Seems like it's better just to build warriors

[Mesix]

My standard build order is 2x scouts followed by 4x slingers. The scouts explore, and the slingers along with the warrior bust up barbs. Once I kill the first barb with a slinger and get the eureka for archery, they upgrade to archers and roll the two closest neighbors. 4x archers with 2x warriors (upgraded to swordsmen when available) can really wreak some havoc in the early game. I DOW the first enemy in the ancient era and the second not long into the classical era.

 

[Archon_Wing]

If a neighboring player has iron and notices you do not he most likely will go for the quick kill, I guess against AI's who are a lot less ruthless than human players you could get away with it?

Which is as it should be, as if it's game over if you don't get a particular strategic resource, that's bad game design. Civ 6 has that right, for single player at least.

It actually kinda is game over; it's just the AI is too stupid to take advantage of it.

I guess you could protect your city, but you have no way of stopping the enemy from pillaging everything and they can stop you from expanding a lot easier than you can stop them. And it only snowballs as tech levels increase.

I mean sure you could have a civ with a combat advantage and rainforest hills surrounding your locations but in most cases I just can't see how you could win against an opponent that's even mildly interested in winning.

I think these things become readily apparent when the AI does take advantage of the unfair situation like say Montezuma is right next to you and attacks with 6 eagles. Even if you survive, your opening is completely hosed. And opening slingers would have been an autoloss.

And they've only recently changed the AI so it can take cities. If it ever learns to actually play, I'd imagine there would be more unwinnable situations if they keep this level of bonus.

That being said, IMO, without balanced resources, a game should not be considered a competitive one.

 

[NukeAJS]

I generally agree with the caveats that -- you don't expect a barb problem in the first 20-30 turns (usually a guess more than anything but can be deduced by geography). You are going to get animal husbandry first (usually because of an archery beeline). You think you'll have ~135 gold when you complete archery.

If you can satisfy these conditions -- it's probably a good idea to build at least three slingers. If you can't satisfy these conditions -- the safe play is to build warriors.

I used to almost always build three slingers right off the bat because ... I dunno. I just wasn't thinking. Bad habits and all that. Nowadays, getting warriors out is the conservative play and slingers is the conditional one.

 

[Spudsie74]

Seems to be a big difference in styles between AI vs On-Line. I'd be interested to try head to head, but am concerned about 1) How long it takes and 2) Do I have enough PC to do it properly? Also I have R&F but not all DLC nations (Nubia and 2 others). Finally, I know the AI is dumb, but how different is heads up w/selected rules and online speed? Probably belongs in a new thread, but, "It is different w/online," comes up a LOT in these discussions.

 

[Chorazin]

It actually kinda is game over; it's just the AI is too stupid to take advantage of it.

I guess you could protect your city, but you have no way of stopping the enemy from pillaging everything and they can stop you from expanding a lot easier than you can stop them. And it only snowballs as tech levels increase.

I mean sure you could have a civ with a combat advantage and rainforest hills surrounding your locations but in most cases I just can't see how you could win against an opponent that's even mildly interested in winning.

I think these things become readily apparent when the AI does take advantage of the unfair situation like say Montezuma is right next to you and attacks with 6 eagles. Even if you survive, your opening is completely hosed. And opening slingers would have been an autoloss.

And they've only recently changed the AI so it can take cities. If it ever learns to actually play, I'd imagine there would be more unwinnable situations if they keep this level of bonus.

That being said, IMO, without balanced resources, a game should not be considered a competitive one.

I try and play more than just 2 ppl H2H games, so its more multiplay. In these scenarios you have to take into consideration that if you do try and attack someone because you say have a resource edge over that person. And another player not involved in the conflict notices you have moved your troops away from your cities to attack, you are ripe to be plundered. He might be able to steal a city by the time you pull your troops back from pillaging/attacking another player to protect yourself, especially slow swordsmen. Geographic location can play a big part in early land wars as well. If you have a coastline on one side and say a mountain range on another border securing you, being planted square in the middle with vast open plains around you is rough. So there is more to it than just I have Iron and you do not, sometimes it can end this way when you are on a small continent and the other players spawn elsewhere. But the fight over the iron mine is crazy generally, horses are great for getting in to pillage it and getting out. Or if it's in between two ppl and there is just a massive war right on top of it.

 

[x2Madda]

With all this talk of early warriors, am I the only one who feels the encampment district comes too late? Most of my military is built right out the gate, early conquest and all that and any military after that is usually just to compound my snowballing effect anyway. Should encampment be a base district without need of research?

 

[Chefofrats]

The game tries to be at least somewhat historical and there were no organized armies in 4000 BC, so the idea of an encampment district so early would be ludicrous. What's more, an Encampment really doesn't make a big difference in creating an army, the experience bonus from barracks and later buildings is nice but it is nowhere near necessary to wage war effectively.

 

[Trav'ling Canuck]

With all this talk of early warriors, am I the only one who feels the encampment district comes too late? Most of my military is built right out the gate, early conquest and all that and any military after that is usually just to compound my snowballing effect anyway. Should encampment be a base district without need of research?

Tough call. I find that Encampments are mostly valuable for the culture/science boosts they and their buildings/units give, for which you only want one. They're actually a penalty in the mid-game, in a way, since with one strategic resource you can't build an anachronistic unit in that city and then upgrade, which is almost always more efficient, resource-wise, than building a modern unit. Other than one for the boosts, there's almost always some other district that's more useful to use a district slot on.

If you make them available from the beginning of the game, I'm not sure a lot changes. If playing Immortal/Deity, you'd still not be able to safely delay building your army while you completed an Encampment first. So your choice becomes whether to build one instead of a starting Builder or instead of a Settler once you reach Pop 2, assuming you're on a map that otherwise allows you to delay building your army until you've got both of these out. I guess that opens up a pure warmonger strategy, but I'm not sure early warmongering needs a boost.

 

[megabearsfan]

Slinger's upgrade to archers at a very low price point and can because an archer army with a lot of destructive power much more quickly if you build them as slingers first

This. I often like to build 3 slingers fairly early. I'll also build a Warrior or 2 as well. Slingers upgrade to Archers cheap, and once you have 3 Archers, you get the tech boost for Machinery.

 

[liv]

I build warriors but I think it is just because I am not very good at deity archer rushes so I rely on melee units more. By the time I get to cities they will have archers and walls and my archers are too vulnerable. But still trying to improve my early deity campaign methods. More chopping and speed required I think

 

[BarbarianHunter]

I think the trick to early game deity is not to get too greedy. If you can rush archery and take a city or two, why not? Peace out, take the reparations gold, and use the resources you would have devoted to warriors and sword upgrades on builders for lux resources and mines to build an encampment and stable for the single horse pasture you may or may not find. Then go out conquering. Then again, I used to have very little luck with horses, but have learned. Perhaps I might have some luck with warriors as well. I still say unless your infantry unit is unique (or upgrades to a unique), cav is always better.

 

[Leathaface]

I usually produce 4 slingers then upgrade them into archers. I don't produce any warriors, I just keep the one I start with. I only produce more warriors if I intend to take cities, but that is rare.

Though since moving up to Immortal i've started to produce Spearmen, aim to get the Eureka for Military Tactics and upgrade them to Pikemen ASAP. I found Knights in the early medieval era are a very dangerous threat against me.

 

[Socrates99]

I build three right away. I rarely have trouble getting the eureka and they're cheap to upgrade. Then it's two more warriors since rivers can make it hard for two warriors to siege a city and a third comes in handy. Then after that I'll either finish out my early army with chariots to upgrade to knights or horsemen depending on resources.

Archers are handy for whittling down deity troops before your warriors finish them off. I find with just warriors the str advantage can be tough to overcome.I

So, a combined approach? Melee is definitely more useful for quite a while though. Bombards and artillery are where I generally go back to spamming ranged units.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

I usually start my new city on a warrior. I know that's probably a bit later then what you're talking about here.

 

[Canadian Bluebeer]

If I have a coastal city, I always get a slinger for them (upgrd to archer).
More for the pesky barbarian boats that keep coming along.

 

[MarigoldRan]

If you're Nubia, slingers are ALWAYS better than warriors.

 

[Disgustipated]

And Kongo/Persia should build warriors.

 

[acluewithout]

And Kongo/Persia should build warriors.

I’m not sure if you’re being funny.

Immortals are better than Swordsmen, but only every alternate patch where they’re not bugged.

But Mvemba’s unique Swordsmen are weaker than normal swordsmen (or they were when I last checked). It looks like it was a bug from when Swordsmen got nerfed then buffed (or was that the other way around).

Stuff that Mvembas unit not getting fixed, or English ships losing their +1 movement when you upgrade, really bug me. Worse, I then feel petty. But seriously: the numbers matter.

 

[Disgustipated]

But Mvemba’s unique Swordsmen are weaker than normal swordsmen (or they were when I last checked). It looks like it was a bug from when Swordsmen got nerfed then buffed (or was that the other way around).

Aren't they cheaper though? I can't remember. I admit they are a bit useless as a UU. But that's because I play peaceful games with them anyways. Maybe they thought the faster jungle movement was worth it (it's not).

Immortals are pretty cool. Especially since I figured out how to actually use them in a melee attack. It's not very apparent.

 

[BarbarianHunter]

Aren't they cheaper though? I can't remember. I admit they are a bit useless as a UU. But that's because I play peaceful games with them anyways. Maybe they thought the faster jungle movement was worth it (it's not).

Immortals are pretty cool. Especially since I figured out how to actually use them in a melee attack. It's not very apparent.

I became disenchanted with the immortal unit when I sent one off to clear a barb camp. Got close, sat him on a hill and fortified, and then the barb brought him to the red zone (even after the +10 from healing). The barb then proceeded to chase my famed immortal 10 tiles back near a city where a crossbowman dispatched him then went off to clear the barb camp proper.

I won’t build them. And I certainly don’t go out of my way to build a bunch of warriors to upgrade. I’ll use the production elsewhere: Districts, builders, archers, swords, horses. Almost anything but these so called “immortals,” which are quite frankly anything but immortal.