Siege weapon promotions

[cal_01]

I'd rather have First Strike on my cats/cannon/artillery. They're practically the only unit that can have first strike as its first promotion, and a horde of 1-2 first strike cannons/artillery tend to mow down anything in its path.

[Velociryx]

Artillery really isn't in the same ballpark as Infantry.

What I mean is, attack strength wise, they are in the same ballpark, and using attack strengths as a basis for comparison, actually Arty is much better...you lose 2pts of combat strength and gain the ability to whack several units in a stack. Potent.

And while I agree with your point about the bottleneck for the space ship being at or around Fusion, my point is, if you reach Rocketry first by, say, some 20-odd, or 30-odd turns, that gives you a rather remarkable "leg up" on getting the initial project completed and getting those ship parts built. Time that your rivals don't have.

33 Techs to reach Infantry, and 37 techs to reach Artillery, with the vast majority of them overlapping, and by this time, with everything up to universities and observatories up and running, your time to research a tech should be plummeting, so really, it's not THAT much of a stretch to snag both in short order (and in general, that is how it plays out in practice, with me grabbing assembly line not for the infantry, but for the factories, and then speeding toward artillery, with artillery generally coming into grasp at about the same time as my last factory/coal plant gets built (ie., before I've begun building many infantry anyway). And with both in hand, a good mix of arty and infantry looks REALLY attractive (infantry for defense, massed artillery for turning enemy cities into smoking piles of debris).

-=Vel=-

[Druss]

I tend to use Barrage on my catapult promotions, for me they are just support units that are only ever used in softening city defences. A rule of thumb is to build five catapults, "cherry pick" there victories gaining Accuracy (10% to bombardment). That means 4 catapults in a stack would decimate 100% city defences. These catapults stay with me throughout the game upgrading to cannons then artillery - I never build more seige units as I never use them to fight with.

Perhaps this is because I tend to favour playing Lizzy/Victoria = Redcoats = foot soldiers do my attacking. A little tactic I like to use is to rush my military, building a core force that will last most of the game. So I switch to Thocracy from organised religeon for about 10 turns - have 2 cities build maceman (my capital can produce one unit per turn at this point), so at the end of the rush I have about 15 macemen - I promote them to City Raider II (45% city attack). By the time I reach Rifling my economy and infrastructure are ready to rampage - thus my newly upgraded redcoats have at least CR II many CR III - a promotion they could not have if id have built them from scatch

This tactic works well for me - tried it using the CS slingshot (Thx for the tutorial Velo ) at Monarch/epic/pangaea/small map. Ended in a diplomatic victory after eating Louis/Alex most of Egypt and part of Spain by 1850 ish.

[Peptis]

I generally build a mass of siege weapons while I am researching my next main combat unit. That way I don't have to build as many of the new expensive units as I can use the siege units to soften up city defenses. This means that more of my expensive units will survive and my attack can continue to further cities.

I also prefer 1st strike as the initial promotion for my siege weapons. I haven't done the math, but I believe that it increases their survivability, especially against archers and other units that begin with 1st strike.

[Swiss Pauli]

I really like this debate cos I think it shows that there's no one 'right' way to approach bombard which makes the game more fun to re-play using a slightly different approach each time.

I started with collateral promos but now I'm favouring city raider. I'd need to check this out, but I feel that CR gives them more turns before death in low-odds combat and thus a greater chance of withdrawal.

[gus_smedstad]

Originally posted by Velociryx
And with both in hand, a good mix of arty and infantry looks REALLY attractive (infantry for defense, massed artillery for turning enemy cities into smoking piles of debris).

Perhaps you're playing on a harder difficulty level? I generally play at Monarch these days, and technology moves slower at higher difficulty levels.

The crux of my position revolves around the idea that you can get Tanks almost as fast as you can get Artillery, and Tanks are much stronger. Assuming you have Assembly Line, Railroad, and Physics, you need Combustion, Electricity, and Industrialization for Tanks, and just Artillery for Artillery. If you've gotten Combustion because you want Destroyers (the Frigate -> Destroyer gap is the biggest combat change in the game), it's just Electricity and Industrialization vs. Artillery.

Is the delay of one or even two technologies really worth building strength 18 units instead of strength 28 units? I suppose it could be 3 technologies if you skip Railroad, but who skips Railroad?

Artillery makes more sense to research if you forgo Assembly Line for a while, because there are a lot of requirements for Assembly Line that aren't needed for Artillery. It's like pushing for Chemistry by pushing through the Guild line instead of following Education. You can do it, but it usually seems smarter to follow Paper and Education.

- Gus

[Velociryx]

Oh, no question...tanks are the all-around superior unit (being the "flagship" land unit of the age), BUT...having said that, hammer for hammer, you will be hard pressed to find a more EFFICIENT damage producer than a unit of artillery. This is doubly true, given the AI's tendency to produce large numbers of them (cats, cannons, and artillery). With the 50% bonus vs. other artillery, you've effectively got a Str. 27 unit against a lot of the AI's units, or, a Str. 18 that can damage lots of units in a stack, OR a unit that can (by itself, over the course of 5 turns, or instantly if grouped with others of its kind), reduce a 100% defensive bonus in a city to nothing.

That kind of versatility is notably absent from both Infantry AND Tanks, making Artillery, IMO, *totally* worth the side stop, even if you're not planning a space race (or an immediate one).

-=Vel=-

[gus_smedstad]

You build Artillery when you have tanks? That really makes no sense to me. In fact, I'd argue you have it backward, Tanks are far more versatile than Artillery.

A tank costs only 20% more than Artillery, and is 50% stronger against almost everything. Tanks are actually the more efficient producer of damage.

Artillery does collateral damage, but if you take the Barrage I promotion, so do Tanks. Sure, the tank is a bit weaker than it could be, but a Tank with Barrage I is still a lot stronger than an Artillery with City Raider I.

Yes, Artillery is strength 27 against cannons, but who cares? It's not like Tanks or even Infantry have much difficulty killing cannons. Since the +50% versus Siege isn't "attack only" like Grenadiers, it cancels out when attacking other Artillery.

I'm fairly certain the crux of the bonus is intended to make Artillery into a Machine Gun killer. Unfortunately, unless the defender has no Infantry left in the stack, the Infantry will defend instead. It does happen, of course, but it's unusual enough that I'd rather have the versatility of a Tank against other defenders.

The one thing that Artillery does well is reduce defenses. Tanks are superior at every other role it fills, and more cost effective. However, if you're dragging along a unit to reduce defenses, even catapults can fill that role. You need fewer Artillery to do it, but in all likelihood you've already built enough cannons or catapults in earlier wars to reduce a +100% city in one turn.

- Gus

[Velociryx]

Mmm...yes and no. a 20% savings is a 20% savings (the cost push you write off here as being incidental is nearly identical to the BONUS given by most buildings we build to improve our cities (typically being in the 25% range)...in this light, no one would argue that a library is "incidental", and I would contend that it's fundamentally the same argument when building military units. 20% is 20%, and worthy of consideration, IMO.

As to building them...sometimes, sure. It depends on the situation. In a closely contested game, I'll definitely build them in number, because those are the very situations where that 20% cost difference can make or break you. In runaway games like DW1a, there's no need. With something like 500% of the productive capability of my next nearest rival, a 20% savings on unit costs didn't make a bit of difference, so in that game, the only artillery I had were catapult upgrades I had built much earlier, but not every game will play out like that. A financial civ that expands aggressively (Catherine's Russia, and Mansa Musa come to mind) can easily hang with a human, no matter what economic trickery you try to pull, making war with those civs much more technologically even, unless you whack them really early.

-=Vel=-

[The keeper]

If I am fighting longbows with cats, I take CR promotion. Longbows get first strikes which cancels out the drill promotion for cats.

If I am fighting something other than bows, I will usually take drill. This gives them the opportunity to get a couple of strikes in early - and improves your chances of winning more than a CR promotion will.