attacks from cities

[civplayer33]

So what I found was that if I took a 2nd smaller city, and puppeted that, the happiness overwrote the unhappiness and got me into a decent standing (not at 50%, but no longer barbs out the gate). So the answer was...more conquest

Because of Luxuries the second City had? Puppets aren't supposed to generate any Happiness; only Unhappiness (1 for every 5 Citizens).

 

[CrazyG]

Actually, that would be 0 Unhappiness if you made the City a Puppet.
On the current patch you get 1 Unhappiness for every 5 Population a Puppet City has (rounded down).

You are right, this changes the situation quite a bit.

Still though, it isn't that crazy to annex. One way to think of it is that if you settle a city with 4 pop, at this stage of the game, it probably has 4/4 unhappiness. So your annexed city really isn't that much worse.

 

[Omen of Peace]

Also, if the unhappiness is too much by just 1... raze the annexed city for 1 turn. Then you can settle, and later let the annexed city grow back again.

 

[Stalker0]

So while this is not a normal example, it just shows how extreme the archer rush can get.

I had a beautiful start with Siam, got a 7 pop capital, and decided to go to work. In total I

1) Did a Pyramid rush
2) Got my shrine
3) Still did an archer rush and killed Attila's 2 cities.
4) Expanded again
5) With my same archers, archer rushed Babylon and took 2 of his cities (non-capital).
6) Still managed to found with goddess of beauty (granted, on Turn 108 so that was pure luck...I consider turn 100 the cutoff for normal Immortal AI play).

All of that with 5 archers (started with 4 and made a 5th one to speed things up) and my pathfinder.

Now my beautiful capital was a factor in this (and I did get a food CS for Siam for the boost, but that was the only CS I found early), but it shows that you don't necessarily have to super rush the archers to make it work. The key is terrain, as long as there is good terrain for the archers to attack from, they will get the job done.

 

[civplayer33]

I'm still in favor of either a) giving Archers an anti-City-malus (lost on upgrade) combined with more CS from Palace or b) giving Palace +1 Range to City attack and maybe a bit more CS, but the range increase may just be enough given how Cities now deal decent damage (especially if the Capital is settled on a hill...such a capital can almost one-shot Pathfinders now).

 

[Stalker0]

I'm still in favor of either a) giving Archers an anti-City-malus (lost on upgrade) combined with more CS from Palace or b) giving Palace +1 Range to City attack and maybe a bit more CS, but the range increase may just be enough given how Cities now deal decent damage (especially if the Capital is settled on a hill...such a capital can almost one-shot Pathfinders now).

I think the trick is the +1 range. Less damage or more CS won't change anything unless its extreme, I can literally just sit there and plink away at the city until its dead. The only thing that change would do is slow me down a bit, but also grant me more xp once the job is done.

I think the +1 range is probably the best bet, though it might be a bit too strong with the new damage changes.

Having just done a quick hoplite rush, its quite sad how weak the hoplite is compared to the lonely archer. With hoplites I wind getting draw in and mucked down, with the archer rush I just move in and win....its so easy in comparison.

 

[BiteInTheMark]

I think the trick is the +1 range. Less damage or more CS won't change anything unless its extreme, I can literally just sit there and plink away at the city until its dead. The only thing that change would do is slow me down a bit, but also grant me more xp once the job is done.

I think the +1 range is probably the best bet, though it might be a bit too strong with the new damage changes.

Having just done a quick hoplite rush, its quite sad how weak the hoplite is compared to the lonely archer. With hoplites I wind getting draw in and mucked down, with the archer rush I just move in and win....its so easy in comparison.

The point is the lack of retaliation from the city. A need to pull back an archer every 2 or 3 turns would slow you down. Maybe you still get that capital, but other neighbors would have more time to build an effective army or walls against your approach.

I think I would reduce the archers RCS by one, he's simply too good, I only build archers early game and completely ignore warriors if not needed for conquest.
I also would give each city a 2 range attack, but weaken it noticeable. Melee city attackers would benefit from the change while ranged units would get nerfed, and I think this is, what we want, or?

 

[CrazyG]

I agree you need one more range on cities. Should be all cities IMO, not just capitals. Dedicated archer rushing would still work, but you take damage in the process. You get slowed down a lot and you face more risk of losing units. We could try giving archers -1 RCS too. Really their only flaw is they don't scare city states into tributing easily.

 

[BiteInTheMark]

Really their only flaw is they don't scare city states into tributing easily.

Yes? I was always wondering why its so hard to get tribute with my archer army.

 

[crdvis16]

Yeah this seems broken.

Increasing base city range to 2 at the start seems like the best solution. Walls can just buff CS/hp and not buff range.

Nerfing archer city damage just makes it take longer but the city still falls with no way to fight back against the archers.

Only giving palace/capital +1 city range means they still lose their secondary cities.

Reducing archer range to just 1 kinda makes archers too weak IMO. If archers are also too strong relative to spearmen or something then they can get a -1 RCS nerf.

 

[pineappledan]

I don't think Archers are too weak unit vs units; I think giving back all cities 2 base range is the easiest solution here. This is just rolling back to a vanilla feature, so it will also make VP more approachable to new players, so it seems like the best choice.

 

[legoras]

Can anyone tell at which files or where to look, are 'city strength*' modifiers etc. ?

*city strength... damn it, that was looking weird.

 

[Tugboatspotter]

I think I am coming round to ilteroi's opinion on this.

Currently the walled city attack is ridiculous making it impossible for a coastal invasion in some cases when they one-shot everything.

Has it been suggested that the damage inflicted should be a lot less for two tiles than one?

Personally I would remove city attacks and remove the stacking limitation within cities. It is already annoying moving troops around with the 1UPT - if cities could be exempted then it would solve troop movement frustration and lack of city attack in one fell swoop.

 

[Gazebo]

The issue is the archer, not all units. I'd rather adjust the unit than punish all other units by increasing base range by 1.

G

 

[Tugboatspotter]

No ranged units (archer, longbow, crossbow) before gunpowder can hurt cities.

Makes sense?

 

[Stalker0]

The issue is the archer, not all units. I'd rather adjust the unit than punish all other units by increasing base range by 1.

G

You could start with a -1 RCS and go from there. I don't think it will solve the problem, but it would make warriors (and spears especially) a stronger counter.

 

[Gazebo]

No ranged units (archer, longbow, crossbow) before gunpowder can hurt cities.

Makes sense?

No. Civ is an abstraction.

You could start with a -1 RCS and go from there. I don't think it will solve the problem, but it would make warriors (and spears especially) a stronger counter.

Even if it simply 'increases the length of sieges,' that alone allows for counter time, more units, walls to go up, etc.

G

 

[Tugboatspotter]

No. Civ is an abstraction.

G

The ranged units not causing damage to the city is exactly that, an abstraction.

I think it is necessary at this point. The archer rush must be crushed.

 

[crdvis16]

You could start with a -1 RCS and go from there. I don't think it will solve the problem, but it would make warriors (and spears especially) a stronger counter.

It's still kinda silly, though, that the window when you can get archers before they get walls is the only time that you can attack the city without the city shooting back. For the rest of the game that dynamic doesn't usually exist aside from highly promoted units most likely.

I wouldn't think -1RCS would be enough. Maybe a -50% damage to city malus on top? That slows down the siege and buys more time for walls and AI units maybe?

 

[Stalker0]

So here is an example for context.

I just took Spain's capital, which had a Warrior Garrison (so 11 CS). I'm doing 12 dmg a shot with my archers. Now I'm assaulting his second city, with a warrior garrison on a hill (14 CS). My archers have effectively 6 RCS because of the unhappiness penalty.

So now I'm doing 8 dmg a shot, about 50% less, for that 4 effective RCS difference.

EDIT: So it actually made all the difference. Spain was able to generate enough units to stop my assault in its tracks. While I took his capital he was able to hold on to his second city, and now I am swimming in barbs at my capital. Now if that had been the numbers for the capital I don't think it would have stopped me, but it would have taken more turns for sure. And if he had an archer in the city, it probably would have made a huge difference.

Also CrazyG, 2 notes on that annex idea:

1) You can't raze a capital, so generally I have found immediate annex still puts me in unhappiness (33% in most cases)

2) One issue is that this often triggers an immediate flush of barbs. They either appear at my capital (where I have minimal defenses as my units are rushing), or at my new city...which if I am involved in a new attack can be quite annoying.

Edit: Or....they could just go everywhere. In my recent rush, I got 2 barbs at my new city, than 2 barbs at my capital....and then 2 more barbs at my capital....and then 2 more barbs at my new city (jesus this is insane). And I cannot quickly make archers anymore because of the -75% happiness penalty.

So I'm still not sold on immediate annexing.