Is Artillery Overpowered?

[TheMarshmallowBear]

Here's how I see it.

Cannon is just an updated version of the previous two units (Catapult and Trebuchet)

But the moment you upgrade to Artillery, it gains TWO new abilities, longer range and indirect fire.

I don't mine them, but I don't think they should be put together, the longer range allows you to avoid being hit by the units, and the indirect fire allows you to demolish the city without a single unit being hurt by your units, especially with the addition of Gattling Gun/Machine Gun, who are reduced to a single tile range, therefore your cities are completely vulnerable.

I was playing as Theodora and Willim was pretty much one of the guys who were pretty close, he even managed to grab MY wonders (i.e I wasn't ahead in the tech as I should be on Warlord), so I decided to turn on my good old friend William, and it didn't take me long to capture 3 of his cities (he later gave me 3 more and i burnt them as I had no need for them).

And this only because the Artillery was able to destroy the cities to a single HP until I could move in my Infantry units in (I also had the support of Bombers and Fighters). But then again William didn't have many units to defend either way.

 

[smallfish]

Nope, against Industrial era units, sure.

But once you hit Infantry/Tanks, artillery isn't so hot anymore. In fact, if not for their siege purposes, I would say they are peashooters against those kind of units.

e: I'm looking at someone maneuvering his Infantry, in front of his foe's 3 artillery guns and a city, and its tanking a ton of damage that Vanilla style hitpoints would have demolished in a couple turns.

e2: look at this Celtic Infantry here

 

[marioflag]

I personally think that +1 range is overpowered because AI is unable to counter land units with 3 or more range. Firaxis should decrease the range of artillery or give cities a longer range when they enter Industrial age. At Marathon speed where combat experience is already an issue, i finish all my games with at least 2 or 3 artillery units which have gained all promotions due to the fact that they can attack without risk to be attacked (unless i make some stupid move or airplanes).

 

[smallfish]

I personally think that +1 range is overpowered because AI is unable to counter land units with 3 or more range. Firaxis should decrease the range of artillery or give cities a longer range when they enter Industrial age. At Marathon speed where combat experience is already an issue, i finish all my games with at least 2 or 3 artillery units which have gained all promotions due to the fact that they can attack without risk to be attacked (unless i make some stupid move or airplanes).

I disagree - the AI knows how to counter them through airplanes, or their favorite cavalry units...

 

[nokmirt]

I don't think artillery is overpowered. Although getting promotion to fire from 4 hexes away may be a bit much. The only issue I see is that the AI still seems to overlook artillery. Especially, artillery sitting outside its capital. This is inherently dangerous to say the least. Take a look at the end of this game by marbozir. The amazing thing about this is not the artillery per say, but that the AI allowed the artillery of a desperate enemy (severely behind in tech) to actually gather outside its capital to begin with. To me that shortcoming of stupidity present in the AI should seriously be addressed by the devs. In any case this set of videos really were fun to watch. Still the outcome was very close take a look.

Click on the youtube button to watch it there in full screen and HD video.


Link to video.

 

[smallfish]

I don't think it is overpowered. The only issue I see is that the AI still seems to overlook artillery. Especially, artillery sitting outside their capital. This is inherently dangerous to say the least. Take a look at the end of this game by marbozir.


Link to video.

Ahhh

Looks like Nappy didn't have much in the way of units there to counteract the Inkans. Not sure if plinking an arty or two would help there =/

 

[nokmirt]

Ahhh

Looks like Nappy didn't have much in the way of units there to counteract the Inkans. Not sure if plinking an arty or two would help there =/

e2: look at this Celtic Infantry here

I agree with you about the artillery not being overpowered, but that infantry is seriously promoted. Put a greenhorn American division up there and see what happens. Anyway the reason I feel artillery is not overpowered is because it serves its purpose to demolish cities, not infantry. Rock, paper, scissors still works well here. It is just that the AI needs to be better. At least it needs more common sense when it comes to getting rid of dangerous siege units.

Here Napoleon wastes the whole game expending resources to conquer half the world. Then, sadly, he allows the Trojan horse into his capital.

To answer your post, indeed it certainly would have. The AI bombers concentrated too much on less important targets. He had tons of bombers in range. They easily could have knocked out those artys with no air defenses whatsoever. Even without knocking out the artys the AI barely lost. Amazing finish that game.

 

[smallfish]

I agree with you about the artillery not being overpowered, but that infantry is seriously promoted. Put a greenhorn American division up there and see what happens. Anyway the reason I feel artillery is not overpowered is because it serves its purpose to demolish cities, not infantry. Rock, paper, scissors still works well here. It is just that the AI needs to be better. At least it needs more common sense when it comes to getting rid of dangerous siege units.

Here Napoleon wastes the whole game expending resources to conquer half the world. Then, sadly, he allows the Trojan horse into his capital.

To answer your post, indeed it certainly would have. The AI bombers concentrated too much on less important targets. He had tons of bombers in range. They easily could have knocked out those artys with no air defenses whatsoever. Even without knocking out the artys the AI barely lost. Amazing finish that game.

I'm going to start an Industrial duel game (ya got my new rig) and see what comes out of it in terms of Inf vs Artillery

Meanwhile I'm also not sure what you mean by less important targets? Melee? Ranged? Fastmovers? All of them are pretty important targets. The only weakness I can see from this is that the AI didn't have many units at all, something the devs could easily solve by making them build more like on 7. The French had not much airplanes of their own or cavalry type units, and only 1 or 2 rocket artilleries, and apparently most of their navy was busy down south...? That doesn't inspire much confidence in fighting off the Inkans eh

 

[smallfish]

I agree with you about the artillery not being overpowered, but that infantry is seriously promoted. Put a greenhorn American division up there and see what happens. Anyway the reason I feel artillery is not overpowered is because it serves its purpose to demolish cities, not infantry. Rock, paper, scissors still works well here. It is just that the AI needs to be better. At least it needs more common sense when it comes to getting rid of dangerous siege units.

Let's put in a "greenhorn" Dutch infantry instead... since this is a later era start, he gets a free promotion off a city but so do we eh

Spoiler :

That's right, only 6 damage even with all the green bonuses.


So we tried marbozir's approach to rushing an AI in the Atomic Era (well, Willy got into Info pretty quick), and even brought in some modern battlewagons to blast his cap and his units apart.

Spoiler :

It was figured that the AI might just do the ole shuffle to and fro wasting turns... yeah, so much for that

Spoiler :

Hookay, that didn't work out so well. Let's try plop an AA up and see whether this will do... not that it matters since BBs were only scratching the paint off Amsterdam

Spoiler :

And indeed it was a terrible idea to begin with:

Spoiler :

So from this short, brutal game of Duel Immortal, we can learn a few things about the role of Artillery beyond the Industrial Era:

1) It dies very, very easily
2) Your foes won't ignore them every time, and if they have enough units in the vicinity, there will be hell for them
3) WWII Infantry is indeed tough, durable and powerful enough to be send in a mob... and they eat Artilleries for breakfast
4) Artillery itself isn't much against Info Era cities... now rocket artillery on the other hand
5) Better bring in an airforce... and some nukes... and more BBs.

 

[Matthew.]

There is a reason it doesn't upgrade until the very late rocket artillery

I also think the game is set-up specifically so that the war machine is much more capable of clearing the map after industrial. All the happiness limits are to limit the game so it lasts through several eras. I think the way they implement military technology also adds to the same idea. Battleships, artillery, and bombers are designed to clear the map with relative ease late in the game. No limitations left, just you and whatever superpowers are left to clash in an all-out world war.

I mean really, if you are the first one to get to nukes you can usually wrap up a domination victory extremely fast. It is almost as if the game is saying "You've reached the later techs. You can win domination now!"

 

[marioflag]

I disagree - the AI knows how to counter them through airplanes, or their favorite cavalry units...

In my experience AI rarely focus fire on Artillery

 

[Dogmouth]

I don't think they're op. Actually, if anything is wrong, it's that cannons are underpowered. Cannons were major game changers in pre-modern warfare. In Civ5, they're not much better than trebs.

 

[smallfish]

In my experience AI rarely focus fire on Artillery

Except they just did that - plenty of times, I might add - in my game above.

I don't think they're op. Actually, if anything is wrong, it's that cannons are underpowered. Cannons were major game changers in pre-modern warfare. In Civ5, they're not much better than trebs.

Me thinks this is why we need another era in between Ren and Indu... with an Armstrong Gun as a middle unit between cannonae and arty

 

[Avatan]

I don't think they're op. Actually, if anything is wrong, it's that cannons are underpowered. Cannons were major game changers in pre-modern warfare. In Civ5, they're not much better than trebs.

I would like cannons to have indirect fire - gameplay wise. It would be a huge step up from trebs.
One of the first engineering school in France was an artillery servant school, where young officers learnt how to calculate ballistics trajectory of cannonball, so it would kind of make sense too.

 

[Sherlock]

If you get artillery before they have it and tanks, etc.... they shall all drown in lakes of blood.

 

[Rellin]

In my experience AI rarely focus fire on Artillery

AI seems to focus fire well in my games.

 

[FeiLing]

The AI will attack the weakest units. A full promoted infantry fortified is not weak, so it will rather target your artillery pieces I guess.

Anyway, I think in Vanilla Artillery was overpowered. In G&K they are kinda necessary as cities can become ridiculous strong, taking out any unit in one hit easily (150 city strength anyone? >200 in all cities even with the Kremlin?). Also maybe the gap between Cannons and Artillery is a tad to large, so it seems to make artillery stronger in comparison.

 

[fufie]

I don't think artillery is OP - the problem is that the AI does not focus on getting rid of it when you lay siege to a city. Send a wounded/weak unit in as part of the siege and the AI will focus on killing that one off instead of taking out artillery. Depending on research focus you can get artillery early and it will be powerful, but then you postpone e.g oil for the upcoming bombers and tanks.

A change which probably should be is that after you research artillery your cities should get range 3 defence.


But, I think that if anything there are a few important gaps in civ warfare when it comes to cannons/artillery:

The siege of Constantinople (1453) had cannons, and especially the monster cannon of Urban. A pure siege cannon, as opposed to lighter cannons which were used against people e.g the Charles VIII's invasion of Italy a few decades later. In some respects the unit in civ is a siege cannon and is less of an anti-personnel cannon.

The lighter more mobile cannons/artillery of Gustav II Adolf and then later perfected by Napoleon as a vital part of his overall strategy of speed both to the battlefield and on the battlefield. Right now the units in civ are not even close to be used with speed and flexibility - probably because they are considered siege weapons primarily. If not a standard unit, they would be great for Sweden or France as UU.

Fast forward to WWII to the german 88mm which was super-flexible and was devastating in so many contexts - anti aircraft, anti armor and even anti-ship. Would be a great UU.

 

[ahawk]

Except for attacking cities, I'd rather have Great War Bombers than Artillery much of the time.

The main reason I ever mass-produce Artillery is that I can often enough be ahead of everyone (or of most or many civs) in techs by the Industrial era. Which means my Artillery is hitting rifles and other junk. If I don't have the tech lead, by the time I have the Artillery out in big enough numbers, they might have to face Infantry and/or Tanks.

 

[nokmirt]

I'm going to start an Industrial duel game (ya got my new rig) and see what comes out of it in terms of Inf vs Artillery

Meanwhile I'm also not sure what you mean by less important targets? Melee? Ranged? Fastmovers? All of them are pretty important targets. The only weakness I can see from this is that the AI didn't have many units at all, something the devs could easily solve by making them build more like on 7. The French had not much airplanes of their own or cavalry type units, and only 1 or 2 rocket artilleries, and apparently most of their navy was busy down south...? That doesn't inspire much confidence in fighting off the Inkans eh

The planes were there, they bombed the city he placed with several. More were used against a rifleman. Those should have been targeting the artillery and melee units next to the capital. If the AI had attacked those units that last turn, Marbozir's offensive would have been stopped cold. Even he realized that himself in the video. He knows if the AI had used even one more attack against those units threatening the capital, that would have been it for him. The AI never should have allowed his army to even get to his territory. Marbozir's whole fleet of embarked units was surrounded by carriers full of planes, destroyers, and submarines. Anyone with half a brain would have DoWed him and put that whole force on the bottom of the sea. Instead the AI just let him waltz right in there and setup shop, without lifting one finger. The AI even fell for the "We are just passing through" ploy!

The interesting thing is that the first turn of the war Marbo was able to get 8 artys setup in range of the city. The AI knocked out 4 of them during its turn. Then in the following critical turn when Marbo had only 4 artys left the AI only damaged one of those to yellow, with one bombing raid (the only one against his units that turn which needed to be targeted). Now why is that? The AI did not play to win!

Also, in your screenshots above. How come Napoleon did not do what the Dutch did above. The AI should have and it could have.

My thoughts on artillery vs infantry. In CiV artillery should have a chance to be better vs infantry. The thing is in real life infantry could be devastated by artillery if they are not dug in and fortified. The reason is that artillery fires different types of rounds. Shrapnel rounds are fired for anti-personnel. High explosive rounds were used for things like barbed wire. Heavy artillery and armor piercing rounds are used for fortifications and tanks. In my mind some new and interesting promotions may help artillery be more effective in an anti infantry role. One could be fast fire, another accurate fire, rolling barrage, vs soft targets, vs hard tagets (like tanks). If you are bombarding a prepared position certainly you want to train your guns to fire as quickly and accurately as possible. That way you do greater damage in a smaller area, to take out bunkers, pillboxes, forts etc. What my point is here is that through promotions you can set up your cannons and artys to have an anti-personnel role, or a siege role. Just like you have to make a choice between rough terrain, and open terrain with melee and ranged units. You should get a choice on the first option for promotion the siege unit receives, from catapults on. The promotions could be Hard Targets I or Soft Targets I, something like that. From the outset their role should be noted. Vs. open terrain, and rough terrain, in my mind should be a secondary promotion down the line for siege units.