Medival Error War Stategy

[mgardner]

Playing the Americans, and after a rough start from a poor starting position, (plains, floodplains, and dessert.) I've managed to conquer the Iroquois to gain better grasslands, relocate the capital, clear a jungle, and build the forbidden palace and hold onto second place. Just in time for the Spanish to declare war on me. I now hold a medium size continent with the Spanish on a slightly smaller one to the south, connected by a narrow, mountainous strait. Right before they declared war, I completed the Sistine Chapel and hit my golden age. Rather than spend my golden age building units, I concentrated more on Universities to try and regain the scientific edge and researching toward Democracy. Rather than advance into Spain I decided to just hold them back at the strait.

It looks now like i really went the wrong way during the golden age, spain just got calvery and I don't even have chemisty yet. I guess i should have spent the golden age building tons of knights before they got to calvery and just gone on down and wiped them out, rather than try to position myself for a more long term advantage. Especially since the third place civ is way behind, however i was worried it was too far to reach and resupplies and fresh troops would be slow comming.

I'm guessing knights vs calvary is a no win, even defended by Musketmen? It's probably too late to invade now, so i'm thinking sue for peace, wait for railroads, setup supply lines, then get some revenge. That assumes that the benefits from the universities kick in and i can catch up scientifically.

If peace can be reached, and I switch to democracy, will that help the research? Isn't there a commercial bonus from democracy that would up the income and help the research?

Play it safe or say the heck with it and try to overwhelm with a blitzkreig of knights? I would hope that if i could reach the their iron source and cut it of i might could beat them as long as i could survive their calvery.

 

[nullspace]

Welcome to Civfantics!

It sounds like your strength is the fact that you've got a lot of universities, and Spain's advantage is that they've got lots of cavalry. It sounds like your best bet is to make peace as soon as possible. Any knights you make aren't going to do much damage against cavalry and musketmen. If you can capture a vulnerable city or two, or just kill a few of their units, you shouldn't have to give them anything for peace.

You didn't mention what government you or the Spanish are currently using. If you are a republic now, you're already in a good position to catch up in tech. If you're not a republic, get to democracy asap and use that. If the Spanish are not a republic or democracy (you can check in the military advisor screen), then you're even better off to out-tech them.

One of my favorite times to attack and AI is when I get infantry and artillery. Factories, railroads, and wartime mobilization add up to some great production. The AI doesn't understand how to use artillery and railroads well, so that's a big advantage to the player. Wars go slow as you bombard city defenders down into the red, but you don't have to worry about counterattacks at all. Just keep enough infantry and artillery on your rail network, and then anything that steps into your territory is easy to take down.

 

[Igmod]

I am playing a similar type game right now. The Germans have enjoyed their own continent for very long time while I was busy with 4 other civs on mine. Unfortunately this left them with a significant tech, cultural and manufacturing lead.

Some possible strategies (All gleaned from the excellent War Academy and posts on this forum):


Get Defensive: Get Gunpowder ASAP. A veteran cavalry unit only has a 38% of victory against a Musketman fortified behind a walled town or fortress. That percentage falls to 29% if the defender is on a hill. Use knights to clean up those weakened cavalry that do attack successully. It sounds like you have some chokepoints that need to be controlled and this is a good way to protect them. Besides, the AI just LOVES to hurl his forces against defensive positions.

Get Sneaky: Once you have your defenses set, give the other civs ANYTHING they want in order to get a military alliance against your foe. This will keep them busy while you race to metallurgy and cavalry.

Get Busy: Crank military units. I would rather have 10 knights than 1 Cavalry. If you can build enough units you will be able to overwhelm them.

Get Offensive: Take out his resources. My first move on the offensive was to dump Musketmen and workers on ALL of his Saltpeter squares. I was able to get fortresses up pretty quickly. He will throw his cavalry at you but if you can hold he will no longer be able to produce cavalry and will start sending longbowmen at you.

Get smart: Capture a city and sue for peace and a tech. Rinse and repeat. This will help you catch up. Unfortunately, I captured 3 cities and 6 wonders and Germany won't give me ANY techs for peace!!! This has made it pretty difficult since he can outproduce me but since he has no resources he just keeps hurling conscripted longbowmen and riflemen against my fortified units.


Since you are in Republic, maintain peace as until you are ready for your own offensive then strike quickly. War weariness reduced my production to an embarassing level without happiness improvements so I had to switch to Despotism.

These tactics should give you a fighting chance but of course only you know all the factors of your specific game. I haven't won my game yet as I am still learning how to combat his overwhelming culture but I think it is only a matter of time.

If you haven't read ALL of the War Academy articles I recommend them highly.

Good Luck!

 

[Gothmog]

The commercial bonus from Democracy comes from reduced corruption, its not huge but it is substantial and can amount to 20% in a semi-large empire, more if you have cities away from your cores.

As Igmod says: If you can get at his resources that is a wonderful tactic against a superior foe. Cavalry against muskets is a sure loss, even cavalry against rifles is no fun. Defend choke points fortified on a mountain (with a fort if you can), get them out into the open and take them out with knights. But unless your lay of the land is kind, pray to the RNG gods.

 

[Sullla]

Just out of curiousity, how did you manage to trigger a Golden Age as the Americans by building Sistine? The American can trigger a wonder-induced golden age by building an Industrious and an Expansionist wonder. Sistine's is a religious wonder and thus lacks both of those characteristics. You can't possibly trigger a golden age with the F-15 in the Middle Ages, so... I'm curious to find out how you did it. Did you perhaps capture a wonder instead from another civ? That or a modded game are the only ways that I see for this to be possible.

 

[mgardner]

That thought occured to me too when I returned to play. I'm pretty sure Sistine was the only thing I had going on when the Golden Age started, but I would have to go back and check a saved game to be sure. I wouldn't think that would trigger it for the Americans.

As a follow up for the war, Spain has been reduced to a handfull of tundra based cities and no longer pose a threat. Even though it was Knights vs Calvery, I decided to try to overwhelm them. I started researching toward Military Tradition, immediately switched every city to make knights and riflemen where I wouldn't loose too many shields, and the rest when they completed what they were working on. Reinforcements were slow, and Babalon has a city on the southern end of the strait, so I had to get a ROP from them, but I managed to get across the strait and take their first city. From their I lauched two attacks, one by sea (bypassed some mountains) with 2 caravels and 6 knights to land and cutoff their saltpeter, the other with 8 knights in two stacks making a bold dash deep across their far frontier to deprive them of iron.

I dug in and picked off their calvery in the open where I could, taking some heavy losses. When the calvery stopped comming at me and the reinforcements started arriving, (city ralley points worked great), I knew it was a matter of time as I headed for their cities. Workers had improved the supply lines with roads, so conquered cities immediately enjoyed a barracks (Sun Zu), which came in real handy when I finally got Military Tradition and used my cash to upgrade all knights to calvery.

Yesterday I spent the afternoon searching for info on getting Great Leaders, as the Spanish campaign had yet to produce them. Then last night during mop-up operations with Elite calvery, General Washington appeared! On the next turn I made an army and switched my two biggest cities to the Heroic Epic and Military Academy. Two turns later General Lee shows up! I use him to relocate my Capital to the center of the newly conquered Spanish cities to built a third "industrial park". Tough move at the moment, but I'm hoping it will pay off in the long run.

Technically we're still at war, though I've advanced as far as I want too. I took one of the tundra cities that had JS Bach, (how'd they build that in a tundra city with virtually no production?). I'm still picking at their spearmen and longbowmen with Elite calvery hoping to get another leader. Maybe to move my capital back later or another wonder.

Next stop, democracy and industrialization. And not a minute too soon, need railroads bad with this much land!