Cavalry or cav+cannon/arty??

[vmxa1]

The people are not happy when they lose units or cities, just like real life. A plane crashes, and it bring some unhappiness and if at war adds to the weariness of war. That is why governments tend to not give the people all of the bad news, until they at least have some good news.

[Golden Bear]

Hmmm... live and learn. I had not realized that war losses increase war weariness.

I wage war out of Republic all the time. After a while production slows down because workers have to be converted to entertainers. However, I can conduct some extremely long wars this way.

I am also now using the French as warmongers. In the current game (Monarch, Large, continents) I was stuck on a medium size continent with the Babylonians. They disappeared under attack from horsemen and spear. I figured that the continent was too small to share.

Then, the Germans had another continent only three squares away, so I attacked as soon as I had knights. Two down, five to go.

The Americans and the Russians shared a wide but short continent four squares to the south - conventiently I had err, borrowed Mags Voyage from the Germans. I attacked the Americans, took a couple of cities and got peace. After a quick conversion to Cav, I attacked again (less than 20 years on the treaty, too bad for them!) and wiped up the Americans.

Short interlude for building, etc. I have the tech lead and 100% wonder trail. Mass produce more cav and go knock on the Russians door. Four down.

Except for the Babyonians and maybe the Germans, none of this is "necessary." I could turtle up and count the turns to a space ship win. But... conquest is more fun in CivIII! BTW, the other civs will still trade with me a little. But they have less and less that I want. My goal is usually to possess all luxuries so I do not have to trade.

I will have to try a militaristic civ in the next go because I consider them to be crippled. Militarism does not give much benefit when compared to Rel, Ind, Com. Maybe the Chinese with their super horsemen?

Carlos

[Golden Bear]

In my long ramble, I forgot one of my points. I use cavalry swarms by themselves in attack. Arty mangles the buildings in cities and sometimes I can capture cool stuff - factories and whatnot. Of course, I have a certain number of Rifle/Inf travelling along with the Cav in order to hold cities. I do use Cav against Inf but only if there are few Inf. If there are lots, I wait for tanks.

Carlos

[Arrian]

Golden Bear,

Oh, trust me, militaristic isn't a "crippled" trait. If you use it as a dedicated warmonger, it rocks. Consider this: your battles will generate elite units at roughly double the rate your French are. So if you have 10 elite Cavalries now, you would have 20 as a militaristic civ. Now it's true that you are sacrificing the benifits of another trait to have this promotion bonus (and 1/2 cost barracks, walls & harbors, which is quite useful early in the game). But man oh man can you generate a lot of leaders.

China's Riders (a super knight, actually) do in fact rock - they very well may be the most powerful UU in the game, all things considered. Japan's Samurai are very good too.

-Arrian

[vmxa1]

Golden Bear, I war for a long time in Republic as well, but it does hurt production (WW). If it goes on long enough, you will have commit a large portion to lux/ent or face disorder.

[vmxa1]

I think the Rider is a very strong UU, it comes at a good time and can be used for a long time. That is why I am not so fond of Panzers, too late for me and are not super compared to tank, just better. When the AI gets panzers, you will soon have MA and are not so scary. China may show up with Riders at a point that will be down right frightening.

[nbarclay]

I regard panzers as vastly superior to normal tanks, in exactly the same way that I regard Riders as vastly superior to knights. A movement rate of three usually makes the difference in whether or not you can launch an attack directly from one city to the next without having to stop in between. Further, anywhere a normal tank can strike in a single turn, a panzer can strike and still have a move left over either to attack again or to go into a city to heal (assuming the city is captured). That difference is big enough that if I'm anyone but Germany, I'll usually wait for MAs to engage in mechanized warfare, but as Germany, I'm perfectly willing to use my panzers to strike.

Nathan

[nbarclay]

By the way, I have a hypothesis that being able to attack directly from one city to another is valuable for lessening war weariness. If having troops end a turn in enemy territory is the basis for calculating war weariness due to troops in enemy territory, but you always make the territory you attack yours by the end of the turn, you won't get war weariness from that source. The question is, is that how war weariness due to troops in enemy territory is calculated?

Nathan

[Golden Bear]

Aha! I thought that I might get a little response with my tweak about "crippled" militaristic. However... a little of my thinking. With Industrious, I upgrade my infrastructure with less effort - almost half the number of workers to achieve the same goal. That is extra population that can be building, err, troops maybe. Commercial gives me cash - lotsa cash. Cash turns in to faster science if I want or, under most governments, troops. Militaristic helps me build barracks and gives me more elites. Nothing wrong with elites, I want all I can get. But they are only good during wars - some of these other traits are good all the time. Religious also has 'round the clock benefits.

Having said that, I am still going to try to play a militaristic civ just to try and prove myself wrong! Besides, I am more and more convinced that the advocates of the dark side are correct - start fighting early and often!

Carlos

[vmxa1]

nbarclay, they are just too late for me to care about them. Yes if I am playing Germany, it allows me to get rolling faster, so what. My point is that by the time I get tanks, I do not care what kind they are, the AI's are going to suffer, even if they are Germans. In a hard game at say Emp, I would rather have an early UU that can save my butt, rather than panzer, when I win regardless. Yes, I said they were better than tanks, but it does not matter at that point. It does make it easier for me, that is all. Legionares have keep me from being put out of the game, when I am way behind and the AI shows up with Knights or even Calv. Legions or Immortals can survive in a forted up city, where the Germans spearmen would be history. Armies of Legions can take down a city that has Pikes, sometime even with better units. If I was Germany, I would only have spearmen at that time and archers, now what. Ok, maybe Horsemen, still rough. When I play Germany, it is not because of the panzers.

[Admiral PJ]

The panzer tank is better than the rider, as its a late Unique unit, so it gives better Golden Ages. Later GA's are much more preferable as you by then have factories as well as unis/banks etc, so the GA will produce many more resources, not to mention you should have conquered at least half the planet then, with lots of cities.
It was quite tough having to go against the chinese riders across a mountain range for my first civ game, Luckily it didn't take long to get Infantry by then, but destroying their military roads helped a lot.

The mounted warrior Iroquois unit is the most effective cavalry unit so far I think, (apart from the coming mongols equivalant ones possibly) though its early GA isn't to my liking. Its attack of 3 is equal to swordsmen and allows it to destroy any other cavalry with ease and quite cheaply.
Cossacks sound quite nice too, though i've not had experience with them.

Try putting these 3 movement units into armies.. 3 attacks ! that would make 4 units attacking 3 times.. a pretty good blitzkreig I believe.

[nbarclay]

I'll definitely agree that panzers come into play too late to be a decisive factor in most games, and that that seriously devalues the UU. As a result, I'll also agree that they are one of the less valuable UUs.

But that is the fault of the UU's timing, not of its relative capabilities compared with the unit it replaces. For a blitzing style of fighting that tries to take out enemies quickly without giving captured cities time to flip (which happens to be my preferred style), panzers are absolutely fantastic once they do become available.

Nathan

[nbarclay]

In most games, I regard a GA in the late industrial era as too late to make much of a difference. But there was one game where I made a big dent in one of my neighbors early and then played builder all the way until I got panzers (trying to get the fastest space race victory I could). Then I got panzers shortly after my better cities finished building all the city improvements they could. I used my GA to stomp all over my neighbors and then to rush some improvements, and that plus a palace move courtesy of one of numerous great leaders generated in the war gave me what I needed to maintian my fast tech pace in the modern era.

Nathan

[vmxa1]

Originally posted by Admiral PJ [/SIZE]
"The panzer tank is better than the rider, as its a late Unique unit, so it gives better Golden Ages. Later GA's are much more preferable as you by then have factories as well as unis/banks etc, so the GA will produce many more resources, not to mention you should have conquered at least half the planet then, with lots of cities."

Yes, if you compare the gross output it is true. It is not true that a late GA is better. It is too late to mean much to me, I have already caught up and will surely win, by the time Panzers come into play. A well timed GA in late ancient or early midevial ages can make or break a game at high levels. To me at levels from Monarch and certainly below, you have the freedom to do many things.

"The mounted warrior Iroquois unit is the most effective cavalry unit so far I think, (apart from the coming mongols equivalant ones possibly) though its early GA isn't to my liking. Its attack of 3 is equal to swordsmen and allows it to destroy any other cavalry with ease and quite cheaply.
Cossacks sound quite nice too, though i've not had experience with them."

I have little use for either of those civs, but will concede the MW can be a problem. I tend to not have them as neighbors, so they are not much of an impact. Additonally I do not like expansion for a trait.

"Try putting these 3 movement units into armies.. 3 attacks ! that would make 4 units attacking 3 times.. a pretty good blitzkreig I believe."

Sorry I do not follow this point. Of course most people that make armies will make one for Calv and later for MA (3 moves). If you have Panzer, maybe them as well. Armies is a whole nother supject.

[tinyp3nis]

Imho, late GA is allways worse than early one, it's like rolling snowball, the early game also defines the late game. Also scoring likes early GA much more. If you have mw or immortal as UU you will like the production bonus which will allow you to build more of them and therefore take more cities. So yes, I agree with them about panzer being too late for GA. Btw in my current game I got random America so I'm still not sure if there even will be GA before it ends .

The people are not happy when they lose units or cities, just like real life. A plane crashes, and it bring some unhappiness and if at war adds to the weariness of war. That is why governments tend to not give the people all of the bad news, until they at least have some good news.

What is the best thread about ww? When I saw thread about ww last time ages ago it was only players opinions and conclusions, most of them were false so didn't bother to look any further into the thread.