Medics

[andersw]

(Wasnt sure if I should post here or in balance but lets start here.)

How do you play with medics and is it worth the trouble?

I played until gunpowder with Persia.
Upgrading quite a lot of Archers (now xbows) to medic 2 for mid/backline healing.
All melee were Immortals -> Pikemen -> Tercio.
Promos shock 3 > march to make most use of the bonus healing.
Healing is nice but units are still so easily oneshot since the AI happily throws away all their units (which they replace for free) to kill off yours.
So Im not sure, its probably better to just sit back, get range and pelt forever until you can hopefully take out a city.
I even have fountain of youth in this game, should maybe try the same with sweden, shaka or japan.

To get march you need to go shock with the melee, not horrible but that means no cover 1-2.
Medic 2 is reached via accuracy 1 > medic 1 > medic 2, both medic promos reduce power from the archers (I assume the dmg loss from the two promos stacks) and no accuracy 2+3 which is a signficant increase in power.

My initial thought is that it works nice, my second thought is that it doesnt matter because things get oneshot so easy anyway.
On the other hand, I've done less unit reshuffle than normally because things heal up so fast.
Maybe the problem is just how weak/squishy units in general are for human players before tercio/fusiliers?
Does medics heal a unit that have moved (my guess would be no as units in general dont heal when moving) ? but if medics are an exception march could be skipped/delayed.

 

[CppMaster]

I don't use medics, but maybe I should.

Are you sure AI gets units for free? Or do you just mean that they have bonus to production?

Nope, medics don't heal units that made a move unless they have march promotion.

 

[feb]

Medic 1 is great that I use it on all my ranged units but I don't bother with medic 2.
For melee, I find shock hardly compelling. I always try to get cover 2 before other promotions.

 

[andersw]

I don't use medics, but maybe I should.

Are you sure AI gets units for free? Or do you just mean that they have bonus to production?

Nope, medics don't heal units that made a move unless they have march promotion.

I mean that you kill 3 and 3 new pops out of nowhere in almost no time.
I you lose some units war weariness kicks in and there is almost no production, AI's just keep churning out units like nothing.
So "free-ish"

 

[looorg]

My pathfinders/scout eventually get to become my medics. I tend to have like 2-3 of them at least depending on the map and how the start of the game went. That way they move very fast, can stand on any terrain including mountaintops etc (word of caution: units on mountaintops do not heal no matter if they stand still or not). They have promotions to cover and take less damage in foreign lands or heal more. But it does require that you use them for proper scouting in the start of the game to maximize the xp, it might work better if you like me play on the largest maps and not small or standard maps. But they'll get enough XP then to usually have almost all the promotions. The other tactic I have seen, and experiment with, a lot is to use cavalry (or ranged horse of any kind) medics as they can fairly quickly get the promotions to ignore zoc:s. Still it requires that you level them up via killing and then they are sort of killing machines that you chose not use much except as medics which is a bit of a waste plus all horsy units are a bit squishy.

Getting march (indirect fire, extra range etc) are all a bit of a double edges sword as you also lose % of your attack power or so per one of those promotions so are they worth it? For melee units that tank I don't think so as it's all about cover and all things that make you harder and stronger in defense on all terrains against all attacks. The issue is more that if you stand right next to the city you'll be the target of so many attacks that you might just not survive it no matter the amount of promotions and medics (the city, various ranged and usually then also one attack from the unit in the city).

Medics can in that regard be used to stand right behind those units, which in the mid-game and forwards also mean you are in range of a lot of attacks. Which can be bad.

As CPP noted above units that move don't heal. Unless they have the march promotion or similar. It doesn't matter where you are or what you do or whatever. So if you are going to move then move, do not just shift a tile or whatever. Also you don't have to move to not heal, spending any kind of action point prevents healing, so if you say pillage the tile that is a "movement" and you don't heal from the heal but you heal some from the pillage but that isn't influenced by the medic promotions as far as I can recall. If you have free pillage on the unit that doesn't count as movement I think, I seem to recall that being the case at least. But I could be remembering wrong. If you can't move out then just stand and die. At least then they soak an attack or two before they perish.

So if medics are not frontline medics then they are in the rear with the gear. So they are a few tiles back and your frontline moves there to heal up and then back to the front again. The faster then can heal up the faster they can get back to the front again. If you can get them in a forward city then that is naturally even better but such city placement might not be around. That said if it is a long and drawn out war where you plan or razing cities, you might want to keep some of them around at pop1 (so stop razing them) just to have a forward healing zone or base to stand in as you heal more in friendly land then enemy or neutral land.

 

[stii]

I don't like medic, it just isn't worth the cost. I find there isn't really space to fit them in, I'd rather just have more attacking units. Pulling back to heal takes enough time that speeding it up doesn't make that much difference

However the Assyrian UU is really good so it is mostly the taking up room that is the issue for me.

 

[Delvemor]

I usually have no more than 2 archer units with Medic and it works pretty well. I surround them with as many injured units as possible even if it means they sometimes don't get to shoot at the enemy. I don't bother with getting March, I instead strongly prefer getting Cover II as soon as possible and then eventually Stalwart through the Drill line. Shock promotions for melee mounted units, along with Charge I and II.

 

[phantomaxl1207]

Mounted Ranged are another good choice for Medics

 

[beginner_]

Never used them so can't say anything about it. Don't even know which promotion line to go. I guess there are better promotions before you would choose medic.
In general I'm probably not so good at warfare and making use of specifc promotions. The 1 unti per tile is micromanagement enough for me, if I had to bother properly placing on top by promotions? argh. I just prefer to swarm the AI with melee and then move siege units in place. But yeah, low levels.

 

[Stalker0]

Medic 2 is the most powerful promotion in the game....and yes I'm quite serious.

At higher difficulties, the name of the game is attrition warfare. Your goal is to kill AI units without losing your own, and medic is the key to that success. You should be positioning your units so they aren't getting one-shotted, if that's the case your unit has entered a "kill zone" and you should avoid that spot until you can clear away the danger. Use tanking units to take pain, retreat them back, use medic 2 to get them back in the fight quickly.

Further, a citadel with a medic 2 behind it is the ultimate in defense, able to survive multiple times the punishment as compared to without the promotion. If you plan your defense right, your citadel unit should never die.