Artillery late in the game obsolete?

[axisworks]

I've found that, when formulating wars late in the game, the slow-moving artillery units slow down columns of tanks and such to a degree that essentially makes them a massive liability.

This is no surprise, as tanks and mech infantry are intended as blitzkrieg weapons. Since artillery can't defend itself against anything except weaker artillery, it seems necessary to protect it by stacking it with SAMs and armored units, and this takes units away from joining the main thrust of the attack or from garrisoning cities that need to be protected. Artillery really can't win any sort of attack on a city unless the units inside are substantially weakened, so it's pretty much only useful for bombardment of city defenses. I've also used them to garrison rear cities, as they move so slowly that I have to wait two or three times as many turns for them to catch up to the armored units.

The primary reason they're pretty much worthless at this point, however, is because of bombers, and even moreso: stealth bombers. Since stealth bombers can reduce city defenses just as well as artillery (mind you, bombers occasionally are intercepted), and they do it from many tiles removed from the target city without slowing the advance of armored troops, this more or less renders artillery completely useless, at least in wars that are fought past a First World War-level of technology. Thoughts?

[Fallenhero]

Yes, you're right. In my last game I wanted to remove the remnants of the American empire to relieve the cultural stranglehold they had on some of my other cities. I had no bombers and it took awhile for the Art to walk there.

I could have taken the cities with tanks but the cost would have been high. I use the Art to bombard the defenses only then attack with tanks with less losses.

I would think though, the late game blitz comes mostly into play if your going for a domination win. In my last couple of space wins I never built a bomber.

[axisworks]

Yeah, I was going for the domination win, but only as a part of a larger strategy to simply destroy my two main rivals, both of which had amassed gigantic militaries and were picking on small allies that couldn't defend themselves

I'd think one of the later techs might improve the speed at which artillery move, since in modern warfare most artillery is brought in by helicopter, airplane, or is speedily trucked in on armored transports and can shoot far longer and more accurately than artillery designed say, during the world wars.

[Jaybe]

Originally posted by axisworks
I'd think one of the later techs might improve the speed at which artillery move, since in modern warfare most artillery is brought in by helicopter, airplane, or is speedily trucked in on armored transports and can shoot far longer and more accurately than artillery designed say, during the world wars.

It isn't the artillery that is necessarily slow, it's the vast amounts of ammunition and support required for them to be effective.

If you want to go the "realism" route, then tanks should not have the City Raider promotions available: that should be left to the Infantry (gunpowder) types. In fact, I have been considering changing the xml files to make it so, but I fear the AI strategy is hardcoded.

[greenday_234]

I was thinking perhaps a mod to create a mobile artillery?

[Yosho]

(shrug) If you're going for a rapid conquest heading for a domination win, then yeah, bombers are better. If I'm trying to fight an enemy who's about my size or stronger, or if this is a minor war and I want to do some damage to the enemy without slowing down my economy much, I'd rather keep using the artilary I already have to break through his city defenses and spend my hammers on ground forces instead of building (and re-building as they get shot down) a large air force; keep the artilary safe, and you never have to rebuild them. I often don't really care much about the speed of the attack, so long as I can hurt the other guy and grab a few cities without the war costing me much. It's all about what your stratigic goals are...

[Arrian]

The best siege unit, IMO, is the cannon. Those babies rock. I often ignore artillery entirely.

-Arrian

[greenday_234]

Out of curiosity, why do people love cannon so much more that artillery, is there some strategical advantage behind them that I am unaware of?

[Quillan]

I don't think so. I think it's a combination of things:

1) Cannon have a strength of 12, and often enter the game before Riflemen make it in. Strength 12 with a couple of City Raider promotions will walk all over defending musketmen or longbows.

2) Even after the introduction of riflemen, cannon are still good. Riflemen are only strength 14, so the cannon with city raider still does well against them.

3) By the time you get up to artillery, infantry are into the game. Artillery begins at a disadvantage against infantry, and that gets MUCH worse once mechanized infantry shows up. Since a cannon with Bombard reduces the defense rating by 30%, and Bombers can both reduce the city defenses from a long distance away without having to march there as well as cause collateral damage to the defending units without much chance of failure (barring interception).

All this means most people go for Flight/Radio and build bombers rather than build lots of artillery. I generally do. I will upgrade the cannons I have to artillery if I have the money, but I don't build artillery once I can build bombers.

[Gueron]

Hmm, Can Artillery be used to bombard units, or only cities? I'm thinking only cities.

But if they can bombard units, then they might be useful in defense of a city, as they might be able to damage multiple units. I've never successfully used artillery outside bombarding a city I'm trying to take.

G.

[axisworks]

Exactly my point. They're so weak compared to other units and move so slowly that you have to use lots of stacked troops just to protect your artillery from being outflanked and destroyed in one turn if they're at the front lines. This makes sense realistically-speaking, but it would also make sense to be able to bombard a city one or two squares away, I'd think, and have troops in front of it as a buffer attacking at the same time... which is more how artillery is used.

Nope, artillery can't barrage units. It can attack them, but, as I mentioned before, it's pretty worthless if there are units from the technological level of infantry forward.

[borntosoul]

For me artillery is the one of the most powerful units in the game, they can significantly damage stacks of units and avoid sams. but theyre are slow moving in enemy territory so i use them for defence later.

[Badtz Maru]

Originally posted by Gueron
Hmm, Can Artillery be used to bombard units, or only cities? I'm thinking only cities.

But if they can bombard units, then they might be useful in defense of a city, as they might be able to damage multiple units. I've never successfully used artillery outside bombarding a city I'm trying to take.

G.

Yes, Artillery can attack units outside of cities. I like to have Artillery in my border cities because even one can really hurt a stack of doom's chance of taking your city.

[spammurabi]

I've personally never had to use artillery very much, but if I was at technological parity with my enemies (as I might be as I progress upwards in difficulty level) and I needed to bombard enemy cities to have a decent chance of winning combat in their city, and they had a big nasty air force hovering about, I'd probably use artillery.

Bombers get shot down, and the AI sure does like building fighters and SAM infantry. When that happens I typically just roll over them with Modern Armor, but if they had City Defender Mech Infantry, that'd be a problem.

You can get Arty pretty quick though, if you try. City Raider Arty fare decently enough against Infantry after bombarding the cities, and the collateral damage they do can be very valuable for the units they're working with.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by greenday_234
I was thinking perhaps a mod to create a mobile artillery?

Good idea. You should be able to build self-propelled guns.