elephant rush

[cabert]

has anyone actually ever got that start though? must be a pretty poor city placer to not get a single resource

you won't laugh when this happens to u

i had this because i lacked early expansion (monarch level = AI pumping out cities, can happen even more at higher levels)

 

[KrikkitTwo]

An Archer wouldn't defend the Cats

Stack withh Archer and Cat defends against HA

Archer (Combat 1)= 3.3
Cat=5/(1.5)=3.333

Cat defends (unless Stack is on a Hill/Forest)

In any case, that situation would really stink... best solution might be to get an ally in the War and Tag along with their units (or at least hope thier units attract the Attention)

 

[cabert]

An Archer wouldn't defend the Cats

Stack withh Archer and Cat defends against HA

Archer (Combat 1)= 3.3
Cat=5/(1.5)=3.333

Cat defends (unless Stack is on a Hill/Forest)

obviously, you will want to use hills and forest for your moves!
that what i had in mind anyway

In any case, that situation would really stink... best solution might be to get an ally in the War and Tag along with their units (or at least hope thier units attract the Attention)

good thinking!
should have thought about it myself!!

 

[The Lardossen]

pikemen require Engineering and iron!and if you promote one or 2 elephants to shock, they eat spears without second thought.

longbows can be tough, but that's why you need the cats

edit : typo

It's really not smart to attack just after getting your economy back up again. I build a few of them just to repel Knights etc., but I wont attack again until Infantry.

 

[cabert]

It's really not smart to attack just after getting your economy back up again. I build a few of them just to repel Knights etc., but I wont attack again until Infantry.

attacking with strong units is bringing more money than it costs (pillaging and razing)
elephants are strong units, you don't lose much of them = don't need to send bunch of them.
taking (and razing) one city will pay the expenses of the war

 

[nealhunt]

Cat/Archer rushes work fine. You'll need something to hold the cities you take anyway, so you might as well take Archers with your attacking force.

Incidentally, I prefer First Strike promotions for "offensive" archers. It seems to work better.

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has anyone actually ever got that start though? must be a pretty poor city placer to not get a single resource

Well, if you've got, say, 3-4 food resources, gems and/or precious metals I would hardly call that a bad start despite a lack of strategic resources. With multiple food resources you can pop-rush a huge army in no time.

 

[Zombie69]

An Archer wouldn't defend the Cats

Stack withh Archer and Cat defends against HA

Archer (Combat 1)= 3.3
Cat=5/(1.5)=3.333

Cat defends (unless Stack is on a Hill/Forest)

Siege units are always chosen last as defenders, even if they'd have better odds. Also, try to stay on hills and forests to actually give a chance for the archer to win (extra 25% bonus for archers on hills, and cats don't get any defensive bonuses).

 

[pigswill]

You don't need to be bad at city placement to get no military techs, just unlucky. What happens is you research bronze-working:another civ has the only local source;switch to horses;ditto; switch to iron;ditto.That's not bad planning.

 

[Paeanblack]

Siege units are always chosen last as defenders, even if they'd have better odds. Also, try to stay on hills and forests to actually give a chance for the archer to win (extra 25% bonus for archers on hills, and cats don't get any defensive bonuses).

Machine guns are usually chosen as defenders, and they are siege units.

 

[Lord Chambers]

Has anyone tried a pure catapult rush? Same tech, no resources.(slight deflection of topic).

I did once, to have something I could produce and subdue barbarians with while I was CS slingshotting my way to Musketeers. It was a pretty horrible failure. Catapults offer no defense for your stack, so in a war you get ganked, although against isolated barbarian cities they're fine, since the stack is always safe from attack.

 

[The Lardossen]

attacking with strong units is bringing more money than it costs (pillaging and razing)
elephants are strong units, you don't lose much of them = don't need to send bunch of them.
taking (and razing) one city will pay the expenses of the war

I'd rather be building courthouses and marketplaces.

 

[cabert]

I'd rather be building courthouses and marketplaces.

courthouses won't kill your neighbours

 

[Zombie69]

Machine guns are usually chosen as defenders, and they are siege units.

All right, siege units besides machine guns!

 

[Yva!n]

You don't need those techs to know which mines to go after, as i found out in a game last week (it's a wonder i didn't notice this earlier). Toggle FPC display on if you haven't already, then look at which mines give more P than they should. Even tiles that haven't received a mine yet will show up this way, since the unimproved resource gives +1P.

Cool observation I'll have to check that out. I was going to say you can guess at which mine is the resource by looking where the archer is stationed - he must be guarding something!

 

[The Lardossen]

courthouses won't kill your neighbours

Yeah, rather toss some axemen against their stack of macemen, catapults and knights than getting your economy up to get technology for better units

 

[Pantastic]

All right, siege units besides machine guns!

Yeah, this actually makes a huge difference since the AI loves to send a single unit paired with a cat. If it's a horse archer, for example it would be a real pain to knock if this didn't happen, but because it does you can send a spearman in to easily kill the horse, then something else for the cat.

 

[Zherak_Khan]

Siege units are always chosen last as defenders, even if they'd have better odds. Also, try to stay on hills and forests to actually give a chance for the archer to win (extra 25% bonus for archers on hills, and cats don't get any defensive bonuses).

That's simply not true, though there is some shred of truth in it. I know for certain that Inf vs SAM+Art, Art defended. I'd love it if anybody could shed the details on when siege units defend.

 

[Zombie69]

Well, i know for certain that spearman vs horse archer + cat, horse archer defends. And i've never seen in my games a siege unit defend when there was anybody else there to defend. But then, i've rarely if ever seen cannons, and never seen artillery, so it might be different for those.

 

[Vynd]

I've tried this a few times, and it can definitely work. The biggest problem I've had with it is that Elephants are pretty expensive to build. So it takes awhile to accumulate enough of them to start your attack, and if you're unlucky and lose one or two your offensive quickly grinds to a halt. And while they're effective at guarding newly captured cities, their high cost makes this inefficient.

All in all, I think this is a reasonably effective strategy but one I'll only follow if I can't take the more conventional route of killing people with Axemen or Swordsmen. Those units are cheaper to research and build and with the right promotions are almost as strong as Elephants. More units allows for greater flexibility, plus once you get Macemen they can be upgraded and become even better than Elephants. Whereas Elephants don't get an upgrade possibility until Gunships.

 

[cabert]

I've tried this a few times, and it can definitely work. The biggest problem I've had with it is that Elephants are pretty expensive to build. So it takes awhile to accumulate enough of them to start your attack, and if you're unlucky and lose one or two your offensive quickly grinds to a halt. And while they're effective at guarding newly captured cities, their high cost makes this inefficient.

All in all, I think this is a reasonably effective strategy but one I'll only follow if I can't take the more conventional route of killing people with Axemen or Swordsmen. Those units are cheaper to research and build and with the right promotions are almost as strong as Elephants. More units allows for greater flexibility, plus once you get Macemen they can be upgraded and become even better than Elephants. Whereas Elephants don't get an upgrade possibility until Gunships.

glad to see someone who did it with success