Warlord Game Strategy Discussion

[Theben]

One thing Boudica has for her is the guerilla line of promos is available for her melee units, and they start with Guer I (with dun). So only 4 exp and they can have guer III and 50% withdrawl... good for keeping those early GGs alive.

[Brael]

Ya, I went over it a couple posts up (post 57). What I need to figure out is if the dun benefit will apply to units post rifling or not. That's the important factor. Guerrilla is a line that has the same availability as drill.

Between guerrilla, aggressive, and chr you can save some real exp on higher level units.

The other thing with guerrilla 3 is it's a 30% hills attack while hills are 25% defense. The AI invading will path over hills as they're usually more defensive terrain. So you can set some hills up as kill zones and get yourself a 5% attacking boost on top of the retreat if the attack fails.

[rah]

Hmm, will have to ponder this one. Yes I do clear forests around cities but there are sometimes those annoying hills that you know they'll use.

[Brael]

Ok, I just tested. The promotion bonus obsoletes with rifling as well so it would be a bit like CR units where you build them earlier and promote them to gunpowder units later on. It's still a saved promotion (and a useful one at that if you take it to 3) just not as nice as it could be.

[rah]

Still confused. You still get the CR bonus when you upgrade the unit.
Do you get the attack bonus after the unit has been upgraded?

[Brael]

Yes. Guerrilla 3 doesn't care if the unit is upgraded or not. The promotion reads as:
+30% hills attack bonus
+50% withdrawl chance.

What I was referring to is Guerrilla 3 being more appealing with Boudica due to the combination of a free combat 1, 1 promotion less for Guerrilla 3 with the dun, and CHR. That's a pretty major exp savings you can leverage though any civ can take advantage of that hills attack bonus. After testing though it would work a bit like CR because the dun obsoletes at rifling. So when you start getting good gunpowder units is when you lose a free promotion. Making melee units and promoting them to rifles and such would help to avoid that issue though.

Is that more clear?

[rah]

Yeah, that's what I thought but then what you said confused me.
Life is fun at my age. Everyday is a new day.

[Theben]

Are you playing a mod? B/c in regular 3.19 Guer III only gives a +25% attack on hills.

I think if you want to do the Warlord/GG game, you'll need IMP... but if all you want is massed stack of well-promoted units, then Boudica is a good leader to use.

[Brael]

Interesting, you're right. I know it was 30% before though, maybe it changed with 3.19 (or for that matter 3.17)? I distinctly remember having slightly better odds against units on hills than flat land due to it. I made use of it a lot so I had plenty of time to compare.

[Dinner]

Ok, I just tested. The promotion bonus obsoletes with rifling as well

I didn't know that.

[Lord Avalon]

Walls go obsolete with Rifling. The Dun is the Celtic wall.

[Theben]

The point for using the Celts IMO is getting the withdrawl promo available very early in the game as to allow those GGs to survive to late game. Otherwise Tokugawa is just as viable (for masses of promoted units) since both the Samurai and Gunpowder units start with COM 1 and DRILL 1.

Speaking of free promos, axes/swords that get upgraded to Samurai get a free Drill I promo, so that's something to keep in mind.

[Brael]

I wouldn't say Tokugawa is just as viable. He has protective rather than charismatic. If you're going for highly promoted units that trait is a game changer.

[Theben]

Not really... charismatic nets you ~1 extra promotion over normal traits. Aggressive effectively cancels that (not taking into account the +1-2 happiness CHA give you wrt more production, etc). Boudica gets both and has a free defensive promo that helps you survive combat, but you have to spend 2 more promos to get it. Tokugawa gets a free promo that is both offensive AND defensive and spending 2 more on it's line not only helps you survive, but win.

The REAL answer, of course, is to play Boudica and change her UU to the Samurai.

[Brael]

On higher promoted units it's worth more than 1 promotion.

Level	Normal	Charismatic
0	0	0
1	2	2
2	5	4
3	10	8
4	17	13
5	26	20
6	37	28
7	50	38
8	65	49
9	82	62
10	101	76
11	122	92
12	145	109
13	170	128
14	197	148
15	226	170
16	257	193
17	290	218
18	325	244
19	362	272
20	401	301
21	442	332
22	485	364
23	530	398
24	577	433
25	626	470

At 4 exp it's +1 promotion, then +0 at 5-7, +1 at 8-9, and so on.
4 exp is the first time it's worth +1
37 exp is the last time it's worth +0
49 exp is the first time it's worth +2
147 exp is the last time it's worth +1
193 exp is the first time it's worth +3
363 exp is the last time it's worth +2
398 exp is the first time it's worth +4

And I stopped the list at level 25 which is 626/470 exp. I felt it got kind of pointless to compare when non charismatic gets that high (plus you run out of stuff that helps combat odds in any real way).

So simply saying it's worth +1 promotion isn't quite accurate. If you go for 200 exp units it's worth 2 promotions.

From 92-100 exp CHR is +2 promotions, from 101-109 exp CHR is +1 promotion, and from 110-121 CHR is +2 promotions. Lets just say highly promoted units are in the +2 range. With Macemen/Samurai Boudica is running Guerrilla+Combat 1 while Tokugawa is running Combat 1+Drill 1. Tokugawa would win out here but Boudica has another 2 free promotions beyond that.

Once gunpowder rolls around a Rifleman for example is doing Combat 1+Drill 1+CG 1 (minor benefit but it gets you closer for the gunpowder bonus on CG3) while Boudica is still running Combat 1+Guerrilla 1 (only from promoted older units) plus two more promotions. In the worst matchup Tokugawa has Drill 1+CG1 while Boudica has 2 more promotions that you can spend however you want leaving Boudica slightly ahead due to having more options. In the best matchup Boudica is ahead by 1 promotion.

The higher the exp you have per unit the more Boudica is favored, while the lower the exp per unit the more Tokugawa is favored.

It's too bad Redcoats are +25% to gunpowder rather than a free pinch. Churchill almost makes his way into a good civ for this.