Most useful attack units?

[wioneo]

I LOVE cavalry(especially cossacks), and Keshiks. I don't really like HAs. I would have to say that my personal preference would have to be grenadiers. I always get surprised when I see "Congratulations! You have trained your first gunpowder unit!." I wonder if the new grenadiers are jealous of the former mace/axemen...

 

[svv]

I just played through a game as Catherine so I could try out the cossacks, and they worked really well. They were able to keep winning, at least with catapult/cannon help, all the way through riflemen - and if the enemy had anything less than riflemen they didn't need help at all. I was actually sad replacing them with tanks just before the win triggered.

Next I'm going to try Izzy so I can run the conquistadors. I had tried the Keshiks and it didn't work out too well for me, though I should probably try it again.

 

[Bjorn190]

Early days: Chariot rushes to clear out neighbours, noobs, or wonder builders.

Established start, classical: Axemen with 1-3 spears, possibly preatorians.

Construction era: Catapuuuuuults rule supreme. Put in a few elephants and axemen to lessen the blow from the othser sides cats. Its just one big catfight lol.

Trebuchet times: Trebuchets are nice when they are at the city, but they will never get to the city. The reason is 2 trebs lose totally against the 3 catapults that those hammers could be used for. The rest of the stacks being equal, trebs totaly suck totaly and suck totaly. The reson for this is that only 5-10% of the map is cities, and the trebs are dead fish in a barrel anywhere else.

Gunpowder era: Mustketmen are nice, but knights are nice too. these days dont last, and lead to:

Chemistry era: Grenadiers and cannon, very battle fieldy like lol. The cannons are of course the main offender here, while the grenadiers are useful to get defensive bonuses in towns and on the fields. These is great until:

Infantry era: Infantry with maybe a few machine guns, cannons, until artillery comes. The artillery rains supreme until marines and tanks.

etc.. by this time the game is usually over, and if its not, ur all a bunch of noobs! lol

In general, siege units are the best, simply because collateral damage kills everything.

 

[wioneo]

Your trebs shouldn't be out in the field alone. ANY thing other than an archer or a warrior will beat a trebuchet on even ground. However, if you have a few axes and spears escort, say 7 trebs to a city, 1 maybe two will die. Then the city will burn... You are making city raider trebs, aren't you?

Another thing, how can you DEFEND with grenadiers? That is moronic, the AIs usually horde riflemen, so cavalry will be decimated if you get them too late. What are you upgrading your veteran city raider axes/swords/maces too?

 

[Bjorn190]

Yes, of course. If you have 2 axemen 1 spearman and 7 trebs, then an opponent with 1 catapult cannot kill you. I agree.

But if the opponent has the same production as you, and builds 2 axemen, 1 spearman, and 11 catapults, then the opponent will quite easily kill your entire army. It might work in single player though.

However, it might be good to have one or two trebs in the stack, if you can defend it. But ususally, by the time you have an army that is allowed to siege the enemy town, you have won. The important battle is not the one at the city. The important battle is getting there

 

[uncarved block]

I'm surprised nobody has mentioned Artillery so far. They're a cheaper upgrade than Cats to Cannons (and you should have more $$$ by then anyway), and boy, can they do a job on cities. Even SAM Infantry will get severely damaged, and every Arty after that will have about a 50% chance of winning, in my experience. Yes, Bombers are faster, but you can really exploit a tech advantage with Artillery, IMO, better than you can with Bombers.

Of course, a lot of players here probably have the game won by then, but I just thought I'd give Artillery a shout out-- the unit isn't as dominant as it was in Civ3, or equal to Civ2's Howitzer, but it's still pretty strong.

 

[cabert]

I'm surprised nobody has mentioned Artillery so far. They're a cheaper upgrade than Cats to Cannons (and you should have more $$$ by then anyway), and boy, can they do a job on cities. Even SAM Infantry will get severely damaged, and every Arty after that will have about a 50% chance of winning, in my experience. Yes, Bombers are faster, but you can really exploit a tech advantage with Artillery, IMO, better than you can with Bombers.

Of course, a lot of players here probably have the game won by then, but I just thought I'd give Artillery a shout out-- the unit isn't as dominant as it was in Civ3, or equal to Civ2's Howitzer, but it's still pretty strong.

i never upgrade cats to cannons, i just build new ones
obsolete catapults still deal colateral damage, remember
same for canons to artillery: new ones are better because cheaper while old ones still do the job.

I agree that artilleries are te toughest late game units, but it's just too late to matter.

 

[svv]

On somebody's advice in this thread I tried the Incas and their Quechas, and they really are pretty neat. It's cool the way they can slaughter archers, even when they're barricaded in the cities. I quickly took out my nearest neighbor and nearly finished off the next guy, and still had a few left.

Only problem was early in the game I lost two to a bear and a lion!

 

[DevilJin]

Trebuchet is the best and thats why their cost increased to 80 hammers in the new patch.

 

[wioneo]

How can you say that the battle is getting to the city(I only play singleplayer, by the way)? The AI masses all of its troops in its cities and waits to be attacked. I've only noticed them sending counterattacks after they get trebuchets which are less effective than catapults... Before that, they happily sit and wait in their cities while I bombard and then slaughter their people.

 

[Bjorn190]

In the post I also write "It might also work in singleplayer though". Singleplayer and multiplayer are two different playstyles. I guess trebs are the best in single player.

 

[Roken]

Not really, on Immortal difficulty, the AI will own your ass twice before you're even out of Ancient Age. So the tables turn into you building a tone of archers and hoping to survive before the next wave of assault by another civ. >< damn gangbanging b***ards!

 

[JuanFernando]

Vanilla. Conquistador. Their advatange against melee units helps a lot

 

[BCLG100]

Cats, think about it just simply awesome they can do everything and you dont even need a resource for them.

 

[Arrian]

In SP:

War Chariots and Immortals are both very powerful if you hit before the AI finds & hooks up metal.

Praets are powerful so long as you get them out there pre-feudalism (post-feud, you might as wait a bit and go in with cats & macemen).

Siege weapons are obviously very good. City Raider III cannons are my friends.

MP is another ball game. Siege weapons are even more important, because humans are better about combined arms - they will very likely have the counter unit to your unit, etc. So the solution is collateral damage.

-Arrian

 

[CivDude86]

Praets are still good post feud since +50% vs melee won't help you against longbows and cost about half as much. But you do have bring along some crossbows/maces for defending against maces.

 

[Arrian]

Praets are still good post feud since +50% vs melee won't help you against longbows and cost about half as much. But you do have bring along some crossbows/maces for defending against maces.

True. I should have just said cats. Basically, pre-longbows Praets can chew through cities without needing catapult support. Once longbows show up, though, you are gonna need siege weapons. By the time I have a decent number of cats, I typically have or am close to having machinery anyway, hence my comment about cats & maces. But I certainly have attacked with cats/praets and upgraded (some) to maces in the midst of the war.

-Arrian