deity vox populi, all AIs attacking at once with already gatlings in 1500, anyone experienced with iroquois warfare?

[tramwajg]

hey, AIs in vox populi seem much more competent than in unmodded game (by the way really good work improving it in this mod, it's nice that it is more challenging now, makes me need to improve and I like it), they are getting equipment like musketman and even fusilier/field gun in year ~1300, then gatling in 1500, how would you defend in this situation? I really like iroquois for their ability to travel through forests, but on this map I think I overextended, and I lack experience in defending terrains with only plains and some hills. I tried to build citadel in between forts (neither can be next to same fortification, but different types can create a consistent defensive line), I tried to make a line of melee units on very front, ranged in 2nd line, then cavalry behind, and it works nicely in forests (I really enjoy mobility that iroques have in there), but on this map I conquered too far and these two cities (Vienna and Tiwanaku) are hard to defend. Ollantaytambo was conquered from inca, and they mostly built their special farms there. I wish it was possible to put at least some fortifications in forests/jungles, currently forts only feel viable in spaces without these. Is it intended that game seems to not treat forests as railroads? I was somewhere reading that game treats it so, but in my case it seems it does not work like that. Maybe someone know about place where I could read about battle strategies?

edit: are planes and anti air good?

 

[JNZS13]

looks like some civ drop a nuke near this p screen

 

[tramwajg]

haha good one! I was noticing that, sadly it stays like that no matter how many times I try to remake, brightness and saturation on my print screens is much higher than when I normally use computer

 

[msw1]

You have a huge tech advantage and have basically completely won based on your score so you'll be fine. You should be able to easily hold your borders with melee and ranged units. No need to advance everywhere, just kill any unit that comes in your territory. You can build air units to start attacking, and then advance into undefended territory. In the meantime you can easily destroy Austria and take Salzburg in probably like 2-3 turns, which should take some pressure off. The next target would probably be Cusco.

 

[hokath]

I don't really understand the question. You have Infantry, Tanks, etc. so you're 2 tech tiers ahead.
If you Ctrl+Shift+L, the AI will take over for you. I imagine it will simultaneously crush all other civs in a few minutes.

 

[tramwajg]

haha yeah Salzburg is like Czechoslovakia for germany in hearts of iron 4, long border that enters inner empire, with not much terrain to defend on and there is one more frontline not visible on pic. At least I have red fort in one of cities so it has attack range of 4, and also I just found out it's possible to set production to city defenses during hard sieges. My question.. yeah I'm bit ahead in tech, but still, I noticed advanced techs units are loosing with bad maneuvers (it's not uncommon to loose ironclad/cruiser to corvettes or even caravels, if they do 30 dmg per hit, then 2 caravels are enough to win)

hmm after few turns actually yeah, it's holding, units on my side heal more hp per turn than they take damage, if they don't do any action, and I can occasionally destroy low hp ones by firing from far, I'm building planes now too and they seem good to have. I still like to learn about defending better (such as, how do others are positioning units), tech advantage seems nice to have, although I think it only works because I have whole border filled with units, otherwise they would still be getting killed by high numbers.. I'd be happy to learn more about battles strats

also, that's fun idea of AI taking over for me! maybe I could even watch AIs playing on their own

 

[Jeddite]

If you Ctrl+Shift+L, the AI will take over for you. I imagine it will simultaneously crush all other civs in a few minutes.

Wait, what, is it a real working function by now? Like micromanagement of your army movements and attacks by the AI? I thought this squad something part of the Vox Populi was for only unclogging paths of several units to go to one place without bumping into each other, was I mmissing so much?

 

[hokath]

Yes so
Ctrl+shift+L replaces you with the AI. Do it again to switch back (it will keep playing until you stop it)
Ctrl+shift+P replaces you with the AI and replaces the next AI with you (!) allowing you to cycle through players. A fun use of this is that when you have "already won" (which I caution against btw, the AI can often come back) you can switch to some other player and try to come back from behind.
Ctrl+shift+O makes you the global observer. This is like Ctrl+shift+L but you can see everything, not just your own vision.

 

[azum4roll]

Note that AI will start gaining handicap bonuses if it replaces a human player.

 

[tramwajg]

what handicap bonuses?

 

[hokath]

The AI receives extra instant yields (for various things like building Units, taking Cities, etc.) based on the difficulty level.
These scale in time in such a way that the early game bonuses are small compared to later on, allowing you to e.g. get early game Wonders that you would never get versus Vanilla AI (that just has some flat advantage + better start than you).
This is how the VP AI can keep up with the player (economically) even though they aren't able to engage in proper strategic planning like policy choices that react to the situation, etc.
This is one of the main ways the difficulty is imposed but there are others (like how long it thinks for when moving units in war).

 

[tramwajg]

ohh makes sense, so that's how they rapidly advanced from knights and crossbowmen to gatlings and fusiliers?

also new game now, I am unsure... go rationalism, get free tech and take combined arms (normally 33 turns of research), or go imperialism, pentagon and have jet fighters early - all the AIs are hostile again and they already have powerful weapons, I wonder how much two jet fighters can change how war goes

edit: I tried jet fighters.. it feels weak, like two additional machineguns with larger range, although can be good to kill some wounded units from distance

 

[msw1]

Fighters are for fighting enemy planes. For attacking units or cities you want bombers.

 

[tramwajg]

Fighters are for fighting enemy planes. For attacking units or cities you want bombers.

I see, so rushing pentagon (whole imperialism tree) does not seem super good compared to other options such as rationalism.. seems like I'd be better getting combined arms 30 turns earlier from free tech, and use more research from rationalism for getting early bombers instead of jet fighters

 

[azum4roll]

The range alone is worth it. You get to add extra damage every turn even while your entire frontline is fortified and healing.

 

[FinMc]

I see, so rushing pentagon (whole imperialism tree) does not seem super good compared to other options such as rationalism.. seems like I'd be better getting combined arms 30 turns earlier from free tech, and use more research from rationalism for getting early bombers instead of jet fighters

Don't remember what pentagon does in base VP but with more wonders mod it gives cities +2 air slots and it's ridiculously OP, one of the best wonders in the game

Airplanes are also quite powerful and basically end the game, they get ridiculous when massed.

 

[tramwajg]

Don't remember what pentagon does in base VP but with more wonders mod it gives cities +2 air slots and it's ridiculously OP, one of the best wonders in the game

Airplanes are also quite powerful and basically end the game, they get ridiculous when massed.

in base mod, pentagon gives several different bonuses (I didn't memorize the other ones) one of them is two free jet fighters, which seemed very nice because just rushing combined arms is enough to also get powerful air units. I will try to build bombers in next game being able to catch barely surviving musketman or cannon in enemy territory felt worth it, not sure if worth getting imperialism (instead of rationalism), although other bonuses such as retaining all conquered buildings are nice too, newly acquired city immediately has defenses without waiting for walls and forts to build