Drill (first strike) vs Combat 1 promotion

[MoonWolf]

I like to give my machine guns drill promotions, they can be really awesome. I think I once had a machine gun with over 200XP (it got also a great general attached to it after a while). It started out with drill-promos placed on a hill in enemy territory.

I haven't though thought of giving archers and catapults drill for kamikaze attacks, have to try that one.

[Nugog]

Originally posted by MoonWolf
I like to give my machine guns drill promotions, they can be really awesome.

Good point!

Drill on fortified Machineguns would be awesome.

[couerdelion]

Very strange. Not only do you attach a GG to a unit that cannot attack, but it is then attack by the AI - perhaps because they know the GG is there. How it could get to 200 XP, though, is beyond me.

[MoonWolf]

It was actually a sort of experiment, trying to see how many XP's I could get or something. I was at war with someone on an other continent, the Aztecs I think (this was Warlords btw). Instead of invading them, I placed a lot of units on a hill in their land to have a sort of decoy, letting them spend their units on mine and to keep them busy. I simply wanted a superdefender, so I attached a GG to my already well proven hero. I also had a supermedic (GG with Medic III) so healing was pretty fast. Of course, I also had quite a few other units with Hill-promos there for defending. When I'm not thinking back, I'm quite sure that the superdefender reached nearly 300XP and when I ran out of useful promotions, I saved the XP's earned for when it could be upgraded to a mech inf.

And the superdefender got attacked as the game mechanics let the best defender (or with highest XP) defend in a stack.

Note: I play for fun, not to win (it's not often I finish a game cause I want to start over again and try something else). This might change with BtS though, as there are more to do in the modern times.

[couerdelion]

Originally posted by MoonWolf
And the superdefender got attacked as the game mechanics let the best defender (or with highest XP) defend in a stack.

What sounds a little unusual is that the AI would try/ to attack it when fortified, with promotion and heavily defended.

Maybe it’s just me but any units that I want to keep alive, I will keep defended. Probably to the point that the AI knows that it can’t do much so stays holed up in their city. Nowadays, if the AI does attack, I get a little nervous that I might have misjudged the situation.

[MoonWolf]

Ah, then I'll understand. True, but I think they just wanted to try to weaken my forces enough to take'em out. Of course, I lost some units as when my machine gun hero got damaged, others not that strong took over as defender. But I just replaced those so it wasn't any big issue

And as you say, nowadays it's different. Haven't tried BtS that much yet, but have already noticed the changes to the AI.

[LDiCesare]

The ai still does silly things, though, like landing a settler and one longbow right besides my huge stack which just razed a city there...
First strikes strike me as rather useless. It could be worth comparing Drill II vs. Combat I though, in case you are protective or somehow start with the Drill I promotion on a unit you intend to use on offense (grenadiers, cho-ko-nu or riflemen for instance).
There may be an effect of drill on collateral damage for cats, but it doesn't sound that great, since bombard looks better at it. I also noted that you can cause collateral damage without damageing your defender, so I doubt the usefulness of drill there.
However, I believe first strikes can be useful in one situation: When the other party is already low on hit points (damaged), whether or not it is still stronger than the driller.
So, in order to compare Drill I and Combat I, we'd have to test the results of fights between full health units, then half health units, and maybe 10% health units, of different strengths?