Do you upgrade spearmen or use them for cannon fodder?

[Irish Caesar]

I never upgrade units. I disband old units in cities to speed up building new ones.

 

[Matt_G]

Originally posted by dunk
Now is that every unit of that type or just every unit of that type on that particular tile?

It's every unit of that type that's in a city with a barracks. Really handy when you have 20 cities with barracks and 4 riflemen in each and want to upgrade to infantry.

 

[Lt_Tarantulas]

lets syau ahvea pike man u wanan upgrade.. u press shift U..

it will say , you have (example) 18 pikeman, that u can upgrade, for 200 golds, do you want t upgrade?

meaning, u have 18 pikeman, all over your empire that can be upgraded.

 

[Raw is War?]

When the needed techs are researched i automaticly upgrade all my unit's in that turn( if i have enough gold).

 

[Mad Bomber]

Dunk:

Shift U will upgrade all units of that type in a city that allows the unit type to be upgraded. To upgrade a unit in a city you need access to the resources needed for the unit type & a barracks in the city

 

[Octavian X]

I immiediatly upgrade all units on border cities, then work my way in. A problem I have, though, is that not all my cities might not have barracks. With two spearmen stationed in one city, I take a risk and send one to some barracks somewhere else. I return the upgraded pike to its home, and send the spearmen to exchange their spears for pikes.

 

[sealman]

Originally posted by dunk
The only units I may use as cannon fodder are swordsmen and cavalry since they don't upgrade. Usually, I disband them and collect the shields.

I always upgrade spearmen. Frequenty riflemen are skipped since I beeline right for replaceable parts. Unless I play as a scientific civ, I get Nationalism from a trade.

I wish you could "upgrade all" fromt the military advisor screen. Instead of going town to town, I wish I could just upgrade all my spearmen in one fell swoop from the advisor screen.

You can. Use Shift-U and it will upgrade all of that type that are available, providing you have the gold.

edit: should have read the rest of the posts first as it seems this was answered many a time.

I tend to follow what the norm appears to be. Upgrade along the boarders and then in the core whenever needed. That is one reason I like the sentry command. No more surprise attacks on my small island garrisons with me with spearmen instead of infantry

 

[Mad Bomber]

Octavian X:


i always put Sun Tzu's War Academy as a priority wonder build, this puts a barracks in each city of the continent that it is built on. It's a great way to make sure you can upgrade your units

 

[Barker]

It is every unit of that type that is in a city with barracks.

I move my elites out of my cities before I upgrade all... IThey lose their elite status when upgraded.

I will upgrade my units as needed. I will upgrade units on the border cities as soon as possible,,,espescially if I am at war.

 

[alpha wolf 64]

i upgrade one level only so some of my frontier units never get upgraded and I use them for guarding cities that I fear might flip. I've modded modern units much higher than the original values so medieval units are nearly useless in modern combat.

 

[sabo]

Originally posted by Mad Bomber
Sabo10:

I'm not really sure wether it's cost effective to upgrade spearman but unless you have to I would not use them for cannon fodder. Instead of using them as future casulties, use them to help rush improvements (by disbanding unit) to newly captured cities, as little as 10 shields used in this matter can save you half the cost in rushinng improvements. Typically I will upgrade all defensive units to MI's but I use old offensive units (swordsman, Chariot,Archer, Calvalry (after I get MA's) in this matter & it saves your currency reserves.

Hey that's a good idea bomber, I usually use some of my artillery to do that when I get flight but it's a good idea to use old spearmen to rush projects

 

[Mad Bomber]

Sabo10:

I don't use defensive units to rush projects as they can be upgraded all the way to Mech Infantry, but I reserve this function to the units that are obsolete & can't be upgraded.

Great signature BTW

 

[robehans]

Its justto keep the borders and the biggest and most important citie's defencive units up to date... when the enemy comes within range of a city with spearmen i just simply upgrade the spearmen.

 

[kb2tvl]

When/If a war breaks out and I did not cause the war, I will upgrade immediately. I try to keep a wad of cash on me for those types of incidents.

 

[JohnGalt]

I used to not upgrade spearmen until I got attacked, since the AI didn't care how strong your units were, just how many you had. Post-1.29f, though, they take A/D into account, and so I upgrade as soon as I can afford to, and I prioritize being able to afford to.

 

[Chieftess]

Well, you could always use them to defend against TANKS!

 

[Oddible]

I upgrade those in problem areas first and then wait around til I have the $$ to do the mass upgrade - there's something very satisfying about hearing the click of a hundred infantry all at once.

I NEVER upgrade pikemen to musketmen though because musketmen suck hard. I rarely even produce musketmen if I can avoid it.

 

[col]

edit - snipped this

 

[Shabbaman]

Well, if you want your obsolete units to serve as cannon fodder, I guess you've got a hard deal since the AI doesn't use artillery properly.

Originally posted by Sanaz

This is how I have always done it before, but with the military strength formula change in the recent patch, I've been upgrading more readily (and maybe wastefully, I don't know yet). I figure if I have more of an upperhand in military strength, I'll be able to better determine exactly when I can enter and exit wars. Maybe the more rigorous players will determine the actual new military strength formula at some point, or the Firaxis folks will clue us in after a while - for those who didn't know, before there was no formula, it was just a simple headcount.

Correct. Since 1.29, I upgrade all my units. One word: Leonardo's workshop

 

[Pillager]

Try to get Leo's and upgrade all.