Praetorians and Keshiks are worse than jaguars and skirmishers

[TheMeInTeam]

CR noobtorians beat axes in cities though, especially at CR II and especially III. It's not hard to get CR II with imperialistic, either.

Iron can be a problem, of course.

 

[Culture Bomb]

Quechas suck because sometimes the AI cities are too far away to rush.

Edit: OK, I was being facetious, but there is a serious point - it's not that uncommon to be playing a civ with an aggressive early UU AND have the necessary resource, but still not get the chance to use it because the the terrain or location of opponents makes an early rush a less favourable option than peaceful rexing or building the Pyramids or whatever.

 

[noto2]

honestly I'd still rather have jags than praets. Praets are costly and come later. It's not just about the luck of finding iron or not, it's also about the time it takes to hook it up. With jags, I can get them out in time to pillage my target's copper mine, thus guaranteeing I face nothing but archers. Jags are strong enough to then completely wipe out a target. They aren't good enough for 2 targets back to back, but conquering one neighbour is a good start and praets are almost never good enough to conquer 2 in a row anyway either, the wars get too long and costly

 

[Mylene]

Praets are costly and

Hmm not really, 45h for 8str..cheap imo, Jumbos i.e. cost 60h, same str., come later and cannot get CR.

 

[shakabrade]

There was a thread My could remember about praets. Not so bad UU in the right hands.

If land is scarce, you have to look for a rush, but still not rush into a rush. There's an option to grow vertically and wait for drafts or trebs or something and then attempt to conquer.

I don't think any game should focus on utilizing UU but HoF games. It is often case to get better results with conventional units than UU. UU can blind you.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

I don't think any game should focus on utilizing UU but HoF games

You're forgetting all of those games people play on marathon .

 

[shakabrade]

I respect the fact some people don't want to challenge themselves but I don't understand it.

 

[BornInCantaloup]

I respect the fact some people don't want to challenge themselves but I don't understand it.

Ha! Nice! Post wins the Quote of the day Awards.

 

[shakabrade]

Humbled

 

[TezaPsyborg]

You're forgetting all of those games people play on marathon .

Playing on the slower speeds certainly does allow you to exploit those UU's to the max. I recently (well couple of weeks ago) decided to start a game on marathon speed playing Portugal on an archipelago map. I had LOADS of fun using caracks to their maximum potential, think I'm gonna make Marathon my default setting from now on for SP, which is almost exculsively what I play.

I respect the fact some people don't want to challenge themselves but I don't understand it.

I also vote for this - motion passed Which is why in the archipelago game I just mentioned I started a custom game and added Vikings, Dutch, Carthage, a number of civs that start with fishing, left some as random so I didn't know exactly what I would be getting and HRE. (I added HRE reasoning that their UB would help them expand on an archipelago map... boy does it... especially when they start on the largest island and quickly vassalize Spain and Korea ) I turned raging barabarians on for good measure and let the games begin. Seriously you have NEVER seen as many barbarian galleys, I think I've had to send fishing boats to every single sea reasource at LEAST twice

Anyway to keep my ramblings vaguely on topic Yes UU's that dont require a resource are generally more useful than UU's that do, but come on... Aren't you glad when you've got Rome as a rival and they haven't got any iron? Or Mongols with no horses? Turn around is fair play sometimes...

 

[noto2]

If I have jags and I start beside Rome, Rome never will get praets, I'll make damn sure of that. In fact, Rome won't build more than 2 axes and 3 chariots before I take it all for myself

 

[Manco Capac]

When I will grow up, I want to be as witty as shakabrade.

 

[Manco Capac]

If I have jags and I start beside Rome, Rome never will get praets, I'll make damn sure of that. In fact, Rome won't build more than 2 axes and 3 chariots before I take it all for myself

So basically, you rush IW all the time.
Is it that efficient?
Of course, that's K-Mod, so warrior choking doesn't work at all. Yes, it's justified, BUT not everyone knows you are playing K-mod.

 

[noto2]

if I'm playing as the Aztecs yes I will bee-line iron working in most cases. It depends on a few factors, but as the Aztecs I really hate trying to get pottery first and will try to avoid doing so at all costs. Bee-lining IW can slow down tech, but then again, if you start capturing cities right away they give gold, and it should be more than enough gold to get to pottery and start working some of your own cottages

Btw, you may think that my playstyle is finely tuned to Kmod but it isn't. I don't pour over all the tiny little details of AI behaviour, knowing whether not it will do this or that, I play at a more general strategic level. I don't care who will declare at pleased nor do I care to know exactly what an AI worker will do in any given situation. This is why I play with random personalities. I try to have good diplomacy with civs I consider allies, knowing that there is always a chance I will get backstabbed, I prefer to not have 100% guanratees. That's part of the reason I like Kmod, and I like not being able to see when a civ is plotting

 

[TheMeInTeam]

If you're playing as the Aztecs unrestricted, you can stomp on prats with any metal at all by simply taking shock on axes. I don't see the need to rush a particularly expensive tech. On top of that, most difficulties you can kill or at least choke metal with something like chariots too.

Jags are not the counter to prats, they are a utility UU unto themselves. If you want to rush a UU that actually does screw Rome over ASAP with consistency (and almost every other civ too) then you definitely want Mali.

 

[noto2]

unless you have copper in the BFC you can get jags around the same time you'd get axes. Sure, if I have copper in the capital bfc then I'd just axe rush, but that's the beauty of jags - you don't need to rely on luck. Even if there are no horses and there is no copper anywhere nearby, I know I can count on the jag

 

[traius]

I guess... but you can build axes with Iron too, and jags means you have revealed iron too. so you need to have no iron and no copper. And then you get a unit that trades 50% bonus to melee for 10% when attacking cities and 20% bonus when defending forests. The sad thing about your forest upgrade? A regular swordsman defends a forest better than a jag, including the jags aggressive bonus (with aggressive, a jag has 0.5 less strength, 8.5, defending a forest than a swordsman, 9, and is WEAKER than swordsman aywhere else). You do get better/easier super-medics and woods2 sprint demons, but to then just attack with a 5str unit who used his promotion on defending forests, just so he could get there a little faster? Dubious.

 

[noto2]

traius. If I have copper in the BFC I can axerush. If I have iron in the BFC good for me, I don't need it. I get to IW and I have jags right away. Woods2 jags will go in and choke/pillage my target so that they do not have metal. CR jags are slightly better at attacking cities than axes, and since I'm only facing archers, I'll just build those jags instead of axes, and obliterate those cities.

Look I'm not interested in theorycrafting, I started this thread due to experience. I've played hundreds if not thousands of games of civ and I can tell you I've been so very disappointed with things like keshiks and praets. They are situational, very situational, and end up not contributing anything to the game more than 50% of the time. Oh sure, there's that odd game, 1/4 playing the Mongols, when keshiks shine, or simillarly with praets. But I play random settings, so I get to play Rome once every two months, if that, and if praets only work 1/3 games then guess what, I only see them do anything useful about once or twice a year. But what about Monty and the Aztecs? Well Monty's traits aren't all that impressive but the jag ensures I have a strong early game. I'm making these observations based on EXPERIENCE, not theorycrafting. In my experience, jags have completely dominated countless games. Sure, maybe on paper they don't look too hot but then why do they break games? Praets almost always disappoint me, in contrast.

 

[Mylene]

Sorry but your experiences are not saying much without mentioning on what difficulty levels you rush with Jags..
cos i can tell you from my experiences, waiting for IW with Monty's terrible starting techs, and then rushing with not really strong units is not good enuf for Immortal.

 

[shakabrade]

Experience is just drop in the sea. Just one variable.

Ability to learn from experience is what counts.
And it is affected by intelligence, attitude, ambition, persistence and previous experience. We don't know much about all those for anyone on this forum. That is why we brag with games on this forum. Only results matter.

You could say my experience is very limited compared to many here since I have played probably around 100 games so far including all difficulties.

But I bet my experience was much deeper.

If you are in situation so desperate you need to claim more land by rushing, waiting for cats is a way to go. It is risk free and easily achievable even if boxed to 3 cities. No matter the land. With Oracle or/and Math bulb, it can be set fairly quickly. With the right Philo leader, even BC trebs are possible. Civ really has many alternatives to ragequitting. Just abandon the whole concept of leveraging the UU no matter what. For instance, I don't find strat resource is limiting early rush such as praet rush. What is usually more limiting is commerce. Applies to all early rushes.