Besides defending cities, are defensive units useless?
- Thread starter bugga_ba
- Start date
Welcome to CFC, bugga_ba.
No, I wouldn't say "useless." They can also defend stacks of cats, defend stacks of artillery, and, in some governments, help keep your people from rioting. Just exactly how useful they are depends on what kind of game you play and the difficulty level.
No, I wouldn't say "useless." They can also defend stacks of cats, defend stacks of artillery, and, in some governments, help keep your people from rioting. Just exactly how useful they are depends on what kind of game you play and the difficulty level.
Optional
Deity
What many players would say is that, for defending cities, offensive units are often better.
Say, an enemy stack of a Spearman and 3 Archers is entering your territory, heading for one of your cities. You're better off, if you've got some offensive units around (and better, some catapults to take some hitpoints off the Spearman first!) to attack this stack on your own turn. That's better than sitting in your cities with Spearmen, waiting to be attacked.
What a hostile AI also often does is entering your territory with solitary Spear- or Pikemen, heading for your luxuries or strategic resources in an attempt to pillage those. You need offensive units to attack those nasty AI invaders.
Defensive units are not useless, but offensive units offer you more tactical options.
Say, an enemy stack of a Spearman and 3 Archers is entering your territory, heading for one of your cities. You're better off, if you've got some offensive units around (and better, some catapults to take some hitpoints off the Spearman first!) to attack this stack on your own turn. That's better than sitting in your cities with Spearmen, waiting to be attacked.
What a hostile AI also often does is entering your territory with solitary Spear- or Pikemen, heading for your luxuries or strategic resources in an attempt to pillage those. You need offensive units to attack those nasty AI invaders.
Defensive units are not useless, but offensive units offer you more tactical options.
Also depends on the age/unit in question. Pikes and Muskets are the best defensive units for their age, but both are easily outmatched by UUs and special units. Immortals outmatch Pikes (4 attk to 3 Def) and arrive on Ironworking. Standard swordman match pikes 3 defense with their attack stats. Knights /Samurai which arrives on Chivalry can cut through pikes and upgrading to muskets and their 4 defense only brings them to parity. In all these cases you need to rely on defensive/fortification bonuses, and lots of attacking units of your own to hold a city or position safely.
This changes with replaceable part.
Infantry is a very good all around unit in that period after cavalry but before tanks. In fact, used properly, they can defend almost any position fromt he AI all the way up to modern armor.
Resourceless variants such as Guerilla and TOW also have the bombard ability. Though AI uses all 3 units I've mentioned offensively (because they have decent attack stats for the age they arrive in) I use Infantry almost exclusively as a defensive. Both for defending positions and cities obviously but also as an offensive unit to 'bleed AI' of troops when hostilities commence.
Park a stack on a mountain and watch the AI go insane trying to take it down. An infantry unit on a mountian tile fortified has 10*2.25 = 22.5 defense.
Depending on the tactical situation, You can then either wait, or send your fast attackers to pick off their redlline units. then retreat back to a safe position inside a city or to a stack defended by DEFENSIVE units! Or support it with artillery, also defended by DEFENSIVE units!
This changes with replaceable part.
Infantry is a very good all around unit in that period after cavalry but before tanks. In fact, used properly, they can defend almost any position fromt he AI all the way up to modern armor.
Resourceless variants such as Guerilla and TOW also have the bombard ability. Though AI uses all 3 units I've mentioned offensively (because they have decent attack stats for the age they arrive in) I use Infantry almost exclusively as a defensive. Both for defending positions and cities obviously but also as an offensive unit to 'bleed AI' of troops when hostilities commence.
Park a stack on a mountain and watch the AI go insane trying to take it down. An infantry unit on a mountian tile fortified has 10*2.25 = 22.5 defense.
Depending on the tactical situation, You can then either wait, or send your fast attackers to pick off their redlline units. then retreat back to a safe position inside a city or to a stack defended by DEFENSIVE units! Or support it with artillery, also defended by DEFENSIVE units!
Lord Emsworth
Emperor
I only rarely use defensive units to defend my cities. By far more often I will use them outside of cities to simply block AI movement routes and force those units onto terrain with a lower defensive bonus.
For example I couldn't really stand an AI archer stack approach a town over an adjacent mountain. Instead, if I put a Spearman there, the Archer stack would have to circumnavigate that mountain (I doubt the Spear would be attacked) through terrain with a lower defense bonus and make far more easy pickings.
For example I couldn't really stand an AI archer stack approach a town over an adjacent mountain. Instead, if I put a Spearman there, the Archer stack would have to circumnavigate that mountain (I doubt the Spear would be attacked) through terrain with a lower defense bonus and make far more easy pickings.
Lord Emsworth
Emperor
Wrt to Infantries I have noticed that if you put them in a fortress (regardless of terrain) they'll never be attacked by anything lower than tanks. (At least, that holds for my C3 1.29b2 (Mac)) Makes for an awesome way to entirely seal off even fairly wide 'chokepoints.'
Optional
Deity
What I've seen is that the AI does attack defensive units on mountains just to get their own offensive units on there. But I do the same thing; parking defensive units on mountains so that the AI can't easily use those as a stepping stone.
darski
Regent in Training
Defensive units are not useless by any stretch.
It may not come up often but I have used a spear to attack that last 1hp spear/warrior in a city just so the city is taken and the spear cannot regenerate IBT. I don't count on them for offense but I use it if I have to.
It may not come up often but I have used a spear to attack that last 1hp spear/warrior in a city just so the city is taken and the spear cannot regenerate IBT. I don't count on them for offense but I use it if I have to.
Like most, I use offensive units to garrison border towns, not defensive units. I mainly use defensive units to escort stacks. I always add a couple spears to a sword stack. Better to lose a 20s spear than a 30s sword during an ambush.
I tend to have defensive units around just so that it is them that get attacked rather than the offensive units, so that my offensive units can counter attack with full health.
and a great way to weaken an enemy is to park a defensive stack on a mountain in their territory. I try to have a few fast units in there too to pick off any redlined attackers
and a great way to weaken an enemy is to park a defensive stack on a mountain in their territory. I try to have a few fast units in there too to pick off any redlined attackers
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