Praetorians!

[_BuRjaCi_]

Originally posted by Flamer(fin)


Well.. not exactly. Praetorians hardly left the city of Rome. They were used to defend to city and as emperor's guards. Usually the emperor of Rome was chosen by the leader of praetorians (Prefect) or it was vital for the emperor to be in good terms with the prefect.

Legions did the most fighting and conquering.

That's why I always play with Pretorians renamed into Legion.

Does anyone know why Firaxs chose Pretorians instead of the classic Legion of Civ2 and the UU Legion of Civ3 ?

[Nugog]

Originally posted by _BuRjaCi_


That's why I always play with Pretorians renamed into Legion.

Does anyone know why Firaxs chose Pretorians instead of the classic Legion of Civ2 and the UU Legion of Civ3 ?

Cos Praetorian sounds better?

[DirtyMartini]

Excellent post as usual Blake. You've put your finger on why I (and many others) like Praets, but become one dimensional when using them. Like you said, build Praets, crush opposition, lather, rinse, repeat.

Your post aside, apparently, someone thought they were just a a liiiiittle bit overpowered as they've been made more expensive in Warlords (don't remember exactly how much).

[Thedrin]

Is this on top of the cost increase from one of the previous patches?

[DirtyMartini]

Don't know -- there were a couple of things in the Warlords manual which were ambiguous. Things that I thought had already been changed somewhere along the way, but that the manual made sound like new changes. For example, manual states that forests now = +0.5 health. IIRC that's been true for some time.

[Nugog]

Originally posted by DirtyMartini
someone thought they were just a a liiiiittle bit overpowered as they've been made more expensive in Warlords

NO

Say it's not true

[DirtyMartini]

Originally posted by nugog



NO

Say it's not true

Like I said, I might be wrong about how new the change is. I'd hate to be spreading misinformation.

[DrSpike]

I wouldn't be surprised if they are nerfed. I agree with Blake's post, but the result is that they are overpowered versus the AI, and nerfing praetorians is a much easier fix than making the AI react properly to them.

[Dis]

real men don't need overpowered units.

The problem I have is when I dominate too early, I lose interest and never finish the game. This happened in my current game with the Japanese (samuraii do rock). I conquered 2 nations, now I have little incentive to finish my game.

I think I'll stick with the germans.

[Nugog]

The Warlords manual lists the production cost as being 45 hammers.

For the life of me I can't remember the cost in civ vanilla!

[Yosho]

Originally posted by Blake
Praets aren't really that overpowered, here's why:
1) They replace a relatively useless base unit - Swordsmen have no niche and are generally inferior to Axemen. A slightly boosted Swordsman would still not be all that useful, so a significant boost is needed.

I've got to say I don't agree with that. If you want to do an early rush (and don't have an early game UU), the best way to do it is with swordsmen, IMHO. Ideally you can pull of the rush before he gets axes, which most AI's do not prioritise, but even if not, the AI dosn't use axes well on defense, usually relying on archers and sometimes some spearmen for city defense.

A sword rush is an effective tactic for any civilization; swords walk though archers like they're nothing, and the bronzeworking/ironworking tech line is also useful economically. And praets are just better then swords. Yeah, a pure axe stratagy would do ok against them at least when it comes to defending cities, but any kind of mixed forces get slaughtered; wheras a mixed stratagy with even a small number of axes beats any sword-based stratagy.

[Thedrin]

Originally posted by nugog
The Warlords manual lists the production cost as being 45 hammers.

For the life of me I can't remember the cost in civ vanilla!

There's no change on top of the change that was made in one of the patchers:

Jaguar 35
Swordsman 40
Praetorian 45

[Nugog]

Originally posted by Thedrin


There's no change on top of the change that was made in one of the patchers:

Jaguar 35
Swordsman 40
Praetorian 45

WOOHOO!

[Snotty]

whoops I must have been hearing what I wanted to hear at the conference then

[DrSpike]

Originally posted by Yosho


I've got to say I don't agree with that. If you want to do an early rush (and don't have an early game UU), the best way to do it is with swordsmen, IMHO. Ideally you can pull of the rush before he gets axes, which most AI's do not prioritise, but even if not, the AI dosn't use axes well on defense, usually relying on archers and sometimes some spearmen for city defense.

A sword rush is an effective tactic for any civilization; swords walk though archers like they're nothing, and the bronzeworking/ironworking tech line is also useful economically. And praets are just better then swords. Yeah, a pure axe stratagy would do ok against them at least when it comes to defending cities, but any kind of mixed forces get slaughtered; wheras a mixed stratagy with even a small number of axes beats any sword-based stratagy.

My post above agrees with your central point, but you did miss Blake's point, which I also agree with. Basically he is saying they aren't overpowered in principle, and he is right. In practice though, because of the AI, they are a little overpowered as the AI doesn't use the counters it has effectively.