What Was Your Most Massive Strike Force?

[Gatekeeper]

Everyone:

Just what the subject line indicates. Myself, the largest armada I ever brought together involved 15 transports loaded to the gills with howitzers and armor, all escorted by a dozen battleships and AEGIS cruisers. In addition to that, I had an aircraft carrier nearby, along with two subs heavy with cruise missiles ... and a nuclear weapon or two, just in case.

All of this was intended for a sprawling modern Mongol Empire on the "Northern Hemisphere" Earth map (downloaded from Apolyton). Even with all of this firepower, I took just eight of their 34 cities in the first strike.

CYBERAmazon

[rah]

My favorite was seen used by the AI in the WWII scenario. Playing the Spanish I put to sea a battleship escorted by 5 vet aegis cruisers. The batttleship was supposed to act as cruise missle bait since they are high on the AI targeting algorithm before I started the land attack. 127 cruise missles attacked the stack. Needless to say I was expecting a massive attack but not 127. I went back and checked and some must have been launched from cities farther than a cruise missle's range. And the AI had to have built multiple missles in cities that turn. Typical AI cheat. But it was hilarious watching 127 missles strike without sinking anything. (I was so impressed by the amount that I did the turn again so I could count. The stack survived the second attack too)

RAH
Lord of the unsinkable Ferrets

[SCG]

My most effective strike force was a rather unconvetional one. ~50 spies (most veteran), ~100 engineers, ~20 caravans and a full treasury (on the mediteranean map). Using 1/2 the spies to sabatage courthouses and the other half to incite riots, engineers to build railroads throughout, and caravans to replenish my treasury, I managed to take about 30 cities of a slightly underdeveloped Spanish empire in 1 turn.

One thing that helped, since i was a democracy at the time was that if you preposition all the spies adjacent to the target cities, and move all other units still with movement away from that AI (or sentry them), the AI won't contact you for a cease-fire until you are ready. That way I could continue to get all their cities for half-off, without having to subvert them

[joew]

What can you do to make cities cheaper to incite? Is that what sabotaging the courthouse will do?

[SCG]

There are several ways to incite a revolt mre cheaply. Destroying the courthouse has the biggest effect. A courthouse will double the revolt cost. Other way is using veteran spies (vs green spies - i'll usually use my green spies to sabotage to become veteran). Another way is to position the spy on the ajdacent tile furthest from the AI's capitol (sometimes its 1 tiles away from the obvious choice). You could also decrease the city population (attack, poison the water etc). If want to wait a turn, you could try and cause disorder (destroy happy improvements, kill martial law units etc). A city in disorder is 50% the cost of one not in disorder

[jpk]

Once I built about 30 or so paratroopers. I attacked by landing a paratrooper on every square near a city. It worked quite well against the AI.

[SandMonkey]

jpk -

Did you do that against an AI who was in a representitive government? If so, then that should have worked perfectly, redusing them to just one unit.

If i remember correctly, I had an attack force with two carriers full to the brim with bombers, a few battleships, and about 5 transports full of howitzers. I don't think I ever finished that invasion. It was just too bloody

[CornMaster]

Well my best manuver I did (that I can remember) was a defensive one. I had 4 cities on a normal sized map with 3 other civs on one contient, it was also in the 1900's. It was on chieftan so it was a little easy but I turned the Fundamentalism after getting all the tech. (Which I don't often do but since it was on Chieftan I said what the heck.)
I built a three block (three blocks next to each other) group of fortresses and put 3 fanatics in each one. I must of had 200 or more fanatics around my four cities in a huge circle. Anyway I'm sure this has been done but it looked pretty cool. Needless to say the AI never got any of my cities.
My latest major offensive involved a transport with 3 tanks, 2 artillery, 2 calavery, a carrier with a nuke, a sub, AGEIS Crusier, a battleship, and a destroyer. I used it to break up the huge Mongol empire which had control of Asia, Europe, and Africa. While I had control of the Americas, and Australia. It's a scenario I made for the duelers. If you want it you can get it here http://www.geocities.com/thecornmaster/scenario/two.zip


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"I'm too out of shape for a long fight so I'll have to kill you fast"
"If the great Emperors of Rome, Egypt and Greece were alive today, do you think they would prefer Coke or Pepsi?"

[Smash]

Not exactly massive but I once sent 14 triremes of vet knights after Berzerker's capitol.Walls and vet pikes saw 14 triremes return.....empty.

[jpk]

SandMonkey:

I don't remember their form of government but the paratroopers worked well. The main problem was that the AI had not built many roads so it took two turns for many of the paratroopers to get to the newly captured city.

Veteran stealth fighters combined with paratroopers works faster. At least if the AI does not have armor or mechanized infantry.

[Chainsaw]

What I´d like to know much more:
What was the most massive assault force ever the AI has sent to you? E.g. the biggest invasion or the longest contiuos attack, number of attacking units in one turn or anything you would find remarkable?

[Gatekeeper]

Chainsaw:

Well, my armadas are regularly struck from 20 to 50 cruise missiles per turn while on ocean squares w/i an enemy nation's range. Hence a crapload of AEGIS cruisers defending the very vulnerable stacks ... still doesn't do much to stop submarine attacks, though.

On land and in the air, I've had up to a dozen bombers hit a single city at once followed up by armor attacks, then Marines and Special Corps. Lastly, the AI brings in howitzers. OUCH! That's really the only time railroads aren't good ... esp. if they're connected to the enemy's rail network (yes, a strategy by me to invade first ... AI surprise atacked, though).

CYBERAmazon

[jpk]

Chainsaw:

Once, after building Apollo, I saw a group of 30 to 40 diplomats marching toward one of my cities. After a few turns the number of diplomats was much smaller.

Since I often have isolated cities near AI civilizations, it is not uncommon for these cites to come under futile attacks that last for dozens of turns. Once I had a city with coastal fortress defended by two veteran marines that was repeatedly hit by 10 or so ships per turn. Another time I had a city that had forest and hill squares between it an the AI civilization. Every turn two or three units would move next to my city. On my next turn I would put them out of their misery. If I can recall correctly I had crusaders when the attacks started and it continued until I had howitzers.

[Smash]

If the ai knew how to fight even a tiny bit,OCC might have been impossible.At least more difficult.You can guard your modern city with an obsolete archer and diplomat.Thats kinda silly.

[Gatekeeper]

Chainsaw:

Your algorithms theory probably holds water ... but I cannot help but wonder if there's more that the AI simply doesn't use much. After all, the instruction manual hints that the programmers taught the AI a whole new group of nasty tricks and surprises. Even how to support a coordinated air-land-ocean assault.

I've had as many as four cities stripped from my control in a single turn ... but those are usually ones I've just taken from the AI. My own fortified cities are harder to crack ... though I've lost two or three of my own cities in a single turn against the AI. Only once have I paid the punks $1000 to stop their assault.

CYBERAmazon (who's incorporated more tech advances to keep nukes at bay as long as possible)