Gallic Swordsman: Is it overpriced?

[player1]

editor

[Fried-Psitalon]

The editor works just GREAT for those of us who play people online. Really.

[CerberusIV]

My attack is going nicely although it would have become expensive with only two Viking cities taken (1 GS lost so far for killing 4 spearmen and two others retreated).

Conclusion - 40 shields GS is right for SP.

MP is another matter. My only iron is right on the border with the Vikings and a human player would have pillaged it many turns ago, probably archer rushing at the same time.

[Jon Shafer]

Originally posted by WarpStorm
I would rather have 5 Mounted Warriors than 3 Gallic Swordsmen.

Bingo. If anything, you should be using GAs for offense, as using them for defense means they lose their mobility and their attack of 3. This means their extra defense point is essentially useless, and you might as well have Mounted Warriors. Couple that with the fact that Mounted Warriors are 20 shields cheaper and there's no question in my mind which is a better, more useful unit.

[player1]

If they were 30 shields, 10 Warriors and 200gp would be unstoppable army.

If they were 40 shields, 10 Warriors and 400gp would be unstoppable army.

With 50 shields, you'll need 10 Warriors and 600gp to get unstoppable army.



As for Spearmen in city, that's 2 defense and bonus for terrain and fortify of 0.35.
That's 2.7 total.


So sword units win more often then they lose.
And if its 2 movment unit then they even stay intact if they lose.



P.S.
Of course there is still valid question of changing price to 40.

[CerberusIV]

My invasion of the Viking lands went well. I took 8 cities for the loss of 3 Gallic Swords and the Vikings are history. However time has passed and all civs have Feudalism and most have Chivalry so the usefulness of any attack 3 unit is almost over.

The biggest objection to 50 shields for Gallic Swords just occurred to me. It upgrades to a unit that only costs 40 shields so you can upgrade to med inf for free but presumably then pay 80 gold to upgrade to guerilla, not 60 gold. I can't think of another unit where the upgrade unit is cheaper to produce so it is unreasonable to charge more than 40 shields for GS.

[aaglo]

Hmmm... interesting thread.

Cost of horseman (2-1-2) - 30 shields
Cost of spearman (1-2-1) - 20 shields
Cost of G-swordmand (3-2-2) - 50 shields + Golden Age ability

I see no problem. It's better than horseman+spearman (stronger attack, faster, 2x exess shields lost) and can release golden age.

IMHO the pricetag is just right. 40 shields would be overwhelming.

[player1]

50 shields would be OK, if it not UU.

But since it's UU...

[aaglo]

50 shields would be OK, if it not UU.

But since it's UU...

...it's not OK? I don't get it

[anarres]

I've had a couple of big arguments about the price of GS.

I started by arguing that they should be 40 shields. Someone else defended the 50 shield price tag by comparing to Immortals, 10 Immortals to 6 GS.

We set up a simple scenario and did lots and lots of maths, the conclusion we came to was that at 50 shields Immortals were the better buy. At 40 shields the GS becamse the better choice. I can find the link to the cfc thread if anyone want more detail, but the servers are down atm.

So what would I do if I could? Set them to 45 shields. The editor however doesn't allow this, the only way to implement would be to double the cost of everything in the editor (yeah - like that's going to happen...). The result is that I have used GS as Celts and they kick ass. Retreat abillity is worth *much* more than the extra movement point, this should be obvious.

The only other relevant point is that the AI is *really* bad at using them effectively. The best way to get a GS army quicklyis to do upgrades, and the AI just doesn't understand how to pillage it's own resource and reconnect it to good use. Add to that the fact that shields are at a premium in the ancient era and the AI falls apart. Concerted, cohesive attacks are needed, and the AI just seems lame at this when they are low on shields, as they always spread the units too thin.

So, good idea for humans to play Celts, bad idea for the AI to so so. 50 shields is a little pricey, but not massively overboard.

[Artifex]

The overaul impression I get here is that the GS is basically a broken unit..kind of like the man o war. It's kind of sad because it could have been a great unit.

[Jon Shafer]

Originally posted by aaglo
Hmmm... interesting thread.

Cost of horseman (2-1-2) - 30 shields
Cost of spearman (1-2-1) - 20 shields
Cost of G-swordmand (3-2-2) - 50 shields + Golden Age ability

I see no problem. It's better than horseman+spearman (stronger attack, faster, 2x exess shields lost) and can release golden age.

IMHO the pricetag is just right. 40 shields would be overwhelming.

You realize that a GA is only good when it's on your terms. The GS is the kind of unit where you don't really get much of a choice as to when your GA will be if you want to have any sort of offensive capability until the Middle Ages. An early GA is rarely a good thing, you see.

[Fosse]

I think that the GS is powerful enough in the early middle ages and late ancient ages that waiting until in Republic or Monarchy won't actually hurt the player who is dead set on having a non-despostism GA and nothing else. 3-2-2, bearing in mind that the unit may retreat, is useful against anything up to musketmen, after all.

[Cort Haus]

A combined sword and horseman is worth 50. They'd be too strong if it was cheaper.

[Chemical Ollie]

I think the GS rocks. The retreat ability increase it's survivability, which makes the higher price justified. If you have capacity to produce them in numbers, they will last all the way to the emerge of riflemen. I have used stacks of GS to capture cities defended by musketmen. They can also attack and kill knights, even if they die easily when defending against them. But this only works if you have a large empire where you can produce them in numbers.