How much military do you need?

[Capt Ajax]

Sami-Same with Formation I & II (+25% combat strength vs. mounted units, requires Shock II, Drill II, Accuracy II, Barrage II)

Is this going to help when the Krouts are knocking on the front door with Panzers?

It just doesn't seem right....why can't the Formation promotion be utilized somehow by anti-tank units? Seems logical to me...

 

[Optional]

For a defensive force, geography is very important in knowing how many units you'll need, and what kind... If you are defending a hilly area with rivers, you can get away with a much smaller force.

Geography is very important indeed.
Including settling a town on a hill.

A nightmare is to have a town between hills but to have the town itself on flatland; it's a sort of invitation to the AI to attack you.
Also your borders matter. With big borders you can see your enemy coming and have more time to prepair. If you're playing peacefully you should end up with these big borders. Be careful with giving Open Borders, as you never know what an AI force is up to that's 'just passing through'. You'll have no time to prepare if they suddenly attack.
But if you have big borders that the AI has to respect, then it doesn't matter if you're just having a small bunch of obsolete units. You can still upgrade or even buy some if the AI decides to attack you, as they will need some turns to reach your towns.

I wouldn't go for Honour if your idea is just peaceful defense. Although Honour is my favourite tree, Tradition is better for pure defense; +3 culture going to your capital's borders straight away and after that 100% increased ranged strength for your cities with Oligarchy.
Honour is more a 'get out and kill' thing.

 

[Calicea]

Geography is very important indeed.
Including settling a town on a hill.

A nightmare is to have a town between hills but to have the town itself on flatland; it's a sort of invitation to the AI to attack you.
Also your borders matter. With big borders you can see your enemy coming and have more time to prepair. If you're playing peacefully you should end up with these big borders. Be careful with giving Open Borders, as you never know what an AI force is up to that's 'just passing through'. You'll have no time to prepare if they suddenly attack.
But if you have big borders that the AI has to respect, then it doesn't matter if you're just having a small bunch of obsolete units. You can still upgrade or even buy some if the AI decides to attack you, as they will need some turns to reach your towns.

I wouldn't go for Honour if your idea is just peaceful defense. Although Honour is my favourite tree, Tradition is better for pure defense; +3 culture going to your capital's borders straight away and after that 100% increased ranged strength for your cities with Oligarchy.
Honour is more a 'get out and kill' thing.

That is something I need to try I always skip that one usually to pick up piety asap, but I'm starting to think that early game needs to be more of getting set up and surviving than beelining for your choosen path of victory

 

[Capt Ajax]

When I play a "peaceful" game I still engage in wars, I just don't DOW unless I'm forced into a corner by an alliance or just NEED a key piece of ground. Most times I drag out a war that has been declared on me to get experience for my units.

 

[binhthuy71]

When I play a "peaceful" game I still engage in wars, I just don't DOW unless I'm forced into a corner by an alliance or just NEED a key piece of ground. Most times I drag out a war that has been declared on me to get experience for my units.

As I've moved up, I found that I had to redefine a peaceful game as "One i which I don't DoW." That's a bit of a disappointment to me because I was hoping that CiV would have more options for moving beyond "Beyond the Sword."

 

[timtofly]

This has been broken for a relatively long time so I'm a bit surprised that it wasn't addressed in a patch. Ideally, when you upgrade a ranged unit to Rifleman you would get back all of the points that were formerly devoted to Ranged promos so that you could apply them to as appropriate to a melee unit. I'm not holding my breath on that one.

For that very reason we need a "ranged" unit like a "sniper" and then a "stealth marine". This would keep the range unit separate, but not as powerful as a seige unit. I am not talking a city buster, but a "melee" buster in "open" territory.

My "unitless" game ended in a victory for me (Catherine) in 1950's with a UN Vote. Rome was one unit away from a Completed Spaceship, and in the future era. I was going for Utopia, but "communism" got squashed again. I am just glad someone else built the UN for me. That was still 100 turns away. Greece never did declare war, even though he did eventually get 100+ points past me. I must not have "boxed" him in that time and he was a little more peaceful. I had 18 votes and Rome had 9; yes I kept stealing his CS's.

 

[binhthuy71]

For that very reason we need a "ranged" unit like a "sniper" and then a "stealth marine". This would keep the range unit separate, but not as powerful as a seige unit. I am not talking a city buster, but a "melee" buster in "open" territory.

Excellent idea! I tend to build as few Archers as possible because although they're cheap and make great earl game defensive units it seems like a waste when they go to Rifleman and lose the Ranged promos. It's better for me to build Riflemen with Barracks>Armory>Heroic Epic>etc. melee-appropriate promos than to upgrade a promoted Archer to a meagerly promoted Rifleman.