[LP] Levying city state units.

[Tech Osen]

I just never do that. The times I did in the past ended with me losing suzerainty quickly and thus control of the units and wasting my money. Now the added another leader with an ability for this mechanic.
So I wonder: do other people use it successfully? Do you like it? Am I missing something?

 

[AntSou]

I use it consistently as long as I have gold and a clear advantage in terms of envoys.

 

[Oberinspektor Derrick]

I do it for era score if I really, really need it (happened like once it twice over the last year).
Not a fan of that mechanic in its current form.

 

[tedhebert]

It’s mostly situational for me… I use it rarely, but it can really change the game in ancient and classical era when there’s a CS perfectly placed on the map VS an annoying neighbor you want to take out. There aren’t many ways for the AI to steal the CS from you if you placed Amani there and the ennemy has used his envoys somewhere else…

Other than that, as @Oberinspektor Derrick mentions, it can give you the 1 era pt you desperately need one turn before the era shifts…

 

[BenitoChavez]

I basically only do it as Hungary or if I'm playing Heroes & Legends mode and have Himiko for the era score. Usually it's pretty risky because the AI likes to envoy bomb city states that I become suzerain of, and it costs too gold much to be worth it in my opinion.

 

[shaglio]

I only do it when I play Hungary (or, I suppose, when I try Varangian Harald). Not because I dislike the mechanic or anything. I usually don't utilize it simply because I forget. In hindsight, there are probably many situations where wars would have gone more smoothly for me if I had only remembered to Levy some units, but there's just so many mechanics to remember and my brain can't handle them all.

 

[Oberinspektor Derrick]

I only do it when I play Hungary (or, I suppose, when I try Varangian Harald). Not because I dislike the mechanic or anything. I usually don't utilize it simply because I forget. In hindsight, there are probably many situations where wars would have gone more smoothly for me if I had only remembered to Levy some units, but there's just so many mechanics to remember and my brain can't handle them all.

It usually doesnt factor in, because the city states you would wanna levy (close to a fresh target) usually have the AI deeply invested with envoys, to the point where you usually can't take control of it.
Unless we're talking the super late game where you have 9 spare envoys and the cars that doubles your envoys when placed, but at that point you're usually 1-20 turns away from winning the game anyway so who cares about what is (often) 3-5 obsolete units.

 

[newtociv6]

If there is cash for levy and upgrades, it's much cheaper than training units myself, especially with road mods that build roads whenever a tile is improved. And if you pick a close city state you save many turns for marching troops. In one game I wiped entire civilizations by levying multiple city states in late era at once, on another continent, and flooded enemy lands with crossbowmen and men-at-arms.

Losing control is not likely unless you compete with AI for envoys.

 

[Oberinspektor Derrick]

it's much cheaper than training units myself

Unless of course you pillage for faith and buy more units through the GMC.
In that case levying is a waste of money that would be better spent raising several armies with faith to spread out, and modernizing these armies with gold as they become obsolete.

 

[newtociv6]

Unless of course you pillage for faith and buy more units through the GMC.
In that case levying is a waste of money that would be better spent raising several armies with faith to spread out, and modernizing these armies with gold as they become obsolete.

Normally it's much harder for me to get gold than faith (> 2:1. Usually it's 1:1 or less). Levying makes more sense when I have little army myself, usually in isolated locations (happens a lot in TSL maps), and my faith is being spent on correcting the ways of allies with endless missionaries.

 

[Oberinspektor Derrick]

Normally it's much harder for me to get gold than faith (> 2:1. Usually it's 1:1 or less). Levying makes more sense when I have little army myself, usually in isolated locations (happens a lot in TSL maps), and my faith is being spent on correcting the ways of allies with endless missionaries.

I mean if you want to just play for fun and do whatever, that's a fair use of faith.
But generally you don't need a religion for domination games, and even if you do have one, any benefits you get from spending faith on missionaries to spread the religion, dwarves in comparison to how fast you can roll over your opponents with more units (and then use Inquisitors to flip your newly acquired cities).

 

[newtociv6]

I mean if you want to just play for fun and do whatever, that's a fair use of faith.
But generally you don't need a religion for domination games, and even if you do have one, any benefits you get from spending faith on missionaries to spread the religion, dwarves in comparison to how fast you can roll over your opponents with more units (and then use Inquisitors to flip your newly acquired cities).

I always thought inquisitors are worthless defense-only version of missionaries until a few turns ago today...

 

[Oberinspektor Derrick]

I always thought inquisitors are worthless defense-only version of missionaries until a few turns ago today...

I mostly use them to flip back cities that have been converted, because of how cheap they are compared to how much pressure they add to a city.
Very nice to have if you took an enemy holy city, where you get easy era score to purge their religion from it.
That being said, I only use religion combined with domination if I'm doing a timing rush with Crusade on deity.
It's very consistent and levels the early tech gap that the AI enjoys over players.