The worst unit in the game

[Giaur]

Maybe Explorers should have sighting promotion for free as well ...

 

[Palantir30]

The Axeman.

You asked about unbalanced units- the Axe is too strong, therefore he is unbalanced. The priority level for achieving Axemen is extremely high, and the penalty for not achieving them soon enough is more often than not Game Over.

 

[PugFugly]

I think the explorer should be a combination land/sea unit. They should be the first unit capable of going out into the ocean- but they couldn't carry any cargo.

 

[Reignking]

Not to mention that the Explorer comes with a technology I usually ignore...

 

[jayron32]

Many people mentioned the uselessness of explorers several times, but on another forum here, I saw someone mention that they use Explorers as "medics". With the right civics and buildings, you can create a level 3 explorer that will act as a walking field doctor. The advantage for this is BECAUSE the Explorer is a cruddy unit, not just in spite of it. Put an explorer in a large stack of tanks and mech infantry, and it will NEVER DIE. It will just heal everything else in the stack. Why? Because it will a) never attack anything and b) never defend, since it will never be the "best unit" left in the stack. They are cheap and mobile, so they won't bog down the panzer divisions. A brilliant use, if you ask me. Still haven't had the chance to try it, but in my next game I might.

For me, the most useless unit is the crossbow. I almost never build them. I always get them so close to macemen that I forget about them, since they are only marginally better than axemen, I never bother to build them.

 

[Reignking]

How would the explorer get enough experience to get the medic promotions?

 

[Pantastic]

I agree with what you say, but you cannot build scouts when you can build caravels...

That's part of why the explorer is so bad - it obsoletes a much better unit. You can buy 2 2/3 scouts for the cost of an explorer, and the explorer isn't stronger enough to matter in all of the cases I've encountered.

And Reignking, you just need a barracks and one of vassalage, theocracy, the pentagon, or west point, or the red cross to make an explorer start with medic.

 

[Pantastic]

Jayron, you just highlighted how sucky the explorer is. Why would you want an explorer medic over a scout medic? You can build almost 3 scouts per explorer, and it still has all of the advantages.

That's why the explorer is so bad, you'd actually be better off if it was removed. Even if you never use crossbows, removing them would not provide you an advantage, while removing the explorer would.

 

[marioflag]

Explorers are surely the most useless unit they should have more strength or more bonus or they aren't worth 1 single money.2° worst unit are ironclad in my opinion they should have at least 3 movements or i don't think they can stop frigates from attacking your coasts.

 

[aaronpark]

i personally think the most useless military unit is the pikeman. they always seem to die pretty easily

 

[DrewBledsoe]

A scout; the explorer doesn't give you any benefit, either one is just going to hop on the roads and autoexplore. Using an explorer just means it took you 25 more shields, it doesn't give you any real advantage.



In my experience, they just don't work well for that. Their defense just isn't high enough to fight off the barbarian longbowmen and macemen that will be roaming around, I find a longbow with woodsman II to be a far better explorer than an explorer. Especially since an explorer can't investiage a new world village, since he can't kill the warrior or archer that will inevitably be fortified there. And I'd certainly rather send in 2 scouts with 10 shields left over than 1 eplorer.

True, but scouts stand no chance at all against anything Barbarian at that stage, my explorers will start with woodsman 2 and probably guerilla 2, and will be safe against archers (I often get optics early) they actually stand a reasonable chance against longbowmen in a forest and should win if in a forest hill.

To investigate the "forified unit" villages true you can't, but I just wait for a maceman or knight, then group them with the explorer..thus guaranteing a positive result from the hut...but yes scouts would work the same too.

 

[Tenochtitlan]

I hate Warrior and horse archer

 

[Archbob]

I don't think I ever built an explorer.

 

[naterator]

once, i popped astronomy 2 games in a row with an explorer! one of them was level 5 at the time from goody huts because i rushed to caravels for the delicious movement bonus, so they weren't defended yet, and by the time you get you 2 caravels going east and west to circumnavigate, you can already have 2 explorers built ready and waiting, just in case your caravels pass a hut. even if you get 35 gold, hey, better than coming back later with a settler/longbow/worker galleon and finding a barb city on the hut, right? those are the only 2 you'll ever really need though, and it's gotta be the right kind of map though, of course. if you're on a pressed pangea, they're useless. i'm not saying that they're not near the bottom, but if you have iron, the jaguar warrior is actually a hinderance, so that's my vote.

 

[Older than Dirt]

I can't see building an explorer to use as a medic. Why not build a decent unit that can at least defend? The upkeep cost is the same for weak and strong units - why have a weak one, unless you just want to have fun and give the unit a cutesie name, like your stupid boss's?

 

[Pantastic]

Actually, I think exporers/scouts don't cost upkeep like military units do, and I know they don't get the additional cost for being outside of your borders.

 

[jayron32]

I can't see building an explorer to use as a medic. Why not build a decent unit that can at least defend? The upkeep cost is the same for weak and strong units - why have a weak one, unless you just want to have fun and give the unit a cutesie name, like your stupid boss's?

The point is, that you build it is the medic BECAUSE it can't defend. You automatically defend with your best unit. If a unit defends, then it can die. Since the explorer never defends, it will ALWAYS be the last unit in a stack to die. If the rest of the stack is dead, you don't need the medic. If there are other units in the stack, the explorer/medic will heal them.

How would the explorer get enough experience to get the medic promotions?

Barracks + either vassalage or theocracy gives 6 experience points. It's only 5 experience points to get medic 1 ( the promotion)

 

[The BMC]

I build ironclads in almost every game, since I don't like it when enemies park their frigates next to my cities and cut 6% off my defenses every turn. It's not worth taking a frigate to attack another frigate with its 10% water bonus.

The worst part though is that if you don't have the oil or uranium for destroyers, the ironclad is dirt worthless by comparison. I mean, if you can't build tanks, you can take 10 marines and go look for some oil. If you can't build the war elephant, the pikemen will take down the knights just as well. But there's no substitute for not being able to build modern ships (that I can think of).

 

[Pantastic]

Though jayron, a scout would do the job even better than an explorer, since its low strength means it's even less likely to be the defender. And you can build 2 2/3 of them for every explorer! Explorer - the unit so bad, the unit it replaces does its job better.

 

[naterator]

it will ALWAYS be the last unit in a stack to die.

unless you have some wounded units, although the new patch reduces the chance of this, it's still possible, i'll take an extra troop, but that's my strategy, i see the value of the medic explorer, but pantastic is right that the scout is technically superior at this due to it's inferior strength. i still think that the increased chance of winning the astronomy goodie hut lotto merits for something. to compare to jaguars-- finding an undefended goodie hut and popping astronomy is quite unlikely, but if if happens, you've won the game. it's yours to lose at that point. whereas lacking iron, also situational, but more common, is the only situation where jaguars are very useful. otherwise the jag or two you build before the iron is hooked up becomes your only benefit, but the reduced strength almost negates this. if you don't need explorers, don't build them, you're not losing out on anything, whereas if you have iron and need swordsmen, you'll be cursing the sub-par swords you have. maybe if they became available at bronze working, with the weaker metal accounting for the strength difference. i would say that the explorer is like a tick, an minor annoyance, whereas the jaguar is a tick with lyme disease, weakening your offensive punch.