Too Many Barbs Too Soon (BtS)

[Willem]

IMO it's pretty simple and straight forward to not defend resources with galleys from marauding destroyers using sea patrol.

Frankly I find the need to move a ship 1 tile away from a resource to be counter-intuitive, especially when that action is call Sea Patrol. That conjures images in my mind of a unit actually moving around.

 

[Ghpstage]

That's a whole nother debate! I use it frequently to defend tiles from barb galleys using the safety of coastal waters. If a barb galley is heading for your fish, you might as well sit beside the fish and sea patrol. IMO it's pretty simple and straight forward to not defend resources with galleys from marauding destroyers using sea patrol.

Anyway, better not get into that debate again...

How would sea patrol help here? Barb galleys can only pilage your coastal resources, so how do you gain anything by patrolling?

 

[PieceOfMind]

How would sea patrol help here? Barb galleys can only pilage your coastal resources, so how do you gain anything by patrolling?

The Sea Patrol mission, which isn't very well named by the way, is basically a mission which makes the unit auto-attack any unit which attempts to pillage any adjacent tile. However, the sea patrol unit gets to enjoy any defensive bonuses of the tile its on making it effectively the defender in the battle. There is often confusion because this means if an attacker repeatedly attempts to pillage a resource it can repeatedly kill units that are on sea patrol making it look like a pseudo blitz unit. In other words, don't use 8 caravels on sea patrol to defend a resource from a destroyer. The destroyer can kill every single one of those caravels in the one turn.

As for defending from barb galleys, the advantage is simply you get the better odds (roughly 63%) rather than having to attack the barb at 37% odds or defend with at best 50% odds.

 

[Ghpstage]

The Sea Patrol mission, which isn't very well named by the way, is basically a mission which makes the unit auto-attack any unit which attempts to pillage any adjacent tile. However, the sea patrol unit gets to enjoy any defensive bonuses of the tile its on making it effectively the defender in the battle. There is often confusion because this means if an attacker repeatedly attempts to pillage a resource it can repeatedly kill units that are on sea patrol making it look like a pseudo blitz unit. In other words, don't use 8 caravels on sea patrol to defend a resource from a destroyer. The destroyer can kill every single one of those caravels in the one turn.

As for defending from barb galleys, the advantage is simply you get the better odds (roughly 63%) rather than having to attack the barb at 37% odds or defend with at best 50% odds.

I've never got to a position where I've both needed and been able to (as in if this happens I lost my galleys ) to attack a barb galley like that . Why would your galley be defendingwith 50% odds? If your galley is on an ocean tile in your culture, the barbs cannot attack them.

 

[Yamps]

Wow, so that's how that Patrol thing works, you still get the defense bonus! Question: what if barb galley doesn't attempt pillaging and just sits on the fish? (I think that's possible, 50% chance for pillaging IIRC)

Anyway, can barb galleys really enter ocean tiles? If not, then Sea Patrol is only useful for protecting more fishing nets at once.

 

[PieceOfMind]

I've never got to a position where I've both needed and been able to (as in if this happens I lost my galleys ) to attack a barb galley like that . Why would your galley be defendingwith 50% odds? If your galley is on an ocean tile in your culture, the barbs cannot attack them.

If your galley has combat I then attacking a barb galley would give you 50% odds unless you are at a difficulty where there is an inherent bonus vs. barbarians.

Without combat I, attacking the galley would give less than 50% odds (approx 37% if I recall correctly). You are right that defending you get better than 50% odds unless the barb galley is promoted.

Wow, so that's how that Patrol thing works, you still get the defense bonus! Question: what if barb galley doesn't attempt pillaging and just sits on the fish? (I think that's possible, 50% chance for pillaging IIRC)

Anyway, can barb galleys really enter ocean tiles? If not, then Sea Patrol is only useful for protecting more fishing nets at once.

You're right about the galley not being able to enter the ocean tile. Sometimes though you need to defend two seafood resources with one galley and you can do this using sea patrol. If it's on a bend then it's possible the barb could sail right past you to pillage the other one if you weren't on sea patrol.

As far as I can tell barb galleys either attempt to pillage or attack units. You can't always be sure which they're going to do.

Very rarely barb galleys can be coming to drop off units, though I believe this can only happen if the galley is built in a coastal barb city.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Usually sea patrol's effect can just be achieved by moving your galley so that the barb galley has to attack it to pass. I do use sea patrol on occasion but I hate when the barb galley parts on the seafood and DOESN'T pillage for a turn b/c it runs out of moves ----> better just to block it if possible, since defending odds will be the same.

However, having 2-3 barb galleys hit at once is pretty annoying and unless you put 3 galleys in a threatened side of your borders and replace them bad luck can lose you seafood.

DanF's "2 square radius" rule seems pretty nice now though...barbs are trivial on normal speed where they used to be quite problematic for me. Archers are usually only necessary on deity! Crazy!

 

[PieceOfMind]

Usually sea patrol's effect can just be achieved by moving your galley so that the barb galley has to attack it to pass. I do use sea patrol on occasion but I hate when the barb galley parts on the seafood and DOESN'T pillage for a turn b/c it runs out of moves ----> better just to block it if possible, since defending odds will be the same.

However, having 2-3 barb galleys hit at once is pretty annoying and unless you put 3 galleys in a threatened side of your borders and replace them bad luck can lose you seafood.

DanF's "2 square radius" rule seems pretty nice now though...barbs are trivial on normal speed where they used to be quite problematic for me. Archers are usually only necessary on deity! Crazy!

Yes, the sea patrol isn't always necessary if you can help it.

Just an example where it's definitely useful. One of your galleys could be protecting two separated nets (maybe several tiles between them). If your galley is sent when the barb galley is spotted and the barb galley can only reach the nets but not pillage, then you don't want to have to attack the galley, so you just do sea patrol one tile away from it.

In my experience galleys never just "sit" on the resource tile (or if they do they don't do it for long) - they'll either pillage it or attack your unit on the next turn. I figure the extra odds is worth one turn of not using that resource in your city.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

It might seriously be cheaper to just fogbust everything with warriors oftentimes if you're having to use more than 2-3 galleys ---> a situation where you'd have to move a 3 galley defense between seafood tiles to protect using sea patrol begs for fogbusting or BORDER busting at least one of those sides (such that galleys are not willing to enter borders, so you don't need D there).

One thing I'm having fun experimenting with lately is using the warrior whip (and possibly chop) overflow trick for gold, and then ACTUALLY USING those warriors for fogbusting/city garrison .