The least effective unit

[druidravi]

Explorers I make so that they can go in a caravel and explore any isolated landmass I find before Barbarian Archers own them. Its true I lost an explorer just today to a barbarian archer on plain ground .

Why explore map you ask, its just to get small amounts of gold from ai's in map trading( not so much as civ3 map trading lol, I still remmber how I used to make sevral gold per turn in civ3 selling the world map and national map to the Ai's every other turn ) and also for popping huts . I am yet in search of that elusive astronomy giving hut , the natives always want to give me gold

Its also helpful if you find a isolated continent with good resources . Caravels can only get youvision of the coast line.

 

[feldmarshall]

my opinion MUSKETS are useless, because you will discover chemistry right after gunpowder

 

[feldmarshall]

There was thouthand treads like that. I am tied of them.
Practically all units have good uses. If you do not know how to use unit or never run in situation when you need unit, it is your problem.

About Muskers, read this for example befor you claim muskets useless.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=192600

more specific post, please. that thread is 13 pages long, I can't read the whole thread just to find out your theory of musket usefulness

 

[cabert]

more specific post, please. that thread is 13 pages long, I can't read the whole thread just to find out your theory of musket usefulness

it's not a theory, mutineer shows you a game where drafting musketeers is pushing a losing game into a winning game.

 

[Wodan]

I just found a new use (new for me, anyway) for Ironclads.

You don't need Compass or Optics to build them.

Yeah, by the time you can build Ironclads, you could research those techs for 1 turn each. Still, take what you can get.

Wodan

 

[KMadCandy]

on ironclads: this week i had my first game with no oil. at all. and no chance of getting any, ever. i was playing OCC, one opponent, and he had only one oil source himself (altho he couldn't yet use it). so the best offensive/defensive ships i could build were ironclads. first time i ever built 'em. they worked.

 

[Ankh-f-n-Khonsu]

i was playing OCC, one opponent, and he had only one oil source himself (altho he couldn't yet use it).

Continuing my great work of running off topic... I'm immediately fascinated by the idea of an OCC with one opponent. What size map? Any other custom settings? Random opponent, or...? Sounds like fun, something different...

 

[KMadCandy]

Continuing my great work of running off topic... I'm immediately fascinated by the idea of an OCC with one opponent. What size map? Any other custom settings? Random opponent, or...? Sounds like fun, something different...

well, as you already know, i am completely bizarre. yeah this game was different alright. see, i specifically needed to win by time, but have all conditions enabled (for hall of fame) and wanted a way to do that quickly, since my last attempt had, ummm, technical errors caused by the player after lots of hours spent .

so, the advice was to go duel pangaea, one opponent, and set it to OCC so that i'd have no fears of domination. i just wanted the checkbox for that win condition really, later i can go back and play "real" games to improve scores if i care about rankings but for now i just want to fill up my table. so i totally stacked the deck. i picked mehmed for his traits. expansive and organized. the plan was to limit him to just one city too, altho he didn't know it the traits didn't help him a lot

in my case i wasn't trying to actually "win" win, i let him live ... tortured him endlessly, but let him live until the end of time. poor mehmed, i won, he lost. see this thread for how much fun i had in the process. it was the first OCC i'd played thru to any kind of victory, and i learned a lot in the process even under that artificially easy setup.

 

[Rancid Sushi]

Ironclads aren't useless. They're slow, but frigates don't stand a chance against them, and they upgrade to destroyers.

 

[Wodan]

Ironclads aren't useless.

Agreed.

frigates don't stand a chance against them

That's hardly true. Frigates have been around for a while, and can easily have a handful of promotions by picking off all the wussy ships floating around (especially caravels). Your ironclads, OTOH, will have one promotion if you're lucky. Combat between the two is an even-up match.

and they upgrade to destroyers.

So do frigates.

Wodan

 

[KMadCandy]

Ironclads aren't useless. They're slow, but frigates don't stand a chance against them, and they upgrade to destroyers.

for me they had to be (and were) useful as ironclads themselves. i never got to upgrade them, the oil and uranium were in wrong places grrrrr. so you can't count on that 100% of the time. probably 95%, but not 100%.

 

[ownedbyakorat]

Last time this thread came around, I said "carriers", and I am sticking with that. There's simply no situation where I can imagine building a carrier, because you can't land bombers on them, and fighters suck for supporting amphibious landings.

Every time I've built one I've been left throwing a lot of resources at them to protect them and getting very little return on investment.

 

[Quagga]

This being the 1000th thread devoted to discussing the most useless unit and this post being the 1,000,000th post on that topic, I am especially proud to contribute something new to the discussion:

Ironclads stink because they trigger an Assert error during battle (when using an assert-enabled build anyway).

How do I know this? Because I often build ironclads!

Sorry, I can't think of anything new to say about how bad muskets are.

 

[bardolph]

Last time this thread came around, I said "carriers", and I am sticking with that. There's simply no situation where I can imagine building a carrier, because you can't land bombers on them, and fighters suck for supporting amphibious landings.

Every time I've built one I've been left throwing a lot of resources at them to protect them and getting very little return on investment.

Use carriers for recon. 3 fighters can reveal LOTS of map space in a turn!

Carriers CAN support an amphibious landing, by pillaging coastal improvements before you land. You can then land, destroy roads, and cut off enemy reinforcements in short order.

Using fighters for air strikes can give you a tactical advantage when the top defender is slightly better than your top attacker. Fly in an air strike to reduce that top defender to give you an edge in your attack.

 

[uberfish]

The least effective unit is infantry number 14 because it revives old threads!

 

[bardolph]

Crossbows can defend cities, too. Pairing up Longbows with Crossbows makes cities much harder to crack.

 

[Wodan]

Crossbows can defend cities, too. Pairing up Longbows with Crossbows makes cities much harder to crack.

The only cities of mine which need this kind of consideration are those with a weak culture border. All others usually end up with an obsolete unit as garrison. The idea being that any AI with the temerity to invade me gets quickly whomped by my up-to-date reaction force.

Just me.

Wodan

 

[bardolph]

The only cities of mine which need this kind of consideration are those with a weak culture border. All others usually end up with an obsolete unit as garrison. The idea being that any AI with the temerity to invade me gets quickly whomped by my up-to-date reaction force.

Just me.

Wodan

True, but for a large empire, the "weak culture border" can be quite large. I like having a few drill-promoted crossbowmen as part of an invasion force, where there serve a 3-part role:

1) stack protection against maces
2) clean-up crew (after siege and city raiders do their job). The drill promotion can leave these xbows unharmed.
3) city garrison (for wounded xbows).

Plus, when drill-promoted crossbowmen upgrade to grenadiers... YUM!