Inflection points

[obsolete]

Has anyone gone through a list of inflection points for units? What I mean by that is.. a unit who ends up outperforming the task that is specific for another unit.

For example, I have noticed that longbowmen upgraded a specific way end up becoming stronger against knights than upgraded pikemen which are specialized (in theory) for that task. It really is making me start to devalue the whole pikeman units

 

[DaveMcW]

Longbows beat anything if they are hiding in a city.

But good luck fighting knight vs. longbow in the open...

 

[carl corey]

As Dave said, those longbows are useless in the open. Giving them first strike promotions doesn't work since knights are immune to that. You're pretty much reduced to defending purposes, hoping for a hill or something. There's no way you can use them to attack though, so in that respect they're clearly inferior to pikes. Combat promotions could serve to get you to Formation, but that works just as well for pikes as for longbowmen.

Trebuchets were doing a pretty good city raiding job, but they cost 20 hammers more now. They're still excellent at this, but you'll probably already have CR axes and swords or macemen by that time that can do the job. Maybe promoting the trebs to collateral damage could actually ease the job for the "normal" attackers.

 

[Mutineer]

Well, you can use them to attack, in some conditions

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=178323

 

[CivDude86]

Praetorians are better is then archers,spears,and axes (only slightly) but thats about it. Unless you want to get into extreme cases like a combat 5 formation longbow it better than an unpromoted pike.

 

[drkodos]

I had one game where I used a successful Longbow/catapult assault to gain a domination victory. Prince level, no strategic resources until much later after taking over three other nations.


Just like any tool, its how you use it; not its size/strength.

 

[Crighton]

but then of course: quantity can be it's own quality.

And there is nothing wrong with the brute force method as long as it works.