Most worthless unit?

[Paul Saunders]

Good response Paul. I can see on a Huge Terra map maybe some use for them exploring. In response to using them as sentries, I suppose without mounted units you could do that.

I'm playing on a large terra map at the moment, and coincidentally, I've played most of the game without horses. In fact, I've only just gained access to them, in 1795, just a few turns before getting railroads!

Interestingly, mounted units (horses) can be just as useful exploring new lands, and they are stronger. The only thing worse is their goody hut results, which on higher levels and at a mid-game point aren't much anyway.

I wonder if nerfing mounted units to 1 mp in unexplored terrain would then buff the explorers.

But in forests, jungles and hills, mounted units *do* effectively only have 1mp. I like to play on rocky maps, with dense forests and jungles too, if using Smartmap.

Or giving explorers the ability to create an "Outpost", which will allow resource collection from a resource in neutral territory.

I dunno, I just wish I had a reason to build them.

I agree that they should have something extra, to make them more desirable. Since they are explorers, I think it would be most appropriate for them to start with the sentry promotion, for extra visibility range.

 

[arretium]

and you fly at night with low viz paint and a spitfire spots you and catches up to gun you down. Right. A stealth bomber has much better than 50% chance of going undetected

Remember the days when that chariot could take out your stack of howitzers? I remember the sound it made in Civ 1... "tick-tick-tick....tick". Or when the battleship got taken out by a sailboat? Or how about when your whole stack of 90 units gets destroyed by an archer?

I agree with you on the Stealth planes. First off, stealth bombers can fly at an altitude a spitfire could never reach, so the idea that a WW2 plan can even approach a stealth bomber is ludicrous. Not to mention the fact that stealth planes fly at a speed no where near as slow as props. If I recall, the fastest props were in the neighborhood of 350-400 MPH during WW2, where as a jet plane flies at speeds well north of this figure (not to mention supersonic).

 

[Zongo]

I build one or two Explorers per game. They make great medics. [...] Throw one into each stack since they'll never defend. Or, if they do defend, then everyone else in the stack is dead so it doesn't matter.
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That's a good idea! I'll try it out. Build them in the Red Cross city and with 2 promotions only they will be cheap Medic I, Woodsman III, never defending units!

I use to build Medic I transports in my Red Cross city, but I guess I will give the Medic Explorer a go. Do you know if Woodsman III works on water too? I mean, suppose you have a Medic I, Woodsman III explorer on a transport, on the same tile as a damaged ship. Does the ship get only the Medic I healing bonus, or the cumulative Medic I + Woodsman III goodness?

As an afterthought, it would be cool if the explorer had a modern look after the industrial age, like -yes!- a combat medic team...

 

[Elite Hoplite]

Well it's so obvious that the worker is the worst, he can't even atk so thats why he gets my vote.

 

[kazapp]

I agree with you on the Stealth planes. First off, stealth bombers can fly at an altitude a spitfire could never reach, so the idea that a WW2 plan can even approach a stealth bomber is ludicrous. Not to mention the fact that stealth planes fly at a speed no where near as slow as props. If I recall, the fastest props were in the neighborhood of 350-400 MPH during WW2, where as a jet plane flies at speeds well north of this figure (not to mention supersonic).

You're confusing history with game balance.

Stealth bombers that are completely immune to Fighters are completely unbalancing.

Besides, look at it this way: if your Civ flies Stealth Bombers, what says the enemy Civ doesn't develop half-good ways of detecting them?

When you fight another Civ in the game it isn't like fighting afghans or iraqis - fighting another Civ would be more like going up against Russia, Germany, India or China. A power with the means of negating (or at least blunting) your technological advantages. Look at WWII: there important technologies were sometimes negated within the scope of a single Civ turn.

But that said, Stealth Bombers need to be detected by Fighters for game fun reasons.

 

[LemonJello]

I would have gone with Explorer as a useless unit, but now I think I'll be trying the Medic promo that others here have mentioned. At least I'd actually build one then. My next choice would probably be chariots. I never build them, just never seen the need in any game I've played to date.

 

[Angst]

medic explorers sounds nice...

Well, useless unit. Is it ONLY me who says the Warrior? Yes alright, it is a necessary unit early on, but later it will be heck of an expense to upgrade and a weak n00b unit, not able to fight properly... And too slow, too little XP gain for Medical use.

 

[DigitalBoy]

Well, useless unit. Is it ONLY me who says the Warrior? Yes alright, it is a necessary unit early on, but later it will be heck of an expense to upgrade and a weak n00b unit, not able to fight properly... And too slow, too little XP gain for Medical use.

Well, naturally, but until you hook up copper, horses, or research Archery, you don't have much of a choice.

 

[peter450]

a chariot makes a far better medic, and it can actually earn a bit of XP to actually get all the medic promo's, a explorer is the most useless unit and has been since civ 4 vanilla, they would really have to make a real plumb of a unit for it to be more worthless than the explorer, any unpromoted low str (for the era) army unit can function in a medic role an be last to defend, the advantage is they can actually be promoted up further if required