What to do with Great Generals

[noto2]

basically I almost always settle my GGs. I might build a military academy in the city that has westpoint, for example, but usually I prefer to settle, also military science is not a priority in most of my games. Creating a warlord, as most have pointed out, is usually a crappy idea, since it will die very quickly. The only time I might create a warlord is if it actually effects the outcome of the game. For example, let's say I'm playing a peaceful strategy and get a tech/economy lead, and then get surprise DOWed and face a very tough defensive war. If I'm desperate I might create a warlord to try and save my bacon and salvage the game. Very rare, though.

 

[Riot]

GG's are actually very useful in helping you get to the breakpoint for West Point. Heroic Epic probably not so much. 10 xp (normally) or 8 xp (Charismatic leaders) isn't that awful to get.

 

[henrebotha]

I always make a super medic to escort my stack of doom. (Much fun to attach a late-game GG to a Warrior still sitting around in my capital, then upgrade him for free.) But I find that a super-withdrawing mounted unit is incredibly useful against an opponent fielding lots of siege. In my last game as Churchill, Zara was sending unreasonable amounts of cavalry-escorted cannon into my lands. I had a cavalry with Flanking II and Tactics (and Leadership, of course), and he was a huge help in taking out the offending siege weapons before they made it to my cities.

 

[noto2]

I always make a super medic to escort my stack of doom. (Much fun to attach a late-game GG to a Warrior still sitting around in my capital, then upgrade him for free.) But I find that a super-withdrawing mounted unit is incredibly useful against an opponent fielding lots of siege. In my last game as Churchill, Zara was sending unreasonable amounts of cavalry-escorted cannon into my lands. I had a cavalry with Flanking II and Tactics (and Leadership, of course), and he was a huge help in taking out the offending siege weapons before they made it to my cities.

Wow, nice, I never thought of that.

 

[Mudcrab]

I settle in my production city and opt to spit out 3 promo units as the core of the infranty - CR3 for attack and various stack defense combos, as well as some CR3 seige for sacrificial city attack. Other cities can produce horses, siege and city defenders.

 

[ranger101]

I usually settle the 1st one in my Heroic Epic city. I am a builder type and run Bureaucracy and Org. Religion, so the 1st GG gives my archery and melee troops 2 promotions off the bat.

2nd GG goes for super medic.

I will usually build Military Academy a 3rd one in my Heroic Epic City, but I wonder if that is the best use of it. I am getting +100% from the H. Epic, +25% from the forge, plus 25% from Org. Religion and then another +50% from factory/power. Still, the 2nd settled GG doesn't offer the 3rd promotion so I guess it is the right move.

 

[Sisiutil]

Since the HE city already has a huge bonus toward military units, a military academy there is a relatively low priority for me; I usually build West Point in a different production city, so I prioritize placing a military academy there.

 

[vicawoo]

I always make a super medic to escort my stack of doom. (Much fun to attach a late-game GG to a Warrior still sitting around in my capital, then upgrade him for free.) But I find that a super-withdrawing mounted unit is incredibly useful against an opponent fielding lots of siege. In my last game as Churchill, Zara was sending unreasonable amounts of cavalry-escorted cannon into my lands. I had a cavalry with Flanking II and Tactics (and Leadership, of course), and he was a huge help in taking out the offending siege weapons before they made it to my cities.

Trying to assess how effective great general super units is very much like comparing apples to oranges. Regardless, it's worth assigning a value to great general units.

My metric would be how many units would average the same effect? Obviously this doesn't work well for morale/siege, but it can be used for withdrawal great generals.
Flanking 2 cavalry have 60% withdrawal. A super flanking goes up to 90%, although there is a withdrawal limit.
So a great general flanker will average 10 withdrawals (not wins) before he dies. A flanking 2 cavalry will average 2.5 withdrawals. Therefore he is worth 4 flanking 2 cavalry (3 if you include the original unit).
With horse archers, it's 75% vs 45%, or 4 withdrawals vs 1.8.

 

[henrebotha]

Trying to assess how effective great general super units is very much like comparing apples to oranges. Regardless, it's worth assigning a value to great general units.

My metric would be how many units would average the same effect? Obviously this doesn't work well for morale/siege, but it can be used for withdrawal great generals.
Flanking 2 cavalry have 60% withdrawal. A super flanking goes up to 90%, although there is a withdrawal limit.
So a great general flanker will average 10 withdrawals (not wins) before he dies. A flanking 2 cavalry will average 2.5 withdrawals. Therefore he is worth 4 flanking 2 cavalry (3 if you include the original unit).
With horse archers, it's 75% vs 45%, or 4 withdrawals vs 1.8.

Yes, but you're leaving out the question of "does he win?" If you use other cheaper/weaker units (particularly collateral damage units) to precede the super flanker's attack, he has a huge chance to win. In the game I mentioned, I kept waiting for the enemy stack to approach to within 2 tiles of my city, then sent out a suicide cat followed by my super flanker.

The important point here is that I was desperately trying to produce an army of my own, and having to constantly produce new cavalry because my flankers die would not have helped.

 

[vicawoo]

Yes, but you're leaving out the question of "does he win?" If you use other cheaper/weaker units (particularly collateral damage units) to precede the super flanker's attack, he has a huge chance to win. In the game I mentioned, I kept waiting for the enemy stack to approach to within 2 tiles of my city, then sent out a suicide cat followed by my super flanker.

The important point here is that I was desperately trying to produce an army of my own, and having to constantly produce new cavalry because my flankers die would not have helped.

I don't understand your first point. Withdrawal only activates if your unit loses, so high chances of winning minimize the impact of the promotion. Flanking 2 cavalry with have the same odds of winning outright as a flanking 2 withdrawal leadership cavalry, so we only have to compare the withdrawal rates.

And super withdrawal great generals tend to be worth more of their comparable units than pure attack great generals, though this probably says more about the attack promotions not keeping up with experience.

 

[henrebotha]

I don't understand your first point. Withdrawal only activates if your unit loses, so high chances of winning minimize the impact of the promotion. Flanking 2 cavalry with have the same odds of winning outright as a flanking 2 withdrawal leadership cavalry, so we only have to compare the withdrawal rates.

And super withdrawal great generals tend to be worth more of their comparable units than pure attack great generals, though this probably says more about the attack promotions not keeping up with experience.

I simply mean that your post seemed to imply that the super flanker would only survive 9 out of 10 battles, which I felt was misleading. Apologies if this is not what you meant. The goal of the unit is to survive at all costs so that it can flank siege, so it is important to understand that winning a battle is as good as withdrawing from one.

Having the survival rate that he did, my super flanker obviously leveled up fast, allowing him to accrue other promotions like the Combat line.

 

[vicawoo]

So a great general flanker will average 10 withdrawals (not wins) before he dies. A flanking 2 cavalry will average 2.5 withdrawals

Erm, I explicitly stated withdrawals not wins.

 

[mirthadir]

It is extremely hard to beat the usefulness of the MASH, the Mil Acad, and finally the settled gg.

The MASH is effectively a stack multiplier; with typical stack counts for high levels of play it translates into dozens of units.

Settling, at most, gives you +25% to any unit; unless you are rushbuying your army or making heavy use of promotion production ... then you get more bang for your buck virtually every time with an academy until you run out of pumps that can't drop a tank per turn. As an added bonus, the mil acad works on nukes =)

 

[Sisiutil]

It is extremely hard to beat the usefulness of the MASH, the Mil Acad, and finally the settled gg.

The MASH is effectively a stack multiplier; with typical stack counts for high levels of play it translates into dozens of units.

Settling, at most, gives you +25% to any unit; unless you are rushbuying your army or making heavy use of promotion production ... then you get more bang for your buck virtually every time with an academy until you run out of pumps that can't drop a tank per turn. As an added bonus, the mil acad works on nukes =)

You can settle GGs long, long, LONG before you can build military academies. If you war early, are you just gonna sit on 'em for 2/3 of the game? A barracks + a settled GG = 1 more promotion without having to change civics. The additional promotion can sometimes make the difference between life and death for a unit in a close fight, and avoiding costly changes into Vassalage/Theocracy (if you're not Spiritual) is also valuable.

 

[mirthadir]

You can settle GGs long, long, LONG before you can build military academies. If you war early, are you just gonna sit on 'em for 2/3 of the game? A barracks + a settled GG = 1 more promotion without having to change civics. The additional promotion can sometimes make the difference between life and death for a unit in a close fight, and avoiding costly changes into Vassalage/Theocracy (if you're not Spiritual) is also valuable.

I have no disagreement with any of that; before mil trad (or at least close to it), I settle all my GGs barring the MASH. Depending upon play style I either try to have all the major unit pumps at 5 XP in non-XP granting civics or I try to pump the primary unit pump (almost always the HE) up to 3 promos and then start on the next unit pump (normally a captured cap).

However, once I do have the option to make mil acads I will normally make those instead of settling. Even at the most "life and death" situation 2 xp can never be more than +35% (CRIII vs gunpowder) and more often is around +15-20% on average.

Once I can make mil acads, pretty much the only times to settle instead of getting another mil acad are the following:
1. If I think getting the + / from settling him is more valuable to me than any military consideration. E.g. I'm about to DP the strongest AI in the game and make a run at culture/space and settling him in a key city gets me more than a mil acad in the next best city.
2. I'm getting most of my unit from ; most notably doing the infamous maces -> rifles upgrade can make XP extremely valuable.
3. My military pumps are sufficiently strong that I'm already pounding out a tank per turn without the bonus and the XP gain in one of the pumps is a greater net gain than setting up a new pump. Virtually always this is when the game is in the bag and I'm more tempted to upgrade my MASH to an UberMASH (WIII/MIII) to get a stronger healing multiplier.

 

[Artichoker]

@mirthadir:

You're missing an obvious point...settling the GG in the HE city, unless you are assuming that your HE city already has a settled GG by the time MAs are available. With a +100% bonus, adding a MA increases the already high production multiplier of 2.0 up to 2.5, resulting in a marginal gain of 25%. In that case, your settled GG inside the HE city can often get you better returns. Of course, there is also the case where you're deciding between a GG in the HE city vs. a MA in a different city...but this will depend on the relative output of the 2 cities, as well as the inclination of either city to produce military units.

But there is another issue that you don't address--the overproduction of military units, which leads to a greater demand of quality units over quantity of units. As you get more units, you unit upkeep increases, and each addtional unit has a decreasing net gain, due to increasing upkeep costs. The focus on quality instead of quantity slows down this progression. Now, 1 per turn for upkeep may seem small, but once you add in supply upkeep during wartime, and top that off with the effect of inflation, the upkeep cost becomes non-trivial.

 

[mirthadir]

@mirthadir:

You're missing an obvious point...settling the GG in the HE city, unless you are assuming that your HE city already has a settled GG by the time MAs are available. With a +100% bonus, adding a MA increases the already high production multiplier of 2.0 up to 2.5, resulting in a marginal gain of 25%. In that case, your settled GG inside the HE city can often get you better returns. Of course, there is also the case where you're deciding between a GG in the HE city vs. a MA in a different city...but this will depend on the relative output of the 2 cities.

But there is another issue that you don't address--the overproduction of military units, which leads to a greater demand of quality units over quantity of units. As you get more units, you unit upkeep increases, and each addtional unit has a decreasing net gain, due to increasing upkeep costs. The focus on quality instead of quantity slows down this progression.

A mil acad in the HE is normally for massing nukes; particularly ICBMS. Other than that, I always have the HE at 2 promos in any type of serious military game; settling a second GG brings me up to 9 xp with theo which makes it a one shot win to my third promo. Settling an additional general is normally not worth it as I find I often take The Pentagon or opt for a PS, Vassal, Theo, Pentagon total war run which puts me up to 3 promos out the door pretty much every. Rarely is there a game where mil acads are open and I don't have the HE in a good position.

You are correct that upkeep costs make the calculations between quantity and quality skewed, on the flip side you will find a substantial number of cases where the extra XP prove completely worthless. E.g. Let's say you build a 7xp tank thanks to a settled gg. You, like a pro, don't promote it until you need the promos. You attack 6 times with a combination of luck, unit order, and collateral before ever needing the third promo (and further let's say that you lose no turns to healing for this unit as the stack is being held up by other units). The extra xp was completely worthless to you; getting to the promo threshold is max 35%, but only if you use it before you'd have gotten it anyways. It is quite possible that actual return for settling is zero; particularly if you have a bunch of heavily promoted units running around already. If anything, second order effects like upkeep costs and xp efficiency tend more towards mil acads than towards settling.

Ultimately more units should allow you to:
1. Complete your wars faster.
2. Open a new front.
3. Turn off other units pumps and have them do something more efficient (e.g. build infra and hammer out gold).

Normally, when I hit the point that it isn't obviously clear if another mil acad is worthwhile; I've already won the game handily.

 

[noto2]

I agree that later in the game military academies can often be a much better choice than instructors, but instructors are your only choice for the first 1/2 - 2/3 of the game. It also depends what kind of game you're playing. Do you have a massive, sprawling empire with tons of production cities? Then you might want a MA in as many as you can get. Or, are you running a commerce heavy empire with just a few production cities? In that case, you'll want a MA in the few good production cities, and then probably want to settle GG's in them too. In the latter case you'll have a smaller but better military force.

 

[real_jobe]

I wrote an article about the different uses of Great Generals. It involves uses which wouldn´t make much sense in single player, but can be game deciding in multi player.

"Putting a great General to good use"

 

[troytheface]

a land based ultraman unit

a seabased ultra trireme to hyper jules verne sub

moral, leadership, tactics, combat, amphibeous

this is the superior