Most useless unit?

[snipafist]

I used to think explorers, musketmen and ironclads were useless units, but I've since changed my tune. I play on epic mode, so units with shorter life expectancies see more play, and can be useful for longer periods. Due to this, I've made extensive use of all three units.

Explorers: beyond being useful as medics, explorers are quite handy for... exploring! On maps like pangaea, they obviously aren't so handy, but in any map with separate continents (most specifically the Terra, Earth, and Continents maps, but just about any with separate continents will do) they are exquisite for running about and gathering info, expecially with guerilla II and woodsman II. With such a configuration, they do an excellent job even as barbarian killers (on Terra maps, mind you) when on a forested hill. Keeping them around your own continent has its advantages as well, just set them to explore and they'll constantly wander about, refreshing your info on enemy cities that you have open borders with. Drop them off on friendly AI continents to quickly pick up info without needing to wrangle map info out of them. Don't forget you can load them into caravels for an extra edge.

Ironclads: these really shine in the stage between frigates and destroyers. Think of them as defensive units and you've got it right. Their use should be based around water resources - either defending your own (fortify an ironclad on top of all your resources and watch your enemies struggle to even budge them), or going after a nearby enemy's (slow but effective and can easily brush aside lesser enemy defenders). Ironclads don't always have to be slow either. You can get their speed up to 5 with both navigation upgrades and being the first to circumnavigate the world (this is especially easy with the Vikings), which makes them reasonably quick vessels more capable of acting agressively, and quite proficient for their era at bombarding enemy towns.

Musketmen: with the introduction of trebuchets, musketmen have a better role to play. Now that you're not dependent on macemen for raiding cities (your trebs manage bombarding and city raiding in the early renaissance), the musetman emerges as the most capable treb defender with a solid strength of 9 and having no counters yet against him. The only other necessity is a pikeman unit or two to ensure the knights keep their distance, but with a strength of 9, musketmen can give knights some trouble as well. I used to swear them off, but now I'm quite fond of musketmen for my early renaissance armies.

What would I nominate as the most useless unit? I wouldn't nominate anything, really. They've all got their uses within their window of use, otherwise they wouldn't be there. Sometimes you play a map that makes them pretty pointless, but that doesn't mean they have no use whatsoever.

 

[Hey Joni]

Sending one along with horse archer or chariot pillagers is a narrow strategy, but sending a couple of explorers along with your attack stack isn't. Sure, you could have sent with a couple of spears or axemen which you can use offensively -- but spears are vulnerable to axemen and axemen to chariots, whereas explorers are all round defenders with no particular counter.

By narrow I meant that usually you don't beeline for compass. And even more so, that it is only viable to protect horses with explorers because of the movement. Otherwise, it is best to defend your assault stack with diverse units that will counter whatever is sent against the stack.

In other words, for stack defence, it's better to have good counters instead of good all round units.

 

[GoodSarmatian]

I hardly ever build stealth bombers. They just come too late in the game. At this stage the fighting is over and I'm going for space race.
Carriers...never erally needed them. If they could carry bombers the would be great...
Musketmen. Not a bad unit, but in most of my games they come about 10 turns before I get Grenadiers, so I don't even bother. But when playing the Otoomans I'll try to research Gunpowder early. Janissaries are awesome units, they are almost as strong as grenadiers against anything except siege and gunpowder units.
Ironclads: Sometimes. OK to sit on ressources.

 

[Stuie]

Ironclads totally saved my ass in my last game. Other than that, I've never used them.

But the unit with no use whatsoever (unless playing a Terra map) is the Explorer. Never built one on a non-Terra map.

 

[uberfish]

Submarines. The stealth just isn't very useful and recon duty is better done by planes.

They never accomplish much beyond feeding experience to enemy destroyers. I think I've managed to find useful roles for every other unit.

 

[Stuie]

Submarines. The stealth just isn't very useful and recon duty is better done by planes.

They never accomplish much beyond feeding experience to enemy destroyers. I think I've managed to find useful roles for every other unit.

I've used submarines to deliver spies to hostile continents from time to time.

 

[catchsomezzz]

Okay - I'll be the smart-aleck, here.

The most useless units are.... *drum rolls*... *ALL* the other Civ's UUs in the game.

I will never be able to build them in the game I'm currently playing, and they are usually stronger and better than the unit that I can build in the same class.

Damn those useless Praetorians, Keshiks, Panzers, etc... I say!

:-D

 

[suspendinlight]

I don't think carriers are useless. They provide mobile air bases for your fighters when you are fighting an overseas war where your fighters can't reach enemy cities from land bases. Even if you are just using them for pillaging key enemy resources with your fighters, they still have their use in modern warfare.

 

[Sloth Bear]

I would have to say carriers.

First, I've never been in a situation where I would need one.

Secondly, even if I was, the most I would need it for is to 'hold off' the AI until I won since they come so late in the game.

Third, even if I did build them I would have to devote a strong naval force just to keep it safe since carriers by themselves are sitting ducks (if the AI is strong enough that I need to send a carrier of aircraft to take them out, they are strong enough to sink that carrier many times over).

So, a unit that comes too late to be really useful, isn't useful for much when it is, and requires devoting a lot of other resources to just to use properly? That gets my vote

For the record, I have built explorers and found them pretty unimpressive, but at least they can be put on caravels and sent overseas early to pick up those rare unused goody huts or harass barbarians

 

[JMaltman]

I love to read a thread like this... where there are still people defending the "most useless" - meaning that the ones making nominations as useless are either:

a) playing on a speed which closes their window of usefulness too quickly
b) playing on a kind of map that doesn't utilize them
c) playing a style that they're not suited to
or
d) haven't been creative enough to think of a use for them, despite all this.

Got some neat ideas on the less useful ones here. Thanks!

 

[Sloth Bear]

Well for the record I play Marathon speed on random maps with a different style depending on the leader and what sort of start I get

And I've thought of several uses for carriers. The question wasn't "which unit has no uses" the question was "which is the most useless" as in relative to the others. It can still be a fairly useful unit but still be the 'most useless.'

 

[Murky]

The machine gun since it can't attack and most games are won with offensive units?

 

[eerr]

on a duel map with private continents i couldn't get oil so i had to substitute subs and destroyers due to bad planning i held him off to the end of the game with my subs blockcading his ports endlessly...

 

[Hristo]

Explorer! When you can build then, the whole world is all ready explored...

 

[carl corey]

Murky, I found that machine guns can be quite usefull when you're conquering new territory. You never know when some cavalry will go just past you, and having a MG or two garrisoned in the latest captured city makes coutering this much easier. You don't have to worry about pillaging, since the city hasn't expanded yet, and you'll need defenders, no matter the type, so MGs seem perfect for this.

 

[Hey Joni]

I never tried it but isn't it useful to have a few machine guns for stack defense?

EDIT: actually, I have tried it but AI wouldn't attack

 

[cabert]

i don't like those threads, since every unit has some use, but there are some points here i want to discuss!

Submarines are useless??
try desert war scenario, and come again...

I very often beeline to radio, so delaying the battleships. I have a good use for flanking subs, believe me!
those, plus one or 2 carriers loaded with fighters, make any enemy fleet to easy prey for my destroyers. Even battleships sink, you know

 

[Paeanblack]

Carriers.

Their only use is obtaining a beachhead on a totally unfriendly continent. Once you have a beachhead and rebase your airforce, carriers are just eye-candy.

The problem is that building enough carriers+fighters to crack that first city is way more expensive than building the requisite number of disposable marines/artillery/barrage-tanks to do the same job.

You need to be trying to establish beachheads on many separate, unfriendly continents that have no friendly cities within bomber range for the construction of a carrier task force to be worthwhile. Maybe it's just how I play, but I usually keep a few friends around.

 

[gunkulator]

Subs with Flanking I and II are 80% likely to withdraw. Go ahead and attack with them. And how else are you going to get your spy onto that unfriendly island AI to scout around before declaring war?

I've actually built ironclads to prevent AI frigates from coming out of the gray and pillaging my sea resources. The AI can't defeat them until destroyers since it probably can't get its ironclads to my coast easily.

Machine guns with drill promotions just eat up AI riflemen, grenadiers and even infantry. They're not too bad against cavalry too. Very useful to have in a stack.

 

[SkippyT]

My vote goes for: dudududududuuuuuuuu IRONCLAD