Combat Strategy ??? Tips and Advice!

[snepp]

So basically you do have to pillage a resource improvment (iron, oil, ivory, wine, silk, etc) but you do not have to pillage a standard worker improved tile if your goal is just to stop them from working that tile (farm, cottage, workshop, etc)???

So if the city has a cow pasture and I park a unit on it, they no longer get the +food because they can not work that tile but they still get the +health effect of having cows as a resource??

You got it.

 

[Draax]

I don't believe this is accurate. Parking a unit on a tile will prevent the city's citizens from working that tile, but the empire will still recieve the resources from that tile. Pillaging is required to deny access.

I'll experiment tonight. I know the graphic changes because I noticed it just last night. I moved onto an enemy's pasture and the cows moved. I moved to a silk plantation and the plants dried up and turned a tan color. I moved onto a rice farm and it got all weird looking. Then again I'd been without sleep for a couple of days and could very well have been seeing things.

They may still receive the benefit, though. Dunno. I haven't been trying to deny benefits, but to starve population of food and production.

 

[snepp]

I'll experiment tonight. *snip*

I just setup a world builder test, parking enemy units on various resources of mine, both inside and outside of my city radius, and didn't lose access to any resources.

I think putting units on resources should deny that resource, why does it "need" to be pillaged if you have control of that tile. Also, having units parked on a city's only road to a resource could count as cutting off the connection.

Edit again...

Just realized something, naval units deny citizens the ability to work all adjacent squares, definately need to make better use of this.

 

[Geon]

Even if he kills my guy, I win because I can then kill his guy next turn. That's one less unit in his city, and I still control the tile.

I have found that even a 1 movement unit if attacking from a city to an adjacant square with a road can still retreat back into the city on the same turn. The only way to stop it is pillage roads, and roads are always pillaged last. So I say pillage pillage pillage. Sure making towns grow again hurts, but all the other improvements are just a worker away.

Also I have found fast unit pillaging way easier in SP than MP. Fast units are easy targets against spears. The AI doesn't make good use of spears and axes, but another human sure does. I try and cut off his transport network and vital supplies such as horse and especially iron/bronze, but I do this knowing that my fast units are usually sacrificed in doing so(if they even make it). It is worth it though, especially if he can't make axe/spears for a few turns or maybe permanently if he is low on spears initially and I send harrassers faster than he can reconnect his supplies. or if my plodding axe/spear/sword mini stacks can reach them and fortify on em.

 

[Heroes]

Again, promotions are cool but when talking about balance in the game it's wrong to compare a level 0 axeman to a level 3 or 4 horse archer. With the right civics you can have your axemem out with 50% forrest bonus right from the bat. And how do you intend to take out a level 4 axeman? A level 7 horse archer?

Promotion is a part of balance, IMHO. Because aggressive trait gives a free combat 1 promotion to melee and gunpowder units, and some civics and wonders add XP to new units. By selecting these things, you can make your new soliders stronger than their veterans.
BTW: Heroic epic is a great national wonder: +100% production for military units. To build it you need a level 4 unit, which means an ancient age war, --or killing many animals?

 

[Colonel Kraken]

Regarding the original post about the defender getting to choose who fights. The trick to beat this is to overload on a unit. If the defender has 3 axemen and one spearmen either overwhelm the spearmen with cavalry or wound the spearmen and proceed with cavalry. If the defender has 3 axemen, 3 spearmen and you have 3 swordsmen and 3 cavalry, then you probably shouldn't be attacking 1:1 (unless you are very desperate) without an advantage such as artillery to collateral them.

Cool advice. Thanks!

I find it's smart to take advantage of promotions. If you're attacking a city, city siege is a no brainer. City Siege 2 can be enough to overcome the huge defensive advantage of a lot of units.

I think we're all at least intelligent enough to realize this obvious part of the combat system! I probably had not made myself clear. I was expecting to lose units. But, I was hoping that my Praetorians with Combat 1, Combat II, and +25% versas melee units (and other such power combos, etc.) I would be able to do some damage and make a killing. Instead, the AI had some sappy bimbo archer defending like he was some kind of king of the battlefield.

Sure, it's easy to make catapults overpowering again. Just set their retreat percent to 100 in the appropriate XML file and you have a unit that won't die on the attack. It'll do collateral damage and you can redline foes with ease and not pay any price for it. You can do that with all the artillery units, if you want.

I'll stick with gameplay balance myself.

Arathorn

Don't assume I dont' want gameplay balance. But it's also nice to have game mechanics and such make sense to the game player. Things that may balance a game but simply don't make sense to the player don't exactly make for a great game. Besides, if both attacking and defending "artillery" type units have the same capability, where's the imbalance?

I would also reccomend keeping an eye on what civic your neighbors are switching to. If you see a message that your pesky neighbor who is already annoyed with you has just switched to Vassalage and Theocracy you can guess what's going to happen next.

Excellent advice!

Just realized something, naval units deny citizens the ability to work all adjacent squares, definately need to make better use of this.

Adjacent land tiles?

 

[Heroes]

I like the Theocracy + Vassalage mode to build units. In terms of using it in case of defense, too, one option would be to switch all cities to this for a few turns and build three of four units in each city, then switch to Organized Religion and building production for a few turns and then switch back to produce units, etc.

This would cause a lot of anarchy, but would be a good way to maximize the benefits of a Religious trait, which I've always seen as kind of useless, but would actually be really good here. If you switch back and forth and synchronize production in all your cities with the appropriate civics, then it would be a really good trait to have.

Many revolutions are only good for spiritual leaders for no anarchy. If you are not spiritual, as a comprise, how about sticking in vassalage + organized religion? A new unit with 6 XP is enough to gain 2 promotions, you don't need the extra 2 XP so badly that you would like to sacrifice +25% benefit in building production and to have much anarchy.

 

[snepp]

Adjacent land tiles?

No, sorry, should have been more specific. Naval units stop citizens from working the tile they're on, and all adjacent water tiles.

 

[narmox]

To build it you need a level 4 unit, which means an ancient age war, --or killing many animals?

experience from animals is capped at 5 XP, and for barbarians it's capped at 10 XP, so don't waste time with them if your unit has that much. Instead what I do is once an exploring warrior has reached 5 (or 10) I return it to my cities and cycle it with a new one with no XP, so at the very least a large part of my units will have 5-10 XPs before even my first war (with or without the help of barracks!)

 

[mrnoface]

Well, I can't really say I'm happy with the combat system in Civ4.

Archers and musketmen crushing my armors... this is soooo unimaginable in real life! Of course they have some advantages because of defense bonuses but I can't really agree when 3 out of 5 armors being defeated by older units in several combats.

I mean, what's the point of having more firepower? In one game I even used WorldEdit to put 50 Panzers to crush those pesky China and Spain, and guess what? Although they couldn't build any units better than musketman/rifleman (they came up with infantry later) 30 of my tanks were gone!

 

[MiamiBigAL]

But this is where the strategy actually comes in. If both of you are out pillaging land and avoiding battles you cant win and trying to exploit the other player's weakness, then the better strategist will prevail. The person who is able to plunder more efficiently, or choose his battles better, or build the larger/more balanced military will win.

This is not a bad thing.

You could use that argument for any situation.... Why don't we make warriors with 10 strength instead of 2, because it would still be fair because everyone can get warriors and the better strategist will win.

I guess I'm the only one who agrees with Lor. It would be nice to have a symmetrical RPS system in the ancient era. Right now it DOES seem like you can make a stack of solely Axemen without worrying too much about what defenders you're going to face.

I'm not saying the game is entirely unbalanced at that era, as I think the Axemen having 5 strength instead of 6, like horse archers, are because of its anti-melee capabilities whilst still being a melee unit. However, it would be....shall we say, "tidier", if there was an anti-axeman unit that wasn't just an axeman, especially when it's such a useful attacking unit.

The same could be said for ranged units, bar the existence of que-chas, but being defenders, that's more acceptable

 

[Jazz_Newton]

That's one way of doing it, and certainly the best when laying seige to a walled city(in game or RL), but it's not the only way, and it's important not to get stuck on one strategy. You may have all your cats heading toward the enemy's capitol when you notice a large enemy stack heading towards yours and if you're not flexible/adaptable enough, you're doomed.

I can't understand why you're using this as an example of bad game design. If you over-commit your attack force, get counter-attacked and don't have any contingency plans in place, you DESERVE to get smashed. In CIV (or pretty much any other computer game), in football (or pretty much any other sport), or in real-life war.

 

[snepp]

Well, I can't really say I'm happy with the combat system in Civ4.

Archers and musketmen crushing my armors... this is soooo unimaginable in real life! Of course they have some advantages because of defense bonuses but I can't really agree when 3 out of 5 armors being defeated by older units in several combats.

I mean, what's the point of having more firepower? In one game I even used WorldEdit to put 50 Panzers to crush those pesky China and Spain, and guess what? Although they couldn't build any units better than musketman/rifleman (they came up with infantry later) 30 of my tanks were gone!

Artillery and bombers.

 

[Colonel Kraken]

Sure, it's easy to make catapults overpowering again. Just set their retreat percent to 100 in the appropriate XML file and you have a unit that won't die on the attack. It'll do collateral damage and you can redline foes with ease and not pay any price for it. You can do that with all the artillery units, if you want.

I'll stick with gameplay balance myself.

Arathorn

Incidentally, I happened to notice tonight that bombers can bomb units in a city with impunity (except the occassional SAM --whoop-de-do). Are these imbalanced as well?

 

[snepp]

Incidentally, I happened to notice tonight that bombers can bomb units in a city with impunity (except the occassional SAM --whoop-de-do). Are these imbalanced as well?

I think so, but I might be a bit biased given my recent migration towards building bombers/stealth over artillery. Keep in mind my entire post involves little thought, and under no circumstances any meaningful calculations.

[FONT=Courier New]              Arty   Bomber Stealth
        Cost  150    140    200
       Range  1      8      12
Damage Limit  70%    50%    50%
   Max Units  8      6      6
     Bombard  25     15     20
    Withdraw  25     n/a    n/a
     Evasion  n/a    0      50
   Survival*  25%    30%    65%
 Annoyance**  High   Med    Low[/FONT]

*Effective Survivability. I just made that up, it's basically BS. Artillery can upgrade their withdrawl ability or strength, or a combination of the two, giving a consideratly higher percentage. Bombers and Stealth is assuming Jet Fighters defending (70% intercept), actual survival percentage is considerably higher when you consider that few interceptions result in death, only a damaged aircraft.

**Annoyance factor for the player to use. Arty with their 1 movement dragging behind your tanks takes the cake. Bombers constantly intercepted is slightly annoying, but expected.

Let's see. Arty can cause collateral to more units at a time, and take them down to a lower percentage. This is assuming you have the patience to move them into place. Bombers and Stealth will give you a much lower death rate, but require more of them to accomplish the same objective. Looking at the numbers it might be beneficial to knock down defenses with artillery (quicker), cause initial collateral with bombers/stealth, deal more collateral with arty (they've got a much higher survival rate now), then finish them off. Though by the time you bring the defenders down to 50% by bombing, it's unlikely you're going to be losing any tanks, so bringing them down an additional 20% with arty isn't likely to benefit you much unless they're highly upgraded/on a hill/across a river.

Doh, I didn't factor in the material requirements. Artillery doesn't require anything, bombers need oil, stealth need aluminum and oil.

I guess I just plain don't like artillery. Bombers can attack naval units, bombard defenses, deal collateral, have a significant range, higher survivability, and are faster to redeploy (warring on the other side of the world? no problem).

Increasing artillery's ability to be transported would help. I don't necessarily want to be able to move them into enemy territory and fire on the same turn, but give them some way to keep up with the tanks (same can be said for infantry). Here's what I propose, a troop transport capable of loading 4 units (1 artillery max, to simulate towing), that has a movement rate of 2. Unloading would function like the naval transport, using up the unloaded unit's movement point for that turn.



Edit: Heroes reminded me of artillery not having access to the flanking promotions, yet another strike to artillery's standing in my book.

 

[Heroes]

experience from animals is capped at 5 XP, and for barbarians it's capped at 10 XP, so don't waste time with them if your unit has that much. Instead what I do is once an exploring warrior has reached 5 (or 10) I return it to my cities and cycle it with a new one with no XP, so at the very least a large part of my units will have 5-10 XPs before even my first war (with or without the help of barracks!)

That cap thing is very helpful, thanks. So I guess an important thing is to get a 10 XP unit and literature quickly to unlock heroic epic. Even without marble, it just costs 200 hammers, while it will save thousands of hammers.

 

[Heroes]

I guess I'm the only one who agrees with Lor. It would be nice to have a symmetrical RPS system in the ancient era. Right now it DOES seem like you can make a stack of solely Axemen without worrying too much about what defenders you're going to face.

I'm not saying the game is entirely unbalanced at that era, as I think the Axemen having 5 strength instead of 6, like horse archers, are because of its anti-melee capabilities whilst still being a melee unit. However, it would be....shall we say, "tidier", if there was an anti-axeman unit that wasn't just an axeman, especially when it's such a useful attacking unit.

Why a stack of axeman is safe? Axeman's base strength is just 5, and they cost 35 hammers. Both chariot (4, 25, 20% withdraw) and horse archer (6, 50) should be effective against axemen.

 

[Heroes]

*Effective Survivability. I just made that up, it's basically BS. Artillery can upgrade their withdrawl ability or strength, or a combination of the two, giving a consideratly higher percentage. Bombers and Stealth is assuming Jet Fighters defending (70% intercept), actual survival percentage is considerably higher when you consider that few interceptions result in death, only a damaged aircraft.

Flanking is only available to mounted, armored, helicopter, and navy units, not siege weapons, -- otherwise it would be imbalanced.

 

[snepp]

Flanking is only available to mounted, armored, helicopter, and navy units, not siege weapons, -- otherwise it would be imbalanced.

Ahh yes, of course. Though in my defense I did say little thought would be involved. I'll tack that on to my list of reasons I prefer bombers.

 

[WetWarev7]

I can't understand why you're using this as an example of bad game design. If you over-commit your attack force, get counter-attacked and don't have any contingency plans in place, you DESERVE to get smashed. In CIV (or pretty much any other computer game), in football (or pretty much any other sport), or in real-life war.

Um....I wasn't talking about game design, I was commenting on someone posting about allways using stacks of catapaults. I like the game design, and I was saying the same thing you just did - Don't put all your eggs in one basket.