Outperforming unit stats...

[Tomoyo]

I just had a regular warrior beat two swordsmen and an archer on defense.

 

[catchsomezzz]

Here's another way to look at it.

Let's just use some arbitrary units as an example - a veteran MI attacking a fortified regular Spearman on a grassland. According to the Combat Calculator, the MI should have an 81.6% chance of winning the battle. That's pretty good right?

Alternatively, if you red-lined the spearman with your catapults/trebuckets, the MI would have a 97.4% chance of winning. That's just 15.8% more - not much of a difference right?

Well, let's roll the dice - literally (as a close approximation)

If you roll a 1, you lose, and any other number, you win. You'd have a 83.3% chance of winning.

On the other hand, let's play another game wherein you have to draw a card, out of a deck of 52 cards, and you'll win with any card except, say, a 4 of diamonds. Your chance of winning is 98.1%.

The difference is also about 15%... but the chance of you drawing the losing card out of 52 is much less than rolling a losing number from a dice.

The point of the example?

Even you're attacking with a superior unit, if you're attacking straight up, you still have better odds playing Russian Roulette.

 

[eldar]

Don't talk to me about the RNG. Stoopid thing laughed in my face, spat me out, and left me hung out to dry way too many times in GOTM42. (That's my excuse and I'm sticking to it - and after I ran a few simulations, I'm still sticking to it: especially the 10 Archers vs xxxyyyzzz bit.)

I also feel more aggrieved when the RNG does me on lower difficulty levels. E.g. last night, on Chieftan (100K attempt for HoF), an unfortified Sword on Grassland outright kills my attacking Cavalry. It's like, what's the point? I have 4 Cavalry and I'm going to wipe out your entire pathetic little Civ anyway, what's the point of winning little battles like that?

 

[Boutte]

I'm new to this game, but I have noticed that archers in general seem harder to defeat than they should. It's very frustrating!

Glad I'm not he only one. I've also thought that infantry units seem to be more successful than mounted units with the same attack strength.

 

[Grand Cadfael]

I just had odd luck,my healthy elite(wich I've moded to have 2 more hit points than a vet)gets kiled by a fortifed reg spear (with no bonuses that I could see)and the dosent lose a HP and then I kill two in the same spot with an elite warrior!

 

[mastertyguy]

I got immortal killing tank. Gave me GA in modern ages, it was kind of anti-flip obsolete unit. Immortal defeat tank = spear defeat tank (it was in defence). btw, all terrain have bonus (at least in vanilla, I don't know in conquest if it has changed). Even a warrior in defence on grass is 1*10%, so 1.1 (I don't know if the .1 counts, but anyway, it should exist still) So infantry is 11 on grass

 

[Crazy Eskimo]

The best I've seen was in Civ I.

I was playing an earth map and had a city in Japan, defended by a knight. Along comes an Indian fighter plane that attacks the city, but it is thwarted and destroyed by my knight!

Given the numbers involved, I'm not sure that this was unrealistic probability wise, but I was amused by the scenarios that I tried to come up with to determine how a group of knights would take down a fighter squadron.

 

[Renata]

They polished their shields to a super shine and blinded the pilots?

Man Charged For Using Laser To Blind Pilots



Renata

 

[mastertyguy]

1- They threw their sowrds in the air
2- The planes ran out of gas
3- The planes killed themselves
4- You bribed them to suicide themselves
5- You attack your city with your own planes, so they didn't killed the knights, and died

 

[gunkulator]

MDI have some serious short comings. They have the same defense (2) that early AA units have (spear/sword) and only 4 attack. They will be facing much better defenders than swords did. They will see mostly 3 defense units and many will now be in cities, rather than towns. Lots of 4 attack units are available (Knighs/LB/MDI) and later even calvs. More bombardment units will be around, cannons are built, were cats may not be. This is due to cities now having much better production than in the AA. Better governments and those benefits.

MDI typically come with your first MA tech so it is only logical that they are outclassed by later MA units. The main advantage of MDI is that they are incredibly cheap. 40 shields is much easier to come by in the MA than 30 shields is in the AA.

The nature of warfare changes dramatically in the MA. In the AA you just stack your horses together and your swords together and turn them loose. The MA requires you to start using combined arms. You can't send just send MDI alone. You also need a few pikes, plus cats/trebs/cannons, plus a few horses/knights. However, you get the most bang for the buck with MDI. Casualty rates can get high since there's no retreat but so what, they are easy to replace.

 

[Crazy Eskimo]

1- They threw their sowrds in the air
2- The planes ran out of gas
3- The planes killed themselves
4- You bribed them to suicide themselves
5- You attack your city with your own planes, so they didn't killed the knights, and died

6- The knights found a really really high hill to charge up.
7- The planes' bullets richocheted off the metal armor, back at the planes, killing them (just like the movies!)
8- The pilots of these planes were committed to the path of non-violent confrontation
9- The knights found some really really long lances
10- The pilots decided to fly really really low to the ground

Heh, thanks Renata and master. I found your reasons as amusing as the ones I had come up with.

 

[Zorn]

Combined arms in mediveal? I must have really missed something.
In my games, mediveal wars are the most, let me call it "straightforward".
I build some knights for offense, some knights to defend the knights, and a few knights to hunt stragglers. Then I round it off with a couple of knights.
I mean seriously, the knight is a unit that combines the best attack, defense and movement of all units for a long time. I never had the need to build anything else (exept to garrison cities).
And now that I know that they can even kill planes, I will use them as anti aircraft too...

 

[Crazy Eskimo]

Combined arms in mediveal? I must have really missed something.
In my games, mediveal wars are the most, let me call it "straightforward".
I build some knights for offense, some knights to defend the knights, and a few knights to hunt stragglers. Then I round it off with a couple of knights.
I mean seriously, the knight is a unit that combines the best attack, defense and movement of all units for a long time. I never had the need to build anything else (exept to garrison cities).
And now that I know that they can even kill planes, I will use them as anti aircraft too...

According to a secret source that may or may not be positioned in Sid Meier's bubble bath, the knights are actually more effective at interception and air superiority missions than fighter planes themselves

 

[gunkulator]

I like knights too but they have a few strikes against them:

- You need both iron and horses, If you play C3C, that is not sure thing,

- They are a minimum of 3 techs in and they are on an optional tech. If there's a race for Leo, you may not have time for Chivalry.

- They are 70 shields - ouch! It takes a while to build up a decent stack.

- They only attack at 4, no better than MDI or LB. Against pikes foritified in cities, they'll lose more often than win. Yes, they have retreat but that's still a lot of expensive units you need to build/upgrade.

- A combined arms stack of pikes/MDI/trebs suffers fewer casualties even though they have no retreat because of bombardment.

 

[mastertyguy]

11- They stocked their horses one on another, and attacked the planes from the top
12- They asked help to the wizard, and he gave them a magic potion to fly. Afraid by the flying horses, the ennemy air army died.
13- The planes thought they were not at the right place, landed near the knights to ask direction, and they got killed.

 

[Crazy Eskimo]

14 - The knights had St. George and Beowulf in their group
15 - The city in Japan was located near a "flubber" resource that was used to fashion the horse's shoes.
16 - The knights made use of a particuarly cunning sign in a small font that read "If you can read this, you're flying too low"