Modern Warfare for the mostly stupid.

[darski]

I was going along with my little Persian Empire - killed off the Aztecs (with a little help from my American friends) and the Mayans (with a little help from my American friends) and then bad things started happening.

with a little tech development my game started wanting to build strange stuff like flak and Civil Defense and stuff like that there.

Could someone give me a quick rundown on what this newfangled stuff is and what I do with it? i used to be pretty good at modern warfare in Civ Vanilla but I am unsure of even what this stuff is let alone what to do with it.

This is the first game that has gotten this far along for me to discover these things. I have done the Guerrilla upgrades for my Immortals now and have used them here and there. I am just completely lost and need some basic instruction in this stuff.

What is the difference between an airport and an airfield?

When and how do I create Radar Towers>

shucks , I need to learn it all from tanks/MI upwards

 

[vmxa]

darski;
"with a little tech development my game started wanting to build strange stuff like flak and Civil Defense and stuff like that there.

Could someone give me a quick rundown on what this newfangled stuff is and what I do with it? i used to be pretty good at modern warfare in Civ Vanilla but I am unsure of even what this stuff is let alone what to do with it."

Flak is anti air unit. You can put them into towns or with stacks to try to shot down bombers.

Civil Defense, forget them. They are a means to boost defense in a town. You should not need them in all but a rare case.

"What is the difference between an airport and an airfield?"

Airfields are tile improvements done by workers. You can base planes on them. Very handy to fly units to places that you could not afford to made an airport. I do not even make airports.

Airport confer vets status to plane built there and act like barracks to heal planes. They also act like harbors to connect landmass that have airports, but not airfields.

"When and how do I create Radar Towers"

Pretty much never. You could make one to boost defenses, but they need to be defended.

 

[darski]

In Vanilla, I could send planes to any city I wanted any where on the map. Has that changed? Do I need airports or airfields to do that now?

 

[Kumquat]

Civil defenses are...well there for defense in any size city, they are pretty useless. Flaks are anti-air units that upgrade to Mobile SAMs and you can rebase planes to airports/airfields/carriers

 

[dexters]

Rebase distance in C3C is now double or triple the plan's operational range. IIRC.

 

[darski]

So this is going to take a lot of getting used to all new rules...

 

[TheOverseer714]

Build airfields on railed mountains (in the boonies, as they destroy all improvement except roads/rails)to get troops overseas fast. I use workers to build them(the worker is destroyed, so you'll need plenty of spare workers to get a decent number built) An airfield can only airlift outgoing once per turn but can take an unlimited number incoming, so your target only needs one.

 

[darski]

Build airfields on railed mountains (in the boonies, as they destroy all improvement except roads/rails)to get troops overseas fast. I use workers to build them(the worker is destroyed, so you'll need plenty of spare workers to get a decent number built) An airfield can only airlift outgoing once per turn but can take an unlimited number incoming, so your target only needs one.

I have a lot of workers and slaves standing around waiting to clean pollution so I could use them to create an airfield beside all my good production cities
Yes____ No_____

I happen to be on a pangaea map so I don't have much need of these. I am already fully railed - well everybody is fully railed just now

(But I am building explorers Mwuhahahahah)

 

[Spoonwood]

The civilopedia explains some of this. I wouldn't say never build civil defense, since I don't know your games situations, your play style, or your concerns all that well. You only need them where you think you might get attacked though, as they boost the defense of your metros or cities.

 

[darski]

Civilopedia said that Flak is "anti-air" it took me while to figure out what that meant but I still didn't know where to put them or how to use them. do they need a defensive unit on top just as arty would?

 

[Gosnork]

No, Flak and Mobile SAMs both have an offensive and defensive rating, just as any other unit (besides Arty). The only difference is that they can shoot down planes, whereas Mech Inf, or Modern Armor can't. I build a few SAMs to move into whichever city the AI decides to bomb, and sometimes make an army out of them to help defend a major airbase near the frontlines.

 

[vmxa]

Civil Defense are very expensive, so you are not going to be building them, except rare cases. You cannot afford to rush them and you will take for ever to build them in those far off places.

I have done them a few time in beach head towns, when I had the chance on Sid.

 

[Rodent]

The new features are mostly for show, besides airfields. nothing better than pouring 20+ units per turn into an AI

In modern era you need only Modern armor and (few) SAMs in case AI decides to bomb

 

[Kumquat]

Civil Defense are very expensive, so you are not going to be building them, except rare cases. You cannot afford to rush them and you will take for ever to build them in those far off places.

I have done them a few time in beach head towns, when I had the chance on Sid.

I guess you are a lot poorer on high levels It only costs around 500 gold to rush them with a shield in the production box.

There is a SAM site improvement and unit with rocketry but Jets are a much better defense because Flaks, Sam Sites, & Mobile Sam Sites only protect the tile there in but Jets protect an area around where there stationed.

 

[Aabraxan]

I have a lot of workers and slaves standing around waiting to clean pollution so I could use them to create an airfield beside all my good production cities
Yes____ No_____

I happen to be on a pangaea map so I don't have much need of these. I am already fully railed - well everybody is fully railed just now

(But I am building explorers Mwuhahahahah)

I do build airfields, but not "beside all my good production cities." See Overseer's comments below:

Build airfields on railed mountains (in the boonies, as they destroy all improvement except roads/rails)to get troops overseas fast. I use workers to build them(the worker is destroyed, so you'll need plenty of spare workers to get a decent number built) An airfield can only airlift outgoing once per turn but can take an unlimited number incoming, so your target only needs one.

My core cities usually use every tile available to them, so I don't want to un-mine a mountain to put an airfield on it. In the farmlands, however, nobody is using the mountains, so I rail them and put airfields on several mountains. Then build a single airfield on the other continent. As units come off the production line, send them to the airfields and ferry them to the other continent. As Overseer noted, an airfield can only send one unit per turn, but it can receive an unlimited number of incoming units. That's why I build several airfields on my home continent, but only need one in the war zone.

 

[darski]

Ok, I think I am getting this now.

Thanks

 

[dexters]

If you build/capture smith's, your airports are effectively free from maint. costs.

The most cost effective invasion airfield I find is still going to be the one you build inside your first city that you conquer. From they you can pretty much send as many units you want a turn as possible and you won't have to defend it from AI counterattacks. That said you'll need lots of launching off points to achieve this so either you find a spot of land to build lots of airfields at the cost of 1 worker each or you build airports in your cities, which has the added bonus of producing veteran air units.

What I find airfields most useful for? Before Stealth Bombers, your prop bombers has more limited range and in a wrap around globe, a city you on one corner may be the closest geographically a strategic spot you want to bomb (resources/luxuries) and if its a high corrupt cities, airfields are essentially 'free' airports to take off from and has no load limit of 4 planes, unlike carriers.

 

[vmxa]

I guess you are a lot poorer on high levels It only costs around 500 gold to rush them with a shield in the production box.

There is a SAM site improvement and unit with rocketry but Jets are a much better defense because Flaks, Sam Sites, & Mobile Sam Sites only protect the tile there in but Jets protect an area around where there stationed.

I don't mean to imply you do not have 500, I mean you do not need them, so why waste the money. Again, if you need 1, ok, if you are going to make them all over place, no I don't have money for that and why would I want them?

I think I have probably made one 3 or 4 times all total. The AI cannot invade, so no need at home or any land mass I control. I could use them on invasion, but you do not tend to have the time for that.

You need a barracks and then a wall. They are already on you most of the time by the second turn. If not then I decide what I need, a harbor, a civil defense, maybe an airport.

I don't wait for the discount of a shield in the box, that time I do not have. I either pay full price or I disband a ship to get the discount. I may even raise a town before founding and use a slave to get the discount.

I do not expect to have time to get up a third structure, but some times I do. The few times I used the CD, it was under what I knew would be intense pressure.

In that case, I use many armies to block the attacks, while I rushed what ever structures I needed. Then I moved the armies to allow attacks.
This is not common, but when I knew they could get most of their units on the scene with rails and would bring 400 or more cavs and 500 or more infantry, I felt I had to have all the edge I could.

As to jets, I do not put any value in them at all. I only use them for recon. I would rather have 4 flak units than 3 jets. First I can move the flaks any where on the rail system and they are ready. Jets have to be rebased and will not function that turn.

Mobile Sam, same as flak to me, they are fine. Sam bases are great, but you can only have one per town. So If I have a Sam base, I will augment it with flaks/mobile sam. Again, 4 of each or 5th for backup, if one is destroyed.

I case you don't know, 4 is the magic number for AA.

Flaks can also defend quite well from ground attacks. Bombardment will chew up jets and not do much to flaks. I don't have airports so my jets are 3HP, not worth much. I tend to put them out of harms way from naval bombardment.

 

[dexters]

The AI playing against itself can invade. The problem is, just when the AI gets the tools to mass troops properly (transports protected by escorts) human players gain a massive advantage with rails.

All we ever need is a small defensive stack, bombers and navy to stop an invasion. And if its the human player who is the agressor, we've probably absorb most of their units when we attacked them on their home continent/island.

I've played one of my early hopeless game to completion (a loss) where I had a bad island start and there was no way I could win in a continent's game (the AI won by domination) and a runaway AI could do quite a bit of damage just landing galleon full of cavalry due to technological edge and sheer numbers.

I think relative power comes in play as well as in most cases where a game is played to the modern era for the epic d-day invasions,, the human player is either well ahead or has a realistic chance of winning the game so a lot of what the AI can do is lost through our inherent capabilities.

 

[vmxa]

You don't need any navy or bombers to stop invasions. You don't need rails, but they do help. You need CxxC spacing, a knowledge of the AI tactics. I have played many AW games where the AI had big numbers advantage and they were stopped.

The only times the AI has success is in some Sid games, where several nations are not too far away and all are at war with me. Then I am often not able to fend them off in the early game.

I am maybe just half way into the middle ages and they are deep into the IA. They can then send so many ships, they can bury me, unless I got up a couple of armies.

Don't know why a non conquest game would get to the modern age. Even on a conquest only massive map AWE they do not get to modern age before all are gone. A conquest Sid, huge island, they can get to Modern Age. You just cannot find and kill that many units quick enough.

So what I am saying is what you say is valid for many players, but is not inherent to the game, only to the skill levels of the players.