Is this the best way to rush-build an army?

[Rast]

I'm trying to win domination on prince on a Huge map, so speed is rather important. So far it's going rather well but I just want to know if anyone has any ideas on how to make this idea work better.

I'm playing as Washington, with the high-production civics that he's godly with.

Here's how it works. Every city in my civ except my war city pretends it's peacetime and builds improvements like banks, markets, jails , and wonders.

My war city has the Heroic Epic which halves unit costs, and also seems to halve the hurry cost. I haven't built the Kremlin yet but I'm teching toward it. I have my research slider at 60% and pull in about 400 gold a turn while maintaining a sizeable tech lead.

Now, I built a unit (Calvary, Cannon, or Rifleman right now, depending on what I need). I wait a turn. I rush the unit. Repeat ad nasuem. So far it's working great - I can even rush a building in another city every 2 or 3 turns. Anyone have any better ways to do this / alternate strats though? I'd love to hear them. Thanks!

 

[Drogear]

The only army-rush Ive done is to utilise the chop-rush for toons of keriz(mongol UU) pretty effective but you will sone get money problems waging early wars.

 

[katank]

That's late. Early on, you should use forest chops to crank out axes/swords practically one per turn.

Your cash rush technique is definitely correct. Wait a turn before rushing.

Have you checked out the Catherine cottage spam strategy? Performing some variant of it is the epitome of late game cash rushing.

 

[Rast]

Yes, it's for later in the game. I haven't read the Catherine cottage spam strat but when I play Washington I do maximize my cottages (since Washington is all about the money).

Early on I chop enough axes to grab all the land I can comfortably hold without maintenance taking a heavy toll on my economy but oftentimes I find it more effective to chop other things (like courthouses, or settlers). Also I play Marathon so forest chops aren't exactly instant (though they are still much faster than actually building them!)

Thanks for the replies!

 

[emills]

with washington, first buy the kremlin and then the pentagon. Rush buy units in at least 2/3 of your core cities. catpure a city and rush buy a theatre, a courthouse, a bank and a barracks, then rush buy units.

The capture of cities will allow the straight buy (not waiting a production turn).

I have had this work for a monarch, large map, archipelago, domination victory. I had 85 cities, and was poised to take 3 more the next turn.

 

[Sparta]

The capture of cities will allow the straight buy (not waiting a production turn).

Could you please elaborate on this? I think I am missing your point.

@Rast: I've done similar to what you're doing, and don't see any obvious inefficiencies in what you're doing either. I'd prioritize Kremlin too maybe (it is SO powerful), and rush it when able if you can (turn 2+ of course). Then you can (potentially) turn science down another notch for a bit, rush the (few) remaining improvements necessary in your core cities, and get 4-6 or more other cities joining the rush-buy troop-building efforts of your HE city. You'll basically wind up with [participating cities]/2 new units per turn (maybe even an IW/RC variant city as well). Very powerful in the end IMO.

 

[emills]

I was referring to the pillage money from capturing cities. The extra cash can allow the purchase of an item on its first turn without waiting for the price to drop after one turn of hammers applied to the item.

It is most effective when you take two or three cities at once during the early going of a land war, or every other turn or so during an archipelago war.

 

[MyOtherName]

Now, I built a unit (Calvary, Cannon, or Rifleman right now, depending on what I need). I wait a turn. I rush the unit. Repeat ad nasuem. So far it's working great - I can even rush a building in another city every 2 or 3 turns. Anyone have any better ways to do this / alternate strats though? I'd love to hear them. Thanks!

Well, you can actually achieve that rate without rushing at all. My Heroic Epic cities usually have enough production to build my most modern unit in two turns, with surplus! (Admittedly, my games are almost always over before modern armor) My Iron Works city is usually that strong too.

Also, I would think that when going for domination, you would be able to secure plenty of highly productive land -- cities that could still manage to produce your best units every 3 or 4 turns. These cities don't take very long to get on-line either: simply bring a few workers along to customize the terrain, and have it build a barracks&forge and you're good to go! (Add factory/coal plant in the late game) These buildings might already be there when the city is captured!

So if you're planning on not building your army the old fashioned way, you're going to have to be rushing several units per turn in multiple cities in order to keep up, I'd think.

 

[Rast]

Thanks for the tips everyone. Last thing I'll add is I play Marathon, so, even with the Heroic Epic and that city being my best production city they still can't kick out a Calvary faster than every 4-5 turns. Another reason why I like this strategy - I can rush more units in comparativly less time with a normal game speed.

Thanks again everyone!

 

[frankcor]

The Nationhood civic allows you to draft units with a slight, temporary unhappiness penalty. You can pop out an army pretty quickly using that.

 

[ekanata]

Well, you can actually achieve that rate without rushing at all. My Heroic Epic cities usually have enough production to build my most modern unit in two turns, with surplus!

If a city can do that, then with money rush, the city should be able to produce 2 such unit in 3 turn with micromanagement:

• 1st turn, build normally, the production bar will be about half filled.
• 2nd turn, cash rush the first unit, thus the hammer produced in this turn will overflow.
• 3rd turn, the second unit could be completed using overflow plus current turn production.

If the surplus is large enough, 3unit/4turn, or even more could be reached.

 

[Synex]

Well, you can actually achieve that rate without rushing at all. My Heroic Epic cities usually have enough production to build my most modern unit in two turns, with surplus! (Admittedly, my games are almost always over before modern armor) My Iron Works city is usually that strong too.

Also, I would think that when going for domination, you would be able to secure plenty of highly productive land -- cities that could still manage to produce your best units every 3 or 4 turns. These cities don't take very long to get on-line either: simply bring a few workers along to customize the terrain, and have it build a barracks&forge and you're good to go! (Add factory/coal plant in the late game) These buildings might already be there when the city is captured!

So if you're planning on not building your army the old fashioned way, you're going to have to be rushing several units per turn in multiple cities in order to keep up, I'd think.

Sure, you might be able to manage this in 1 or 2 cities, but the advantage of spamming cottages + rush buying with the Kremlin is the rate of increase is exponential.

Say you have 10 cities, that's 20 units in 40 turn. You take over another 5 cities, that suddenly becomes 50 units in 4 turns. etc etc

 

[Heeringas]

You can also change to vasselage and theocracy civics, then if you have built the Pentagon and you have barracks in a city, you can buy level 4 (10xp)units from all your cities! During the process you can steal plans of your enemy with spies and look what promotions suit you best...you only need to keep this massive military production for about 10-20 turns. then you can change back to normal civics and start war...Its usually enough to produce rest of the units only in few production city...west point city still gives level 4 units...

Rushing a tank costs only about 100gold after 1 turn of production.(with Kremlin) Figter is about 70 gold and destroyer about 100...
what you need is money...so science to 0% for awhile and then Boom...NOthing can stop your march...

 

[katank]

Yep, I was really amazed by the Cathy cottage spam. Early on, I wanted to break out and start my usual warmonger routine but I stuck it through. Wow, late game was insane. It was far better than my typical smash everything in path things. Rushing armies left and right.

As for the wait a turn before rushing, that's about sustainable/cash efficient rushing.

@emills, I can see what you mean but it still does change the fact that waiting a turn is more bang for the buck. You simply choose to expend more cash for faster unit production. That first turn penalty is also pretty steep.

 

[[Comrade]RaVE]

Slavery is helpful when you need to get those archers fast to defend your cities. I've saved my ass more than several times doing this just before barbs wander on your turf.

 

[emills]

@katank,

I guess it is all a matter of if you have the time to wait. The crazy freaking AI bonuses at the higher levels really press the need for timeliness. While one could argue that it is wasteful (ineffecient) rush buying on the first turn, I say that a tank or destroyer or whatever that is conquering the enemy city one turn earlier can equal or exceed the money spent. Money in the bank does not earn interest in civ4 like it did in civ3.