Conquerors need absolutly... mathematics

[Krill]

Choking is using just a few units in an opponents land to slow his development, as he has to properly defend his city if you move to attack it, and has to protect his worker improving his terrain, and then has to defend his improvements after they are up...which drains resources that otherwise could be spent on growth.This likely won;t work because of hte city bombard ability weakening choking units as soon as they appear so the defender can take them out much more cost effectively.

Sledge is when you build up a stack of units (in this case just think a proper army) and then throw it someone to knock them out of the game. This is the much simplified version, and not hte complete story, but, well, they are the basics.

Castle is when you just keep on expanding, building up the economy. This is the buildfest that was commented on. If it is really hard to attack, then you just sit back and defend, building up your economy as best you can. The better your land is, and your teching ability, the better this strategy becomes. In particular, the quality is more important than quantity now with the exception of area for future discovered resources, because of the happy limit that you have to keep in mind. And happy/strat resources are going to be the main contention for land settlements. You will have to scout those out and guard them while you rush out a settler to them.

Which is why map balance is critical...if you have no happy res near you, in one form or another, you are completely screwed in this game. Much more so than in CIV, because at least there horizontal growth was an option.

Puppet states better have no tech requirement, or that happy cap seriously needs increasing. And it needs increasing for MP, where puppet states will not be an option...

 

[Seven05]

Well, that's another question but firmly related : do you guys think rushing will be possible? I'm starting to doubt it!

My guess (S.W.A.G. even) is that early rushes will still work but because the cities can defend themselves (with ranged attacks) you'll need more units. I don't think that will make it impossible but it will make it more costly. The unit upkeep costs alone may cripple you, so there will be more thought put into whether or not it's really worth it.

For example, if you start on a small landmass with a single neighbor it would probably be worthwhile to rush them as soon as you can. If you start with several neighbors that early rush may not be worth it unless grabbing their capital will give you enough of a boost to offset the added expense of your early army and the lack of any sort of infrastructure.

However, until we know exactly how tough those early cities are compared to the units you can get out in the field it's hard to say one way or the other. Perhaps an 'early rush' in Civ 5 will include archers to compensate for city defenses.

I think a lot will depends on whether it's a SP or MP game as well. But again until we have a chance to play it and try a few things out it's hard to say for sure.

 

[Zhahz]

Who rushes anyway? That's cheap.

I personally think early rush is cheese for civ (single player at least), because civ is more than just a war game. But some folks like it, particularly when playing vs higher difficulties and looking for a cheap way to get an advantage (take advantage of helpless/stupid AI).

It would be less cheese if the AI sacked your capital and knocked you out of the game in the first 20 turns while you were out exploring, or stole your worker, etc. But that wouldn't be much fun, would it? The AI isn't programmed to exploit the player early like that, so I think it's good to orchestrate early gameplay to remove the option/exploit for everyone.

 

[Silverwave]

Well I was mostly talking about MP games, since I too don't think AI will try to rush (barbarians units are there for that).

 

[ShaqFu]

Math is still a good military tech since it opens Catapults now, which will tremendously help city conquests post-Walls.

 

[Drawmeus]

If I'm understanding things correctly, what is really necessary for Civ is not specifically rushing like it has been implemented in previous Civs, just that some form of early aggressive warfare can pay dividends against an opponent with better land or who neglects their military too much.

 

[Krill]

If I'm understanding things correctly, what is really necessary for Civ is not specifically rushing like it has been implemented in previous Civs, just that some form of early aggressive warfare can pay dividends against an opponent with better land or who neglects their military too much.

Exactly. We don't want the game tilted too far in the direction of warfare, so that warmongering is always the right decision. What are wanted are choices. Sometimes early warfare is the wrong decision, and players should have the chance to figure that out and make a decision based the information they have.

 

[Horserush]

Early rush typically means taking the other players capital, which means no razing allowed.

 

[obsolete]

Who rushes anyway? That's cheap.

Don't you mean expensive? I think it's 3 gold for each hammer you rush, and it's more expensive if you don't have a hammer invested.

 

[§L¥ Gµ¥]

Who rushes anyway? That's cheap.

rushing/choking in civ4 is absolutely required when sealed off from land to expand or lacking stronger military resources. Your window to attack may only be small, so you need to be able to strike when the time is right, and be able to recognize that time well before it happens.

 

[Polobo]

Don't you mean expensive? I think it's 3 gold for each hammer you rush, and it's more expensive if you don't have a hammer invested.

Since you cannot "rush" production but rather can only "buy" entire items there is no concept of "a hammer invested".

 

[Superspank]

Keep them as puppet states until you have math.

Is this possible? Can you change a puppet state to an annexed state?

 

[King Jason]

Is this possible? Can you change a puppet state to an annexed state?

You certainly can.

 

[Pinstar]

The purpose of the risk of a rush is to force people to not be able to ignore early military development and concentrate purely on growth.

Without a possibility of a rush the game becomes a build-fest in the early game.

I thought that was what barbs were for. Granted they don't always pose a threat due to city placement, but they are like a civ trying to rush you.

 

[Earthling]

Well, that's another question but firmly related : do you guys think rushing will be possible? I'm starting to doubt it!

No, and overall they have specifically designed the game to slow down conquest across most of all time. (though I'm not sure late-game blitzes and this new domination victory are really stamped out) It's in the memo about the whole combat system, 1upt and so on.

For SP, warrior-rush type strategies simply won't ever work in civ5 I'm thinking past certain easy levels; terrain and city defense will be too hard to overcome and it doesn't look like we have anything as abusable against the AI as Quechuas or Immortals or Praets yet. Minor warfare into the classical era may be possible and a rush that could actually succeed in wiping out an opponent may be doable by late-classical on fair enough settings. In general at any point later in the game I'd expect wars to last longer and require more time and micro though, no more taking several cities and winning a war in just a dozen-ish turns.

I'd like to know more about different gamespeeds because normal still seems to give too little time to get use out of units versus the cost and perpetual progress of new ones, would have been nice if that and the standing army problem was really settled but it doesn't quite look like it (and games are not looking to last the full 500 turns either- looks like we see a repeat of civ4 there)

 

[Decaux]

Are you able to convert a puppet state into your empire properly at a later date? I've a feeling you can't.

 

[Decaux]

Oh nice

 

[dtsazza]

I thought that was what barbs were for. Granted they don't always pose a threat due to city placement, but they are like a civ trying to rush you.

It'll be interesting to see whether the new "trying to win" AI improvements apply to barbs too, in that they specifically try to hit you where you're weakest as opposed to just marauding about. If it's the former it'll definitely increase the value of a sentry net, and having at least a token home defence force.

 

[Cronos]

I think it's 3 gold for each hammer you rush

So to clarify are you saying that a hoplite (fex) which costs 60 hammers would cost 180 gold to buy?

Further, is there a penalty to buying a unit if no hammers at all are invested in it? Does anyone know how many hammers you get from chopping? From reading previews it seems as if you need around 6 melee units to comfortably capture a city, can you even assemble a force this size quickly in the early game? Thats 1000 gold worth of rush buying right there!

Further again, won't opponents generally be too far away/have city states in between anyway? If your going to be rushing anyone, it seems to me that the closest city is going to be a city state and not another superpower civilization.

 

[Cyberian]

So to clarify are you saying that a hoplite (fex) which costs 60 hammers would cost 180 gold to buy?

Further, is there a penalty to buying a unit if no hammers at all are invested in it? Does anyone know how many hammers you get from chopping? From reading previews it seems as if you need around 6 melee units to comfortably capture a city, can you even assemble a force this size quickly in the early game? Thats 1000 gold worth of rush buying right there!

Further again, won't opponents generally be too far away/have city states in between anyway? If your going to be rushing anyone, it seems to me that the closest city is going to be a city state and not another superpower civilization.

But rushing and sacking city states will lead to negative relations with all the other city states. And could ultimately also lead to war with their allied civs.
So you will usually walk by the city state and go to the next civ.
And if there is no civ nearby it may not be needed to rush anyway because then you have enough room for expansion.