how do you defend your cities

[DrewBledsoe]

I'm addicted to the Power Graph and am an admitted upgrade junkie. This compels me to do whatever possible to generate large sums of coinage to keep my city defenses pimped-out with the latest cutting edge, techno units in each era.

Grin, sounds just like me, except I'll sometimes have to do it in a pattern, e.g. N to S in rotating columns, which can be embarrasing if the "West" part of my nation has Infantry and Cannons, and the "East" still has Muskets and Trebs, then the Aztec and Mongolian mega fleet arrives with Rifles and Grenadiers on my...well you guessed it

No, a more even distribution of troop upgrades is generally a more sound idea..

 

[Minci]

Best defence is offence. Guess what i have in cities

 

[Stylesrj]

Umm.... a Mounument? A Broadcast Tower? The Pyramids? Tell me, what....

 

[Pantastic]

On the borders, I like to keep 1 City Garrison unit (archer/longbow/gunpowder) as a defender who just sits there, one anti-cavalry unit (spear/pike/rifle, don't care once I have infantry) usually with a medic promotion, and one anti-melee or general purpose unit (axe/crossbow/maceman/gunpowder) with combat or drill promotions. Back from the border it's a CG unit and an anti-cavalry unit, then further back it's just 'some unit', often an obsolete one. I might station a couple of extra units if a city is always under attack, but usually I don't go for more than this.

If a city needs more defense, I'll make a group of defenders that I can move to where there's a threat, and it will become an offensive stack once I've produced enough units in it. A lot of times I'll have a long war (usually with several treaties) where I nurture what starts off as a couple of extra defenders into a veteran full stack, let the enemy destroy their latest stack on my border, then march into their lands and start taking cities knowing their offensive army already came in.

If I have stone and/or am protective I might build walls/castle, but usually culture is plenty (or the AI has enough seige to get rid of it) except in a newly captured city. I tend to build castles mainly for the trade routes and walls mainly because it boosts your power score without costing maintenance.

 

[AnsarWarrior]

2 Longbows and a Wall...

 

[lord_graywolfe]

well on the border or costal cities its an axeman, a spearman and an archer. just one archer in cities in the middle. they get upgraded as the upgrades become avaliable and sometimes changed out. next is crossbow, longbow and pikeman. then 2 rifleman and a grenadier and then of course they all go to infantry then mech infantry. i also keep a few small stacks of horse units around to pick off enemy units trying to get past the border cities

 

[WuphonsReach]

All depends on the game. I only play on Huge, Fractal maps with 18 total civilizations. So things get a little crazy at times.

Early on, when I only have 8-10 cities, I try to have 2-4 units in each city. One for each "anti-unit" specialization along with a medic. Then I create 2 power stacks for offense / defense, usually 6-24 units in each stack. That lets me react to threats or prepare for war. Along the coastline, I make sure I have at least 3-5 ships fleets stationed in places where I can cut-off any inbound invasion force. It's better to kill those troop carriers before they land!

Later on, I'll look at what the AI is doing and go slightly stronger. Maybe as many as 5-6 units in each city across the board. In a pinch, I can pull 1-2 units from multiple cities to form a new reaction force to defend a city that is under attack.

The AI typically has a simple, brain-dead, battle plan. It masses an assault stack, will attack with singles and doubles of seige units, and will focus everything on a single attack point. As long as you can reinforce that city with enough defenders with 1 or 2 promotions, the AI will splinter it's stack of doom against your city walls.

So I usually declare war, hunker down and wait for their stack to arrive. Once their stack has suicided against my defense point, I turn around and take their closest cities in surgical fast-moving invasion fashion (no pillaging).

 

[the_elf]

I'm pleasantly surprised to see that there are a number of poeple that go really light on city defense.

I tend to go light on city defense, because when I'm ready to war, that's where all my modern units go. So, cities get neglected, and are often only left with on archer or even a single warrior.

I don't see too much wrong with that, so long as you have enough to protect your borders. And, it's really helpful to have enough cash in reserve to upgrade units on the fly if one of your cities is under seige. Besides, standing armies cost money, and if you have a number of units protecting each one of your cities, that's money not going towards technology that will keep you more modern than those that might want to attack you.

 

[Stolen Rutters]

DSODs, Defensive Stack of Death, heavy on offensive counters and strategically placed near border. Gotta kill them coming in before they hit... if the city is too strong once they see it they will pillage . Inner cities get fewer units and the older un-upgraded ones.

 

[kristopherb]

which is more important to you
dsod or sod
(defencive stack of doom)
(stack of doom)

assuming your at war with an even matched opponient

 

[Head Serf]

Stacks of doom were pretty much made obselete with the collateral damage... I tend to keep 2 of whatever the most up to date defensive units are in my cities.

 

[SpartanEvolved]

I usually maintain 5-6 in border cities that are under threat (bad relations). Core cities are no more than 2. Big offensive force means defense matters less.

 

[Amenmesse]

I tend to upgrade as I go along particularly after successful Great Trade Missions, but keep my city defences pretty light. My cultural borders are usually so large that I can rush produce extra defence units, should I need them.

I always tend to keep a couple of my unique units for the entire length of the game - like a ceremonial guard.

I'm trying to task my Egyptian scientists to develop a rock-powered, anti-gravity chariot that my troops can surf around on.

 

[Monkeyfinger]

Like two of the latest archery/gunpowder units in my border cities, at most.

The majority of my defensive force goes right outside my fat crosses. Enemies like to pillage, so I mainly try to stop that. Would rather get a city taken for a couple turns than have all its improvements razed to dust.

 

[Instant_Cereal]

I normally maintain medium - high garrisons (depending on relations) in my borders cities for both first-line defense and intimidation. In my cities with no immediate threat, such as cities within my empire, I generally try to keep at least 2-3 divisions, sometimes just 1. Then I have my reserves. I try to maintain 2 reserve armies at any given time, and these armies usually consist of my best and most up-to-date troops. Meaning, if I get attacked, my armies along the borders can provide enough resistence and wear the enemy down, so my reserves can come clean up. So, yeah, I'm not your typical weak-armied civ player.

Now, when I'm in warmonger mode, that's a different story.