Outposts, any good?

[moondoggi]

I was playing "the" game the other night, PTW, regent level, despot, Ancient times. And there was this mountain region that I didn't want to develope yet. I set up a Outpost, and a couple of turns later, i got a message that barbarins were invading. Where my outpost was, was now a barbarian encampment, with over 10 on horseback, and I got no warning they were coming. I was wondering if this was just a glich with invasions.
It was a late night game, I might of just missed the animation. Lucky for me the horsemen mostly walked threw my land to attack my neighbor, who I was at war with. So it kind of worked out ok. But my outpost was gone, after 2 or 3 turns.
So I am wondering how to use outposts, and if you need to protect them. I thought from reading the manual (some people do) that they would only be taken over if another countries culture took over its area. Not by attack by other nations units.
So how do you use these fog breakers?

 

[pdescobar]

In terms of attack, they are like colonies, (as are radar towers and airports). That is, a hostile unit needs only to enter the square and an undefended outpost goes poof. Also, though I am not certain, I believe that barb camps can simply spawn directly on an undefended outpost as well (destroying it, completely unseen) which may have been what you experienced. Given these facts, and the fact that the range is smaller than the published range, I pretty much don't bother building them.

 

[Arutha]

So far I have only found one decent use for outpost:

When playing conquest, use some of the many captured slaves to plant outposts in areas where you have razed ai cities and have no intention of founding your own.

Thus you get to watch out for settler pairs without wasting units on patrol duty.

 

[moondoggi]

That must have been it, spawning right on my undefended outpost. And I put it up to watch out for thoes guys. Thanks pdescobar

 

[Greyhawk1]

Outposts are completely useless. Why did they bother putting them in the game? So far I've had no practical use for them at all

 

[pdescobar]

Originally posted by Greyhawk1
Outposts are completely useless. Why did they bother putting them in the game? So far I've had no practical use for them at all

The idea isn't bad, particularly if the range is what was claimed (one higher than it currently actually is). There are times, at least before everything is railroaded, that some strategically placed outposts could give you useful intelligence on enemy troop positioning near your borders. Unfortunately, with the implemented range, you only really get a sight increase on a mountain, and even there it's just a single square so the benefit is minimal.

While I have occaisionally used them on mountains right at my border to give some extra sight, I can't say that it's been any major help. Back when I was experimenting alot with them, I did find 2 potential uses though. I don't know how practical these uses are, but they are at least interesting to me.

First off, the AI hates those things. I had one game where I was a galley-hop away from the mongols and just for kicks I dropped an outpost in the mountains at the corner of their continent to keep an eye on theim. The AI actually declared war on me by sending 3 or 4 horsemen to go dismantle my (undefended) outpost. And the worst thing about that was that it had a city 2 squares away; if it had bothered to build some culture, the outpost would've gone away peacefully. It took several turns for it to actually get some troops onto boats and attempt a real invasion. By then, he had completely lost any hope of surprise and my military buildup was in full swing. That was an extreme illustration of the fact that when war breaks out, they immediately go and dismantle all the outposts, so if you have a hostile enemy near you, a strategically placed outpost or two can be used to lure his initial attackers into a trap. Of course, the same thing could probably be done with a unit, but I feel better sacrificing an outpost than my troops

The second semi-practical use for outposts I have found is in screening small, crappy islands. Occaisionally I have found a tiny (1-2 tile) island that I didn't particularly want to settle, but that I didn't want the AI to settle either, so dropping an outpost or two there "reserves" it for my potential future expansion but blocks the AI and doesn't have the per-turn maintenance that troops would. Of course, an amphibious assault could dismantle my outpost, but that's only really an issue for the vikings under standard rules until quite late in the game.

 

[cracker]

Outposts are a technical programming error that should not be on in any single player games. In very few cases, none of value, will the outpost do anything that the worker unit cannot accomplish. The game doesnot even recognize ownership of outposts and thay can easily be destroyed by artillery without causing a war. In this repect they are worse that the worker units that are wasted to produce them.

Their primary purpose of outposts is to provide a buffer zone around your cities in the Multiplayer game type of "Elimination" where if you lose a city you're dead. ALl of the quick game types of "Elimination, Regicide, and Capture the whosit" are not designed to function in the single player mode and the AI is nor effectively programmed to play these modes. Playing of these games in SIngle player is the strategic equivalent of smashing caps on the sidewalk with a hammer. Nothing mean intended here, it is just that testing clearly shows that your AI opponent doesn't really know they are playing the game.

You can turn off this error in you single player games by accessing the terrain tab in the editor and just not allowing outposts to be built on any terrain type. This will reduce confusion and prevent the AI from accidently wasting resources that will just make them play more limp wristed than they already do.

 

[HollandPTW]

A outpost is not a worker worth