with a grain of salt :p . I've decided to mush them all into one thread, rather than bothering everybody more than once.

1. Have you ever built walls in a city anywhere? If so, why?

2. Have you ever built a colony? Besides OCC, when would you prefer one over just founding a new city?

3. Fortresses: ever built one? Why?

4. Catapults: they have the same bombardment value as ironclads, which seem to do nothing (nada) about 60%. So do you ever use them in the ancient age, and if so, how?

5. Archers: Maybe it's because I've never attempted Emperor or Deity (and own only vanilla Civ III), but I've never used them. I always wait for horses or swords.

6. Jags: They must be awesome, because Firaxis felt like they needed to make them cost 15 instead of 10. But I'm inept with them. Two of them never seem to do the job, and by the time you have three, the enemy usually has spears. :confused: Can anybody link me to Jag strats?

Gracias
 
1,2,3,4: No.
5. Sure, but if your scouting archer finds a city defended by a warrior, what do you do? Early war can help you a lot. However I rarely go to war in AA.
6. I don't know, I almost never play Aztecs. They're good for extreamly fast Conquest (3750BC).
 
1. Yes, in AW games.
2. Yes, in AW games.
3. Yes, in AW games.
4. Yes, in AW games.
5. Yes, in AW games.
6. No.

Sense a pattern?

1. A spearman behind walls can kill many troops in a single turn, as opposed to attackers. In AW, you need a very good kill ratio.
2. Very often in AW there will be a resource just beyond you cultural boundaries. It is easier to sneak a worker and defenders to the resource and defend one tile than it is to found a city there and need to defend two.
3. To defend said colonies, and to form a "cheese grater" kill zone, using their zone of control.
4. Yes, since, when used to bombard attackers in your lands (esp. in AW) they help your kill ratio a lot.
5. The free shot is awesome for kill ratios, and you often need attackers before you can get resources in AW.
6. N/A.
 
commodified said:
1. Have you ever built walls in a city anywhere? If so, why?
Rarely, but yes. If a city is about to come under siege it is often better to rush this than to rush additional defenders. If you are going to war and your border cities can be attacked in one turn it also might be useful.
commodified said:
2. Have you ever built a colony? Besides OCC, when would you prefer one over just founding a new city?
Very rarely, when I do not have time for city expansion.

3. Fortresses: ever built one? Why?
Not often, they are good to defend chokepionts. The level 2 fortresses are quite good since they completely stop enemy movement that turn.

4. Catapults: they have the same bombardment value as ironclads, which seem to do nothing (nada) about 60%. So do you ever use them in the ancient age, and if so, how?
Ironclads do little because the caliber of the opposition is much higher in the industrial age. Cataults are fantastic, they are essential for early warfare on the highest difficulty levels since you need very high kill to loss rates(not that needed on monarch though, little opposition). Build a stack of them.

5. Archers: Maybe it's because I've never attempted Emperor or Deity (and own only vanilla Civ III), but I've never used them. I always wait for horses or swords.

Archers are mainly for those stuck without horses or iron.

6. Jags: They must be awesome, because Firaxis felt like they needed to make them cost 15 instead of 10. But I'm inept with them. Two of them never seem to do the job, and by the time you have three, the enemy usually has spears. :confused: Can anybody link me to Jag strats?

Personally, I think they are a tad overcosted at 15. Many of the fastest wins were with the Jags so perhaps you can find some writeups of those.
 
1) I will build walls in key border cities, esp ones that have strat/lux resources nearby. Not only do they help insure vs sneak attack, but they also allow you fewer units committed to the city.

2) Colonies: sure, they are temporary. You only may need one until your borders can expand or settler can arrive (this last very rare). They don't prevent an AI from settling next to it and erasing your access. On a few occasions, however, an iron or a coal has been buried in some mountains, and I had little choice but use a colony for access (huge map).

3) Agree with Tomoyo: fortresses can be pivotal, esp on choke points. If you can spare the worker turns, place them on the border with your neighbor, at or near the ends of any of his/her roads, as that is the likely route of approach. They can improve greatly your kill-ratio for the initial AI unit swarm, and add the ZoC effect for units that try to advance into your territory.

4) I neglect almost no units in the game, they all have their uses. True, catapults seem rather innefectual on city sieges, but they are great for weakening passing enemy galleys/dromons (ships are harder to heal than land units), and for leader farming in the AA.

5) Since you have vanilla Civ, the archer isn't quite as good, but they are an upgradable alternative to the swordsman, and I will build some just to be able to handle barbs, until I can get the iron/horses hooked up. Everyone has likely experienced games where they're the best you've got, initially.

6) Haven't played as Aztecs in a long time. They are great units, but lead to despotic GA, and that I cannot abide. Like the Greek hoplite or Carthage's NumMerc, you've got to play carefully if you want to avoid it.
 
6. Try a jag-rush strategy in PTW/vanilla on a small Pangaea. Get four or five cities up and running, capable of building five or six vet jags every couple of turns pre-golden age. Once you have about ten, go to town on your nearest neighbor's outlying territory. Capturing (rather than razing) where possible should be a high priority, because ultimately you're going to need huge numbers of units and the unit support will be nasty. (But on the good side, you don't need any techs!) It'll probably take about 20 jags to take out capitals, more than that if they're on a hill.

I remember a succession game that did this on Emperor a while back and steamrolled the rest of the world before anyone had pikes.

Renata
 
"1. Have you ever built walls in a city anywhere? If so, why?"

Yes, but under special conditions. Mainly I know I am going to be attacked there and want to save some units from dying. Mostly in a beachhead town planted on the other civs land. It will draw all the atackers and I want to lose no more units than I have to lose.

"2. Have you ever built a colony? Besides OCC, when would you prefer one over just founding a new city?"

I have, but it has been maybe two years and I had to have oil right then and no settler was available.

"3. Fortresses: ever built one? Why?"

No, because the times I could have used one, I would not be able to get a worker to the spot.

"4. Catapults: they have the same bombardment value as ironclads, which seem to do nothing (nada) about 60%. So do you ever use them in the ancient age, and if so, how?"

Are you asking if I eve use Ironclads? Once or twice, mostly they never get researched.

Cats, of course, but I will try to avoid them if I can.

5. Archers: Maybe it's because I've never attempted Emperor or Deity (and own only vanilla Civ III), but I've never used them. I always wait for horses or swords.

"6. Jags: They must be awesome, because Firaxis felt like they needed to make them cost 15 instead of 10. But I'm inept with them. Two of them never seem to do the job, and by the time you have three, the enemy usually has spears. :confused: Can anybody link me to Jag strats?"

I forget the link, but a reasonable use was record as a movie on Deity CivIII. Also look for some of the SG or HoF games. They are quite stong on tiny maps.

You just have to use them in numbers. I have not used them in a very long time, I do not like that early of a GA on std maps.
 
Apolyton has a few articles on Jag use IIRC. Use them as scouts-with-teeth (who can defend themselves from barbs) and special forces for resource denial and pillaging. Otherwise stick with better attackers. (thats what the experts say, anyway...)
My only Dom win was as the Aztec (only Regent, though) and I found the Jags semi-useful for exploration but I used swords for my first real war.
 
I've built both walls and fortresses (four forts) in the Diety game I'm playing, in order to turn my west front into a solid barrier. Allows me to concentrate entirely on fighting in the east without worry.

Yes also on colonies, when the resource is in horrible territory where an early city can't thrive. Large areas of hills and deserts, for example.

Catapults do have use in the ancient age--they do damage without putting your troops at risk. I've built them in a few games, but the AI's in the Ancient Age are pretty easy to crack without them (cities are small during this age, and rarely have walls). Artillery becomes useful when you're up against size 12 cities with musketmen in them and you don't have access to horses.

Jaggie Warriors? Used those two. Only played one game with 'em, but they were a fun unit. Mostly for scouting, but handy even against spearmen because they could retreat.
 
commodified said:
I can beat Monarch with ease, but take these questions with a grain of salt :p . I've decided to mush them all into one thread, rather than bothering everybody more than once.

1. Have you ever built walls in a city anywhere? If so, why?

2. Have you ever built a colony? Besides OCC, when would you prefer one over just founding a new city?

3. Fortresses: ever built one? Why?

4. Catapults: they have the same bombardment value as ironclads, which seem to do nothing (nada) about 60%. So do you ever use them in the ancient age, and if so, how?

5. Archers: Maybe it's because I've never attempted Emperor or Deity (and own only vanilla Civ III), but I've never used them. I always wait for horses or swords.

6. Jags: They must be awesome, because Firaxis felt like they needed to make them cost 15 instead of 10. But I'm inept with them. Two of them never seem to do the job, and by the time you have three, the enemy usually has spears. :confused: Can anybody link me to Jag strats?

Gracias

1. Very rarely, but it's possible. If a frontier city is facing a horde o' barbs, it can be useful.

2. If the resource is surrounded by mountains. Also if you can't wait long enough for a city to expand to cover the resource in question.

3. It's rare that my workers have nothing else to do, but I did it once with a crusader who had nothing else to do.

4. By the time ironclads come online, they're facing rifles. Cats won't face anything stronger than pikes.

5. If you start with Warcode as a tech, archer rush is the way to go

6. I don't like playing the Aztecs, so don't ask me.
 
Walls - Yes, but only in certain circumstances. In my current game, I built it in a city on a choke point (literally a one tile wide land bridge) to a mini-continent with six of my cities, that was in the artic (wasn't going to be a size 6 anytime soon), and was on a border with the zulus (who I was at war with) that I couldn't rush units to that quickly. I basically wanted to not have to think about that front and it worked quite well.

Colonies - newp.

Fortresses - yes, mainly on established borders that I don't expect to move. Also, mainly later in the game, when my workers have already built all the irrigation/rail/mines that they're going to. I intersperse them with cities as mentioned above.

Catapults - All the time. Even having the opposing unit down one bar of health is useful. Plus, they upgrade to far more effective means of bombardment.

Archers - never used them, but I've never been lacking iron either.

Jaguars - Dunno. I plan to play the aztecs, but haven't yet.
 
commodified said:
1. Have you ever built walls in a city anywhere? If so, why?

I rarely build walls. If I need to defend a stroke point, I just build an aquaduct and join workers instead. Since wall obsoletes so quickly once the city get above size 6, it would be best to build an aquaduct instead and focus on growing your cities above size 6. Extra Bonus: you would also get extra free units support (if you are in Republic). Therefore, getting more than one birds with the same shot.

2. Have you ever built a colony? Besides OCC, when would you prefer one over just founding a new city?

If the resource is on top of a mountain or on a jungle tile, I usually build a colony before I build a city next to it. The reason for that...instead of taking a long time to finish its road, I would get instant road. Of course, it costs 1 worker; hint: use the slave workers if you have them.

3. Fortresses: ever built one? Why?
Only build them a few turns before the war. If the enemy have a lot of fast units, you may want to consider building barricade as well. With proper barricades, you could easily trape and kill all enemy offensive (assuming you have cannons/artilleries to support your defenders). Extra bonus: a military leader farm.

4. Catapults: they have the same bombardment value as ironclads, which seem to do nothing (nada) about 60%. So do you ever use them in the ancient age, and if so, how?

I rarely go to war without catapults, cannons, or artilleries! Ironclad (or any type of other warship) is usually useless; I don't build them. I usually focus my resources on building horseman/knight/cavalry, and catapult/cannon/artillery. Hint: You could easily destroy the enemy fleet by hurting them with cannons/artilleries. Once their ships withdraw into their cities to heal, capture their cities and their fleet will be destroyed as well. If not, once you collapse their land, their fleet would be useless anyway. IMO, the worker is the #1 unit to go head to head against the enemy warships and bombers.;) Since bombardment can't harm the workers, and by camping enough workers right on the spot, I can instantly rebuild any road without any problem. Btw, the cost of a worker is much cheaper than the cost of a warship.;)

5. Archers: Maybe it's because I've never attempted Emperor or Deity (and own only vanilla Civ III), but I've never used them. I always wait for horses or swords.

There is really no time for archers! Focus on building settlers and workers first, then charriots or horsemans.

6. Jags: They must be awesome, because Firaxis felt like they needed to make them cost 15 instead of 10. But I'm inept with them. Two of them never seem to do the job, and by the time you have three, the enemy usually has spears. :confused: Can anybody link me to Jag strats?

I think Jags is over rated! I rarely used them; therefore, I'm not qualified to talk about them.
 
1. If a town is going to be attacked, sometimes rushing a wall there is better than rushing an unit.

2. I used colony to get Iron a few times, but only early in the game when I needed that Iron for a sword rush. In those instances, colony is the fastest way to get to the Iron. It takes only 1 turn to build a colony. There is no need to road a mountain or to build a temple.

3. In AW games only. In most other games, the battle front is too fluid for foresses to be effective.

4. A very important unit. The best way to do more with less. The best way to fight someone stronger. The thing about catapults, it takes a big stack for them to be effective on offense, because on offense, they're trying to hit enemies that are fortified and enjoy defensive bonuses. On defense, catapults only need to hit un-fortified units that are walking around in the open. In those instances, even one or two catapults can make a big difference.

5. An archer/cat/spear stack can be just as effective as a sword stack.

6. Just because they are an UU, doesn't mean they have to be the main assult force in any strategy... The jag's advantage is in its mobility. They are best used to hurt the enemy and gain benefit for you in ways other than direct frontal assult. They can do things like grab goody huts, picking off workers and settlers, pillaging tiles, or if you feel :devil: , "pulling the AI's puppet strings" (coined by Sirian, I think).
 
catapults are fantasitc and cheap force multipliers--especially handy if you dont have early iron or an anciet age UU, and you need to relieve some land from a bloated AI neighbor who wouldnt know what to do with it if someone told him.

fortresses are good for folks who dont want to fight an epic ancient age conquest and dont want to fund an epic scale army to defend against an AI looking to expand.

Walls work where the border is too long for fortresses. But nothing beats a nice fat mountain range between you and a rude opponent.

colonies are a waste of time before the late industrial era usually--they will simply be dissolved once the AI sets up a city to horde the resource you only half claimed.

In my experience the AI doesnt stop building cities until virtually every last tile is claimed or is one cultural expansion away from the same, for some reason once the great mutual protection wars start that slows down the AI city cropping.
 
1) Walls - agree with everyone here
2) Colonies - listen to Moonsinger.
Colonies are widely underused. I'd bet most players aren't really aware of the fact forming a colony instantly creates a road...
I much prefer a colony over placing a city somewhere it doesn't benefit otherwise. And I much prefer a colony over rushing culture like mad, especially for non-REL/SCI Civs.

3) Fortresses
The defense bonus doesn't give me much. But, a Fortress has 'zone of controll'; I'd rather build a Fortress where the AI passes by and I get free shot, than to block them off.
Also, Barricades are underused - and you obviously need to build a Fortress first.
But I in general like to build Fortresses; I tend to bring Workers along when I move the slow siege weaponry to a city for roading, and when the road is done, why not build a Fortress?

4) + 5) Archers and Cats.
Yes, I do build them. Aside from AW, not in large amounts. The offensive Bomabrd of Cats isn't great - but, and that's why I also build Archers even when I have Iron and Horses, the defensive bombardment rules.
 
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