Emperor and Military Difficulty

[sorky]

In most case, I usually build only warriors first, then when i hook the iron (in most case), i first build needed spears (border cities + SoD) because i have already enough swords in hand, in most case.. Spearmen have the same % of winning defensively, and you WILL defend sometimes, especially before army for your SoD and in others strategics tiles (cities, luxury..etc). And vs tank swordmen ALWAYS lose

You lose 20 shields each time you lose a sword instead of a spearman in defense. If you've built it, it's 300% time wasted. So if you have a SoD of 20 swords, you could offer them 3-4 spearmen..

 

[Heroes]

Depends what you consider a "defender" I guess. Swords are the "defenders" of my early stacks. Build warriors instead of spears and upgrade them to swords. Sometimes this gives enough swords right there that I only need to build horses during the transition to knights. Of course your lower-production non-barracks cities should be going all cats from early on. Anyway, I used to think exactly like you are saying, now I refuse to ever build a spear. Just give it a try, just one game of the "build no defender" rule and you'll be hooked. You'll find the best defense is a great offense.

An interesting idea, thank you What setting would you suggest, especially difficulty? Is this only possible for <demigod?

 

[ZubieMaster]

An interesting idea, thank you What setting would you suggest, especially difficulty? Is this only possible for <demigod?

I dunno since I'm just an emperor, vanilla player. But by no means is this my idea, I got it from here. I'm sure if you search you'll find this argument has been made by other much better players than me. I just finally said what the heck and tried it, and it works and is really fun.

@Sorky, your analysis leaves out a couple things, like the opportunity cost when you build a spear it's one less attacker you will have available. Also after you upgrade to swords often you don't need to build many more, so it's a choice between a horse and a spear. If you march on an AA city with 5 swords, 10 horses and 15 cats, you're pretty good to go. If not you haven't allied enough other targets for their SODs to go after, or haven't timed things properly.

 

[Heroes]

I dunno since I'm just an emperor, vanilla player. But by no means is this my idea, I got it from here. I'm sure if you search you'll find this argument has been made by other much better players than me. I just finally said what the heck and tried it, and it works and is really fun.

@Sorky, your analysis leaves out a couple things, like the opportunity cost when you build a spear it's one less attacker you will have available. Also after you upgrade to swords often you don't need to build many more, so it's a choice between a horse and a spear. If you march on an AA city with 5 swords, 10 horses and 15 cats, you're pretty good to go. If not you haven't allied enough other targets for their SODs to go after, or haven't timed things properly.

The main problem is: your advance speed is often limited by your artilleries, not your attackers. Your swords and maces dare not to fight against full HP pikes and muskets. So you need a good partition among attacker, artillery, and possibly defenders.

 

[Woobi]

This is a game I am playing on conquests which I just bought, on Monarch...

I think I am doing much better military wise...

Check it out!!!

 

[axehaxe]

I am all military!! I never upgrade the catapults, trebs, and cannons to artillery because I have enough of them that I can rely on RNG to do the work. This is my building rule of thumb in the late medieval through late industrial age - Once you discover metallurgy find your one city that is not growing too well like size 3,4, or 5 which doesn't have barracks, more than half corrupt, but has anywhere from 3 to 5 shields of production. All This city is going to do until the Industrial Age ends is pumping out the cannons and whatever bombard units. So like every 7 or 8 turns at the least, you'll be getting a cannon. All your other cities are making knights or cavalry if you have MTrad. I find it hard to find a time to build marketplaces because all I am making is military most of the time. These cannons that I accumulate are like half of one of my deadly stacks of 30 infantry, 15 bombards, and 4-8 cavalry in the industrial age.

 

[Heroes]

I am all military!! I never upgrade the catapults, trebs, and cannons to artillery because I have enough of them that I can rely on RNG to do the work. This is my building rule of thumb in the late medieval through late industrial age - Once you discover metallurgy find your one city that is not growing too well like size 3,4, or 5 which doesn't have barracks, more than half corrupt, but has anywhere from 3 to 5 shields of production. All This city is going to do until the Industrial Age ends is pumping out the cannons and whatever bombard units. So like every 7 or 8 turns at the least, you'll be getting a cannon. All your other cities are making knights or cavalry if you have MTrad. I find it hard to find a time to build marketplaces because all I am making is military most of the time. These cannons that I accumulate are like half of one of my deadly stacks of 30 infantry, 15 bombards, and 4-8 cavalry in the industrial age.

If you build so many units, how do you pay their upkeep? I think that's why upgrade makes sense, to increase quality and reduce quantity.

 

[Fatal Exception]

Hi I'm new to these forums but thought I'd comment...

I'm a vanilla player who's trying to move up to consistently winning at Emporer from consistently winning at Monarch - I'm pretty well able to get a lock on winning at Monarch by the middle of the middle ages at the latest.

In vanilla I'm pretty convinced that the way to go, militarily, is the defense unit/mobile attack unit/artillery combined arms stack. Using units that withdraw as your attack unit really keeps casualties down as long as you don't go chasing stray enemies and letting yourself get picked off.

In vanilla swordsmen don't upgrade to anything, so I consider them dead-end unit that you don't need to win wars unless your likely ancient age enemies have better than spearmen for defenders (ie, hoplites or legionaries). I vastly prefer units with a long upgrade path so that as many units as possible are militarily effective for as long as possible, and because it's a lot easier to keep up with the AI through a combination of upgrades and new production than just new production.

 

[nullspace]

This is a game I am playing on conquests which I just bought, on Monarch...

I think I am doing much better military wise...

Check it out!!!

Your military is decent, but it's not large by any stretch of the imagination. You made the right choice by building many more knights than pikemen. The crusaders are nice too, but you can't count on having those in high-level games.

I'm impressed that you're fighting as a republic because that's a very good skill to learn, but you're doing it entirely wrong. Use the luxury slider so that you can grow your cities to size 12 and keep people happy without entertainers. Your cities will be making more money and will be producing many more shields (which will let you build more soldiers). I also noticed that your military is small enough that it is costing you nothing, I hope you're not doing that on purpose. Another reason your military is small is that you're building too many city improvements. Your marketplaces are essentially worthless because you're running 70% science and have only two luxuries. Building granaries in every city is a waste, just build two or three and have those cities build most of your workers and settlers. And not every city needs a university. All the shields that you've dumped into these improvements could have been spent on soldiers. Those soldiers can then go get you more cities, luxuries, wonders and techs and will be more useful than the expensive improvements.

The game you're playing is much closer to a builder game than a warmonger game. It looks like you're having a successful campaign against England, but it also looks as though it's your first one, and it's already 940 AD. Your military is an improvement from the first save you posted, but if you want to be a warmonger, you need many more troops, much fewer improvements, and at least two eliminated civs by this point. (extra bonus advice : you need to explore much more and trade more.)

 

[Woobi]

By no means do I want to be a warmonger...

I was in that game gonig for oppertunistic wars...

And I ahd already destroyed the Summerians, I was on a conquest for saltpepper for calvery...

And is hwat you say true about the marketplaces???

How do htose work exactly???

After I destroyed Englad I took over Rome...

Still no saltpepper...

Ha, oh well...

 

[Own]

About the AW, it helped a ton, at least for me and gma. My biggest problem was that I was afraid that I wasn't 110% ready, and before I was satistifed, the AI would have the next best defender. AW taught me you can declare war the instant you meet a civ and do fine.

Btw, gma, you have a date with AWM.

 

[Heroes]

And is hwat you say true about the marketplaces???

How do htose work exactly???

Markets increase a city's contribution to revenue (the golds NOT to science and NOT to entertainment) by 50%. Since you are doing 70% science, there is not much left for revenue, so your markets are earning very few gpt. Markets can also increase happy faces generated from the 3rd to 8th lux, but you only have 2, so this function has no use so far.

 

[Woobi]

Good to know about the revenue part...

Thanks...