Protective Civs

[Aurelius321]

Ok... I've just bought BtS and have started playing Civ again. I've been playing Civ on and off since it's inception way back in the day.

I play Custom games on Noble and have played around with advanced start here and there. Out of the last four games I've played three have had Churchill as my nearest neighbor... Also the Neighbor who needs to get the ax for my expansion. Now usually I am a more peaceful player but I recognize the need for lots of military and some warlike tendencies to secure my boarders. Since I've been playing again I can't help but notice that I'm having a ***** of a time getting anywhere in a war with someone with Protective.

In the past I could win on Noble about %50 or %60 of the time. Now I'm having some issues. Advice with tactics against Protective?

 

[mnf]

I'm not a good player at all, but I find highly promoted (City Raider III) advanced units are the best way. With 0% city defense, you may be looking at 70% odds, but throw in one or two Barrage siege weapons and that odds suddenly goes up to 90%. So I suppose a tech lead is very important.

I still cringe when I see CGIII+Drill I defenders on a hilltop city, though.

 

[GoodGame]

Pretty much don't let them get settled, if you spot them moving in on territory to which you plan to expand. Otherwise you need siege weapons or a definite tech lead in unit types. Also pay attention to their city sites's terrain, and avoid attacking hill cities that have PRO archers/gunpowder units.

Attacking a PRO requires finesse, like spies to cause revolts, or destroy walls, and slow plundering of key resources and mines, to make the attrition work in your favor. Direct attacks will only work if you have a definite tech lead, or a huge numbers advantage.

 

[Aurelius321]

I was just considering attrition after this game I am currently playing. I have a SLIGHT tech and I had two giant stacks going against one city that was slightly to the south of my empire. By the time I got there and got his Defense down to %0 he had refortified the city, which originally had three Longbowmen with an insane stack of Macemen, Knights, Catapults, and more Longbowmen. I saved and tried several different ways of attacking and never had any effect.

What I could do is send smaller stacks of units against his other cities which were left relatively unprotected due to his concentration on the city where I had two giant stacks. That strategy will be good for his little cities but would fail against his larger more well defended ones.

I am considering trying attrition using several spies by destroying his strategic improvements and destroying specific city improvements like you've mentioned. I know he won't attack me since he is usually not a warmonger, however it will be difficult to get a significant lead over the other civs without taking his land.

 

[Rusty Edge]

As for strategy, I often find that protective civs make great buffers and cultivate them as allies. Another strategy is to pick a fight against another civ first, so that your army gains promotions to offset the protective ones.


As for tactics , per your original question,

*cut the roads to your intended target with horsemen ahead of time. Then you can kill the reinforcements en route rather than fortified.

* On the other hand, those protective promotions are less useful for retaking cities than the are for defending them , So you can take a city quickly, then fortify it well, and let him bleed himself in counter-attacks against it before you resume your offensive.

*Take extra siege and city raiders for each city because those protective promotions mean that you will often come up a strike or two short of winning each combat or a turn or two short of winning a battle.

 

[Aurelius321]

Nice with cutting the roads off before hand. Worth killing some obsolete riding unit for the trade off of cutting off some reinforcements.

Normally I wouldn't mind cultivating them as allies, but in the last three games Churchill was my closest/only real expansion room. Ack.

 

[zenspiderz]

The first rule of winning conflicts is to play your strenghts against your oppenents weakness. Protective's great strength is in city defense and ONLY in city defence. So don't go up against that strength. Hit them where they are weak. Where they are weak is in field military (unless protective is teamed up with aggressive or charasmatic as in togu and churchill). Thus assuming equivalent tech level, production, military size etc. dealing with protectives requires a two phased attack.

First phase pillage and harass. Send in dedicated pillager armies that DO NOT initiate attacks on protective's military and especially cities but only move around his territory pillaging everything in sight especially cottages. Do a thorough job aim to pillage every single improvement in one offensive.. Tactically combined arms are a must each pillager stack should include at least one counter to the protectives forces; spear/pike/elephant for mounted, axemen/macemen for melee/ and also mounted units to do the actual pillaging (2 move means they can move and pillage in one turn).

Don't put all your pillagers in one mega stack as they will be vulnerable to cats/cannon and less efficient at pillaging. Instead numerous small stacks of combined arms can avoid obliteration from massed cats and also pillage many more tiles per turn. Protective civs of course can send out troops to attack your pillagers but they have no special advantage when doing so and since to stop you pillaging they must go on the offensive most of the time your combined arms you will have the advantage of meeting the attacks with the best defender.

Use spies to sabotage well defended stategic resources such as iron mines on a hill guarded by guerilla promoted troops.

Once the protective's territory has been properly leveled sue for peace taking whatever techs or cash you can squeeze out of your opponent then leave half an age or so before going into stage 2. The pillaged protective's economy and production will be devastated and so you should pull ahead in tech and production. When a substantial lead is obtianed go in for the kill with the traditional SoD city raiders and take his cities. If all goes well you will be sending in rifles and cannon against his longbows and cats...

This is the most effective strategy but it does require using two distinctly different armies in terms of composition and promotion.

 

[Rusty Edge]

Sometimes you have no choice. Often you only have one other civ on your continent, and it's not big enough for both of you.

If it's a protective civ I'd probably go with the ax rush or Quecha's if you've got 'em , before Churchill or Toku or whoever has got walls and especially before the have longbows.

 

[Aurelius321]

Zen that is simply genius. I appreciate the time giving the advice.

 

[SickCycle]

Simple answer to a simple question..

Siege, Cats/Trebs/Cannons, it doesn't much matter if they have three garrison promotions if you drop a stack of cannons on the city before you attack you could take it with warriors..

 

[Aurelius321]

I had a pile of about 15 to 20 Treb and Cata plus incoming to keep up the attacks and yet still no effect. When the enemy has 30-50 units of a similar tech as you guarding the city it simply isn't a matter of mass artillery

 

[flyingchicken]

Bring in the siege units in small, protected stacks in the early game. Later on, you can opt to bring in massive air support (8+ bombers to a city, with lots of fighters).

EDIT: I would hardly find 20 siege vs 50 units a matter of "mass" artillery.

 

[Robovski]

Choke for 'teh Win'. Like it was said above, the big advantage of the Protective is in city defense, so don't do that (until you are good and ready). Kill units in the field. Tear up thier lawn - that is destroy thier improvements. Keep thier economy in pieces and build up a good attack army with plenty of seige and a couple of medics in the stack. Take those cities one at a time and you will get there in time.

 

[eXcel]

I will have to try Zen's tactic sometime, but

Siege, Cats/Trebs/Cannons, it doesn't much matter if they have three garrison promotions if you drop a stack of cannons on the city before you attack you could take it with warriors..

This is very true. I found that it is a very effective strategy to build a few siege units to sacrifice for each city you plan to take. Depending on the number of units in the city you may only need 1 or could be a lot more if you are on a gigantic map and marathon or whatever the slowest speed is. The result is that your attacking units become very strong (they rarely die), and taking cities matters much less on how many defenders the enemy has.