Why not Protective?

[azzaman333]

Aggressive is almost as bad as Protective IMO, but barracks are built in almost every town especially when playing with AGG. Which gives it that slight edge over PRO.

 

[PieceOfMind]

But barracks are cheap.

I think it depends a lot on what settings you play if building barracks in nearly every city is a standard strategy. I find that most of my cities have to focus on commerce out of necessity. My dedicated military pumps and usually the capital are the only ones who get barracks, plus captured cities which have military instructors etc.

 

[azzaman333]

But barracks are cheap.

I think it depends a lot on what settings you play if building barracks in nearly every city is a standard strategy. I find that most of my cities have to focus on commerce out of necessity. My dedicated military pumps and usually the capital are the only ones who get barracks, plus captured cities which have military instructors etc.

If I'm aggressive I'll build barracks in any city, because they'll be very cheap, and produce combat I + 3exp units right off the bat. Even if they only build 2 or 3 units over 100 turns, that's 2 more experienced units to counter an enemy than I wouldve had otherwise, for not much cost.

 

[zenspiderz]

But barracks are cheap.

I think it depends a lot on what settings you play if building barracks in nearly every city is a standard strategy. I find that most of my cities have to focus on commerce out of necessity. My dedicated military pumps and usually the capital are the only ones who get barracks, plus captured cities which have military instructors etc.

Quite so.

Really only a few cities need barracks. Main military city (HE & WP) and 1-3 supplementary military cities and thats even if you war heavily.

Even when I play spiritual and use the trait to switch to theo & vassalage for empire wide unit building there will be plenty of cities (pure commerce, GP farms) that won't be building military units.

Castles are good in every city. Any city with a courthouse should have a castle for esp bonus.

Extra trade route is good in every city esp coastal cities with harbours and capital cities and other high pop cities and commerce cities.

border cites benefit from the culture bonus

potentially any city may benefit from the defensive bonus.

Walls make your cities almost invincible pre-construction. And tougher to defeat even after construction.

 

[GooglyBoogly]

Really only a few cities need barracks. Main military city (HE & WP) and 1-3 supplementary military cities and thats even if you war heavily.

Sometimes, when I am in a war, hand haven't got the pyramids/fascism yet I find myself strapped for happiness. Switching into Nationalism can be great for the +2happy the barracks provide, and when in that situation I often find myself constructing barracks in my larger cities I.E GP farm and Commerce centers, which pretty much means that almost all of my cities have them.

 

[azzaman333]

Quite so.

Really only a few cities need barracks. Main military city (HE & WP) and 1-3 supplementary military cities and thats even if you war heavily.

Even when I play spiritual and use the trait to switch to theo & vassalage for empire wide unit building there will be plenty of cities (pure commerce, GP farms) that won't be building military units.

Castles are good in every city. Any city with a courthouse should have a castle for esp bonus.

Extra trade route is good in every city esp coastal cities with harbours and capital cities and other high pop cities and commerce cities.

border cites benefit from the culture bonus

potentially any city may benefit from the defensive bonus.

Walls make your cities almost invincible pre-construction. And tougher to defeat even after construction.

You're not leveraging AGG to its maximum potential if you aren't spamming barracks in most cities.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

IMO it kind of sucks in single player. The AI doesn't really do anything to you that needs protective, so you'll wind up using it mostly for offensive longbow counter promos and gunpowder...both of which combat winds up a superior promotion in many cases (combat II amphibious, stronger toe to toe vs drill, etc). Perhaps more annoyingly the cheap buildings for protective obsolete way, way before they should as defensive structures, and I complain about that more than I should I suppose.

Archer rushes in MP though? Especially protective archer rushes so that the archers have access to counter promotions? Nasty, You can hit with 8 before 2000 bc, often somewhat considerably before that. At this point in time, they MIGHT have hooked up copper. If they didn't go archery, they'll be defenseless. If they did, even then 8 archers will overrun 2 archers defending.

 

[Arms Longfellow]

I'm not great at figuring out the exact math, so I have a question. For offensive purposes, should I be giving my Cho Ko Nus Combat promotions or Drill promotions? Right now I tend to have 50% of them follow the Drill line and the other 50% do Combat, and I use the Combat guys to hit the city first, who are then followed by the Drill guys (they also double as stack defenders). Any way I can improve on this?

 

[The Snug]

I'm not great at figuring out the exact math, so I have a question. For offensive purposes, should I be giving my Cho Ko Nus Combat promotions or Drill promotions? Right now I tend to have 50% of them follow the Drill line and the other 50% do Combat, and I use the Combat guys to hit the city first, who are then followed by the Drill guys (they also double as stack defenders). Any way I can improve on this?

I think it's best to maximize any line of promotions, whether it's drill, cg, or simple combat. The reason being that the truly great strengths of each line maximize at the end. As Piece of Mind stated earlier, besides the extra strikes both d3 and d4 reduce the amount of collateral damage taken, and d4 also adds a 10% boost against mounted.

Just as some ppl advocate city specializiation, in similar fashion it may be best to specialize your units. I try to utilize mixed promotions in all of my stacks. I'll have some units that are cr3, some that are c4 commandos, some that are 3rd degree guerilla's or rangers, and of course cg3 units that will defend cities. I also try to give some units the +25% counter promotions. I anticipate any all situations.

I should reitterate for emphasis, that instead of building an entire army based upon a single promotion line, it is far more effective to use a mix of different specialized units. You will need guerrilla's, rangers, commandos, city raiders, city defenders, anti-mounted, anti-archer, anti-melee etc... So anticipate it ahead of time and be prepared.

 

[Arms Longfellow]

Yeah that's what I do, but I'm wondering if I should have more Drill specialists than Combat specialists (especially considering I get a Drill to start with anyway). Like I said I tend to make the Combat guys hit first, to hurt the top defenders of the city stack, then my Drill guys can do the major collateral damage.

 

[The Snug]

Since you're already getting drill for free, I'd max out that line. Just make sure that you make some anti-mounted units too to stack with the drill troops.

 

[brucedecatz]

IMO it kind of sucks in single player. The AI doesn't really do anything to you that needs protective, so you'll wind up using it mostly for offensive longbow counter promos and gunpowder...

Play Always war games
Pro saves the player's ass when 6 axeman rush to my city which only has two archers.
And I stop playing China in Always War games, for a good reason.

 

[Arms Longfellow]

Thanks, I'll start using more Drillers.

And thanks for this thread, dudes. It made me feel better about playing my favourite civ China "despite" the Protective trait which I used to think was crappy. I still don't think it's GREAT, but now I'm at least convinced that it's slightly better than Aggressive, which I already liked.

 

[blitzkrieg1980]

Protective is a great trait for bunkered techers, cultural, or diplo victories. Usually a larger land mass is required for a score/time win, but you can achieve that with protective by warring. It plays off better for peaceful civs, but is useful for warmongers too.

Japan is a great war mongering civ. Perfect if you plan on steamrolling everyone before techers start taking off.