The worst unit in the game

[Giaur]

If it was the final battle, wouldn't it have not mattered if they could counterattack, since they'd be dead anyway? And if I'm misunderstanding "final battle," why did you leave the city undefended in lieu of sacrificing a defensive unit to protect it? Or by "capture" do you mean "raze"?

Actually I didn't know it was the final battle. It was Domination Game and I didn't use to check Victory Conditions every turn to see how much land and people I possess. I didn't also had an appropriate unit to resist attacks of tanks and artillery. If AI decided to recapture the city, it would have garrisoned it with 2 or 3 units. And these would be cannon food for my artillery.

Crossbows ... i didn't produce them a lot, besides of bonus via maceman, they're quite difficult to destroy. Only Knight guarantee high chance of victory against this unit.

P.S. Ehhh, third conditional ... No more sleeping on English classes :]

 

[BadHorsie]

I'm surprised there aren't more units in the list to choose from. I wouldn't put some of those in there in the first place (Archers?)

I voted Musketmen and other. Musketmen are just pointless and they become obsolete so fast.

 

[Giaur]

I just forgot about other units

 

[kernok]

Musketmen have the smallest window of use.

+1
this is the problem for musketmen (and musketeers).
they are quite good but they don't stand a chance against grenadiers that are just available one tech behind.

 

[Sabretou]

I'll have to go with the Explorer. I suppose the only place where he is useful is exploring islets, islands etc. but most ships can scan out the islands.

 

[LeConquerant]

Horse archers are simply awesome to me: if I see horses around I jump to build city there and takeover my closest neighbor.

It is awesome form a logistics point of view: being able to quickly bring over fresh troops is necessary in old wars. Unlike modern was were one can swarm the ennemy lands under 30+ artillery, cavalries, etc... in classical ages wars teh economy can afford only less units. And reinforcements will take much longer from axemen and swordsmen than from horse archers or keshicks.

(disclaimer - as everything in civ4, you can't have your strategy solely based on one unit, until the moment you've prevented your enemy from countering your preferred unit. So I don't mean I use horse archers only... I will use a few axeman as well in the beginning, if my enemy has copper and I want to destroy his early spearmen, but once this detail is sorted, I will send in only horses).

The poll: I said musketmen... of course explorers are even less useful... but ironclads are rubbish.

 

[DrewBledsoe]

Explorers are by no means useless, if you play huge maps / marathon settings as I do..often you only know of half of the worlds civs at the time you discover optics, and guess who fits snugly in a caravel?

Then sign open borders with whoever you meet (if they will) dump you explorers , set them on auto explore and let the caravel move on..they are a great way to discover a newly met potential friend / rival before they have the chance to make their mind up about you, you have their complete land map

They are also invaluable on many huge maps for exploring the interior of a large island / continent so you can plan out where you put your cities without "going in blind".

I'd vote for the Archer as the most useless unit in the game.......oh sorry I meant overpowered

To be serious probably musketmen, but i think overall a good job has been done balancing all units..

Oh except archers....grrrhhh..on hills..grhhh

 

[tymmail]

I think explorer is not the worst unit as they're useful for exploring newly discovered continents; they are also useful to check out neighbours' development quickly due to their quick movement.

Crossbows are powerful defensive unit with first-strike upgrades. Place it all over hills and forest and Monty won't declare war easily

The worst is musketman as its strength is low for a gunpowder unit, which require a lot more hammer to produce. I'd just use crossbow/longbow during the musketman era; strive for peace during this period; then upgrade everything to rifleman and declare war !

 

[Samson]

I cannot belive that catapults are on the list. These are the most important unit in the game for me. Once you have cats you can take any city with any units.

 

[Giaur]

I cannot belive that catapults are on the list. These are the most important unit in the game for me. Once you have cats you can take any city with any units.

I put them on the list because they only can bombard city defense. While attacking cities, have small chances to destroy enemy unit. Very often are destroyed. However didn't vote on them

Voted for Musketman, the worst unit in the game. Hammers needed exceed their usefulness. I very often settle down on the hills. And much cheaper longbows are only little less powerful. Also important is fact that Grenadiers with strength 12 appear 20 turns later.

 

[Samson]

I put them on the list because they only can bombard city defense. While attacking cities, have small chances to destroy enemy unit. Very often are destroyed.

Well, each to his own, but for me construction and cats is when war becomes profitable.

 

[Lance of Llanwy]

Musketmen. Their window is ridiculously narrow and they aren't great offense, especially if you run into pinch knights. And they obsolete so fast you don't even have time to make them your primary city defender before grenadiers come. All of the other units listed are very useful, especially Cats, HAs, and Crossbows. Cats are essential and work well; Horse Archers are decent but plenty good enough to do some decent conquering; and Crossbowmen own Macemen harder than Macemen do, on the cheap. Always worthwhile to have some of them defending important cities with your longbows and throwing some in your macemen stacks, so your macemen can stick to city-raiding and not be bothered by other macemen.....

 

[Giaur]

Seems only I voted for Archers

I prefer duet Axeman, Spearman. It's much more flexible

 

[Orion071]

If you include UU's in the list then the Jaguar is the worst unit. Otherwise, I'll stick with the Musketmen. Medic Explorers have a real use in wars with Cavalry/Tanks since they can keep up with them.

 

[pub hero]

Musketman, easily. Building them is just a waste to me.

 

[shivute]

Musketman is the worst. I will still build them though, if required at the time.
The warrior is the next most useless. Not strong enough to defend a city against barb axemen and often taken down by 2 barb archers. It is just rubbish. The scout is much better at the time.
The chariot is 3rd for me, no defensive bonuses. I never build them now, I prefer building an archer to a chariot as it is much more useful.

 

[Samson]

Musketman is the worst. I will still build them though, if required at the time.

This bit I agree with.

The warrior is the next most useless. Not strong enough to defend a city against barb axemen and often taken down by 2 barb archers. It is just rubbish. The scout is much better at the time.
The chariot is 3rd for me, no defensive bonuses. I never build them now, I prefer building an archer to a chariot as it is much more useful.

You are not saying you would prefer to have scouts defending your city than wariours? Yeah, axemen will easily kill them, but they do not come for a while. 2 barb archers? I do not tend to haev 2 archers attaching the same city in the same turn very offen, esp. early game. Still a whole lot better than scouts, and they need less tech than scouts. If you have anything better to build and they are likely to be fighting then it is probably worth building them, but for a good bit of the game you can not. OK for MP too.

I think chariots have their place. If you have horses and no copper they are resnoble at taking cities. A big use is for them is for active defence and milatry police. They are very cheap, and can cover a big area. So if you get attacked, you can usually concentrate 2 or 3 times as many chariots on the point of attack than you could if you had the same number of archers. Also if you are using them for the happiness (under HR) they can move around your empire quickly as city requirements change.

 

[Grohan]

Explorer. I have needed explorer only once.

 

[Pantastic]

Explorers are by no means useless, if you play huge maps / marathon settings as I do..often you only know of half of the worlds civs at the time you discover optics, and guess who fits snugly in a caravel?

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.

They are also invaluable on many huge maps for exploring the interior of a large island / continent so you can plan out where you put your cities without "going in blind".

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.

 

[Samson]

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.

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