Leveraging Protective

[Scaphism]

Cheap castles and walls are big in multiplayer - they can be whipped with 1 pop instead of 2 which means they can go up "instantly" and that extra turn can mean getting an extra defender whipped as well.

The other "big" deal with protective in multiplayer are free upgrades to resourceless units. You can't be pillaged into being totally helpless. It's largely meaningless in single player where a human player is almost always on the attack, but you don't always have that luxury in MP. The change to Drill allowing you take Shock or Cover after Drill 1 is especially important in that regard.

 

[Wodan]

Cheap castles and walls are big in multiplayer - they can be whipped with 1 pop instead of 2 which means they can go up "instantly" and that extra turn can mean getting an extra defender whipped as well.

Seems to me this is just as much a benefit to SP as MP. When that stack shows up on your borders, it doesn't matter if it's an AI or a human, you have to get defenses up.

The other "big" deal with protective in multiplayer are free upgrades to resourceless units. You can't be pillaged into being totally helpless.

I agree, that's is a good benefit for MP, because the AI doesn't really know how to pillage strategic resources. Oh, if the resource is on the border and convenient to get to, they'll go for it, but not anything like a human will.

The change to Drill allowing you take Shock or Cover after Drill 1 is especially important in that regard.

Yes, another good benefit. This is equivalent to Agg, where you can get Shock or Cover out of the gate with your barracks promotion without having to "spend" a promo on Combat I or Drill I.

Wodan

 

[Scaphism]

Seems to me this is just as much a benefit to SP as MP. When that stack shows up on your borders, it doesn't matter if it's an AI or a human, you have to get defenses up.

It's useful for the same reasons and in the same situations, but I think this situation occurs more frequently in MP than it does in SP, which makes it more valuable when choosing a leader.

Yes, another good benefit. This is equivalent to Agg, where you can get Shock or Cover out of the gate with your barracks promotion without having to "spend" a promo on Combat I or Drill I.

It is. A lot of people look at protective as the turtling trait, especially if you are stuck in your cities. If that's all you do, sure, you promote along the city garrison line and this extra flexibility is meaningless. In MP you're more likely to see stacks fighting in the field than the dominant city sieges. In those situations being able to defend in the field (city garrison is useless) or attack with specific promos is really valuable.

 

[Polobo]

Yes, I think the early strategy with Protective should be to beeline Archery and Feudalism, and switch to Vassalage Civic. With Barracks and Vassalage, your Longbowmen can be promoted to City Garrison III. Cities build on hills with CG III Longbowmen behind Walls would be a tough nut to crack. Sitting Bull, with a Barracks and his UB Totem Pole can even produce CG III Archers.

Also, you can probably defend you cities with just a couple of CG III Longbowmen, allowing you to create more offensive troops for your conquests without breaking the bank.

As an extension to a Feudalism slingshot you can actually turn this into an excellent mid-game economic expansion by building effective but inexpensive archers and then once you hit Feudalism switch to Vassalage/HR/Serfdom/OR and starting growing your cities up to the health cap and build commerce buildings to leverage your city size in trade. The extra defenders and promotions will make those cities relatively easy to defend and the time you spent building archers instead of workers earlier can be somewhat made up by the increase worker productivity (since you are growing the cities slavery is counter-productive). Start researching military and build up your forces and switch to Theology/Bureaucracy/Caste System to pump out units with two promotions. Once you have that work toward calendar and drama and start weaning yourself off of HR while you conquer the world.

 

[Wodan]

...while you conquer the world.

Step 3 = Profit !

 

[johnny_rico]

When playing Sitting Bull (SB), I like to go for the feudalism slingshot primarily because of the totem pole and the synergy with switching to vassalage. 10 xp longbows are not diffiuclt to get. However, one could go for Metal Casting with the intentions to buld a quick forge in order to generate an engineer (quickly - he's philosophical) to bulb machinery. Provided iron is available (and I find it pretty rare in BtS to be without iron), we're looking at BC access to Xbows. Are quick Xbows better than longbows? Well, the Xbows are certainly more field worthy than longbows and promote along the same lines, however, with the longbows comes vassalage. I'm not sure how sorely missed the extra 2 xps will be. The other argument with SB is if you get the quick engineer, why not use him to build the pyramids (SE, philosophical, representation)?

Looking at the MC slingshot + GE for machinery bulb with other protective leaders:

Churchill - charismatic Xbows, not bad, not great
The - machinery required for engineering, opens up Trebs, UU, and castle, um, that's ok.
Gilgamesh - he's already got a beast of a UU, this is probably n/a for him
Mao Zedong - isn't his UU a Xbow
Qin - his UU is also a Xbow, plus he's industious, cheap forge,
Saladin - I'd prefer the feudalism slingshot with him because it is on the path to guilds, maybe machinery is also, don't have the tech tree in front of me.
Toku - machinery is needed to make samurai, not sure this is the best way though.
Wang Kon - Since his UU got hosed in BtS, I don't even consider playing him anymore.

nice underpants gnomes reference.

 

[Scaphism]

@johnny

Both Feudalism and Machinery are required for guilds.
In Saladin's case however, Feudalism seems like a no brainer over Machinery. Feudalism opens up two useful Civics, which he is in the best position to take advantage of due to the Spiritual trait, as well as picking up Heretidary Rule along the way. That's 2 no-brainer Civic switches (Vassalage+Hereditary Rule) and one interesting choice (Slavery/Serfdom).

Longbows allow him to be entirely resourceless, and resourceless knights (Camel Archers) continue the trend. Crossbows might be better in the open field or maybe save a few hammers when assaulting a city, but I'd generally take longbows with an extra promotion, plus all the extra flexibility the other civics give.

---------------
For leaders looking at Machinery slingshots:
The biggest problem when going for a late Oracle is research - it takes a while to research Monarchy or Metal Casting on their own, adding in Iron Working seriously jeopardizes the timeline on anything but the lowest difficulty levels.

Oracle-Feudalism also works well for Gilgamesh. It's true he has a good UU at Bronze Working, and if you can rush someone with Vultures it may be a good call. If you don't have an immediate, immediate neighbor to rush however, you can grab Feudalism and send a stack of Vultures and Longbows, both with 5xp.

 

[johnny_rico]

Good points.

I don't think a machinery slingshot is possible, certainly not at monarch and up which is where I play. I was thinking more along the lines of a metal casting slinghsot, cranking out a quick forge and running an engineer to get a GE to bulb machinery.

I've pulled off the feudalism slingshot on monarch frequently. It's not that difficult but you have to stay pretty focused.

With Gilgamesh, it is worth considering (feudalism slingshot) but I usually focus on an espionage economy with him as his courthouses (ziggurats) are available so early. True, it requires priesthood, thus the oracle is also available, but I don't go after monarchy that quick with him and I'd prefer to build the great wall

 

[kristopherb]

Although a bizarre one , but a tactic none the less. Humans regard Protective As a lower tier and thus a less of a threat, so you could make them 'eat their words', while they lower their guard.

 

[Hereditary Rule]

This is an interesting thread and I'm looking forward to seeing Wodan's ends result as far as the article goes. I've read his posts where he's discussed declaring war, and allowing the AI the crash his forces against your protective units behind cheap walls and castles, only to crush them with your counter attack. It sounds great on paper - with the Great Wall, you generate double GG points, and you'll always generate war weariness for your enemy with this approach.

I tried this very tactic in my last game as Gilgamesh. I had access to stone, so walls and castles were up between 1-3 turns each in all my cities. I declared war BEFORE I built my SoD, waiting for my neighbor to break himself on my cities, but he never sent more than a 2 axeman

Not sure what I did wrong (opponent was toku).

Is there a way to know beforehand if your opponent will in fact come in and attack you (instead of just waiting in his borders)?

 

[Wodan]

Is there a way to know beforehand if your opponent will in fact come in and attack you (instead of just waiting in his borders)?

Some knowledge of how the AI is programmed might help (assuming you don't already know this, in which case I apologize)...

The AI basically assigns each unit a "job". That job might be garrison a city, or explore, or simply hang around until a war begins.

It's the latter guys that are the ones who form a SoD and invade you.

Now, if the AI has been in a war recently, most of those guys will have been killed and all the AI will have left are all the "garrison" guys, who are going to stay put no matter what, pretty much. Or, if not all killed, then the AI will have captured a city or two, and those guys will be siphoned off as some of them will now be assigned to garrison duty (etc.)

Long story short, do you remember if Toku was in a war recently? Dollars to donuts he was.

Anyway, if you want to do the "invade me" trick ("no, don't throw me in that brier patch!"), then don't do it to an AI who has been in a war in the past 100 turns or so. You'll get results as you saw... just a couple of axemen or whatever.

Likewise, don't ask other civs to join in war against the AI... you'll likely make the AI split his attention and that also means less troops the AI will send against you.

Wodan

 

[Hereditary Rule]

Likewise, don't ask other civs to join in war against the AI... you'll likely make the AI split his attention and that also means less troops the AI will send against you.

Wodan

Wow. that must have been what caused his attack to be nonexistent. My religious ally jumped into the war 5 turns or so after I declared. That explains it. Thanks.

I'll try again next time the situation arises and hopefully I can keep others out of the war.

 

[Wodan]

Good luck.

By the way one caution which I have in my slowly compiled notes for the article. It's possible to have too much of a good thing. Leveraging Protective by getting the AI to attack you with manageable forces is one thing. Poking a pit bull with a stick is another. Quite often, if an AI hasn't been in a war ever, or in a very long time, the AI will assemble a friggin' huge force of guys just waiting for a war. This can include 30-50 siege, 30-50 knights or cav, 30-50 maces or rifles. Protective is without a doubt the best trait to handle this kind if incursion. However, be sure and scout the AI (and look at the power graph), plus keep aware of who's been fighting wars throughout the game. If the AI is getting into this kind of numbers, even if you have higher tech, you'd better have a LOT of fortified first strike city defender guys.

Wodan

 

[cabert]

I would use protective in combination with forts.
You try to get a "choke" point somewhere, build a fort there, put CG 3 archery there and let them die coming for you.

 

[Bandobras Took]

I played a game with Sitting Bull trying out the specialist economy, which is most emphatically not my preferred way of playing. I'm sitting comfortably atop a huge tech lead, and I'm expecting to get attacked soon -- which is where I prefer protective. I'm not going to need to go on the offensive to win this game, but protective is great for dissuading people from attacking me and keeping my cities alive even when they do. And those totem pole Archery units upgrade into rather nice Gunpowder units.

 

[InvisibleStalke]

All excellent ideas. However, unless I'm missing something, it doesn't have any synergy with Pro, and other traits can do it just as easily. So, I don't think it belongs here. If espionage is really such a good economic aid, then it can be done by other Traits to make them even better. (Which I agree it is, and it can be, so it does not add to the comparison of Pro to those Traits.)


I totally agree. Which is why for this article.

I think people try to use Pro with their tried-and-true strats and gameplay style. Which is nonsense. You don't play the same way when you have a Fin leader, why assume you should play the same way with a Pro leader? The same is true of Agg or anything, really. To honestly get the most out of it, it's best used with a Nationalism strat, a Combat-line promotions strat, etc. Ditto with Pro.

Wodan

There is a synergy for protective and spying:

- half price castles (and walls). Putting castles in every city is a cinch to a protective leader.
- very strong drafted units = incentive to stay in nationalism = espionage bonus
- synergy with great wall - since you want a great spy, and you are more effective fighting defensively = GG points from wall.

Also you can use your EP to avoid many seige units and war almost entirely with drafted units.

I think the guide has to also focus on:

- Synergy with nationalism - gunpowder is where the bonus switches from a defensive unit to an offensive one.
- Fighting defensively - using death cities where the AI batter themselves to death against CG3 units defended behind castles on hills.
- The effect on your apparent power that lots of walls and castles give you. This should not be underrated - a protective leader should fear no attack and should punch above their weight in diplomacy. I've had civs capitulate to me on the first turn of a war.

 

[Polobo]

Also you can use your EP to avoid many seige[sic] units and war almost entirely with drafted units.

All excellent points except this one. Without siege, drafted units carrying "at most" DrillII promotions wouldn't make for a very effective offense, and EP does nothing to help with the happy issues back home.

Now, spies can do more to harass the enemy than just drop defenses and you don't have to declare war to do so. With the extra EP you can continually poke a sharp stick in the opponent's eye while you hide behind your walls and castles with you uber-promoted longbows and, if they do decide to try and strike back, can quickly draft in a few more supplemental defenders wielding DrillII that will survive the catapult barrage a little stronger and be ready to defend against the main stack.

 

[InvisibleStalke]

All excellent points except this one. Without siege, drafted units carrying "at most" DrillII promotions wouldn't make for a very effective offense, and EP does nothing to help with the happy issues back home.

If you are going to war with EP, then the only seige you need is for collateral damage - which means you need fewer, not none. Admitedly I'd probably build seige 9 times out of 10 and use EP for research, but I have used EP with cavalry stacks for raids where speed was of the essence (in particular in one game attacking an opponent with the Statue of Zeus being able to storm knights quickly without accompanying seige was invaluable - allowed me to capture the SoZ city early in the war.)

And drill 2 + CG 1 are pretty effective and useful draftees. But there is another option - Drill 1 + Pinch/Cover. Which means your draftees get +25% against the likely city defender of their era - not too shabby.

And one of the buildings you are likely to build for its EP benefits will help with happiness (jail). But generally I rely on the resources I pry from my dead enemies and the happiness I get from theatres and colliseums to cover wars. I like my wars to be either short and brutal, or long and drawn out but in my territory (when I feel safe). Protective suits the long and drawn out wars early, but is a good mid-late game warring trait once you get gunpowder and nationalism.

 

[Wodan]

My games over the past couple of weeks since this topic came up have been to explore this whole concept further. I've toyed with it in the past but am going more in-depth now.

Anyway, one strat I see as very strong is the synergy with Warlord units. GG promoted up the Combat line (rather than Drill, which is where it's a strong idea to promote your other non-siege units). Within a short period of time you can get to Commando and Morale. You can have many such units, since you have GG coming out your ears.

This has a great synergy with the EP you get from all your castles, plus other sources after the castles go away. Remember, you're constantly desiring to fight almost entirely on your own territory. When you're ready to take a city, spies knock down the defenses, and your Drill1, Combat IV+ Warlords swarm in using Commando and Tactics, instantly taking the city. Your normal units can immediately use normal movement to reinforce (as the enemy's border is now gone), and again you're fighting on your own territory.

Just some thoughts. There are a lot of varied substrategies that I'm discovering. This is one of them that is kind of cool.

Wodan

 

[pi-r8]

I'm glad I saw this thread. I'm playing a game right now where I'm experimenting with a new way of using Wang Kan. My basic strategy was:

!) Conquer someone nearby using Hwachwas. If you beeline construction, you can get it pretty fast, and then since you'll have mathematics already, you can chop hwacha extra fast. Combine them with protective archers, and you've got a very effective resourceless army. I was able to take out Ragnar quite easily with this army of nothing but archers and hwachwas.

2) Beeline engineering. When I was planning this, I forgot about how engineering gives you pikes and trebuchets. I just wanted the castles, but in retrospect, I could have easily conquered someone else at this point.

3) Cottage up, built walls and castles everywhere, and profit. This is where I'm having trouble. My initial plan was that I could rely on walls and castles to boost my power graph enough that the AI would leave me alone, and I could pretty much skip out on having an army. Now, It's true that I haven't had to fight any wars, but that's only because my neighbors are all very peaceful (I have Gandhi, Mansa Musa, FDR, Augustus Caesar, and Hammurabi. All Hindu. Talk about a love fest!). I'm 5th in soldiers right now. And the +1 traderoutes from castles aren't helping much, either- I'm just barely managing to keep up, by using shrewd tech trading.

I think this strategy has potential, but I'm not convinced yet. I'll try doing it again, with more warlike neighbors, and I'll also try using Wodan's tricks of fighting a war with early trebs/pikes and letting the enemy attack me. Another thing I'll add to this is Cavalry. Walls and Castles won't help much if the enemy bombards away all your cultural defense. A few horse archers, though, can eliminate ALL their siege, forcing them to make suicide attacks.