Worst Leader

[Yosho]

Originally posted by wodan11
If you're using siege units, then the siege units are the ones with the CR promotions. The other units could have cake-baking promotions and they would still win. The fact that they have FS promotions allow them to win the combat with little to no health loss. That means they can immediately proceed to the next city to be assaulted.

In other words, I think "city-smashing macemen" are not only overrated, they aren't even needed. You need siege anyway. And, if you're using siege, you don't need city smashing macemen. FS xbows would be much more useful. Plus, the FS xbows are going to do MUCH better in your non-city-assault combats while CR macemen will be weak and ineffective.

Wodan

(shrug) I do use siege units, but I don't usually like to sacrifice many of them to take a city. Lower the defenses, throw away one or two until the best defenders can be beaten by my couple of uber-upgraded macemen, and then finish the wounded with my other units. If I didn't have 1-3 very upgraded macemen, I could still win to be sure, but it would be a LOT more expensive; I'd have to sacrifice a lot more siege units, and then the badly wounded city defender longbowman will probably still kill the first regular maceman I send in. On the other hand, with a couple of "city smashing macemen", I sometimes can take fairly well defended cities without losing any units at all, or at most one or two siege units.

[Yosho]

Originally posted by snoopy369
Entirely agree with wodan. Also, a lot of people seem to play on a level where they lose no cities... many people do NOT play this easy of a game. My last game I lost two cities to an AI assault, with an AI 2x my power; I beat it back and am now taking cities back. This is normal for me, and probably for anyone playing at a 'hard' difficulty level (ie, a level they sometimes or often lose at). Having city defenders that will actually beat some of the AI units means the AI spends more units taking those one or two cities, and loses more... very helpful later in the game

(nods) Oh, yeah, absolutly, city defenders are very important, and better ones are clearly an advantage.

It might be my style of play, I guess I just don't really use a "fortress city" defense style very much. I lose cities, sure, but that dosn't mean I'm relying on fortified longbowmen to win the war for me. In fact, if I get surprise attacked and am numerically outmatched and in trouble, there have been times I've just completly withrawn all of my millitary units from minor border cities, and let the AI take those in the early stages of the war rather then lose units trying to defend them; that way, my more important cities are well defended, the AI leaves large numbers of units garrisoning those border cities and thus weakens his stacks of doom, and it gives me room to maneuver and to wear down his now much more spread out and vulnerable forces. And the forces sitting in your former city with 0% cultural defense and your roads running right up to his door are just sitting ducks for your city attacker units.

Basically, in any war, my first goal isn't to take cities, or even necessarally to avoid losing minor border cities. My first goal is to destroy his army, and if I can do that, everything else is easy.

Of course, sometimes it's worth defending a border city you can't keep just to bleed him down a little, but often times I find myself in a situation where I'm so outnumbered that if I lose 2 of my units to kill 3 of his, it actually hurts me more then helps me.

[wodan11]

Originally posted by Yosho
(shrug) I do use siege units, but I don't usually like to sacrifice many of them to take a city.

A CRIII siege is going to survive more battles than your CRIII Maces, IMO.

If I didn't have 1-3 very upgraded macemen, I could still win to be sure, but it would be a LOT more expensive; I'd have to sacrifice a lot more siege units, and then the badly wounded city defender longbowman will probably still kill the first regular maceman I send in. On the other hand, with a couple of "city smashing macemen", I sometimes can take fairly well defended cities without losing any units at all, or at most one or two siege units.

You can do the exact same thing with siege, and no it wouldn't be a lot more expensive, and no you wouldn't have to sacrifice a lot more siege (if that was true, then you would have to sacrifice just as many of your macemen).

Maybe we should look at some numbers. Assume culture/walls are knocked down beforehand.

CRIII Mace vs fortified CGII Longbow:
8 + 75% vs 6 + 70% = 8 vs 5.71

CRIII Treb vs fortified CGII Longbow:
4 + 175% vs 6 + 70% = 4 vs 2.93 (+25% retreat)

=========================

Now, let's look at some collateral damage in the mix. In your "plan" you send in a couple of siege for collateral before you send in your maces.

CRIII Mace vs wounded fortified CGII Longbow:
8 + 75% vs ~4.75 + 70% = 8 vs 4.52

CRIII Treb vs wounded fortified CGII Longbow:
4 + 175% vs ~4.75 + 70% = 4 vs 2.32 (+25% retreat)

Wodan

[Unimatrix11]

Originally posted by Yosho

Basically, in any war, my first goal isn't to take cities, or even necessarally to avoid losing minor border cities. My first goal is to destroy his army, and if I can do that, everything else is easy.

Seems like you read Clausewitz.
a) destroy army,
b) take land,
c) break will

[Yosho]

Originally posted by wodan11

A CRIII siege is going to survive more battles than your CRIII Maces, IMO.

Do you actually manage to get city raider III trebs??? How do you do that?

Getting very experenced macemen isn't all that hard, even with without agg, because you can usually have them pick off large numbers of enemy obsolete units in the open ground or obsolete units defending a city. However, if you have a basic treb with, say, city raider 1 from the barreks, (or say city raider 1 + drill 1 from pro if you want), what can you do with it to get it experence points that won't probably get it killed?

A few very experenced macemen are just much easier to get then a few very experenced trebs, IMHO. You can't finish off wounded units in cities with trebs, or kill random enemy pillegers, or whatever, so trebs that actually go into battle seem to die young a lot more, in my experence, and really don't ever seem become that experenced; at least not when I use them. Especally since I usually have a few very experenced axemen or swordsmen I upgrade to macemen in the first place.

I tend to think of seige units as what I send in to lose battles that are probably going to be lost no matter what, because at least they have a chance of retreating and will do collateral damage to the rest the enemies anyway.

[wodan11]

Originally posted by Yosho
Do you actually manage to get city raider III trebs??? How do you do that?

The exact same way you get CRIII maces.

Wodan

[Krill]

I've acutaly got a game going where I have a city that has Heroic Epic, barracks, stables, West Point, 5 settled GG and I'm running Vassalage and Theo (I'm pretty much building mostly units) and I'm Cyrus, so Chm/Imp. 21XP on trebs, so They are CR3 Barrage2 out of the gate. Boudicca didn't know what hit her.

[snoopy369]

It doesn't matter how many trebs you lose, or get CR3, or whatever. It matters how much it costs you to take a city.

Treb: 80h
Maceman: 80h (I think?)

If I can give up 3 trebs to take a city and suffer no other losses, that's 240h to take a city. If you'd lose on average 4 macemen to take that same city... you're ahead by 80h.

I usually get some CR3 trebs, but ultimately i'm just as happy to be sacrificing them. 240h=1 city is worth it to me

[Jvstin]

Originally posted by Krill
I've acutaly got a game going where I have a city that has Heroic Epic, barracks, stables, West Point, 5 settled GG and I'm running Vassalage and Theo (I'm pretty much building mostly units) and I'm Cyrus, so Chm/Imp. 21XP on trebs, so They are CR3 Barrage2 out of the gate. Boudicca didn't know what hit her.

Daymn. Now that is an conqueror dream city for military production.

[One_more_turn]

Is it possible that wodan is not playing the BTS?

[Krill]

Originally posted by Jvstin


Daymn. Now that is an conqueror dream city for military production.

I got pentagon and added a load more GG to it; no it is making CD3 Drill 3 Infantry. I just one of those in each border city and there isn't anything that will get odds on them until MA or bombers.

[wodan11]

OMT: I'm running BtS 3.13 + Bhruic's.

Wodan