Archer Rush Part II - Revenge of AAHZ...

[UnOrthOdOx]

More cities working unupgraded tiles are pointless. And if you're just defending the cities, you can't be upgrading the tiles. There might be instances where a creative civ or someone with stonehenge might be better served planting such a city for fogbusting purposes, but generally it's more efficient to use units.

As an avid player of raging barbs, there's never been a situation where fogbusting hasn't been an adequate answer.

Yes, it's often more units than most are used to building. But it's always better to be able to at least see where the barbs are coming from.

Yes, some slip through the cracks, but the point of fogbusting is not only to prevent, but to see them enough in advance that you have plenty of time to deal with them before they can cause harm.

[wodan11]

Originally posted by Yosho


Well, I wouldn't say "no matter how many units it takes". Especally if you take out one of your neighbors in an early rush like this, and then end up with a very spread out empire, it sometimes would take a lot more units then you could have to get rid of ALL the fog. Not only that, units that wander too far out when attempting to fogbust often get isolated, and if they get attacked by one barb and wounded, they can't heal or get back before another barb finishes them off.

I didn't say it's a no brainer choice no matter how many units it takes, I said it's a good option to consider.

As always, the player needs to use his or her brain and make an intelligent decision.

Regarding your concern about a weakened fogbuster getting killed by multiple barbs, it's incumbent upon the player to bring him home to heal when threatened by a 2nd barb. You don't leave him hanging out there high and dry. As you say, all that will do is result in him getting killed to no benefit.

Personally what I do is position fogbusters, and then I have one or two extras (usually stronger "elite" units) that I can rally when there is a swarm of barbs like that. So, I bring the wounded sentry home, meanwhile I send the elite guys out there to clean up.

Don't get me wrong, getting rid of some fog is always worthwhile, it's often worth it to have sentaries posted right around your empire in defensive places like hill forests. But if you can't get rid of all the fog, some barbs will always spawn, and there's no easy answer to them.

Sure there is. It just may not be an answer you like.

It's subjective. Some people will want to go ahead with additional fogbusters. Some will want to keep additional "elite" units at home.

What is NOT fair however is to want to have your cake and eat it too. To assume that just because you stopped "most" of the fog that you are totally protected. Stopping most of the fog is a good benefit... it prevents spawning. You're right, one or two will still sneak in, and you need to be prepared for it. Or else you should send out more fogbusters in the first place.

You always want to have some units defending your cities, and perhaps key resouces like a hill copper mine. If you have extra units, you might want to use some of them to fog-bust, and you probably are also still exploring at the same time. Sometimes you need to basically go on a war footing in order to attack and take barbarian cities; and of course that can be really tricky if you've already rushed and overexpanded a bit.

What you're talking about there is having your cake and eating it too.

Any player who reduces his fogbusters or his at-home protection in order to do a rush (whether against an AI, a barb city, or a human opponent), deserves to have barb problems. It's your own darn fault.

Basically, some games, all you can do is hang on by whatever means necessary until you can eliminate the fog by mostly just building more cities.

A new city can be just as effective as a couple of fogbuster units, I agree. However, it may require its own fogbusters on the other side of it.

Wodan

[wodan11]

Originally posted by UnOrthOdOx
More cities working unupgraded tiles are pointless.

That's hardly true. Those cities are making stuff for you. If nothing else, that city can be making workers.

And if you're just defending the cities, you can't be upgrading the tiles. There might be instances where a creative civ or someone with stonehenge might be better served planting such a city for fogbusting purposes, but generally it's more efficient to use units.

The point isn't to be "efficient" in stopping the barbs, the point is to grow your civ past the point where barbs are a problem.

As an avid player of raging barbs, there's never been a situation where fogbusting hasn't been an adequate answer.

I always use raging barbs, and I agree.

Yes, some slip through the cracks, but the point of fogbusting is not only to prevent, but to see them enough in advance that you have plenty of time to deal with them before they can cause harm.

Agreed 100%!

Wodan

[Yosho]

Originally posted by UnOrthOdOx
More cities working unupgraded tiles are pointless. And if you're just defending the cities, you can't be upgrading the tiles. There might be instances where a creative civ or someone with stonehenge might be better served planting such a city for fogbusting purposes, but generally it's more efficient to use units.

I don't mean build cities just to bust fog. I mean that I usually never completly eliminate the fog until I expand through it. Of course I'm not building bad cities just to get rid of fog, and of course I'm not working unupgraded tiles. But in general, so long as your economy can support it and so long as it's useful, a new city and two units to defend it is both better at busting fog and more useful then, say, 4 units would be.

As an avid player of raging barbs, there's never been a situation where fogbusting hasn't been an adequate answer.

If there's too much empty land around your civ, you simply can not watch all of it all the time. I've been on maps pleanty of times where there's, say, a huge amount of empty tundra to the north of your empire, and it would take literally dozens of archers to watch every inch of it. That's really not possible; even if it was, it would be a huge waste of resources.

Yes, some slip through the cracks, but the point of fogbusting is not only to prevent, but to see them enough in advance that you have plenty of time to deal with them before they can cause harm.

Welll, right. I said I like to have sentary units in the forests near by cities, to watch some of the fog and ; the early warriors I have out scouting that end up with woodsman 2 or something are good for that, because when defending a forest they can usually beat an archer.

All I'm saying is that, on a lot of maps, eliminating the fog is not possible. And while watching some of the fog probably helps, to a certain extent if you're alone with a lot of wilderness around you, and especally if you start out with a lot of wilderness between your cities (like after an early rush), you really need to focus on city defense against barbs mixed with focused attacks on barb cities, because trying to watch all the fogged areas all the time is just not possible, and if you focus to much on that you'll leave your cities underdefended.

[Theben]

AAHZ's cities aren't THAT far apart- in fact once they grow into the BFC they should fill in nicely. He needs to get more cities settled, true... by the marble/copper for one. Also work the Ivory and Gold to alleviate unhappiness, horse for units/production. More workers, as someone pointed out is definitely needed.

And don't forget AAHZ, the NA civ has the Philo trait, so use it. Babylon in particular has a LOT of choppable forest to build wonders fast and the potential to be a good GP farm.

EDIT: Looking at the map again it will take 2 cities to get the marble and copper in their BFCs. Still 2+ more cities is a good idea.

[ZEE]

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[Pinchak]

You should move up to Monarch.

[ZEE]

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[Theben]

Since I didn't see any other civs near you, after you took Babylon you should've gone to peaceful builder for awhile...

I don't know how many barbs you had, but usually a few well-placed archers will take care of them.

Maybe you can archer-rush a few barb cities to catch up.

[ZEE]

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[Theben]

Ooh, barb city to the south.

Drop a settler where Moscow was ASAP, which btw you should've kept.

[ZEE]

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[Theben]

FYI I was playing MP with a friend last night and played Sitting Bull... Vassalage+Theocracy+Stonehenge+barracks and I had Drill IV Crossbowmen out of the gates. Very nice. Even nicer when I dropped 3000 gold to upgrade 20+ of them to Grenadiers.

[ZEE]

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[Theben]

Originally posted by AAHZ
it would have crippled my economy with the maitnence. I am scraping the barrel as it is. plus i needed ALL my troops to win the bloody victory vs. Catherine.

You can get by on the money from pillaging for awhile, long enough to finish early wars. Perhaps you could have whipped up a warrior or archer to watch the city. At any rate capitals are usually very well placed (and by the screen, Moscow was) so while razing the other cities is fine, I'd try harder to hold onto capitals.

Of course, if you just want to kill, be my guest.




p.s. you didn't burn any wonders, I hope?