The race to rifling: Cavalry are still a dominant unit

[Handel]

Could we please continue the disussion about cavalry now because i'm finding this thread pretty intresting.

Actually this is Civ IV forum, not the BTS forum. And as this there should be topics either for the vanilla game or topics valid for all the 3 games. If this is a topic for BTS only it should be moved in BTS forum.

As for one of my first posts in the topic was if the devs stopped the AI from beelining to cavalry and riflemen in BTS this is stupid. Because this is what made the AI good war adversary in Warlords. Because in Warlords it goes for both techs pretty straightforward.

 

[Bhruic]

Muskets are high enough if properly promoted and fortified.

That's true, the main trouble is that the AI can't upgrade their previous units to Musketmen, they have to build them from scratch. If Muskets were made an upgrade from Longbows, I think the AI would possibly be able to put up a better fight against the Cavalry rush.

Bh

 

[Percy]

Actually this is Civ IV forum, not the BTS forum. And as this there should be topics either for the vanilla game or topics valid for all the 3 games. If this is a topic for BTS only it should be moved in BTS forum.

Oh for crying out loud, drop this unfounded statement already!

This is a STRATEGY forum. So that's where STRATEGY goes. This thread is about STRATEGY, whether you're ready to admit it or not. So that makes it spot on in the right place.

Now, you don't have BtS, and you know it's about BtS. So why exactly are you still posting in it, considering you've been doing nothing but posting derogatory comments in it, and not contributing a single interesting comment? Seriously, if it sucks so much, just stop wasting your time reading it, and save us users interested in reading it the hassle of having to read through your posts. And if you're convinced it shouldn't be in this forum, please do contact a moderator. I'm pretty sure he probably will find your repeated off-topic posting much worse than the fact this thread only applies to the latest commercial expansion of the game.

 

[axident]

That's true, the main trouble is that the AI can't upgrade their previous units to Musketmen, they have to build them from scratch. If Muskets were made an upgrade from Longbows, I think the AI would possibly be able to put up a better fight against the Cavalry rush.

Bh

That and many players will settle GGs and they might be able to crank out some Pinch-promoted cavs to deal with the "problem" cities. If I cav rush, I usually have one or two lumbering siege/1-movement point unit stacks and one or two mass cav stacks. The slow stacks knock out the really tough nuts, while the cavs massacre the lesser cities. Instead of siege you can use spies to knock down walls for a turn, too, via city revolt.

 

[InvisibleStalke]

Anytime you have units that are an era ahead you will have the chance to battlefield dominance.

Knights vs archers would do the same.
Or tanks vs rifles.
Or modern armour vs infantry.

The later the game goes the more chance you have of pulling ahead of the AI to gain this kind of advantage. Both by beelining deep into the tech tree to gain a military advantage early, and by your earlier strategies and better play catching up on the AI start advantages.

The issue is how soon you can gain this sort of advantage. Its rare that I will get to fight maces/knights vs archers on Monarch or higher. Sometimes I won't get rifles first - sometimes I will. And I can usually get a strategic late game military tech if I want to - I like flight and radio for bombers first.

I still prefer rifles to cav - but most of whats said in this thread applies equally to these both and having a big rifle/seige stack for the core and fast cavalry stacks for the remainder is probably the most powerful overall attack.

The AI still has good defense units available - knights, pikes, longbows, muskets, elephants and curraisers all can defend against cav on a 2:1 basis. And hammer wise cav are expensive, so to pull this off you don't just need a tech lead, you also need to invest a lot of hammers. Arriving at rifles and MT first but not being able to build cavalry fast enough can kill the strategy too.

There are other techs that are similarly deep in the tech tree that can provide an adequate defense for the AI. Airships, grenadiers and machine guns are all potential threats from an AI that has a similar tech rate.

But if the AI hasn't any renaissance military techs at all, and you beeline to rifles, invest a lot of production, then they are deservedly toast. Still not easy to pull off though - and if you can always pull it off then you probably need to go up a level.

 

[Via]

All that formation crap or other +% crap isn't enough if the baseline power isn't that high to begin with. That's why pikes, even +185% pikes, can't do much against +20% cavs. The exception is when the differential isn't as awful as 15 v. 6. Anti-tank's baseline +125% bonus against armor is a bit better, as the ratio of baseline power there is 2:1 and not 5:2. Until Modern Armor of course.

That's one of the most common errors around here. The right counting should be 6 +(pikeman bonus 185% - cav bonus 20%) against 15. So it's 6 + 165% = pikeman 15.9 against cavalry 15.

Try it in worldbulder with Vulture against Axeman. With common bad counting it should be equal. But in real = Axeman has the advantage.

 

[JackOfClubs]

I don't think the point is that it is easy to pull this off, but that it is still possible. I don't play BtS but I have gotten the idea that most people think it has invalidated the Cavalry rush. Seems that isn't so, which is valuable information (at least it is to those of you who play BtS and maybe to those like me who have put off buying it on the grounds that it doesn't seem worth the investment of time and money).

But it does seem that this strategy relies on a glitch in the AI rather than a normal bee-line vs. lateral research trade-off. I would expect civs even a few techs behind to be able to defend against this, but it seems they don't bother to get Rifling. That makes using this somewhat closer to an exploit than an actual strategy IMHO. Not a full exploit mind you, but it has an odor of metagaming about it. But perhaps the AI avoidance of Rifling is not all that reliable?

 

[Via]

Actually this is Civ IV forum, not the BTS forum. And as this there should be topics either for the vanilla game or topics valid for all the 3 games. If this is a topic for BTS only it should be moved in BTS forum.

As for one of my first posts in the topic was if the devs stopped the AI from beelining to cavalry and riflemen in BTS this is stupid. Because this is what made the AI good war adversary in Warlords. Because in Warlords it goes for both techs pretty straightforward.

With all respect, most pre-BTS topics and strategies were spoken already. So if you are interested in these, you can search older threads on this forum. You will find that every single new thread here is dedicated to post-BTS game.

 

[JujuLautre]

That's one of the most common errors around here. The right counting should be 6 +(pikeman bonus 185% - cav bonus 20%) against 15. So it's 6 + 165% = pikeman 15.9 against cavalry 15.

Try it in worldbulder with Vulture against Axeman. With common bad counting it should be equal. But in real = Axeman has the advantage.

That is partly wrong. Axident talked about strength bonuses when he talked about +20%, which are always applied independently. So in the present case, it's 6 + 185% against 15 + 20%, which makes 17.1 against 18.

but to be realist, we should also consider where the 185% bonus you talk about comes from: 100% pike, 25% formation, 40% cultural (let's say), and on top of that 20% strength; which maks ( 6 + 165% ) + 20%, so 19.08. But this time we are talking about level 4 pikes against level 3 cav

 

[Via]

True. My mistake.

 

[axident]

That's one of the most common errors around here. The right counting should be 6 +(pikeman bonus 185% - cav bonus 20%) against 15. So it's 6 + 165% = pikeman 15.9 against cavalry 15.

Try it in worldbulder with Vulture against Axeman. With common bad counting it should be equal. But in real = Axeman has the advantage.

I think you are thinking of CR promos not combat? I tried a WB test and perhaps what you are thinking of applies for CR but not Combat promos.

 

[Lurking Liu]

Handel, you really don't understand Beelining, do you... It's no small matter. I don't have the tech tree in front of me, but take only the techs that lead up to Cavalry and you're missing almost half the tree. You have virtually no infrastructure and your entire economy is geared to war. Newly conquered cities are going to quickly out-strip your ability to pay for them, so you're going to go broke for a while until you can get enough Courthouses and Markets to pay for the basic upkeep.

Worse yet, the AI in BTS--even in lower-level non-Aggressive settings--will not hesitate to dogpile into you and knows how to do amphibious attacks. So even if you're simply expanding against the one other person on your continent, you are not safe by any means.


As for getting CRIII Riflemen, you can still build Macemen when you have Rifling. I'm pretty sure you can't in Warlords, but I've done it in BTS... Regardless, with the right Civics and buildings it's not that tough to get three promotions for new units, and it's only about 180 gold to upgrade a Mace into a Rifle on Marathon. So while your Macemen will tend to die during the middle ages, with a few turns of gold-hording you can build, promote, and Upgrade a small army from scratch.

 

[axident]

That is partly wrong. Axident talked about strength bonuses when he talked about +20%, which are always applied independently. So in the present case, it's 6 + 185% against 15 + 20%, which makes 17.1 against 18.

but to be realist, we should also consider where the 185% bonus you talk about comes from: 100% pike, 25% formation, 40% cultural (let's say), and on top of that 20% strength; which maks ( 6 + 165% ) + 20%, so 19.08. But this time we are talking about level 4 pikes against level 3 cav

What? I was talking about Pikes with baseline +100% (anti-mounted), fortified (+25%), with combat I (+10%), and behind walls (+50%). This is a common scenario since barracks only give one promo by themselves. Are you saying that combat promos are applied multiplicatively (6 & 1.65) * (1.2) and not additively (6 * 1.85)? That goes against almost every Civ 4 principle of bonuses... pretty much they are all additive with only one exception that I can think of right now, and this isn't it.

My post read:

"When I first started playing Civ4 and was a noob, I was on the wrong end of this. It SUCKS to have only pikes and longbows vs. cavs. Cavs can pillage, first of all. And even if your pike is behind a wall, if the AI has any siege at all, it won't last long. And even fortified pikes behind walls aren't going to last long against a determined cav rush--the kind that a human player would do.

And as for the 14.7 thing, yeah but that's assuming unupgraded cavs. Barracks + Stables is EASY to get. So a typical low-ranking cav is actually 15+20% = 18 strength, versus, what, a Pike + combat 1 + fortify + 100% vs mounted = 14.1. 18 versus 14.1--ouch!

Even if you have, say, 50% walls or cultural defense, that's 18 str vs. 17.1--the cav wins 7 out of 10 times (and of the 3 times it doesn't, 30% of the time it merely withdraws and doesn't die)."

 

[JujuLautre]

What? I was talking about Pikes with baseline +100% (anti-mounted), fortified (+25%), with combat I (+10%), and behind walls (+50%). This is a common scenario since barracks only give one promo by themselves. Are you saying that combat promos are applied multiplicatively (6 & 1.65) * (1.2) and not additively (6 * 1.85)? That goes against almost every Civ 4 principle of bonuses... pretty much they are all additive with only one exception that I can think of right now, and this isn't it.

Exactly. Considering:
- attacker combat strengths bonuses (ACSB)
- defender combat strength bonuses (DCSB)
- attacker other bonuses (AOB)
- defebder other bonuses (DOB)
in combat, the strength of the attacker is his strength multiplied by ACSB, and the defender strength is his strength, multiplied by his DOB, and then multipled by the difference of DCSB and ACSB (or divided by an equivalent ratio if ACSB is superior to DCSB).

If I'm correct, if you attack with an axeman without promo against an archer, the game will display a strength of 5. With an axeman with CR promo, still 5. With combat 1 promo, it displays 5.5.

Just made a quick WB test, with swordmen against an axe without any city/terrain bonus:
- sword without promo gets 6 against 7.5 (5*1.5)
- sword with shock (without combat 1) gets 6 against 6.25 (5*(1+0.5-0.25))
- sword with combat 1 gets 6.6 (6*1.1) against 7.5

So unless things changed in BTS, this is the way it works.

 

[axident]

Exactly. Considering:
- attacker combat strengths bonuses (ACSB)
- defender combat strength bonuses (DCSB)
- attacker other bonuses (AOB)
- defebder other bonuses (DOB)
in combat, the strength of the attacker is his strength multiplied by ACSB, and the defender strength is his strength, multiplied by his DOB, and then multipled by the difference of DCSB and ACSB (or divided by an equivalent ratio if ACSB is superior to DCSB).

If I'm correct, if you attack with an axeman without promo against an archer, the game will display a strength of 5. With an axeman with CR promo, still 5. With combat 1 promo, it displays 5.5.

Just made a quick WB test, with swordmen against an axe without any city/terrain bonus:
- sword without promo gets 6 against 7.5 (5*1.5)
- sword with shock (without combat 1) gets 6 against 6.25 (5*(1+0.5-0.25))
- sword with combat 1 gets 6.6 (6*1.1) against 7.5

So unless things changed in BTS, this is the way it works.

Okay this is hopelessly confusing to me. I know that CR promos deduct away from the defender's bonuses. But as for multiplying out defender combat bonuses AND terrain/wall/city/hill/whatever bonuses? That's the first I've heard of this... have you WB'd this or are you guessing at the math? I kind of don't want to have to dig up that old War Acad thread about combat odds again.

 

[JujuLautre]

Okay this is hopelessly confusing to me. I know that CR promos deduct away from the defender's bonuses. But as for multiplying out defender combat bonuses AND terrain/wall/city/hill/whatever bonuses? That's the first I've heard of this... have you WB'd this or are you guessing at the math? I kind of don't want to have to dig up that old War Acad thread about combat odds again.

I just WBed it once again, and... actually it's really strange !
It seems that combat promos multiplies the strength of the attacker, but that they just add up with other bonuses for the defender... I will have to check the article again

-- edit: verified in the article, that's indeed how it is. Basically, combat strength gives an advantage to the attacker more than to the defender... oh well, let's get back to the topic and to pikemen baching

 

[Bhruic]

They are always additive. The difference between attacker and defender comes into play for the situational bonuses. For example, if you are attacking a Pikeman with a mounted unit, the Pikeman will get a 100% str bonus (so the Pikeman has 12 str, and the mounted unit has base str). If, however, you are attacking a mounted unit with a Pikeman, the bonus (well, penalty) is applied to the defender (so the Pikeman has 6 str, and the mounted unit has half base str). Combat promotions, however, always apply to the unit itself, regardless of attacking or defending.

Bh

 

[futurehermit]

Anytime you have units that are an era ahead you will have the chance to battlefield dominance.

Knights vs archers would do the same.
Or tanks vs rifles.
Or modern armour vs infantry.

The later the game goes the more chance you have of pulling ahead of the AI to gain this kind of advantage. Both by beelining deep into the tech tree to gain a military advantage early, and by your earlier strategies and better play catching up on the AI start advantages.

The issue is how soon you can gain this sort of advantage. Its rare that I will get to fight maces/knights vs archers on Monarch or higher. Sometimes I won't get rifles first - sometimes I will. And I can usually get a strategic late game military tech if I want to - I like flight and radio for bombers first.

I still prefer rifles to cav - but most of whats said in this thread applies equally to these both and having a big rifle/seige stack for the core and fast cavalry stacks for the remainder is probably the most powerful overall attack.

The AI still has good defense units available - knights, pikes, longbows, muskets, elephants and curraisers all can defend against cav on a 2:1 basis. And hammer wise cav are expensive, so to pull this off you don't just need a tech lead, you also need to invest a lot of hammers. Arriving at rifles and MT first but not being able to build cavalry fast enough can kill the strategy too.

There are other techs that are similarly deep in the tech tree that can provide an adequate defense for the AI. Airships, grenadiers and machine guns are all potential threats from an AI that has a similar tech rate.

But if the AI hasn't any renaissance military techs at all, and you beeline to rifles, invest a lot of production, then they are deservedly toast. Still not easy to pull off though - and if you can always pull it off then you probably need to go up a level.

keep in mind you can prebuild cheaper units (harchers/knights) and generate a GM to upgrade them once you hit rifling. snaaty for example loves to do this.

 

[UncleJJ]

I just WBed it once again, and... actually it's really strange !
It seems that combat promos multiplies the strength of the attacker, but that they just add up with other bonuses for the defender... I will have to check the article again

-- edit: verified in the article, that's indeed how it is. Basically, combat strength gives an advantage to the attacker more than to the defender... oh well, let's get back to the topic and to pikemen baching

Yes, that is what most people here have been saying in their various ways. Combat is a special promotion in that it gets added to both the attacker and defender. ALL other promotions (for attacker and defender) and terrain modifiers are applied to the defender with positive attacker promotions such as CR subtracted from the defenders bonusses.

I feel that cuirassiers are a lot better against longbows than many people give them credit for. They are immune to first strikes (which cavalry are not normally) and so you can simply promote them with Combat 2 out of the barracks and stable. They only cost 100 hammers so you get more of them than cavalry at 120 hammers and they can be built a lot earlier if you beeline them (probably 20 turns on normal speed). Cavalry with combat 2 will be 15 + 20% = 18 strength while a cuirassier will be 12 + 20% = 14.4. Cavalry needs flanking 2 to be immune to first strike (useful against a lot of drill promoted troops) and have a 60% withdrawal chance but then it will only have 15 strength. Cuirassiers are also cheap to upgrade to cavalry from the gold gained sacking cities, costing 80 each.

So now I start my cavalry rush with cuirassiers and then carry on with the real deal when they're available.

 

[Florian]

Still don't understand what is this thread about.

Yes, Handel, it's painfully obvious that you don't understand. FutureHermit is making this observation as part of an ongoing conversation on these boards--a conversation that obviously you know nothing about. The uber-strat in Warlords was to beeline Cavalry and then wipe the map clean. BTS pushed Cavalry back to a later tech, so everyone assumed this wouldn't work anymore. FutureHermit tried it, found out that it does still work to a significant degree, and posted that fact along with an interesting explanation of why it does. You didn't understand any of that.

If you walk in on the middle of a conversation, you'll be wise to keep your mouth closed and listen a while before you start insulting people. Only a fool would assume that the conversants are idiots or boasters just because he doesn't immediately understand what they're talking about.