Improve the Protective trait???

[GoodGame]

I avoid Protective since sitting in a city isn't very useful since raiding can still occur against you, while a good offense is a good defense. Maybe if it meant forts were also quicker to build and the City Garrison also applied to sitting in a fort?

More archer-types wouldn't add much in my opinion, even if there's room for an optional type.

 

[yatta77]

I think you're taking the meaning of Protective and Defensive too literally, You wouldn't consider it protective you take back a town, improvements and land that originally belonged to you???

Uhm... probably you're right. The point it is that Defensive trait to me isn't bed in term of promotions the way it is. I think about a Cho-nu-ku enanched more than what it is, and I think it would be too much.

The Fact the the bonus only works on the defensive is almost useless because you require to build ALOT of units to defend you're many broader tiles unless you're lucky to be blessed with a Peninsula and all those unit are gonna cost you, slowing down your economy.

Use the unit in your city, when you see troops coming bring your units out and defend fortifying what's worth to be defended, and attack when strategically better (enemy on flat, not in stock, ...).

Lowbowmen with CG3 fotified on flat land
6 str + 25% from CG 2&3 + 25 from Fortifying = 9str
Macemen Unpromoted Fortified
8 Str + 25% = 10Str

You forgot the FS and the FSChance from the DrillI promotion. Beside that, Crossbow has +50% against melee units.
And don't forget that what you give to Archery you give it also to GunPowder!
Said that, if the +10% CGII and +15% CGIII bonus I proposed are too low, they can be raised to +20% CGII and +30% CGIII (or even be the same as "in city": +20%CGI +25%CGII +30%CGIII). Whatever option need to be tested to say how "fair" it is.

so improving that won't change people's gameplay.

Protective is fun to play to me. I see what you explain, and I agree that cultural borders of Defensive Empires should be "harder" to invade, and "easier" to defend; but not to the point to break the balance. A promotion line which makes a unit better defending, attacking, agaist melee, agaist mounted, ... , without a weakpoint, seems to me a little too much. Still, I can be wrong, it should be tested; I'm talikng about the idea "on the paper".

I think we agree on what's to emprove (the defence of the "inside the cultural borders" lands), we have yet to agree on how/how much to improve it. Anyway, I find interesting to read your point of wiew.

And I've already Said my 2 cent about about the extra 10% within cultural broaders... it's too generic... I won't a unique bonus that will keep the the trait interesting and different to the others.

I can agree on this. I also like better the enanched CG line option. Lets say now my official position is "Option A"

here's another Idea instead of creating a new CD promotion, how about improving the Drill line, most people generally ignore this promotion line because the Free Strikes seem too random.
...[cut]...
I'm just making this Promotion line more Likable as Drill has kind of been under-apreciated as most Protective players usually just go down to CG 3 and use their defenders for new captured cities.

I tought people loved Drill line with a Protective Leader! I tought nobody liked CG line!
Drill IV has a big reduction of collateral, a great chance to don't get too hurt winning a fight (since the first rounds can't get hurt), and also if not comparable to Combat IV, a quite bigger chance to win a fight agaist a "same streight" unpromoted unit. And with protective that's only 10xp.
Once you don't have to pick Drill I (which worth a lot less than Combat I, I agree), the other in this line are good benefits promotions. The only real weak point are the "Immune to FS" units (the +10% bonus agaist cavalry of Drill IV is there for that reason I guess).
Instead CG is kind of weak: excellent to defend cities, no doubt. But too unflexible: beside defending a city, it's an unpromoted unit.
This makes me also think that you didn't think about the Drill I line as a good counterattack strategy and you think protective units needs one extra attack bonus. Keep in your cities 50% CG and 50% Drill units, 25-50% Longbow and 50-75% Crossbow (later Granateers and Rifleman). Few Pike in case of Mounted units coming. When attacked the CG units will kill the siege units, the Drill units take less collateral and strike back.
I just think that if this could be done on resources as well il would be great, that why I think the CG improvment as something that worth a try. Drill line seems valuable the way it is to mee, especially with a protective leader.

 

[Watiggi]

2. An attacking bonus (added to the Drill I bonus), also if limitated to the cultural borders, is too much, too similar to the aggressive trait Combat I bonus, and I don't think it reflects the "Defensive" idea of the trait. Defensive shold be better defending towns or improvments (fortyfing units there), not attacking to retake them.

I see defending (in gameplay terms) as waiting to be attacked and attacking as initiating an attack. If the combat is on home soil, then I see it as protecting. More precisely, I see it as fighting on home soil. If combat is on anothers soil, then I see it as aggressive. So, giving attacking bonuses to units that can only work within cultural soil is more about allowing it to initiate combat with the aggressors who have invaded their lands, which, to me is being Protective.

BTW, I like the Acqueduct idea. It has a lot of insight into it.

As to the +20% strength to units within cultural borders idea, maybe have it as 2 first strikes for every unit within cultural borders instead. The original Protective trait (as was released) was Drill I and Drill II promotions to Archery and Gunpowder units but was changed - I dare say - because it could be used aggressively very effectively. With this though, the bonus exists, but only domestically, allowing it to fight effectively within their own borders.

 

[Rusty Edge]

Instead CG is kind of weak: excellent to defend cities, no doubt. But too unflexible: beside defending a city, it's an unpromoted unit.

You could just as easily have said that you think - City Raider is kind of weak: excellent to attack cities, no doubt. But too unflexible:besides attacking a city, it's an unpromoted unit.

One is the opposite of the other. They're specialized, but so useful that I've never played a game without using both promotion lines. It's a mixed forces game. If I want flexible I follow the Combat promotion line.

I agree with your comments on Drill, though.

 

[yatta77]

You could just as easily have said that you think - City Raider is kind of weak: excellent to attack cities, no doubt. But too unflexible:besides attacking a city, it's an unpromoted unit.

One is the opposite of the other. They're specialized, but so useful that I've never played a game without using both promotion lines. It's a mixed forces game. If I want flexible I follow the Combat promotion line.

I agree with your comments on Drill, though.

I couldn't say it better!
You said what I meant: of corse if I have to defend a trebuchet city attack I would like to have a CGIII Longbow. In this situation nothing is better than +75% defense (surely not an extra +1FS +3FSchances from DrillIII)! So yes, CG line is an excellent specilization, and I would always have at least a couple of CGII/III untis in my cities.
But I was judging the promotions CGI vs. DrillI as a free trait bonus gifted to _all your units of a type_ (archery or gunpowder). In this situation I think the DrillI is stronger because my units will benefit from it whatever they do: a DrillIII unit always has its promotion bonus and the CGI promotion doesn't add anything when the unit is not defending a city. A CGIII unit has its bonus only when it defends a city, and the extra DrillI bonus adds also there!
So as a promotion to _all your units_ Drill I it is better: as you said about CombatI, it is more flexible, and I would add, never useless.
That's why I think that if there's the need to add the ability to defend cultural tiles to some promotion line, the choice should be the CG line.
Of course, that's just my opinion.

 

[yatta77]

As to the +20% strength to units within cultural borders idea, maybe have it as 2 first strikes for every unit within cultural borders instead. The original Protective trait (as was released) was Drill I and Drill II promotions to Archery and Gunpowder units but was changed - I dare say - because it could be used aggressively very effectively. With this though, the bonus exists, but only domestically, allowing it to fight effectively within their own borders.

That's a great idea!
It make sense (I know better my land, I can suprise you fighting there!), it is not unbalanced, and it reflect the idea of protecting better the land without making the units straight stronger. A chonuku DrillIV as example would "only" (lol) have other 2 extra FS instead of a +20% straight on all the FS it already has (and if I remeber correct the +20% would apply to the collateral damage too. Am I right on this?).
This idea added to the 1/2 price aqueduct would make the Protective trait a really solid one either for peaceful games than aggressive ones (it's not bad when you play agressive to get a bonus in the new land you just conquer).

 

[scy12]

An idea : All protective civs get archery for free in the beginning.Could be Overpowered in multiplayer but it is good enough in singlepalyer.

 

[Thedrin]

Scy12:
An idea : All protective civs get archery for free in the beginning.Could be Overpowered in multiplayer but it is good enough in singlepalyer.

As it is, no protective civs start with hunting. I'll be interested to see if any protective leaders get that starting tech in BtS - surely that would make a popular leader for rushing.

 

[Thedrin]

In previews of Warlords protective was described as:
1) Half price walls and castles,
2) All archery and siege units recieve free drill I and drill II.
Free DI and DII is a very powerful bonus, especially since it's going to siege units (who, unlike gunpowder units, can be promoted to DIV). I'd propose something halfway between that and what we currently have:

Half price walls and castles,
All archery and siege units recieve free city garrison I and drill I.

Machine gunners aside, CGI won't do siege units much good (just like DI doesn't do gunpowder units much good), but giving them a head start down the drill promotion line is a much greater advantage than giving gunpowder units a free CG promotion. Reasons why this provides a greater advantage:

1) CGI is powerful enough by itself that it isn't a hinderance when going for CGIII but DI is quite weak that it can be reason not to go after DIV.
2) The drill promotion line is longer than the city garrison promotion line. With Warlords it's quite easy (relative to Vanilla) for non protective players to give newly built units CGIII in the early gunpowder era, which takes the wind out of the sales of the CGI-for-gunpowder-units bonus. But it's a lot more difficult to give DIV to newly built units in the same era.

Other benefits:
1) Machine gunners - already pretty good - become even better city defenders with their shiny new CGI promotion.
2) Siege units are available for most of the game while archery and gunpowder units are only available in certain eras.

 

[yatta77]

Half price walls and castles,
All archery and siege units recieve free city garrison I and drill I.

Good point about the Machine Gun having the CG line. Beside that, I think that GunPowder units (think about Rifleman facing Cavalry) are defending units which should get improved by Protective leaders. Switching Siege and GunPowder doesn't make the trait stronger in my opinion.
Give the bonus to all the three type of units (siege, gunpowder and archery) would make the trait stronger, but this solution doesn't help to the problem of defending the "inside my cultural border" land, which we were talking about in previous posts. Right now I like the best the Watiggi idea:
CGI to Archery and GunPowder (no DrillI promotion)
+2FS to all the units defending or attacking inside the cultural borders
+ my idea of a +100% Aqueduct production to give a "fast building" other than wall and castle to the protective leaders.

 

[kniteowl]

You forgot the FS and the FSChance from the DrillI promotion. Beside that, Crossbow has +50% against melee units.
And don't forget that what you give to Archery you give it also to GunPowder!
Said that, if the +10% CGII and +15% CGIII bonus I proposed are too low, they can be raised to +20% CGII and +30% CGIII (or even be the same as "in city": +20%CGI +25%CGII +30%CGIII). Whatever option need to be tested to say how "fair" it is.

I thought First Strikes would be implied, because their generally hard to include in my calculations, Gunpowder units were also implied I was just emphasizing just how weak the bonus was particularly to Archery type units like Longbows. Even if you do increase the bonus so the Archery type units having a higher chance of winning, I'd think it's overpower the Gunpowder types.

Protective is fun to play to me. I see what you explain, and I agree that cultural borders of Defensive Empires should be "harder" to invade, and "easier" to defend; but not to the point to break the balance. A promotion line which makes a unit better defending, attacking, agaist melee, agaist mounted, ... , without a weakpoint, seems to me a little too much. Still, I can be wrong, it should be tested; I'm talikng about the idea "on the paper".

10% to advantage to a particular type of unit isn't overpowered at all, when you compare it to the Combat Promotions which is an overall 10% increase in strength and there's also the fact that the Combat promotions are accumulative compared to my bonuses which will always be 10% to a particular type of unit.

I tought people loved Drill line with a Protective Leader! I tought nobody liked CG line!
Drill IV has a big reduction of collateral, a great chance to don't get too hurt winning a fight (since the first rounds can't get hurt), and also if not comparable to Combat IV, a quite bigger chance to win a fight agaist a "same streight" unpromoted unit. And with protective that's only 10xp.
Once you don't have to pick Drill I (which worth a lot less than Combat I, I agree), the other in this line are good benefits promotions. The only real weak point are the "Immune to FS" units (the +10% bonus agaist cavalry of Drill IV is there for that reason I guess).
Instead CG is kind of weak: excellent to defend cities, no doubt. But too unflexible: beside defending a city, it's an unpromoted unit.
This makes me also think that you didn't think about the Drill I line as a good counterattack strategy and you think protective units needs one extra attack bonus. Keep in your cities 50% CG and 50% Drill units, 25-50% Longbow and 50-75% Crossbow (later Granateers and Rifleman). Few Pike in case of Mounted units coming. When attacked the CG units will kill the siege units, the Drill units take less collateral and strike back.
I just think that if this could be done on resources as well il would be great, that why I think the CG improvment as something that worth a try. Drill line seems valuable the way it is to mee, especially with a protective leader.

What Thedrin said bout the Promotions lines being shorter for CG then Drill,Most people who don't want to accumulate XP from combat and just want straight Promotion to Drill IV or CG3, will generally choose CG3 as it is shorter requires less XP (5XP in the case of Protective). Therefore People generally like to take advantage of CG3 as it's easier to get unless you're Churchill who only need 8XP to reach Drill IV.

The only time I get Drill IV units is when I get West point combined with Barracks and GG or Civics, while I Ignore Rifling to build As Many Drill IV Longbows and upgrade to Drill IV Grenadiers or Rifles.

There's also the fact that some players don't know that First strikes are not calculated in combat odds so first strikes can be deceiving to the normal player who don't know about first strikes not being included into in the combat odds.

So far I believe the majority of people in this thread (correct me if I'm wrong) want to improve Protective with these bonuses

- Gunpowder units should be able to promote down the Drill line (to at least only Protective gunpowder units)

- Walls and Castles should be given better bonuses besides from increase city defense so there's a reason in actually building them (eg - castles get +2XP to Siege units).

- The Protective Leader should be given a bonus to also Protect his cultural boarders and improvements.

By the way, why cheap aqueducts to Protective? What Does it have to do with Protecting a nation???

Apart from enemy units standing on Food resources starving your Population while it's unhealthy I Don't see why Protective should get cheap aqueducts.

It'd be like Organized getting cheap factories :S

 

[Rusty Edge]

Castles obsolete at Rifling which I usually get much later than Scientific Method (cannons).

Isn't it castles go obsolete at gunpowder and walls go obsolete with rifling?

 

[Moon Pine]

A.
* 1/2 price aqueduct
* change the CG promotion line as follow:
CGI: +20% city defense
CGII: +25% city defense; +10% defense in improved tiles inside your cultural borders
CGIII: +30% city defense; +15% defense in improved tiles inside your cultural borders

Great^^ But a little buffs to deal with barbarians seems better, as I think Protective is more for them than other civs. And maybe faster Tile Improvements.

In fact it`s the Aggresive that realy needs buffs,I think , as the mainbattle aggresive units are Mounted and Siege units than Armored not Melee or Gunpowder. May Aggresive gives Melee Units and Armored free Combat I and Siege Units free Barrage I better.
I never build a wall or Castel, NEVER! But free CityG I and Drill I can make it impossible for barbarians to capture a city with a Archer on it(Though still possible destroy the tile Improvements if you lack of a huning force), that will greatly help in Prince and Monarch.

 

[yatta77]

@kniteowl
First I'd like to say that what I say here are just simple opinions based on my experience playing. I really hope you don't think of it as something personal

And I know well that my opinions might be wrong, and maybe the extra bonuses to the Drill line you are proposing are the best to improve the Defensive trait.

I agree that get to CGIII is a lot more easy/frequent than get to DrillIV. But I do believe that Drill promotion line is good, maybe if DrillI was +1FS (instead of +1FSChance) and DrillIV +1FS+1FSChance (instead of +2FS) it would be more popular (since the obviously weak promotion in the line is DrillI).

I actually like your idea of a Drill V promotion (maybe +2FS +10%healing?), but to me the +10% specific bonus just doesn't fit neither for Drill, neither for defensive, sorry. I guess the +10% vs.Mounted of DrillIV is because of the Immunity to FS of some Mounted Unit, with the Drill IV unit losing all its strenght, not really cool for a level 5 unit! It is not really about making the Drill units better vs. a type of units.

Beside that, the bonuses you propose to add to the Drill line are something already available with the promotions "Shock", "Pinch", and "the one for siege" (don't remember the name, sorry ).

By the way, did you read the Watiggi idea to change the DrillI free promotion with a +2FS only inside the cultural borders? It is in the direction of "making your unit stronger fighting in the cultural tiles" we started from, and it works in a very simple way. What do you think about it?

There's also the fact that some players don't know that First strikes are not calculated in combat odds so first strikes can be deceiving to the normal player who don't know about first strikes not being included into in the combat odds.

Really? You teached me something! I tought they were! Thanks!

- Gunpowder units should be able to promote down the Drill line (to at least only Protective gunpowder units)

This would be fair to me.

- Walls and Castles should be given better bonuses besides from increase city defense so there's a reason in actually building them (eg - castles get +2XP to Siege units).

By the way, why cheap aqueducts to Protective? What Does it have to do with Protecting a nation???
Apart from enemy units standing on Food resources starving your Population while it's unhealthy I Don't see why Protective should get cheap aqueducts.

...well, that was my idea actually about aquaducts, as I said few posts above. Beside Aqueduct not beeing taken as 1/2 price building from the other traits. But improving the Castles would be ok too, and the +2xp Siege might be fair as a balancing idea (it makes the 1/2 price building more interesting), also if it has not really much to share with "protective" to me.

- The Protective Leader should be given a bonus to also Protect his cultural boarders and improvements.

We yet have to agree on what would be the "right" bonus.
(btw: also if we won't agree on what's the best, who cares? I appreciate to know other poeple opinions, especially when they're different from mines: it makes me see things from another point of wiew ).

 

[Thedrin]

Yatta77:
Good point about the Machine Gun having the CG line. Beside that, I think that GunPowder units (think about Rifleman facing Cavalry) are defending units which should get improved by Protective leaders. Switching Siege and GunPowder doesn't make the trait stronger in my opinion.
Give the bonus to all the three type of units (siege, gunpowder and archery) would make the trait stronger, but this solution doesn't help to the problem of defending the "inside my cultural border" land, which we were talking about in previous posts. Right now I like the best the Watiggi idea:
CGI to Archery and GunPowder (no DrillI promotion)
+2FS to all the units defending or attacking inside the cultural borders
+ my idea of a +100% Aqueduct production to give a "fast building" other than wall and castle to the protective leaders.

I was not attempting to continue on the line of thought which the thread had followed, I was merely suggesting an alternative implementation of the protective trait.

I see no good reason why the trait must be confined to defensive aspects of the game (neither do you since you suggest half price aquaducts). That's why I sugested giving the bonus to siege units instead of gunpowder units; over the course of the game siege units play a big part in offensive strategies. That means that human players have a much greater use for it and the AI (which recieves discounts to upgrading units) can carry its archery bonus over to its gunpowder based city defenders.

I think that Wattigi's sugggestion (or at least the one your quoted) is too powerful, in a similar way to how I thought the originally advertised implementation of the protective trait (drill I and II to all siege and archery) was very powerful.

 

[Thedrin]

KniteOwl:
- Gunpowder units should be able to promote down the Drill line (to at least only Protective gunpowder units)

Give all gunpowder units access to Drill II, III, and IV. A change similar to the one that gave all melee units access to guerilla II and III in Warlords which allowed Gallic Warriors to be promoted down to Guerilla III. This way all protective gunpowder units can go down this promotion line as well as all non-protective gunpowder units that were upgraded from drill promoted archery units.

 

[yatta77]

I was not attempting to continue on the line of thought which the thread had followed, I was merely suggesting an alternative implementation of the protective trait.

Sorry. We were focusing on that in the previous posts and I didn't realize that you were proposing another alternative.

I think that Wattigi's sugggestion (or at least the one your quoted) is too powerful, in a similar way to how I thought the originally advertised implementation of the protective trait (drill I and II to all siege and archery) was very powerful.

This is actually something to think about. But it could be reduced to +1FS or +1FS +1FSChance instead of +2FS, if really overpowered.

Defensive to me is a quite good trait, especially with the Chinese UU, but I would choose many other traits before this one (especially for the lack of good 1/2 price buildings), beside nobody I've talk about leader traits ever said "defensive is my favourite".
Thinking of traits (I hope I'm remebering things right): Spi: Temples and no anarchy; Phi: Universities and extra GP; Cre: Theaters, Libraries, Colosseums and fast cultural expansion; Financial: lots of more commerce; Industrious: forge and quicker wonders; Organized: courthouses, factories and reduced maintenence; Aggressive: barracks, drydocks and units +10% stronger; ...; Defensive: walls, castles and 2 specfic and not synergic promotions to archery and gunpowder... beside making it harder for my enemies to take my cities (which is actually a good thing, of course!), there's not so much. It just seems something is missing to me, that's why I think something should be _added_ to it, and switching Gunpowder with Siege makes the units who benefits from the bonus promotions _less_, which sounds to me making the trait even weaker. But of course I agree with you that the improvment choosen doesn't have to unbalance the trait in the opposite direction. I hope I could explain myself well enough.

 

[Thedrin]

I get what your saying.

switching Gunpowder with Siege makes the units who benefits from the bonus promotions _less_, which sounds to me making the trait even weaker.

Well, I've given my reasons for why making that switch improves the trait but to summarise; defensive options are only slightly reduced (since non-protective city defending gunpowder units often get city garrison anyway) but offensive options are greatly increased since siege units will get to drill IV much more often.

 

[kristopherb]

Free Cg1-D1
Cut price walls-castles
50% more GG in culture borders

 

[Watiggi]

I'd say now that the First Strike system could be fine turned a little (this is taking it off topic a little, but would make the first strike system more reliable and understandable in an intuitive way).

Normal combat round:

Odds are generated based on each units relative strengths. If the odds fall in your favour, then the other gets hit and vica versa.

First strike round:

If the odds fall in your favour, then the other unit gets damaged. If the odds fall against you, then nothing happens.

First strike chances are essentially a chance of having a first strike round (as stated above) in a battle. This is decided at the begining of combat. So if it says 3-6 first strikes, then the unit, in battle, will have anywhere between 3-6 first strikes (inclusive) in that battle. So, in battle #1 the unit might have 3 first strikes, in battle #2 the unit might have 5 first strikes and in battle #3 the unit might have 3 first strikes, etc.

The problem:

Even though you have a Drill IV Cho-Ku-Nu, you may loose every first strike round and end up attacking a unit under the guise that you have Drill IV but be actually hitting it as a unit without Drill IV. Sadly, this just has to happen once - or even come close to it - in order to ruin the power of the Drill IV unit, rendering it essentially no better than an unpromoted unit.

A solution:

A way to improve it in order to make first strikes much more reliable, could be to make first strike chances be just like normal first strikes (ie, it might hit, it might not, based on the combat odds) and then make first strikes a guarenteed hit, no matter what. This would make first strikes really powerful, but also reliable and makes first strike chances sound more intuitive to comprehend. Right now, I'll bet a lot of people still think that first strikes actually mean "a first strike", but what it really means is "it may strike first, then again, it may not".

Doing this, the other units would need to be rebalanced: Every unit that comes with a first strike (archer, longbowmen, keshik, cho-ku-nu, samurai and modern armour) would be changed to have the same amount of first strike chances. Then it would be nessecery to change the Drill promotion line in order to make first strikes much rarer so that:

Drill I: first strike chance
Drill II: first strike chance
Drill III: first strike
Drill IV: first strike

So a top unit would get 2 (real) first strikes (guarenteed rounds of victory) and 2 first strike chances (remember that a first strike chance is really a first strike in the current game). This makes the units reliability more obvious and is much easier to comprehend the units ability.

Summary:

Hope that wasn't too confusing... To me a "first strike chance" means a chance of getting a guarenteed hit. To me a "first strike" means a guarenteed hit. I think it should be set up that way as it would make units with first strike much more understandable and reliable in their true strength. Right now, a "first strike chance" means a chance of getting a first strike round and a "first stirke" means a chance of scoring a hit. Doesn't seem right and is very misleading.