Aggressive Trait-no free promotions with barracks?

[Vox Dei]

I'm trying civs with the aggresive trait for the first time. (Prince level)

It seems the free promotion is useless if one builds a barracks.

(Which I tend to do between worker/settler chops.)

Dang, I thought the units would come out of the barracks with 5 xp.

Am I missing something?

 

[cabert]

agressive trait gives you a free combat I promotion, not XPs.
And you get only combat I for melee and gunpowder units (not for archers/scouts/...)

 

[voek]

Don't underestimate the strenght bonus. The CHEAPER barracks don't compensate the aggressive trait, they make it even stronger.

Especially in your early wars, for example your axemen rush, you now have the option to give city raider to your axeman rightaway! You can build axemen who instantly are good city raiders and when getting some extra XP you will have an axe with +str + 2 x city raider , which makes it an early sword (or even better).

Altough it might be better to be able to choose your 'free promotion' but strenght is a good one anyway and otherwise it would prob. be overpowered, i think.

 

[Vox Dei]

Oh, now I understand it better. Thanks

 

[cabert]

Altough it might be better to be able to choose your 'free promotion' but strenght is a good one anyway and otherwise it would prob. be overpowered, i think.

don't forget that you get the free combat 1 promotion with 0 xp, meaning that you get promoted very fast :
combat 1+city raider 2 is only 5 XP!
and if you use barbs as XP fuel, you can have 10XP, meaning 3 promotions + combat 1: one good line is combat 1,2,3, march BEFORE EVEN GOING FOR AN AI!

 

[slightlymarxist]

Especially in your early wars, for example your axemen rush, you now have the option to give city raider to your axeman rightaway!

Not trying to be a smartalec, but you can give City Raider as the first promotion anyway (it doesn't require Combat I as a prereq). What DOES need Combat I as a prereq, however, is the almighty COVER (+25% vs archery) which is a huge deal.

An Aramada of Axemen with Cover (and City Raider after the first xp gain) is no laughing matter. Since all the AI:s build hordes of archers early on, Aggressive is almost better than Financial.

 

[gunkulator]

Since the AI mostly keeps its archers inside cities, aren't you better off with most of your axes having City Raider I and II? The City Raider promotions work against any city defender. I rarely see an AI archer outside of a city.

 

[slightlymarxist]

I rarely see an AI archer outside of a city.

Then you should try playing Emperor level or above... I always get plenty of barbarian archers lurking around my borders. And when I'm at war with other civs I try to pillage their strategic resources with a suicide unit, forcing them to produce archers instead of chariots/axemen/spearmen.

 

[Dizzy75]

Not just Cover, but Medic, Shock, Pinch. And you only need 5 xp for Ambush or Formation (or March or Medic II).

Midgame wars w/Theocracy you can pop out Pikes or Rifles immediately with Formation. Pikes get 14.7 vs. mounted and Rifles 23.8 (17.7 and 30.8 (!) in forest). Keshiks, Knights, Cavs = dog food

 

[A+ombomb]

Aggressive is particularly good in late era starts with gunpowder units. One of the best team strategies to abuse this concept is england + aggressive, and have england gift its redcoats to the aggressive civ (without allocating experience), thus giving it a free combat star and the ability to get an extra high end upgrade! A simple 6/5 redcoat with 2 star upgrades and vs gunpowder upgrade will have (16+.2*16)*1.5 = 28.8 power vs other gunpowder! That's just a little sick.

 

[Danghis Khan]

The problem with taking cover over city raider II is that cover is essentially a dead end promotion - there is no cover II. If you take city raider II you can then quickly get city raider III - which just flattens any opposition. I'm currently playing as Japan and all my old axemen are now wandering around as samurai - very lethal on cities (thanks to the 2 first strikes, 75% vs. cities, 10% strength). The other problem with cover is it becomes obsolete in the gunpowder age.

 

[Mutineer]

The problem with taking cover over city raider II is that cover is essentially a dead end promotion - there is no cover II. If you take city raider II you can then quickly get city raider III - which just flattens any opposition. I'm currently playing as Japan and all my old axemen are now wandering around as samurai - very lethal on cities (thanks to the 2 first strikes, 75% vs. cities, 10% strength). The other problem with cover is it becomes obsolete in the gunpowder age.

Yes, but why cared about what happened 2000 years from now on?
Omportant think that I can kill this archers outcide cities stright away.

If you play on Empiror + level you will see AI sending stack of doom of 4 archers youw way if they do not have metals. This stack actillay surpriselly effective again warrioes or lonly archer defending you new city.

 

[Gnarfflinger]

What I found was that starting an Axeman or Maceman with Cover and Shock as a means of picking off straglers/resource guards, then when they promote you add City Raider. Once your catapults wear down their cities, then you lower the boom. This assumes that you have Vassalage and/or Theocracy working too...

 

[slightlymarxist]

The problem with taking cover over city raider II is that cover is essentially a dead end promotion - there is no cover II. If you take city raider II you can then quickly get city raider III - which just flattens any opposition. I'm currently playing as Japan and all my old axemen are now wandering around as samurai - very lethal on cities (thanks to the 2 first strikes, 75% vs. cities, 10% strength). The other problem with cover is it becomes obsolete in the gunpowder age.

I never promote old units - I build new ones and delete the obsolete ones (exception: I hang on to one or two ancient lvl4's or lvl5's so I can build Heroic Epic/West Point later). You're right about Cover being useless in the gunpowder eras. I suppose I'm just a total opportunist.

EDIT: "Promote" as in, "upgrade from Axeman to Samurai, for hard cash".

 

[cabert]

I never promote old units - I build new ones and delete the obsolete ones (exception: I hang on to one or two ancient lvl4's or lvl5's so I can build Heroic Epic/West Point later). You're right about Cover being useless in the gunpowder eras. I suppose I'm just a total opportunist.

EDIT: "Promote" as in, "upgrade from Axeman to Samurai, for hard cash".

I keep them as garison in core cities (1980 : washington is defended by an axeman ) or suicide them against any ennemy.
But I do upgrade the city raiders, or combat prmoted, if i need troops fast.

 

[Gnarfflinger]

I upgrade them, If a unit that had Cover is still alive to promote to Infantry, then it is probably carrying something more useful too.

 

[DementedAvenger]

Upgrade any and all city raider III units - it is well worth the investment if you're going to be doing any warring with gunpowder units.

 

[cabert]

Upgrade any and all city raider III units - it is well worth the investment if you're going to be doing any warring with gunpowder units.

i upgrade siege only very rarely, since my west point + heroic epic can produce or $-rush city raider III artillery every other turn.
So i end up suiciding city raiding cats then city raiding canons without second thoughts on most occasions.
Only the rare but SOOO powerfull CR III + good stuff (drill may be best, or barrage)

Melee often have a few exotic promotions without any interest in the late game. I only upgrade CRs when they become riflemen/infantry, and that's awfully expensive : costs as much as building 2 riflemen!!

Mounted get promoted to helicopters! that's just not interesting!

Navals : those i do upgrade, because i build very few ancient ones.

 

[gdgrimm]

Isn't City Raider I only a 20% bonus?

Cover and Shock are each 25% bonus. So a ComI/Cover promotion would actually be more potent then just ComI/CRI when taking a city (which is usually defended primarily by Archers in the early game). Toss in a couple of ComI/Shock to help with attack/defense against enemy Axemen in the field, and you're set.

 

[Danghis Khan]

Yes CRI is 20%, but CRII is 25%, and CRIII is 30% + 10% vs gunpowder. Makes for a pretty potent attack. So if you're aggressive, with barracks and the right civics (forget WP for the moment) you can have a Com1, CRII unit that'll get enough points to promote to CRIII after one battle. I'm slowly playing as the Japanese and I'm just walking all over the Arabs with a massive army of CRIII samurai. Bwah ha ha hah!