Screw Scouts - build Warriors

[Tennyson]

I use the warrior to do a 360 around my city, while building a scout. Scout goes out and does a wider 360 beyond what the warrior has uncovered. The warrior goes after barb camps as the scout uncovers them. If I get lucky with an archer upgrade, the scout can do both. If there's more than one barb against my archer, I back off and wait for the warrior to use as a screen.

 

[Mutineer]

scout mach better then warriors, not only the move faster in average, they are mach cheaper and that faster to produce. They can easy take barbarian camp usually by using some strategy.

if they can not do it them self, then because of there faster movement they let you to concentrate forces, add support to your single warrior. Do not forget about flanking bonuses, which stack.
You scout even do not need to attack, move next to barbarian and make you warrior attack 15 % stronger. Attack with warrior and even if warrior can not kill barbarian outright, now scout with flanking bonus can kill weakened barbarian.

I tend to produce 2 scout at start.

 

[Pragmatic]

- I am not wasting a policy just to make my scouts able to defend themselves against barbarians. I'd rather have warriors who can fight - and some other policy.

I'm by no means an expert in Civ (nor a very proficient amateur... ).

But the policy helps you against barbarians throughout the game. Yes, Scouts + Honor > Brutes. And Warriors + Honor > > Brutes. But the barbarian encampments continue to pop up and they produce units that are the equal of what the highest-tech civilization can produce (though I think not the ones that require Strat resources).

So, as you explore, will your Warrior be better than a Spearman? How about a Pikeman? Honor lets you have a few dozen more turns of exploring with a unit before you have to send it back for an upgrade.

At least that's my more-or-less (emphasis on less...) opinion on the matter.

 

[taltamir]

What the hell are you talking about, archers and scouts dieing to the AI wow you must be blind or ********

blind, sometimes you get blindsided by a faster unit from outside your view range (such as a horse mounted unit, traveling by road).
Alternatively, on occasion, on limited access cities (by terrain), you must get really close and personal if you want to conquer them.
Then there is the case where there is a troop ON the city's square. An archer has a range of 2, if it wants to participate then it WILL be in range of the troop in the city. To avoid having it killed you must barricade it with a line of warriors, or you must leave it out of that fight.

But its really rare. Typically its just a matter of them not being nearly as effective in cost/benefit ratio.

What difficulty are you playing where you can steamroll AIs with 3-4 warriors? Especially assuming it'll take a few extra turns to locate their cities with warriors instead of a faster scout?

1. the scout isn't faster, it just doesn't take penalty from moving through rough terrain. So move across non rough terrain.
2. If you have 3-4 warriors you don't have problems locating enemies.
3. you don't steamroll with 3-4 warriors... thats the MINIMUM you should bring to attack a city at the beginning of the game.
You start rolling over enemies when its your swordsman vs their warriors and archers. it really picks up when its your longswordsman vs their their warriors.
4. I play on prince.

STOP TELLING ME HOW TO PLAY MY GAME!

scout first btw

nobody ever told you how to play. We are discussing the merits of strategy A vs strategy B. Use whichever you like.
Also, don't yell.

I'm by no means an expert in Civ (nor a very proficient amateur... ).

But the policy helps you against barbarians throughout the game.

barbarians are weak enough that you don't need help against them. Pick any other policy and it is better... at least go for tradition for the +33% wonder

 

[Pragmatic]

In general, scouts seem to be valuable only in the starting part of the game.

When you're exploring, and the barbarians are still only brutes, you can discover the encampments and avoid them, then make a beeline for the ruins (hoping they aren't next to an encampment). If your scout is doing any fighting, you're doing something wrong...

But aside from having one scout out exploring, I don't bother...

 

[Bhruic]

Scouts are a valuable source of gold. For a measily 25 hammers, you get 10 gold via deletion.

Bh

 

[Martin Alvito]

Bad trade. 25H is about 110G on rush buys. Plus the unit has upkeep. But that's a good way of extracting everything you can from your Scout once you're done exploring.

 

[jayjackson]

blind, sometimes you get blindsided by a faster unit from outside your view range (such as a horse mounted unit, traveling by road).
Alternatively, on occasion, on limited access cities (by terrain), you must get really close and personal if you want to conquer them.
Then there is the case where there is a troop ON the city's square. An archer has a range of 2, if it wants to participate then it WILL be in range of the troop in the city. To avoid having it killed you must barricade it with a line of warriors, or you must leave it out of that fight.

But its really rare. Typically its just a matter of them not being nearly as effective in cost/benefit ratio.

You make it sound as if warriors don't get blindsided by the same units. Usually in your "blindside" attack scenario, the warrior is dying too, so that argument is for naught.

1. the scout isn't faster, it just doesn't take penalty from moving through rough terrain. So move across non rough terrain.

We've all forgotten that you know exactly where the terrain will be, and if it is rough or not. There's a reason that Hiawatha starts with the trait he does, the fact that it is actually USEFUL to be able to move through terrain, as there's a LOT of rough terrain. Quit minimalizing other strategies by claiming some sort of omniscience about the maps you play.

2. If you have 3-4 warriors you don't have problems locating enemies.

3. you don't steamroll with 3-4 warriors... thats the MINIMUM you should bring to attack a city at the beginning of the game.

The AI is building as well. How undeveloped is your land with this warrior-warrior-warrior strategy? You can't be making much in the way of gold, or else you can't really expect warriors to be relevant for much longer than an extreme rush situation. Under IDEAL circumstances, I can see MAYBE taking 2 cities. And you are acting as if the annexation penalty wouldn't be higher on levels higher than Prince and make this kind of REXing damn near impossible, and RISKY.

You start rolling over enemies when its your swordsman vs their warriors and archers. it really picks up when its your longswordsman vs their their warriors.
4. I play on prince.

Seeing that research is defined strictly by population, anyone can tech to swords/longswords. This does not diminish the intrinsic values of the early game scout build. Your movement ability, and the ability to upgrade into an archer from a ruin you will PROBABLY get to first are excellent reasons to favor the build. I agree with other posters in saying that weapons upgrades are quite common, and even moreso *when you are getting to more ruins!*

The only thing you really have going in your favor is that you have made it blatantly apparent that you play as a warmonger. We get it, warriors are a little bit stronger. That is truly their only advantage in the hands of even an average human.

nobody ever told you how to play. We are discussing the merits of strategy A vs strategy B. Use whichever you like.
Also, don't yell.

He was joking, and I'll have you know it was your general tone that sparked me to reply to you, so step off the high horse when telling people how to speak. Thanks.

barbarians are weak enough that you don't need help against them. Pick any other policy and it is better... at least go for tradition for the +33% wonder

Every social policy in the early game has a place depending on your place in the early game.

 

[Deckhand]

Many people enjoy the exploration part of the game.
Scouts are good explorers.

 

[Dumanios]

And besides, if your lucky, a scout can become a fast archer, crossbowman, rifleman...

 

[taltamir]

You make it sound as if warriors don't get blindsided by the same units. Usually in your "blindside" attack scenario, the warrior is dying too, so that argument is for naught.

No I don't, I make it sound like a warrior can survive being blindsided... not only that, it can even WIN the fight. Especially if it is an upgraded warrior, on a hill... Archers do terrible when attacked by a melee unit.

and anyways, its rare enough as to matter little. Its most the cost/benefit analysis, not the fact you will lose some on a blue moon if the stars align.

We've all forgotten that you know exactly where the terrain will be, and if it is rough or not. There's a reason that Hiawatha starts with the trait he does, the fact that it is actually USEFUL to be able to move through terrain, as there's a LOT of rough terrain. Quit minimalizing other strategies by claiming some sort of omniscience about the maps you play.

Huh? I just move square by square. Exploring shows me where to go next. Although I will admit on occasion you get forced to go through a rough spot and waste 1 move.

The AI is building as well. How undeveloped is your land with this warrior-warrior-warrior strategy? You can't be making much in the way of gold, or else you can't really expect warriors to be relevant for much longer than an extreme rush situation.

A warrior is 40 hammers and a pittance of gold. I build 2 and buy 1 for a total of 4. When I conquer I get extra cities (puppet) AND workers for "free" (the AI paid for them) AND money. I get more workers faster by building warriors than by building workers.

 

[agentkirb]

A scout obviously isn't good for the Warrior-zerging strategy. But for basically any other opening strategy, the Scout is a viable building option (basically any strategy that doesn't involve early combat).

There is nothing a Warrior can do to beat a scout in exploring. The most effective way to explore is to follow the coastline, and if you are being forced to avoid hills... you might not be able to do that really. As the warrior player you have to hope the scout runs into a ton of barb camps because that's the only thing that is going to force them into another direction.

Which brings me to another point, who are these stupid players losing their scouts to barbarians early in the game? Especially if scouts can go through rough terrain (rough meaning +def bonus terrain), and you should have the ability to see further every so often if you are moving onto hills (another underrated aspect of this debate, because Warriors can't move fast over hills)... you just shouldn't be losing your scouts to barbarians.

And now that we have that out of the way, two separate early game strategies. Both give you gold/tech/advantages in their own way. I don't really see the point of saying one is better than the other overall when clearly one is better for a certain early game strategy while the same goes for the other. Scouts are clearly not useless pieces.

 

[bhavv]

Scouts + Survivalism + ignoring terrain movement costs = If your scout gets killed, your a noobcake.

However, I prefer to turn ruins off, and not build either warriors or scouts, because monument > worker > settler > wonder spam is a far more powerful opening strategy as opposed to building anymore units.

 

[Udey1]

No I don't, I make it sound like a warrior can survive being blindsided... not only that, it can even WIN the fight. Especially if it is an upgraded warrior, on a hill... Archers do terrible when attacked by a melee unit.


and anyways, its rare enough as to matter little. Its most the cost/benefit analysis, not the fact you will lose some on a blue moon if the stars align.

I play continents or pangea on standard settings. I have yet to be attacked by an civ AI before my scout is:
1. upgraded (because of all the huts it unlocked. because it has a terrain bonus...)
2. obsolete since the map is explored.
3. disbanded already. BTW I have never been blindsided by barbs with horses. (do they even spawn horses? ive logged about 5 games through and i havent encountered them)

So are you playing on standard settings? or stopping your scouts in dumb spots and auto-declaring war on an AI?

Huh? I just move square by square. Exploring shows me where to go next. Although I will admit on occasion you get forced to go through a rough spot and waste 1 move.

Once again- the previous rebuttal in the earlier has you beaten. Standard settings are full of thick forest and many hills with no flat terrain workarounds. What maps are you playing that are set up with nicely spaced hills and forests? Exploration is a race- lost moves certainly aren't great. Sometimes culture expands and cuts off terrain, or the huts can be gone if your not first.

A warrior is 40 hammers and a pittance of gold. I build 2 and buy 1 for a total of 4. When I conquer I get extra cities (puppet) AND workers for "free" (the AI paid for them) AND money. I get more workers faster by building warriors than by building workers.

This plain wont work most of the time. forget it on high levels- AI probably has several chariot archers pop out.If you have an example of something you do you should post the difficulty on which you do it on because this is not plausible on all levels


Scout first is better hands down- This is page three now. So no use re-posting what everyone else just said- I say "The evidence is clear."

 

[ShaqFu]

There's a reason that Hiawatha starts with the trait he does, the fact that it is actually USEFUL to be able to move through terrain, as there's a LOT of rough terrain.

I'm curious, now, if it's ever worth building Scouts as Hiawatha, given the Great Warpath move bonus. Scouts still outdo Warriors over hills/rivers, but by giving Warriors some rough terrain mobility, it might make Warrior first the right call.

 

[Sainhann]

yeah scouts blow

Get them into a Ruin and get the weapon upgrade and then you got an uber Archer unit.

My current game has two of these units and between them they have killed lots of brutes.

Plus if they get into a tight situation they can get out of it due to their fast rate of movement.

I would much rather build Scouts than Warriors.

Plus I play on Huge or Large maps and that is alot of ground to cover and Scouts do this far better than Warriors.

 

[cembandit]

1 Scout
Sometimes 2

 

[Ahriman]

4. I play on prince.

Ok, you officially just lost all credibility.

Go play on Immortal and then come back and tell us that warriors are better than a mix with an archer.
On higher difficulty levels, efficiency is much more important. You need to be able to fight off large numbers of enemy troops while taking minimal damage. You can't do that with melee only.

If your archers are getting killed, you're doing it wrong.

 

[MaXimillionZero]

I'm curious, now, if it's ever worth building Scouts as Hiawatha, given the Great Warpath move bonus.

Which only applies in your own territory.

 

[Udey1]

Ok, you officially just lost all credibility.

Go play on Immortal and then come back and tell us that warriors are better than a mix with an archer.
On higher difficulty levels, efficiency is much more important. You need to be able to fight off large numbers of enemy troops while taking minimal damage. You can't do that with melee only.

If your archers are getting killed, you're doing it wrong.

I missed his post on his level. Of course junk strat and anything you do works on prince currently. The AI cant even handle itself on immortal yet.