Improve the Protective trait???

[kristopherb]

no keep it as it is ,i want the 2uu as english longbow.protective is a huge warmongering trait used right.

 

[Sisiutil]

I should imagine it makes Qin Shi Huang an ideal leader for builders in Warlords, since he has Industrious to help with wonders and Protective to... well... protect them.

 

[ds61514]

Another problem with protective (and to a lesser extent civs with archer UUs) is that archery is a dead end tech. Bronze-working is the most important tech in the game. In contrast, archery is not one, but TWO dead end techs (hunting and archery).

As for protective being good for defensive play styles, I dunno, but on higher levels (monarch/emp) I have found that having a good defense usually means that you are losing slower. Sure protective may be better if you are on the defense, but being on the defense is more often than not a losing strategy in the first place.

Finally, one of the other problems with Protective is the blatant stereotyping of East Asian leaders. I mean Qin of all people as protective? Methinks Firaxis didn't really take a good look at history .

 

[gettingfat]

I agree protective is a stupid idea to start with.

We are here to play to win, not to play like cockroaches, then lose when 2050 comes.

True, like any trait protective gives you something extra, but what this trait gives you is something that won't help too much to win.

You know what scares me most in a war? Not my enemies attacking my cities, it's these buggers start pillaging my cottages that have turned into juicy towns after a zillion of rounds. The CG3 promotion and cheap wall don't help this.

Protective trait does not help my axes, swords, spears, chariots, elephants, catapult....etc. These are the units I use most. Unless I play Chinese, I seldom use crossbows. You only need certain number of Longbows to stay in the cities just in case. Most of the battles are fought in open field to reduce the loss from pillaging.

The life of castles is really short to be very useful. I'll take any other buildings for the half-cost.

When playing SP, your power ranking is not affected by the number of promotions, so the idea that you can build fewer units and still remain in peace is not a valid one. Once a war starts, you'll still build mostly other units to fight the open-ground war.

 

[Sisiutil]

When playing SP, your power ranking is not affected by the number of promotions, so the idea that you can build fewer units and still remain in peace is not a valid one. Once a war starts, you'll still build mostly other units to fight the open-ground war.

I didn't think so. When I'm warring, though, I usually leave several units behind to garrison a city I've captured; I was theorizing that with protective, I could leave fewer units behind if I use the protective units for this purpose. For a recently-conquered city, the AI tends to leave off pillaging around it and tries to retake the city.

 

[NKVD]

Protective serves it's purpose.
It is supposed to be useless to aggressive players who don't allow the enemy to attack their cities, just like Industrious is useless to a player who doesn't build wonders.
The advantage in the early game is that you can have an Archer with 2-3 first strikes from a barracks to hunt down barbarian warriors without taking much damage. When there are no more barbarians he will still be useful with his drill promotions and the city defense bonus.

hum who told you they would attack your cities. I think the Barbarians or any AI that have to attack your garrisoned cities will go pillage the country land instead. There goes the trait...

And I prefer my agressor to come and die on my walls rather then pillaging cottages

 

[Watiggi]

I should imagine it makes Qin Shi Huang an ideal leader for builders in Warlords, since he has Industrious to help with wonders and Protective to... well... protect them.

Mao should be a really good expansionist now with the bonus to workers (to chop settlers and maybe archers). He could start a well defended expansion without needing Barracks.

 

[Thedrin]

Protective trait does not help my axes, swords, spears, chariots, elephants, catapult....etc. These are the units I use most. Unless I play Chinese, I seldom use crossbows.

Use crossbows. In any one on one fight, a crossbow is equally as powerful as a cho-ko-nu. It's also one of the best units for fighting in the field. As long as you have built enough roads, a group of crossbows and spearmen/pikemen/elephants is a very poweful combination for protecting your territory from pillaging.

In summary, use crossbows. As a bonus you'll find the protective trait much more valuable.

 

[mutax2003]

How about half the build time and upgrade cost for all archery units?

 

[HalfBadger]

You know what scares me most in a war? Not my enemies attacking my cities, it's these buggers start pillaging my cottages that have turned into juicy towns after a zillion of rounds. The CG3 promotion and cheap wall don't help this.

Protective trait does not help my axes, swords, spears, chariots, elephants, catapult....etc. These are the units I use most. Unless I play Chinese, I seldom use crossbows. You only need certain number of Longbows to stay in the cities just in case. Most of the battles are fought in open field to reduce the loss from pillaging.

I agree with this post, pillaging can hurt more than someone directly attacking your cities, especially if you're cities are borderline unhealthy/unhappy, and/or have a lot of Villages/Towns. Or if they pillage resources you were trading to other Civs, you'll brake that trade and they'll get annoyed with you.

Pillaging is a tactic I frequently use when warring with a city.

Sides I think Power is calculated more by power, than potential Power. In Civ3 Someone did a test and the AI veiewed every attack point worth 1.5 defense, meaning aggressive/attacking units are better for keeping ppl from attacking you. Like a storng offense is the best defense.

I have found my problem with Protective is I assume someone won't attack me if I have a few archers with cg2-3 and forget to have a decent offensive army. Also I rarely build walls and find castles aren't usually worth it, they become obsolete so soon.

 

[Thyrwyn]

Protective is great for defending your stacks against counter-attacks after you conquer an enemy city. The free drill chance also means that your troops will take less damage, in the long run. Cheep walls/castles means more income from trade routes after Engineering (which even pure warmongers get for Trebs).

The free drill promotion also means that Archery and Gunpowder troops can take Pinch, Cover, and Shock as their first promotion; Drill II opens up Charge and Formation; Drill II-IV reduces damage taken from collateral damage.

Protective is a great trait for offensive warring.

 

[dcbandicoot]

Unless one is playing Agg/Pro (and for the life of me, why you would mod such a thing I don't know), Protective is a great trait. Just think, a slightly slower unit production in favor of jacked up units - all that must be done is keep cities a little bit closer so it's harder to pillage and run

 

[Mr. Civtastic]

Unless one is playing Agg/Pro (and for the life of me, why you would mod such a thing I don't know),

No need to mod, Toku is agg/pro in Warlords.

 

[Powerslave]

Seriously, I'm truly amazed that people think Protective is useful. I've never even been slowed down by a single turn when facing Protective civilizations. I laugh whenever I see them, because I know they effectively only have one trait, because Protective is so useless.

I play with the latest Better AI, too, and I'm not even that big of a warmonger -- I don't like long, drawn-out games, and warmongering slows down the game. My wins take two hours (small/medium), maybe four hours tops (large/huge).

The way I counter anything is simple: bring more units to the front than he has in his city. It never fails. I might lose five out of my ten swordsmen, but I always take the city. I then garrison one archer or longbowman or what-have-you, and move on to the next city. By the time I've burned through most of my first wave, the second wave is there with reinforcements, and so on.

I almost never pillage anything but resources, because I covet my neighbors' towns. However, if I did run into someone who had an overwhelming number of defenders, each with an overwhelming number of defensive promotions, I would simply pillage every single square around every single city. If I can't have your towns, then you can't have them, either. This is devastating. When you're on the receiving end of this sort of tactic, you swear off turtling forever. I sure did.

It's frustrating to me sometimes, but superior numbers always win out, no matter what. Once I realized this, my games doubled in score, I stopped building defensive units, and I cackled with perverse glee as my catapults took down Tokugawa's Infantry behind walls and a castle. No contest.

 

[kristopherb]

when you start the game there needs to be an option? "no pillaging"

 

[Amask]

if you play against humans who have a clue about how to fight, the second you move your stack into their territory, they'll bombard it with cats (before you have a chance to use your cats), then obliterate it with other units (doesn't even matter what kind, because your units will be too damaged to effectively fight back)

and don't say use defensive terrain, what if there is none next to his cities? happens way too often...

so, the multiple drill promotions you can easily get with protective (and rax, maybe a military leader) really help you withstand the onslaught of those catapults

not only do your longbows/crossbows come out with more health out of the fights because of the first strikes, the other archery units in the stack also lose way less hp to collateral damage, and are still capable of standing up to the cats. Enemy cats are only 1 strength below your longbow/corssbow, so after a couple of them suicide, the rest can slaughter any of your units, especially if the enemy gives the suicide cats the "more collateral damage" promo, and the rest get combat)



The whole issue of "whoever gets to attack with cats first, wins" has been bothering me for a while.
So far the best solution I have come up with is don't attack at all during that period (if you don't have eles that is), the period before other high strength units appear (such as knights/muskets).
Or, you could hope the enemy is stupid enough to come into your lands with a stack that only matches yours, but doesn't exceed the size of it. In that case, you wait till he steps on a flat tile, keeping your army two tiles away from him so he doesn't know what's coming, and the second he is vulnerable, unleash your cats on his stack, then obliterate it. Then, while he is like "omfg WTH just happened, you proceed to eat his land".
I've done it so many times, it's really fun!!!

 

[Drake007]

whats with all of you saying protective doesnt suck. thats how you win games? by protecting cities? the AI will pillage instead. offense is by far the best defense in civ 4 anyhow.

its a weak trait, end of story. to boost it, heres a few of my ideas:

- +20-30% strength inside borders
- higher cap on the fortify bonus anywhere (say 50%)
- bonus vs barbs
- healing rate bonus
- cheaper/better forts
- anything... it sucks

 

[Powerslave]

if you play against humans who have a clue about how to fight, the second you move your stack into their territory, they'll bombard it with cats (before you have a chance to use your cats), then obliterate it with other units (doesn't even matter what kind, because your units will be too damaged to effectively fight back)

Yes, this is how I react to the AI and/or humans who enter my territory. Siege engines, of course, are immune to collateral damage, so they remain unharmed. I try to take an overwhelming number of siege units for just this purpose. Of course, you can't just waltz into someone's land with 20 catapults and not expect to be crushed by horse archers. After mulling on that, I decided to go with drill longbowmen and/or war elephants to protect the stack. It's not perfect, but it works okay. I still have to retreat sometimes.

and don't say use defensive terrain, what if there is none next to his cities? happens way too often...

Yeah, humans are infamous for leaving you no defensive terrain. I like the idea of a guerrilla longbowman or two being in every stack now, just so that I can maximize the benefit from those few hills I do find.

so, the multiple drill promotions you can easily get with protective (and rax, maybe a military leader) really help you withstand the onslaught of those catapults

I agree. With humans, Protective could end up being useful. Often, I prefer to attack someone who's already at war with another human, so that he's fighting wars on two (or more) fronts. Unfortunately, many humans will cry, "Unfair!" and leave, if you do this. The better ones will crush each player in turn, winning the game.

The whole issue of "whoever gets to attack with cats first, wins" has been bothering me for a while.

I found catapults to be vastly overpowered in Civ 4. Now that Drill helps to reduce collateral damage in Warlords, I don't mind catapults as much, but Knights can slice through your Drill 5 Cho-Ko-Nu like a chainsaw through butter. I learned this the hard way, after getting too excited about my Cho-Ko-Nu.

Then, while he is like "omfg WTH just happened, you proceed to eat his land".

It's definitely fun. I also prefer to attack directly after a failed enemy invasion. Even so, I often suffer from the same kind of over-confidence and underestimate the strategic and tactical skill of my human enemies. Maybe playing against the AI too much does that to you!

when you start the game there needs to be an option? "no pillaging"

That's an intriguing idea.

 

[Watiggi]

when you start the game there needs to be an option? "no pillaging"

I think that would remove some of the strategy from the game. Unless of course that was your intention? Quite a few of the AI are pillagers and would pretty much have their strategy screwed by such an option. Besides, with the expense of towns and the ammount of gold they give to the pillager, I think it gives quite a nice need for players (and AI alike) to have to defend their territory as well as their cities. This game forces you to focus on more than just defending cities, which I like. I personally don't mind Protective as it is, but maybe something could be done for helping Protective leaders to protect better within their borders, especially in civ4 now that there is more value on pillaging and therefore a bigger need in having to defend the land.

Maybe giving them an attack bonus for attacking enemy units that are within their borders? The bonus would give the player (AI or otherwise) more direct control when using the bonus to defend their territory.

 

[Powerslave]

I think that would remove some of the strategy from the game. Unless of course that was your intention? Quite a few of the AI are pillagers and would pretty much have their strategy screwed by such an option.

There's already an "always peace" option, and I can't imagine that having a "no pillaging" option could hurt their strategy any more than that.

Personally, I don't see the point to "always peace" being in a war game, but I guess someone else did.