Upgrading=Expensive

[BriantheBold]

With my first game that has lasted into the Renaissance period under my belt I find myself with dozens of warriors and archers yet to be upgraded. I have the proper techs and resources to uprade these archaic units to longbowmen, crossbowmen, macemen, axemen, and swordsmen but find the cost excessive, even more so than in previous Civ games.
I was wondering if there is any wonder or building present in Civ IV that cuts the cost of upgrading units (like Leonardo's Workshop) as my gold supply quickly runs out after a few upgrades.
What are some players' opinions about what the best bang for their buck upgrades are? I know this will be largely based on the game situation and personal preference but all opinions are welcomed!

 

[Oggums]

I almost never upgrade. It's just too expensive.

 

[BCLG100]

I used to upgrade all the time in civ3, now the enormous costs for civ4 make me re-build the majority of the units or just upgrade units individually in key cities, such as the cities nearest the border.

 

[alexti2]

I upgrade a lot of units, for example catapults->cannons->artillery, frigate->destroyer, galley->galeon etc... I think it's more or less a must on harder difficulties. You're always behind in tech, so you really want to do the most in those rare moments when your military is more or less even technologically. Upgrade cost isn't too bad at that stage: you turn science to 0% for few turns and that's enough to get money for upgrade. But in the earlier game upgrades are too costly. So I don't upgrade warriors or archers to anything. They just assigned to the new cities to convince their population that they are safe

 

[Nilrim]

The problem of course with not upgrading is that you have to build new units to take thier place, this eats up a lot of time your cities could be building things that improve your sci/culture thus setting your Civ back a bit. The AI seems to rarelly upgrade, I have had games where my tanks were attacking cities with that had catpults and cannons, Longbomen and mech inf. Personally I think this is a weekness in this game, I think any unit that is more the 2 generations behind your current ability should be forced to either upgrade or disband.

 

[snipafist]

It really depends on the situation. Great Merchants are great for netting enough gold to upgrade many units, and if you're ahead technologically, you can afford to tank your research for a couple turns to upgrade all your outdated units (which is more time-efficient than just replacing them all, which can take quite a while). Also don't forget that units with a lot of experience are incredibly valuable, starting with much more XP than any "store-bought" units you can make. Also, don't forget that some earlier unit types get upgrades that later ones don't, and that upgraded units keep their promotions with them when they upgrade. So your city raider III maceman becomes quite a nasty infantryman for capturing enemy cities, and none of the infantrymen you'll be cranking out can remotely compare.

 

[Oggums]

The AI seems to rarelly upgrade, I have had games where my tanks were attacking cities with that had catpults and cannons, Longbomen and mech inf. Personally I think this is a weekness in this game, I think any unit that is more the 2 generations behind your current ability should be forced to either upgrade or disband.

Strange. It has to be difficulty level, because every time I've played the AI upgrades everything the turn it gains the tech. And I mean everything. As far as I know, the AI gets a huge discount on higher levels.

 

[Gargoyle]

The problem of course with not upgrading is that you have to build new units to take thier place, this eats up a lot of time your cities could be building things that improve your sci/culture thus setting your Civ back a bit. The AI seems to rarelly upgrade, I have had games where my tanks were attacking cities with that had catpults and cannons, Longbomen and mech inf. Personally I think this is a weekness in this game, I think any unit that is more the 2 generations behind your current ability should be forced to either upgrade or disband.

I upgrade regularly. Great Merchants doing here trade route thing is a great way to get the cash.

As for the upgrade or disband option, it would be nice to be able to get back some resources from disbanding.

 

[Nilrim]

Strange. It has to be difficulty level, because every time I've played the AI upgrades everything the turn it gains the tech. And I mean everything. As far as I know, the AI gets a huge discount on higher levels.

I normally play on Noble level and if they do get huge discounts at higher levels then that would be the reason they upgrade I don't know how you guys win wars at those levels, heck I have seen too many battles where my army of tanks and inf. are hard pressed to take a city packed with the lower end units. Even when I bring arty and soften them up with bombers it can be a pain. If they were all upgraded to Inf/mech Inf I would have to bring huge numbers just to take one city.

 

[Duuk]

Upgrades are too expensive to be useful.

 

[Oggums]

If they were all upgraded to Inf/mech Inf I would have to bring huge numbers just to take one city.

Well, if it's mech inf, then somebody already built the spaceship and the game was over many turns ago.

Before that you just bombard to 0 and use bombers or suicide artillary to soften up the cities stack, then roll in with your tanks.

 

[Artanis]

Upgrades are good for units with a couple levels under their belt, especially if doing so will change their unit type and thus leave them with otherwise inaccessable upgrades (i.e. City Raider Riflemen RULE their era ). If it's a level 1 or 2 unit with promotions that it could still get anyways (i.e. City Garrison promotions on an Archery unit), then I usually just build new ones.

 

[BriantheBold]

"Well, if it's mech inf, then somebody already built the spaceship and the game was over many turns ago. "

This is not necessarily true Oggums as the player might have disabled the Space Race victory option.

 

[Nilrim]

"Well, if it's mech inf, then somebody already built the spaceship and the game was over many turns ago. "

This is not necessarily true Oggums as the player might have disabled the Space Race victory option.

That is why most games I play that is the one victory condition I turn off. If I don't turn it off then more times then not either I or the AI wins with it and before I can engage in a nice modern war

 

[Wodan]

My two cents....

Generally I stash my obsolete units as garrisons in my interior cities. You pretty much have to have a garrison to control unhappiness, and the peeps don't care if the garrison is a Warrior or Mech Inf.

New builds always go to the border cities. Over the game, the number of units I have in those cities increases, and there's a mix of older units and newer ones. Generally I have a little cash on hand (because I usually run my Civ in the black) so I upgrade cash permitting. Or, if an AI declares war, I drop my slider to 90% cash or so, and do some crash upgrading.

Occasionally, if I hit the max # of units for my civ, I disband selectively.

Wodan

 

[Artanis]

That is why most games I play that is the one victory condition I turn off. If I don't turn it off then more times then not either I or the AI wins with it and before I can engage in a nice modern war

It's similar for me. The first few games I played, I left it on, but didn't like it because it felt like it pre-empted all other victory conditions and arbitrarily cut short the game. I might as well have been playing a game at Quick speed because I sure as heck wasn't getting the number of turns I thought I was signing up for when I selected Normal speed

So, I turn Space Race off

 

[Aldor]

I usually build new troops two or three times. Of course at the beginning, then when longbows/pikemen become available, then riflemen and finally mech infantry.

Archer -> Longbowman: upgrades too costly in this era usually. I'm often still in the process of bringing my economy up again after the first expansion phase...no cash left for upgrades

Longbowman -> Rifleman: by this time most of my cities have barracks, so its even better to build new units now as they will get promoted right away (I am a peaceful builder usually, so most of my first garrison units never get promoted, except against some barbarians)

When infantry becomes available, I will often upgrade my riflemen to them. The upgrade is cheap enough, and gold is not so much of a problem anymore at this time.

Rifleman/Infantry -> Mech infantry: I usually try to get the Pentagon. So when mech inf is there, its good to build new, because of the extra promotions.

This is my general "upgrade" plan for garrison troops (since I often have few offensive units...mostly I keep my horse archers until the end of the game however, depending on the situation I will (too) often skip those upgrades, and then get annoyed because I have only weak troops when an AI attacks (thankfully happens rarely enough with some care).

 

[Oggums]

Yes, it sucks that with Space Race you don't get to use the modern units very much, but disabling it usually means you will always research all techs before the game ends. With equal military techs and your brain, you should pretty much squash the AI every time.

I hate the space race, because that's how I always lose on Emperor, but without it there's an extra 100 turns or more to catch up and conquer. I just look at it as a more dynamic max-turn counter that I have to beat. If someone has a huge lead, you need to find a way fix it before your time runs out. Unfortunately, that also means I've never built a stealth bomber.

Speaking of Mech Inf and back on topic, I've played Japan and had loads of city raider 3 Samurai, and one had Commando. A City Raider Commando Mech Inf is definitely worth the upgrade cost.

 

[Nilrim]

Yes, it sucks that with Space Race you don't get to use the modern units very much, but disabling it usually means you will always research all techs before the game ends. With equal military techs and your brain, you should pretty much squash the AI every time.

I hate the space race, because that's how I always lose on Emperor, but without it there's an extra 100 turns or more to catch up and conquer. I just look at it as a more dynamic max-turn counter that I have to beat. If someone has a huge lead, you need to find a way fix it before your time runs out. Unfortunately, that also means I've never built a stealth bomber.

Yep enabling or disabling gives different problems. I have played all the Civ games and I just don't ever remember having this kind of problem in the game, I rarly disabled any victory condition in Civ 3, Civ 4 does need some serious end game work.

 

[Harry Haller]

I tend to upgrade units that have good promotions, and to use the remainder essentially as cannon fodder. I send them into enemy territory to slow down advances, soak up some attacks, and to draw enemy units out into the open where they are easier to kill. Any that survive long enough can do some pillaging while they are there.