Makeup of Armies

[Kirejara]

I must admit, that I do not have such an economic view on my armies.

I put the best available unit in it and if possible do not mix different unit types in it.

Most often I simply put the hero unit, that has spawned the leader, into it, since it can not spawn another leader.
But there are still exceptions (z. B. if the hero is a Longbowman and I have Cavalry or Tanks available ).

Good thing, that there is no right or wrong way in this game, as long as one has fun and success playing Civ3.

 

[RobS]

So there is no way to load units into an Army in a specific order, as I asked previously, quote:

"Another question:
Is there a way to load units into an army in a specific order?
The reason one would want to do this is to put the elite units into the bottom of the list of units in an army and the veterans (or lessers) into the top, so that those lesser experienced units will have a good chance of becoming elites. If the lesser experienced units are at the bottom of the list of units in an army, they will be the last to fight and very difficult to turn into elites without risking the loss of the army."

 

[Kirejara]

Is there a way to load units into an army in a specific order?
The reason one would want to do this is to put the elite units into the bottom of the list of units in an army and the veterans (or lessers) into the top, so that those lesser experienced units will have a good chance of becoming elites.

this will not work.

The strongest unit will allways be the first attacker or defender.

So having one elite and two regular Cavalries in an Army means that the elite will allways be first to engage. The others will only engage if the Army switches its active unit after taking a beating in a running battle.

In a mixed Army the game will als choose the engaging unit depending on their values.

So a mix of Pikes and Longbow means, that the Pikes will defend if attacked and the Longbow will take the offensive part.

Also please note, that an Army may loose attributes of in individual units (an Army can never bombard nor airdrop).

And to make things really confusing: an Army of Berserks or Marines can mount an amphibian assault, but an Army of Berserks and Marines can not.

 

[vorlon_mi]

Because it is quite expensive. You have to pay 3 gold per shield. But when you put shields into wealth you have to pay 4(later: 2) shields for 1 gold.

So what one has to do is to assess the relative scarcity of shields and commerce. Sooner or later 1 shield is not worth more than 1 gold.

So from that perspective upgrading is best avoided. In principle building units with shields is preferable to creating them in a more expensive way.

The one big exception is knights to cavalry because the military value of cavalry is quite high. They reason why some(but not too much either) upgrading can be acceptable is that it is required to get cavalry in numbers within 1 turn of having Military Tradition. This can give you an edge over your enemies that unfolds a value that is greater than the net costs of the more expensive approach via upgrading.

Again, I may be making a mistake in my gameplay, but I nearly always have a surplus of gold. I rarely have a surplus of shields.

• As I get to 2-turns left (or 1-turn left) when researching a tech, I turn down the science slider to conserve gold and avoid beaker overflow/wastage.
• Unless I am sprinting/beelining a specific turn-sensitive tech (like Philosophy), I usually am not running deficit research. That is, a small +n in gold per turn
• Unless I do a lot of micro in each city, I can't avoid some shield wastage if I were to build every military unit from scratch. I can conserve gold, but not shields
• During the Middle Ages (no factories yet), each city's shields per turn is less than 10, even less outside the first ring. They usually have something to build, and often have more commerce per turn than shields per turn

I like to let an AI build Leonardo's and then capture it, so that my gold costs for upgrading go down even further.

 

[justanick]

This is starting to become a major discussion that should not occur in this specific thread here. I therefore opened a new thread to answer there:

https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/the-merits-of-upgrading-vs-the-avoiding-of-upgrades.650498/

 

[Bronn Stone]

The only unit I can think of that can move further over land than an Army of Modern Armor is an Army of Mongol Keshik in the mountains or hills. But the Keshik army only move three on grasslands and the MA move four.

I love building ONE Army of Infantry. Plop that in a city and the AI pretty much won't attack before it has Modern Armor. Great for a beachhead on another continent.
Anything fast makes a good Army (after Horsemen). Most of the Unique Units are pretty good.
I almost never lose once I get an Army of Ancient Cavalry. That just crushes before Gunpowder.

I never make mixed Armies. They are there to either attack or defend. Not both.

I also play for style points. The Elite that generates the Army is given a name and sent back home to sell war bonds. It will eventually park on a hill or mountain to symbolize that it is an instructor at the Military Academy. Stacked with like kinds of named units if any. I usually end up with a stack of Tanks and a couple of Cavalry all of which generated an Army.

This is nearly as important as capturing one ship with Privateers from each civilization. Escorting them to safety is an essential task for which I build my navy. In a game with 15 opponents, I have never captured ships from more than 9 civilizations.

But not NEARLY as important as capturing a worker from every civilization in the game. Those workers don't actually work, but build a fortress near the capitol which is called a "Food Court". In my head, getting a Korean worker means I get Daeji Bulgogi. The Romans bring spaghetti. The Japanese bring sushi. The Aztecs make tacos (etc). The French sauces and attitude. The best addition to a Food Court is "a Barbarian Chiefdom (sic)". He brings "Meat on stick". I'm especially happy to get a Barbarian worker in a game in which I have to take them from the Mayans.

These things matter to me more than scores. Which is why I don't play above Monarch.

EDITED TO ADD: One other bit of style points. If I build a town and culture rush it in order to steal from a neighbor that resource I need to go from building Knights to building Cavalry, that town MUST be named "Saltpetersburg". Regardless of which Civilization I am playing.

 

[vorlon_mi]

I always keep one UU unit and park it in the capital, named "Museum Piece." Especially for a civ that has an Ancient Age UU; it reminds the citizens during the Industrial Age of the glory days thousands of years ago.

 

[Bronn Stone]

I always keep one UU unit and park it in the capital, named "Museum Piece." Especially for a civ that has an Ancient Age UU; it reminds the citizens during the Industrial Age of the glory days thousands of years ago.

Love it. But of course in that circumstance I'd save three (I usually play eternal monarchy unless religious and three are the number for helping happiness). The capital should be so far from the front lines that it can be defended solely by what I call "ceremonials".

Though some times the attention wanders and the capital is defended by "Revert to Last Saved Game" when a foe gets dumped and I miss it.

Japan always looks cool with Samurai fortified all around the country, even in the Modern Age.

 

[RobS]

Bronn Stone, you really go all out with your styles.
The most I ever do is sort my slave workers according to nationality and line them up neatly somewhere between my core cities, or some other safe places. Each square often contains three or even four slave workers and it's not unusual for me to have 30-40 from a single nationality. Well, that's what I used to do, but in the last couple of games I haven't bothered to sort them and just throw them together no matter what language they speak.

Yes, I also often keep a four-unit Cavalry Army for symbolic purposes, sometimes as many as three. They can also still be useful in the modern age.

Like you, these "style" reasons is why I play at Monarch level, although I occasionally try Emperor.

vorlon mi, what is UU?

 

[CKS]

UU is unique unit. (Panzer for Germany, Bowman for Babylon, etc.)

 

[Lanzelot]

One of my HoF saves has a horseman army, I'm not quite sure why I did that.

I did this once myself. I remember I got a very early MGL (unusual for me: I usually get them only, when the game is almost over... like in my current COTM, where it's already 1200AD and I still haven't gotten one ) and did not want to wait until I had iron connected. I made sure to always protect it with an eSpear, and it did a good job at capturing some early cities.

And to make things really confusing: an Army of Berserks or Marines can mount an amphibian assault, but an Army of Berserks and Marines can not.

Wow, did not know that. How the heck did they actually manage to implement that?!

 

[Kirejara]

Wow, did not know that. How the heck did they actually manage to implement that?!

Quintillus did have the theory, that it does check only if the second unit is of the same type as the first (amphibian) unit and if not, does not allow amphibian assaults by that army.

https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/less-known-facts-about-armies.508623/page-4