I decided to mod my protective to also have a 50% production boost to the Great Wall and Chichen Itza. Of course, I then decided to abuse the hell out of it by playing Qin Shi Huang with Raging Barbarians and building the GW in 3 turns. I kind of like the idea of Qin Shi Huang getting first dibbs on the GW, but does anyone feel these changes make Protective (or rather leaders with Protective) too strong?
Protective Trait-- Underrated?
- Thread starter PreLynMax
- Start date
Not really, GW is easy to build if you beeline for it and chop a forest or two, even on immortal and diety. And some people would not like it anyway as they don't want their first GP to be Great Spy.
Chichenitza is not that much important, it will just take AI an extra turn or two to bombard you. And you still need to have tech before AIs or they will get it.
Chichenitza is not that much important, it will just take AI an extra turn or two to bombard you. And you still need to have tech before AIs or they will get it.
Wodan
Deity
Obviously you've never had the Chicken Pizza with all the trimmings.
I don't usually bother with it myself, but I distinctly recall one game where I had a nice bottleneck and I purposefully put all farms over on the other side of my city (so I didn't have to fear pillagers too much), and built the 'itza. This was back with version... umm, don't remember which version of BetterAI but it was the one with the godawful stacks that the AI would build up. And they just bounced off my city like a rubber ball. The siege couldn't even dent it, so the AI gave up and attacked, probably incentivized by the fact that I only had a couple of Drill longbows there. But they killed something like 50 units apiece in a single battle. My jaw literally dropped.
I was figuring my longbows would take a bunch of bad guys with them and I was rallying troops to retake the city. Much to my surprise (and my troops' surprise) they could go back to drinking beer back in my heartland cities.
The tectonics map script makes PRO slightly better because there are better chokepoints (with mountain chains and such) that allow one to more effectively defend from within key cities and just absolutely shred offensive stacks while on the defense for cheap like in the example above. I was playing a marathon tectonics map game in FfH2, and I had raging barbarians on (the barbarians are already beefed up in FfH2 (also with marathon), so this was just like all-out carnage!), but luckily I was able to put a hilled city at the only nearby entrance through a mountain chain to my main territory, and I was just shredding the barbarian warriors left and right, occasionally losing like 1 or 2 of my warriors due to sheer numbers and not being able to heal quickly enough. If I had encountered a similar situation playing the tectonics script in regular civ and had had the protective trait, that would have been soooo useful...CG3 D1 archers in no time, cheap walls---just shredding early attackers and barbarians for a cheap cost.
Yeah I noticed in a recent game that barbarians will even attack your cities, almost without thought, when their odds are not even 0.1%.
obsolete
Deity
Yes, I love them, the same with Drill IV.
I already posted this in POM's strategy thread, but here's a real shot from a real game going on now. Thanks to Vassalage and Theo (or a GG if you can't Run Theo. civic) I have Drill IV LongBows coming out of the gates of my cities. I haven't even lost one yet and we're stuck in a perm-war map.
I have SIX whopping promotions coming straight out of the gates... I may even throw in a Guerilla III just for kicks, but I have strong doubts against such a promotion.
Where does your sixth promotion come from? A random event?
PreLynMax
Your Lord and Master
I added some small additions to the Protective trait to add esionage enhancments to make it less usless:
Content in bold is changed or enhanced content.
-+100
-Free Promotions (City Garrison I, Drill I)
-Archery Units
-Gunpowder Units
-Clone Units
-Double Production Speed of Walls, Castle, Archery Range, Jail, Intelligence Agency, Security Bureau
-+1 to Walls
-+2 to Castle
Content in bold is changed or enhanced content.
-+100
-Free Promotions (City Garrison I, Drill I)
-Archery Units
-Gunpowder Units
-Clone Units
-Double Production Speed of Walls, Castle, Archery Range, Jail, Intelligence Agency, Security Bureau
-+1 to Walls
-+2 to Castle
Did you add+100
just for having the trait? is that per turn? in general is just too easy to abuse to begin with. You can get more techs from a single espionage infiltration than you can from bulbing and trading. Especially if there is a dominant tech leader. And it is much more reliable if you have completely crashed your economy. In my current game I was at 0% research and producing less than 20 beakers per turn for a significant time while I crawled towards CoL. Once i got CoL i whipped courthouses and then waited another eternity for a great Person. I popped a GS first and everyone had the tech he could bulb (I was that far behind) so i built an academy and waited and waited for my next Great person. I was only running 2 scientists and 1 spy to increase the chances of a Great Spy. Infiltrated the tech leader and I am almost at tech parity at this point and am 2 turns from winning the Lib race.Did you add+100
Impressive. But if you were only pulling in around 20 beakers, is an academy the best use of a great scientist that early? This situation happens to me all the time with early great scientists, and settling them for a hammer and base science increase just seems a better use if you don't want to bulb .. ?
PreLynMax
Your Lord and Master
I apologize. it was supposed to be 100% , not +100. Techinally, it was supposed to double your EP, and make the Protective trait a vaulable spy monger trait in the late game.
Furthermore, I removed the High Walls additions to the list, this was included in the mod I was playing, and not included in vanilla BTS or any other mod.
@Bostock
You wont find it in any mod on this site, I altered the trait myself, however, if you want the mod (as well as the altered Pro trait), I attend to pack it up and ship it as Chinyu's Extra Mod.
, not +100. Techinally, it was supposed to double your EP, and make the Protective trait a vaulable spy monger trait in the late game.Furthermore, I removed the High Walls additions to the list, this was included in the mod I was playing, and not included in vanilla BTS or any other mod.
@Bostock
You wont find it in any mod on this site, I altered the trait myself, however, if you want the mod (as well as the altered Pro trait), I attend to pack it up and ship it as Chinyu's Extra Mod.
I apologize. it was supposed to be 100%
Furthermore, I removed the High Walls additions to the list, this was included in the mod I was playing, and not included in vanilla BTS or any other mod.
@Bostock
You wont find it in any mod on this site, I altered the trait myself, however, if you want the mod (as well as the altered Pro trait), I attend to pack it up and ship it as Chinyu's Extra Mod.
Late game? +100% is huge early. Especially with Gilgamesh (protective, extra early courthouse) It is essentially granting a great spy to every city you ever have.
My capital was producing quite a lot of commerce. Once i could research/steal currency I could build wealth in my production cities. I was too broke to build units. I was so broke that I had to switch every single citizen to a commerce producing tile. Even my production cities were working unimproved riverside plains just for the 1 coin. I couldn't even spare a citizen to switch to a specialist for beakers. it was grim....very very grim. It was a side effect of being forced to keep GK's to cities that had ivory. He had just finished construction and already had HBR....no way i am letting him build Ger boosted WE.
Once I got currency my money woes were gone and I jacked the slider all the way to FORTY percent. The academy provided way more beakers than a settled scientist would have.
noto2
Emperor
- Joined
- Jul 11, 2008
- Messages
- 1,715
I agree that the protective trait should have more fast buildings. Why don't bunkers, bomb shelters, and intel agencies benefit from protective? Additionally, getting an EP boost from the trait would probably be a good idea, since the trait is the absolute worst in the game, IMO. That said, as Civcorpse pointed out, EP can be abused, so the boost would have to be small, limited to something like +2 EP per jail built (for +4), or maybe even +1 or +2 per barracks (but those come early so that would be a HUGE advantage). However, this is all pie in the sky since Firaxis seems done with this game. Only wishful thinking now. Sigh...I never really get any use out of PRO unless Xbows are for some reason important in a particular game...and it's somewhat useful for gunpowder units. But the real power of AGR is that it's helpful IMMEDIATELY. It helps with that first war. PRO not necessarily so. Oh, and think about this - if Shaka invades you in the early game with a big stack of swords, axes, and impis, which would you rather have, AGR boosted shock axes, or PRO boosted archers? At least with the AGR trait you can have shock axes to match his units (or beat them if they aren't shock), but PRO archers won't hold your cities. The PRO trait sucks donkey balls. Terrible, terrible trait. Some leaders that have it are still good because of their other trait and UB/UU, like Churchill or even Wang, but the PRO trait makes some leaders a lot worse than they could have been, like the Chinese leaders and Gilgamesh. What a waste. Gilga could have been a beast for the player, not just the comp. As for now, it's only useful to the AI.
CornPlanter
Emperor
Last time I played with PRO leader it was I who invented Shaka with a stack of PRO Longbowmen. Shaka lost half his army trying to defeat my stacks on the way (ussually on the hills and in the forests). By the time my stacks have reached his cities they were insanely promoted and made short work of everything and everybody (meaning Impis, Swordsmen, Axemen and workers with their wives).
The problem is, PRO just doesn't fit your play style. Philosophical is equally bad if you never go for Great Persons. E.g. by the same rationale: "By the time Shaka invades you in early game with a big stack of swords, which would you rather have, a stack of Aggro Axemen or those two great scientists at the capital?"
For their cost, archers are going to defend your cities better than axemen will. They do remarkably well when they have even few promotions (especially well when they get D1/CG1 free to start). If I was invaded by Shaka early with the units you mentioned I'd rather thave 7 archers than 5 axes (equal costs), especially if they're behind a city wall which I was able to whip almost instantly becuase it's dirt cheap. Of course, when the enemy starts using siege units you need to be a bit more cunning than using only archery units, but when siege come into play so do longbows and crossbows.
I find it strange you consider the Chinese leaders to be examples of weak PRO leaders. They are possibly the best two PRO leaders. Surviving hordes of barb axemen and spearmen (which you get at Emp+) is easy when you put a city on a hill near where they'll come from, and put 1 or 2 archers there. They'll take down every one of those sucker barbs that comes their way.
PreLynMax
Your Lord and Master
...The problem is, PRO just doesn't fit your play style. Philosophical is equally bad if you never go for Great Persons. E.g. by the same rationale: "By the time Shaka invades you in early game with a big stack of swords, which would you rather have, a stack of Aggro Axemen or those two great scientists at the capital?"
@noto2
This is why I choose a Pro leader than an Agg leader. It just dosen't fit my style, and I almost never can whip enough of an army to go on an offensive while maintaining a stable ecomony. For the same cost, I would've build a bunch of archers and sit and laugh at your stack of axemen die while you unnessarly and unpractically sacrifice your army. Not only will you will be outnumbered, but you will have the odds stacked against you with massive defensive bonuses against you.
While you recover from your shock of losing your army, I would've already started marching my 4 stack of strength axemen protected by 5 stacks of (at that time) D2/CG3 archers up your borders.
Now do you think such a trait is that bad?
I've also been in situations where the only way to keep afloat is to micromanage each city for each measly coin. It's not pretty but like you say it is essential at times to stretch yourself that far. What I am torn by though is how useful the academy is before your economy gets back on track. At 40% science I can see that it would be useful - you only need to be pulling in >18 base science in a city for an academy to outshine the base science boost of a settled scientist. Thing is, until your economy recovers the academy is multiplying very few beakers, and at that moment a settled scientist can nearly double your entire empire's science (I think you said you were pulling in 20 beakers overall) not to mention the free hammer. The academy is a long-term solution, but when I'm up against it and clinging on to every single coin I just wonder whether a settled scientist wouldn't help you out of the economic black hole faster than an academy. From then on the academy might win, but my priority is just to get the economy on track.
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