Protective Underestimated
- Thread starter kristopherb
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MrCynical
Deity
@Cutlass
The combat odds of Civ 4 have been tested an shown to be accurate - one occasion of getting the (slightly) less likely outcome is meaningless.
All the example there shows is that a combat IV unit has a higher chance than a Drill IV, Combat I (let alone a Drill IV unit) of winning that battle.
The combat odds of Civ 4 have been tested an shown to be accurate - one occasion of getting the (slightly) less likely outcome is meaningless.
All the example there shows is that a combat IV unit has a higher chance than a Drill IV, Combat I (let alone a Drill IV unit) of winning that battle.
Tlalynet:
To be perfectly fair, when you're up against an attack stack, there are three primary ways to neutralize it:
1. Exhaust it against better promoted dedicated defenders.
2. Take out the artillery with mounted units.
3. Dismantle it with toolkit units.
Protective's advantages mean that you really want to go for method 1 followed by methods 2 and 3 as secondary options. But really, you want to induce the enemy to target a Castled City without the benefit of his siege equipment.
Forts do take CG into account. IMX, if you have a vulnerable alleyway by which the enemy can rampage his way into your land, it's best to fortify the area by building a Fort on a hill, coupled with Guerilla and Drill CG defenders. You lose the production, but even as Aggressive, it's advisable to build the Fort when you're up against an attack stack you may not be able to take out in one go.
As Protective, it takes less units to take out an attack stack by "trapping" it - nothing but wide open plains except where your uber defensive troops are stationed. The choice is get killed wandering around on the plains without his siege, or suicide against uber defenders.
If you don't have Protective, you can't defend Forts and strong points with nearly the same amount of power. This means that the enemy occasionally has the opportunity to seize a hill or random Forest Preserve or Lumbermill, and then you're going to have a tough time of it.
To be perfectly fair, when you're up against an attack stack, there are three primary ways to neutralize it:
1. Exhaust it against better promoted dedicated defenders.
2. Take out the artillery with mounted units.
3. Dismantle it with toolkit units.
Protective's advantages mean that you really want to go for method 1 followed by methods 2 and 3 as secondary options. But really, you want to induce the enemy to target a Castled City without the benefit of his siege equipment.
Forts do take CG into account. IMX, if you have a vulnerable alleyway by which the enemy can rampage his way into your land, it's best to fortify the area by building a Fort on a hill, coupled with Guerilla and Drill CG defenders. You lose the production, but even as Aggressive, it's advisable to build the Fort when you're up against an attack stack you may not be able to take out in one go.
As Protective, it takes less units to take out an attack stack by "trapping" it - nothing but wide open plains except where your uber defensive troops are stationed. The choice is get killed wandering around on the plains without his siege, or suicide against uber defenders.
If you don't have Protective, you can't defend Forts and strong points with nearly the same amount of power. This means that the enemy occasionally has the opportunity to seize a hill or random Forest Preserve or Lumbermill, and then you're going to have a tough time of it.
After trying it once I got Hatesheput to smash up against a boarder fort. The behavior was a littles strange though, turn 1 they sent 1 tribuchet out of their stack to attack, turn 2 they sent a musketman, and turn 3 they sent the rest of the stack. They would have lost badly either way, but I cant figure out why they sent one unit at a time for two turns.
I think you really need forts to beef protective (as opposed to a generally strong point like a hill or forrest) because of the added CG value. Its really a very bad situation for the AI because the forts 25% bonus cant be broken down. The map I played on was continental so I didnt get to use it as much as I wanted to vs other opponents, so Im going to play a Pangaea next on a higher difficulty.
I played Toku by the way, and while I don't normally like to draft, Toku drafted musketmen can be very serious units, esp once the globe theater is set up. Even a stack of only muskets and cannons is not very vulnerable as nothing at that point gets a bonus vs them, a very good single unit stack esp if you promote them in differnet ways.
Rox,
Im not sure what you mean by getting trapped on a plains without seige. Flank attacks don't kill seige so far as I've seen, they could still be brought to the gates to break down defences. Either way I would so far say most AI's will suicide on fortified uber defenders rather than go furhter and pilladge. In my case the fort was on a hill next to a forrested hill that they could have walked onto instead of attacking my defenders.
It's usefullness against human opponents would have to be mesured in another way though.
I like it as a trait, though for my personal style I like Imp, Fin, and Cha beter.
As an afterthought, Ive been trying to put forts in the third ring of a cities culture whenever possible, so they dont lose any usefull tiles. In the last game I played my culutre was weak and it was directly in front of the city, they still crashed into the fort instead of going around to the city protected by 1 musket.
I think you really need forts to beef protective (as opposed to a generally strong point like a hill or forrest) because of the added CG value. Its really a very bad situation for the AI because the forts 25% bonus cant be broken down. The map I played on was continental so I didnt get to use it as much as I wanted to vs other opponents, so Im going to play a Pangaea next on a higher difficulty.
I played Toku by the way, and while I don't normally like to draft, Toku drafted musketmen can be very serious units, esp once the globe theater is set up. Even a stack of only muskets and cannons is not very vulnerable as nothing at that point gets a bonus vs them, a very good single unit stack esp if you promote them in differnet ways.
Rox,
Im not sure what you mean by getting trapped on a plains without seige. Flank attacks don't kill seige so far as I've seen, they could still be brought to the gates to break down defences. Either way I would so far say most AI's will suicide on fortified uber defenders rather than go furhter and pilladge. In my case the fort was on a hill next to a forrested hill that they could have walked onto instead of attacking my defenders.
It's usefullness against human opponents would have to be mesured in another way though.
I like it as a trait, though for my personal style I like Imp, Fin, and Cha beter.
As an afterthought, Ive been trying to put forts in the third ring of a cities culture whenever possible, so they dont lose any usefull tiles. In the last game I played my culutre was weak and it was directly in front of the city, they still crashed into the fort instead of going around to the city protected by 1 musket.
Wodan
Deity
Tlalynet, for flank attack to work, I believe you have to have the "correct" flanker unit. e.g., knights flank trebs but not cannon, an cavalry flank cannon but not trebs. Beats me why.
Also, I believe the mounted unit has to either win or retreat its attack. So, attacking and dying does nothing. So, if you're facing a combined arms stack with promoted pikemen/riflemen, then don't bother unless you've promoted with Flanking II (to give high retreat %) and maybe Tactics.
Wodan
Also, I believe the mounted unit has to either win or retreat its attack. So, attacking and dying does nothing. So, if you're facing a combined arms stack with promoted pikemen/riflemen, then don't bother unless you've promoted with Flanking II (to give high retreat %) and maybe Tactics.
Wodan
Wodan,
All I was saying is that flank attack does not kill seige units outright, it just takes a % of their HP away so they cant effectivly attack. Units get flank even if they die to do it, I've had to sacrifice quite a few knigts to wear them down.
I think the value of feint tactics is a bit underestimated in this discussion. I started a large monarch pangea playing Cre\Pro. A few things I've noticed.
The AI can be VERY stupid about forts. Ragnar crushed my four fort defenders with his monster stack, then moved in next to my city. I moved units out of the city (who's defence was reduced to something like 6% at the time) and to the fort. They choose to attack the fort... It bought me a few more recuting turns and helped me to survive.
In another case later on they did not do this (much to my shagrin). It was the same city, same fort, same opponent, newer tech units.
Ragnar, Elizibith, and Hammurabi all attacked the fort, did nothing, or beelined to the city, pilladging has thusfar not been a concern, but in every case I had a counterforce ready to mop up and invade their terratory as soon as their SoD was weak, so I dont know if they would switch to pilladge tactics after that.
The most usefull thing I've seen so far, is that the AI focueses almost entirely on its SoD, so I've been splitting CGIII\Drill units and agressive CR units. Once they get a tile into my territory it seems like they are commited to their seige, so I've thrice sent my aggressive stack to take a city while my defencive stack deals with their offence (the enemy is tough for me on Monarch, so I only had enough attackers to take one city)
High level protective units have proven themselves to me, I overexpanded and got laged in midevil tech, so I was in a Longbow\Mace\Cat Vs Knight\Trib\Musket war, and the longbows where very successfull. Later I beelined medicine to get a corportation and got stuck in a musket vs rifle war that I thought would sink me, but the AI's bad tactics bought me enough time to steal rifleing and mount a defence (darnded AP palace ended the war as soon as their SoD was beaten)
To sum I would say protective is good if you can wait a couple turns into the war to lure their attack to your strong defence, and then counterattack while their main force is busy. I got the great wall from Babylon fairly early on and oh the GG's!
All I was saying is that flank attack does not kill seige units outright, it just takes a % of their HP away so they cant effectivly attack. Units get flank even if they die to do it, I've had to sacrifice quite a few knigts to wear them down.
I think the value of feint tactics is a bit underestimated in this discussion. I started a large monarch pangea playing Cre\Pro. A few things I've noticed.
The AI can be VERY stupid about forts. Ragnar crushed my four fort defenders with his monster stack, then moved in next to my city. I moved units out of the city (who's defence was reduced to something like 6% at the time) and to the fort. They choose to attack the fort... It bought me a few more recuting turns and helped me to survive.
In another case later on they did not do this (much to my shagrin). It was the same city, same fort, same opponent, newer tech units.
Ragnar, Elizibith, and Hammurabi all attacked the fort, did nothing, or beelined to the city, pilladging has thusfar not been a concern, but in every case I had a counterforce ready to mop up and invade their terratory as soon as their SoD was weak, so I dont know if they would switch to pilladge tactics after that.
The most usefull thing I've seen so far, is that the AI focueses almost entirely on its SoD, so I've been splitting CGIII\Drill units and agressive CR units. Once they get a tile into my territory it seems like they are commited to their seige, so I've thrice sent my aggressive stack to take a city while my defencive stack deals with their offence (the enemy is tough for me on Monarch, so I only had enough attackers to take one city)
High level protective units have proven themselves to me, I overexpanded and got laged in midevil tech, so I was in a Longbow\Mace\Cat Vs Knight\Trib\Musket war, and the longbows where very successfull. Later I beelined medicine to get a corportation and got stuck in a musket vs rifle war that I thought would sink me, but the AI's bad tactics bought me enough time to steal rifleing and mount a defence (darnded AP palace ended the war as soon as their SoD was beaten)
To sum I would say protective is good if you can wait a couple turns into the war to lure their attack to your strong defence, and then counterattack while their main force is busy. I got the great wall from Babylon fairly early on and oh the GG's!
DigitalBoy
Emperor
- Joined
- Jun 29, 2006
- Messages
- 1,347
I think he means that Flanking units are more likely to survive and do flanking damage.
Diamondeye
So Happy I Could Die
Flanking is rather overpowered against the AI stacks that are 12 trebs and 2 defenders. Go knights! 
Diamondeye
So Happy I Could Die
Only on combat where the mounted unit survives
And yes, I fended 4 units off with an archer in a fort once in MP. Two catties, a sword and a chariot. Then a sword ate me.
And it's right that the first horse archer not necessarily damage all units, but keep attacking and you'll see
Hehe. I once held off something like 35 units on a Forted Hill chokepoint with 8 Cavalry and 4 Drill2 CG1 Guerilla2 Riflemen. It was absolute carnage once the Cannon were taken out of the picture. Not one unit died, every one of his killed - the WW was significant. After the third such stack died, he stopped sending over units. Either the AI got wise to me, or the WW was killing him so bad he couldn't afford to build the stacks anymore.
