How's That New Terra Cotta Army Workin' Out For Ya?

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steveg700

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Built the revised TCA a couple nights ago to see how well it worked. Wound up with a CB, spearman, and scout. I was wondering if I'd get the resource-requiring units I'd unlocked despite not having the resources, or if the units given would be maint-free, but no dice.

I'm not hating on it, mind you. Seems pretty situational, which is okay with me. Good for certain early-dom civ's like Rome.

Any interesting experiences with it to report? Hidden idiosyncrasies and such?
 
Just yesterday, I had Hiawatha breathing down my neck. At least a dozen units right outside my borders. He had already built a city near me and accused me of settling in his lands. A DOW was coming soon.

One turn later, I popped TCA and doubled my army from five to ten units. He marched to the northwest and attacked Pacal instead*...



*But not before asking me why I had so many troops right outside "his" borders.
 
Firesmacker said:
Just yesterday, I had Hiawatha breathing down my neck. At least a dozen units right outside my borders. He had already built a city near me and accused me of settling in his lands. A DOW was coming soon.

One turn later, I popped TCA and doubled my army from five to ten units. He marched to the northwest and attacked Pacal instead*...



*But not before asking me why I had so many troops right outside "his" borders.
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Why didn't you just shut his mouth and raze his cities then they won't be near his borders
 
Someone used it in MP against me...it's a pretty much dead giveaway you're planning on war
 
I used it once. I was the Shoshone, with Japan rapidly expanding next to me. He declared war, and I had enough units to defend myself. I made sure I had one of every available unit (except the horse ones, I had no horses). I got 5 extras from it, and suffered economically, but then had the army to wipe him out. It's great under the right circumstance, but I agree that the extra units should be maintenance-free.
 
Resipsa said:
Why didn't you just shut his mouth and raze his cities then they won't be near his borders
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That came awhile later on when he wouldn't stop converting my cities. Once I had an offensive army built, I took everything he had with the exception of one crappy city. I also brought Pacal back from the dead and made a BFF.
 
yeah, the maintenance is why I have never even tried to build it. If you can get them free, it would be a very cool wonder. Current game, Morocco built it...I am still planning on attacking them next...I think they were worried about Iroquois and Ottomans, who they have close borders with and are not friendly...
I am after them as they beat me to the Parthenon by 4 turns.
 
TCA feels, to me, like they simply wanted to replace it with the Parthenon (which includes a Great Works slot, pre-filled) but decided to keep TCA and had to scramble for a new special ability for it, probably doing so because they'd already done all the work for the TCA anyways, so may as well try to keep it in-game.

TCA is not a thrilling wonder. At lower difficulties, it may be useful to some degree, but at the higher difficulties, well, it's quite unlikely that you can hard-build it after hard-building enough different units to get a good boost from it.

All that said, TCA + Germany may be a good combo that somewhat salvages both of them:
1) take barbs from barb camps (which usually yields a good assortment of archers, warriors, hand-axe, spears, and sometimes higher-up units)
2) bee-line TCA and hard-build it while rounding up barbs
3) have rather large army incredibly early, and send it to take the nearest AI capital
 
With the further reduction in GP production I have never attempted to build it. If there were free units I would do it hands-down, but as it is it would only take my early econ situation from balanced to disaster.
 
I have yet to build it, its too situational and the only time i need it someone else has already built it.
seems to be kind of useless except for some very unusual situations (spawning on an isolated island next to attila/shaka/alex or any other early jerk)
 
ahawk said:
TCA feels, to me, like they simply wanted to replace it with the Parthenon (which includes a Great Works slot, pre-filled) but decided to keep TCA and had to scramble for a new special ability for it, probably doing so because they'd already done all the work for the TCA anyways, so may as well try to keep it in-game.
Click to expand...

I have the same feeling. It didn't make sense to add a work of art to the Terracotta Army and it probably also didn't make sense for it to be unlocked by Drama and Poetry, so they decided to replace it with the Parthenon. And then they just had to come up with a function for the Terracotta Army.

On the upside, it's nice that there's a new military wonder and this function is more fitting to the place that the TCA has on the tech tree. On the downside, the idea they came up with is not that exciting.
 
I think its pretty useless in singleplayer but it can be situationally powerful in multiplayer
 
I'd say it's a damn sight more interesting than the straight-up culture boost it used to have. It's fairly situational, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. I wouldn't be surprised if it saw some tweaks in the fall patch, though.
 
Question... if you build TCA and it gives you 3 free copies of units you already have, are these 3 new units maintenance free? Does it make the pre-existing 3 also maintenance free?
 
El Caballerion said:
Question... if you build TCA and it gives you 3 free copies of units you already have, are these 3 new units maintenance free? Does it make the pre-existing 3 also maintenance free?
Click to expand...
This is discussed above. They are not maint-free or resource-free. They're just bonus units, nothing more.

It's really not a bad idea in general. If you're a wonder builder, then it gives you some way to bump your army up without leaving the wonder focus. Would've preferred it under the iron branch though.
 
Another way to squeeze a little extra out of the TCA is by leaving a few units deliberately un-upgraded. Leaving a single archer around while the rest are bumped up to CB gives you an extra archer that can then be upgraded along with the original. One game I set it up to where I got a warrior, spear, archer, CB, horseman, and scout out of it, without having to do much in the way of special setup. Obviously, you still need to make sure that your finances can take the sudden influx of units.
 
Yeah nice idea that Kaigen.

I've found TCA to be very useful. If you prepare for it economically, commit to war and then keep on the rampage, it is a seriously good boost at a very useful point in the game. Whenever I've chosen to build it I have been catapulted forward into the top ranks or into a position where none of my neighbours can touch me.
 
It used to be the wonder that always crept down my wish list far enough that somebody built it first, but now it has so very little long-term value that I ignore it.
 
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