Tanks or Planes? You make the call!

[BlackFiend]

What would you research next...

I hit the Theory of Evol and spiked all the way to get Electronics (and the Hoover Dam!)

My rival country, the chinese, are able to research marginally quicker than I can. Despite a tech lead, they've been able to catch up with me except for the Atomic/Electronics route.

We both just got combustion.

I am torn to go for tanks, or go for flight. If I hit flight first (and this is my first CIV 3 GAME getting this far, beleive it or not), is flight sufficient enough with bomber and jet to mass produce and beat him to the ground?

I am guessing he will also go for flight since it will be 10 to 15 turns before he gets tanks. So perhaps its wisest for me to get the tanks, mass produce in time to begin the Great War between the titans. But first I trade him for flight at whatever cost.

Is this wise? Or should I just strike for flight first and pray he starts going for Tanks. If he does, I've got him dead to rights with flight in 6 rounds of research, and 10 rounds to begin the grand production of craft.

I'm also going to dabble and use my open ended war to try out mobilization. If I can hit flight first, I'm gunning to make as many as I can and really put a hurting on him. But I may be naive since, like I said...I've never played with flight in CIV 3. (The few games I've played were over by the end of industrial and the cav. On lowered game settings and small maps of course.)

This is vanilla by the way.

 

[Sweetchuck]

What would you research next...

I hit the Theory of Evol and spiked all the way to get Electronics (and the Hoover Dam!)

My rival country, the chinese, are able to research marginally quicker than I can. Despite a tech lead, they've been able to catch up with me except for the Atomic/Electronics route.

We both just got combustion.

I am torn to go for tanks, or go for flight. If I hit flight first (and this is my first CIV 3 GAME getting this far, beleive it or not), is flight sufficient enough with bomber and jet to mass produce and beat him to the ground?

I am guessing he will also go for flight since it will be 10 to 15 turns before he gets tanks. So perhaps its wisest for me to get the tanks, mass produce in time to begin the Great War between the titans. But first I trade him for flight at whatever cost.

Is this wise? Or should I just strike for flight first and pray he starts going for Tanks. If he does, I've got him dead to rights with flight in 6 rounds of research, and 10 rounds to begin the grand production of craft.

I'm also going to dabble and use my open ended war to try out mobilization. If I can hit flight first, I'm gunning to make as many as I can and really put a hurting on him. But I may be naive since, like I said...I've never played with flight in CIV 3. (The few games I've played were over by the end of industrial and the cav. On lowered game settings and small maps of course.)

This is vanilla by the way.

Tanks if you're going on the offensive, bombers if you're going on the defensive.

 

[SuperBeaverInc.]

Personally I would go for Flight. Build up a massive fleet of Bombers and then some Fighters for protection and just bomb the living daylights out of anything the Chinese can send against you. Get yourself air superiority and you will have China beaten with ease.

Of course, that is just how I prefer to do things. You may prefer a different method.

 

[TheAmerican]

You could build an airforce, declare war, and destroy his army as it marches into your territory. Then you can build tanks and counter-attack.

 

[Aceman101]

Oh, I just realized, bombers don't have lethal bombardment in vanilla. Nor can you produce craters if you bomb the enemies land. This makes flight not as useful. In vanilla, I would get tanks first. In complete, I would get flight.

 

[BEHIND_THE_MASK]

I suggest taking Flight. Tanks, despite packing a punch, are relatively slow if you ask me. Use a combination of Bombers/Fighters and Cavalry.

I was got really lucky. The Coast surronding the Enemy had a number of 1-tile islands. Found a city on them, pack em with fighters and bombers and ya got the best fortress ever.

 

[Pyrrhos]

Tanks suck on the defensive & enemy cav WILL take some out (about 1 in 3 succeed so if three cav attack each of your tanks, byeee tommie-cookers!). Unless you've got inf that can keep up, I'd say go for bombers as SuperBeaver & TheAmerican suggest.

 

[garyg]

Are the Chinese on the same Continent?
If he is I would go tanks in vanilla.
You have Hoovers so you should have factories and barracks in all your core cities.
Crank out tanks and just overrun him. Tanks get to attack twice a turn and if you go mobilization you should be able to swarm over the border with an overpowering army. I always prefer to be on the offensive in my wars and not wait for my enemy.

 

[TheOverseer714]

If you want veteran bombers, you'll need some turns to build airports, and then mass them, as 1 or 2 aren't very useful, but 20 are great. Go for flight, then tanks, and set the cities not building airports and bombers to build infantry as tank pre-builds (i.e. motorized transport is 4 turns away, your city needs 6 turns to build infantry, then switch to tanks when you get the research done). When you are ready, you can bomb a city, smash the weakened defenders with tanks, and then demolish their counter attack the next turn with more of same. Use your bombers to destroy their infrastructure when you run out of fresh tanks, while you build more. And I don't recommend mobilization, because you have to build military stuff only, all guns, no butter, until peace is declared. That can crimp your infrastructure, as enemy bombers may destroy stuff you wont be able to rebuild.

 

[Aceman101]

It seems hard to build tanks and bombers at the same time. There's only so many city's that can produce a good amount of shields. So I would first build as much bombers/fighters as you need then build tanks.

 

[pat4]

I'd go for tanks if war is immenant ( using words I can't spell ). You need the muscle of your army for a war. What I would do is get flight and while your researching tanks you can bomb there cities to the ground. Their economy will be fecked and you can walk through them with your tanks.

 

[Mizar]

Bombers have been improved in Civ3-Conquest a lot (lethal bombardement)
In the original version of the game, tanks rule, now it is a closer call.
If you already have a stack of artillery (or can upgrade your cannons) a
combination of tanks/inf/artillery will be the most efficient in terms of shield-cost.

 

[BlackFiend]

After going tanks, and then getting bombers...I agree. Bombers are nothing more than flying artillery. The only good thing about bombers is the mobility. A good fleet is all you need as support. Nothing more.

I'm also seeing fighters as over played as well. They are just defense against AI bombers.

 

[psweetman1590]

They are just defense against AI bombers.

Wrong! They are defense against AI fighters as well! Send in the fighters before you send in the bombers. The AI fighters will go for your fighters first and your bombers will be safe.

 

[Aceman101]

As I have said in previous posts. I think bombers and fighters are hugely underrated. They can be very usefull and have many benifits if you build them. Any army that doesn't build them misses out on a lot.

 

[darski]

As I have said in previous posts. I think bombers and fighters are hugely underrated. They can be very usefull and have many benifits if you build them. Any army that doesn't build them misses out on a lot.

I agree with you on this. They are like all arty, you need them in bulk but they sure do the job.

 

[rysingsun]

i only make planes a priority on archi maps on the higher difficulty levels. yes they improved planes in conquests, but they improved artillery even more. by the time you get to research planes you should already have lots of artillery. the weak link at this point is the offensive ground, which is by this point a highly obsolete cavalry. therefore, tanks are the priority.

one of the huge benefits of the tank/artillery approach to wars that doesn't seem to be talked about much is that it produces huge numbers of leaders. cavalry does not do that because they don't have blitz.

 

[Aceman101]

^ Did they really improve artillery??? I thought it was always 12 bombardment even in vanilla and ptw. The only thing I can think of that they improved about artillery is craters.

With bombers, however, They added craters, they made lethal land and sea bombardment and they improved the range even further.

 

[jb1964]

Both.

I'm playing an Emperor game right now on Standard Continents. I finally scubbed my lands clean and have made it onto the other where I'm using arty, bombers, tanks, cavalry, workers and settlers to cripple two of the AI's. The arty and bombers are just great for reducing Stacks-o-Death to nothing, and especially so when they're moving towards you from the mountains and hills. And they always will.

I'm making them in about equal amounts.

Oh, here's my blunder of the year....
When you abandon a city you'll lose every last aircraft that was there. I held an enemy city long enough to move over plenty of equipment, attrite the enemy forces and establish a few cities of my own. Then not wanting to fall victim to a flip I abandoned my city and build another the same turn on the rubble. When I reached for my stack of bombers to kick the snot out of stacks of samurai and anything the Byzantines could throw at me I discovered my error.

Not cool.

 

[rysingsun]

Did they really improve artillery???

in vanilla artillery attacking cities had only one chance in three of targetting the defending unit. the remaining chance was to target a building or population. in conquests the artillery always targets units. therefore in conquests you only need (about) one third as much artillery to redline the defenders of the city ... well ... neglecting the fact that if you reduce city size then the defenders tend to redline more quickly. but at most you need half as many artillery in conquests to take a city. bombers on the other hand still target infrastucture, which many of us consider quite annoying.