Promotion Tree Meta

[Mightybrain1000]

What is your go-to promotion tree for level 3-4 land/sea/air units? It seems that almost always blitz and logistics/range are the best for land/sea

 

[Anarcomu]

I love to play Zulus, so what I'll say is about them.
When rushing swordsmen, I tend to like "forlorn hope" a lot, because it makes attacking cities (and thus gaining xp) a lot safer than blitz.
Blitz is, however, my second choice.

 

[andersw]

What is your go-to promotion tree for level 3-4 land/sea/air units? It seems that almost always blitz and logistics/range are the best for land/sea

Im mostly using melee as a meat wall for siege/range, when I'm able to use melee offensive I've probably crushed my opponent, run away with the game and/or should probably up my difficulty.
Melee: Drill1> Cover1 > Drill2+3 > Stalwarth > Forlorn or Blitz (same with cav but no cover promo)
Archer: > logistics (sometimes go other way for skirmishers)
Siege: Siege123 > +1 range
I've tried to vary promos but war is already a lot of micro management and its enough keeping track of exp on my siege, keeping track of various different melee on top of that is a bit too messy.
Is it the best way? probably not but this way I always know what I have where.

I like to mix in a couple of early woodsmen if there is a lot of forests, mostly for barb hunting but AI is also notorious bad at handling units that move a bit extra but again thats another special case unit to keep track of.
The game really needs coloring of units or some big own made marker for me to mix promos.
March is good but its on the shock side of promo tree, mobility is really good but a living unit is better.

 

[Phosphoraptor]

Warmonger on King - Prince here, so my promos will be biased towards taking cities

Anti-cav: Cannon fodder, Drill 1 > Cover 2 > Stalwart

Melee: Melee attackers since they already have a defense boost. Shock 2/3 > Cover 2.
(Luxury/situational) Woodsman/Amphi/Drill > FH

Gun: Cannon fodder build, mix with some FH if everyone else is weak.

*Special mention for Zulu: Buffalo line is OP, always fill it first. Blitz is good up to impis, then go march.

Recon: Trailblazer 2 > medic 2 > scouting before flight
Survival > screening after flight

Ranged: mostly barrage > range
Add some barrage 1 > medic 2 (at least 2 healers per army)
A few Accuracy > logi (more with bazookas)

Mounted/armor: Shock > march (Mix with skirms for best effect)
For late game armor spam, mix some Drill > blitz for cities

Skirms: same as ranged
If you have loads of mounted and skirms, go barrage/acc 2 > envelopment first

Siege: Siege 3 > range > volley
(Luxury) field 2 > splash 2 / field 3 > logi

Anti-air: are you going to pick anything other than air supremacy, interceptor here?

() can be skipped
Naval melee, loads of specialisations: BP 2 > (encircle) > BP 3 > (pincer) > blitz
At least 1 healer per fleet - BP 2 > medic 2
At least 1 scout per fleet - BP 1 > navi 2 > BP 2
Late game sieger - Hull 2 > naval siege > vanguard
Late game AA - Interceptor 4 > Hull

Naval ranged:
Ship vs ship - Targeting > splash > indomitable > logi
Ship vs coast - Bombardment > shrapnel (must have with indirect fire) > broadside > logi
EDIT: can beeline logi if you have imperialism / untouchable navy

Subs:
Wolfpack 2 > mobility > logi early on
Wolfpack 3 > logi with attack subs and imperialism

Carrier:
FD 2 > mobility when I have a few
Armor 3 when I spam out more

Fighter:
AS 2 > ace pilot 3 > air repair > ace pilot 4
AS 2 > dogfight 3 > range > air repair
Air repair is optional if you are much stronger than the enemy
Range is optional for jet fighter
Anti-land/sea promos are luxury

Bomber:
This tree is very limited, just pick one half and commit to it
Get range first if regular bomber

If you have very high lvl units, picking defensive promos on them as insurance is good.

Try to rename your specialists if you can, they can easily get lost within late game unit carpets!

 

[Stalker0]

I am more a shock guy myself for my melee, at the end of the day if i've killed the army the city will fall, and shock helps me do that more. So I like Shock -> Overrun or March (if the unit is mostly full I normally overrun, march if they are decently wounded). Always combine with a skirmisher, when possible, really ramps up the attack power.

Archer: Barrage -> Range almost exclusively. Accuracy doesn't apply often enough to me, and as much as I love logistics, at the end of the day when my archers can hit you and you can't hit back...I win.

For Sea:

• Melee Ships: Early game its all Boarding Party (because BP2s immunity from the slow effect is too important, its the strongest thing in the early game imo). I will normally go blitz and then piercer. Later in the game if I have a stable naval force I'll switch it up to go hull -> dauntless as the default (though vanguard is certainly good in teh right circumstances).
• Ranged: Bombardment Early (that anti-city bonus is really good) -> logistics. Mid game its targetting or bombardment depending on what I need, I will favor logistics most of the time but as the game gets later I will shift into other things because it will take too long to get to logstics.
• Subs: Wolfpack always, then often targetting or mobility after that (+1 move on subs is not to be underestimated)

Mounted: I like shock III -> overrun if the terrain is mostly open (if you have the space to bring in 1 or even 2 skirmisher units with your mounted, you will do incredible damage), and then shock -> charge if its less (as less flanking oppurtunities). Drill line is questionable on mounted unless its a UU.

Recon: completely depends on what I need, first unit is normally TB (but I will use survive if I need that first unit for more barb hunting).

 

[FinMc]

I am with Stalker0 on land units. You need to kill their armies to take cities, I never take city attack on melee units. I usually prioritize the reduced damage from range over shock, but try to max out both. Then blitz over march (march is broken on defense though, so strong).

For archers I like a 70/30 split of logistics/range. The DPS from logistics is very valuable to me, but having 3-range units is mandatory at higher-levels to break chokepoints and force engagements so your logistics ranged units can get in and lay waste to everything.

Siege it's all about getting 3 range as fast as possible. 3 range trebuchets/cannon are so broken, it makes taking a city trivial.

 

[Stalker0]

I usually prioritize the reduced damage from range over shock, but try to max out both.

I think cover and cover 2 get really useful at the fusilier+ phase. At this point when you are dealing with artillery and gatling guns and planes and XYZ, the ranged damage focused fire really takes off. So most newly built military academy melee units for me go drill I -> cover2 at their base. This gives them the tankiness they need to survive in the field.

 

[Diomedes_]

I actually really prioritize medic for my ranged units, especially for skirmisher-line and when I'm more likely to be fighting defensive wars. Healing can be super powerful and often feels like a bigger boost than extra CS.

For melee units I almost always go for Stalwart first for infantry and Blitz for cavalry. But I've been experimenting going for Charge and Overrun for my cavalry and honestly it feels very good too, though it does require you to have a pretty different playstyle.

For siege units I've always gone siege into range, but more recently I've been trying out strategies with going field into splash damage/logistics and honestly they get super strong if the terrain isn't too closed. In the past when conquering I always prioritized just killing the city over their units, but more recently I've been trying out prioritizing units first and then going for cities. Its a different way to war but it feels pretty good to me. An army with a few Cannons with field and splash damage 1 and 2, a handful of knights/lancers, some heavy skirmishers/cuirassiers with medic, and the authority heal on kill policy is scary good at pushing and killing units. The cannons and the skirmishers reduce their front line melee units to very low HP (but don't kill them), then your knights come in and can heal as much if not more HP than they'll lose killing the low HP enemies. Once you've killed a bunch of units, that your cannons lack extra range or CS multipliers against cities becomes pretty irrelevant as you can get a much more thorough surround, get more cannons in range, and you're not in as much of a rush to take the city.

For Sea units, it really depends. In the past I always went for the naval siege promotions on melee boats and the city CS promotions for ranged boats, but I've been experimenting with the other side of the tree and it feels quite good. Again, this experiment is also part of a unit-first approach to conquest, where boarding helps a ton because it keeps enemies in range of your ranged units, and the extra CS against land and naval units for your naval ranged units is just a direct buff to that playstyle.

Again, for bombers I had always gone siege into either range or logistics first (depending on geography), but I've been going for the other side of the tree more in my most recent games and it feels quite good. A unit-first approach for your bombers also means you're using them on average further from cities, which means a lower chance they'll be in interception range, which feels quite good.

 

[FinMc]

I actually really prioritize medic for my ranged units, especially for skirmisher-line and when I'm more likely to be fighting defensive wars. Healing can be super powerful and often feels like a bigger boost than extra CS.

For melee units I almost always go for Stalwart first for infantry and Blitz for cavalry. But I've been experimenting going for Charge and Overrun for my cavalry and honestly it feels very good too, though it does require you to have a pretty different playstyle.

For siege units I've always gone siege into range, but more recently I've been trying out strategies with going field into splash damage/logistics and honestly they get super strong if the terrain isn't too closed. In the past when conquering I always prioritized just killing the city over their units, but more recently I've been trying out prioritizing units first and then going for cities. Its a different way to war but it feels pretty good to me. An army with a few Cannons with field and splash damage 1 and 2, a handful of knights/lancers, some heavy skirmishers/cuirassiers with medic, and the authority heal on kill policy is scary good at pushing and killing units. The cannons and the skirmishers reduce their front line melee units to very low HP (but don't kill them), then your knights come in and can heal as much if not more HP than they'll lose killing the low HP enemies. Once you've killed a bunch of units, that your cannons lack extra range or CS multipliers against cities becomes pretty irrelevant as you can get a much more thorough surround, get more cannons in range, and you're not in as much of a rush to take the city.

For Sea units, it really depends. In the past I always went for the naval siege promotions on melee boats and the city CS promotions for ranged boats, but I've been experimenting with the other side of the tree and it feels quite good. Again, this experiment is also part of a unit-first approach to conquest, where boarding helps a ton because it keeps enemies in range of your ranged units, and the extra CS against land and naval units for your naval ranged units is just a direct buff to that playstyle.

Again, for bombers I had always gone siege into either range or logistics first (depending on geography), but I've been going for the other side of the tree more in my most recent games and it feels quite good. A unit-first approach for your bombers also means you're using them on average further from cities, which means a lower chance they'll be in interception range, which feels quite good.

I always stack medic on my two starting scouts and use them as healers the rest of the game.

I've found anti-unit siege and splash to both be very underwhelming, but given your experience I'll have to do a Korea game or something and try it out.

 

[Stalker0]

I always stack medic on my two starting scouts and use them as healers the rest of the game.

I've found anti-unit siege and splash to both be very underwhelming, but given your experience I'll have to do a Korea game or something and try it out.

Splash is actually really good for anti-ship siege. Both because the AI loses to amss blobs of ships later game, but also because Dauntless does not subtract from the splash damage (and that promotion becomes very common later in the game).