The Pilgrim
Deity
Hopefully, local masochists enjoy the pain. 
No ranged units challenge, masochistic version
- Thread starter sufficiency
- Start date
obviously a bunch of horses are needed for this to kill units in 1 turn before they can heal/fortify/pull/strike back.
On top of that I d suggest a worker army of 3 (or 2 with pyras/liberty) to go with your army and road your way to front and make those horses even more effective and make surounding cities easier -
i.e. road to front have horses sit on road and they take out anyoing units -move in melee units (if not shonghai or siam) while horses heal and pillage, take city, heal units - road to next city ...
On top of that I d suggest a worker army of 3 (or 2 with pyras/liberty) to go with your army and road your way to front and make those horses even more effective and make surounding cities easier -
i.e. road to front have horses sit on road and they take out anyoing units -move in melee units (if not shonghai or siam) while horses heal and pillage, take city, heal units - road to next city ...
The Pilgrim
Deity
On this note, is manducavs crusher still this good? I absolutely loved Songhai back in vanilla but haven't played them once since G&K and didn't have much success steamrolling with conquistadors. But maybe that's because of sucky UA. Now I'm tempted to try, despite the fact I didn't enjoy the pain at all. 
sufficiency
King
- Joined
- Feb 6, 2013
- Messages
- 682
On this note, is manducavs crusher still this good? I absolutely loved Songhai back in vanilla but haven't played them once since G&K and didn't have much success steamrolling with conquistadors. But maybe that's because of sucky UA. Now I'm tempted to try, despite the fact I didn't enjoy the pain at all.
The lack of penalty vs cities don't carry over on upgrades, right? I also think Songhai has great potential for this challenge with a reasonably good start + religion.
On this note, is manducavs crusher still this good? I absolutely loved Songhai back in vanilla but haven't played them once since G&K and didn't have much success steamrolling with conquistadors. But maybe that's because of sucky UA. Now I'm tempted to try, despite the fact I didn't enjoy the pain at all.
They are actually pretty decent if you have a ton of them (6-7+) and get them backed with GG (maybe some triremes if coastal). Downright brutal towards CBs and other weak units out in the open too
Spoiler :
The only problem with them is that cities with more than 25+ str are just as brutal for just a handful of cavs.
Spoiler :
Spoiler :
And they don't do so well against Pikemen (esp. Landsknechts)
Spoiler :
Thus in conclusion, the Songhay are a great civ for a no ranged game. I could see 7-9 cavs needed to take a 50 str runaway cap (and all the good stuff inside) with constant pillaging and repair and healthpacks
The Pilgrim
Deity
It doesn't.
Too bad, IMO. I did try. They aren't as awesome as used to be. Shocking.
But still decent. Although it takes 8-10 manducavs to take 25-30 strength city with no loses, pretty crazy. I'm only at turn 128, with one Babylon down and 7 more civs to go. You can only pillage so much and amount of horses is limited after all, so having multiple armies is not given but luck dependent. And in case you have a remote runaway, by the time you get there, manducavs are outdated and you're screwed again like with any other civ. Will work much much better on great plains or cooked HoF style pangaeas. Hopefully I'll finish this game. Or traditioally rage quit. We'll see. smallfish, pikes are manageable thanks to flanks. Cities are the problem. Even without penalty manducavs do very little damage each.
I am trying to do this in the "diety challenge 10". I think it is very possible. 
My strategy was to do tradition and just try to defend 4 strong cities with mostly knights, so these four cities could have good science.
Then I hit Military tradition at turn 140 for cavalry!
Since I did a lot of defending a lot of the knights could get the March promotion. And hitting a city with these cavalry around turn 140 maybe gets about 1/4 of their life. Then the bombardment from the city takes maybe another 1/7 of their life. They survive with other words!
And from this stage these units will be stronger than the equivalent ranged units I think! I do miss artillery though, that is for sure!
My strategy was to do tradition and just try to defend 4 strong cities with mostly knights, so these four cities could have good science.
Then I hit Military tradition at turn 140 for cavalry!
Since I did a lot of defending a lot of the knights could get the March promotion. And hitting a city with these cavalry around turn 140 maybe gets about 1/4 of their life. Then the bombardment from the city takes maybe another 1/7 of their life. They survive with other words! And from this stage these units will be stronger than the equivalent ranged units I think! I do miss artillery though, that is for sure!
Attachments
Peter u seem to be good, if I got some chance to interest u in multiplayer - pm me.
And pls dont act like "fastclick" suckz or so, it s not as important as some bad players try make it to be and there are possibilites to make it even less important (contintn or mirror map f.e.).
In end the real challenge isnt self ristricing but playing some1 same? clever
And pls dont act like "fastclick" suckz or so, it s not as important as some bad players try make it to be and there are possibilites to make it even less important (contintn or mirror map f.e.).
In end the real challenge isnt self ristricing but playing some1 same? clever
sufficiency
King
- Joined
- Feb 6, 2013
- Messages
- 682
Damn Cavalry with March and Blitz.
The Pilgrim
Deity
One interesting thing I noticed: you raised you bpt very high very fast and then at some point it stalls. Are you playing all of your games this way? I haven't read all challenge topics, I'm still hoping to play them myself, so bare with me.
One interesting thing I noticed: you raised you bpt very high very fast and then at some point it stalls. Are you playing all of your games this way? I haven't read all challenge topics, I'm still hoping to play them myself, so bare with me.
Yes, I totally focused on policies and puppets. But landships is not quite enough vs arabia I think. Maybe I am going to replay the map and do Rationalism for quicker tanks etc.
This challenge is not easy!!
Deau
Emperor
Can you pick your opponents?
Seems like if you get a map with mostly mountain/hills biased opponents, it's pmuch GG regardless on how good an opener you've had.
Old Peter's challenge10 is really impressive. It did make me realize how most of the capitals are on flat lands though
*edit* Also, did anyone try Huns or even Pacacuti for hills movement?
*edit* Scratch Huns, every tile is populated by a unit on deity so no sneak attack with 3-4 rushed rams
Seems like if you get a map with mostly mountain/hills biased opponents, it's pmuch GG regardless on how good an opener you've had.
Old Peter's challenge10 is really impressive. It did make me realize how most of the capitals are on flat lands though
*edit* Also, did anyone try Huns or even Pacacuti for hills movement?
*edit* Scratch Huns, every tile is populated by a unit on deity so no sneak attack with 3-4 rushed rams
Yes, I totally focused on policies and puppets. But landships is not quite enough vs arabia I think. Maybe I am going to replay the map and do Rationalism for quicker tanks etc.
This challenge is not easy!!
any 100+ def city is intimidating. You seem to only be 1 or 2 cities from his cap though. Are there still other caps to get?
i really want to get familiar with landships. i just need to get that late in the game. i might drop to immortal or emperor just to learn their mechanics better.
The Pilgrim
Deity
It's not difficult for you either. I mean difficult enough.Yes, I totally focused on policies and puppets. But landships is not quite enough vs arabia I think. Maybe I am going to replay the map and do Rationalism for quicker tanks etc.
This challenge is not easy!!
I'd never had guts to stop pumping science. I have Songhai game going on immortal, decent progress but I'm planing to keep teching as fast as possible. Luckily on immortal surpassing AI won't be a problem, so my chances are ok. Would never ever attempt this on deity, though. You are almost my hero (you need actually to complete it to become one
). And Mathew's point stays valid. Melee (not mounted) are still useless. Btw, out of curiosity, how many deal+DoW did you have?
The answer depends on you personal goal.
It's not an official competition and there is no way (and no reason) to impose rules on players who don't want to follow them. Thus you can do whatever you feel is fair if all you want is to win. Reload, cook the map and use all available exploits. For me personally these challenges are about learning and comparing different strategies, i.e. figuring out which ones are viable and which aren't in different circumstances. Everything stated above defeats the purpose. I only play on random maps, random opponents and standard settings. No policy/promotion savings.
