War for leaders??

[Xin Yu]

To safely win a battle, do the following:

Put several attacking units and bombard units (catapults, etc.) in a city then put an empty city behind it. When the enemy tries to bypass your first city to reach the second one, use the bombard units to hurt them then use the attacking units to attack. They have very good chances to win. Remember do not attack the last unit since your unit will move into the square and be vulnerable to counter attack. That last enemy unit will be in red (hurt by your bombardment) thus will retreat. Then next turn several other enemy units will come and you can repeat.

[Ironikinit]

Elements of chance aren't popular with many players of Civ 1, 2 or 3. For example, random events were removed from Civ 3, I believe because people didn't like the prospect of unexpected setbacks. I'm surprised that leaders are at all popular.

I understand what you're saying about the reward being too big for a random event. It could be like drawing a card in Monopoly that read, "A winner is you!"

However, once a player gets used manipulating armies so that elites fight as much as possible, generating a leader isn't so much an if but a when. At least that's my experience. Even with a non militaristic civ, if I keep fighting long enough, I feel pretty sure that I will get a leader.

But, and this is the cool part, that isn't assured. I know that it's possible that I won't get one at all. What that means is that I'm forced to make room for the possibility that any strategy I devise that hinges on getting a leader could fail. I'm forced to look for alternatives, just in case that part fails. Basically, it keeps me from playing the same strategy every game.

It seems apparent that the leader was made as he is in order to allow rushing not only wonders, but wonders or improvements in corrupt areas. While typically players rush one of the two palace types in these cities, other possibilities exist, such as rushing the Sun Tzu wonder in a city on a continent one plans to conquer, but apart from the player's starting continent.

I would like to see more civ specific abilities, tho. For instance, I think it could be cool if each civ had an associated wonder that they received a bonus for building, or required fewer shields for them to build. Also, it would diversify the wonders as so many of them, esp. the modern ones, are American or Western European.

[Dodgy Geezer]

Originally posted by Hermann the Lombard
A couple of questions:

1. Has it been determined whether you can have more than one GL "alive" at one time? I've heard both yes and no. In my limited experience, when I've had one, I didn't generate another, and as soon as I used the first, I generated a second.

2. Any opinions on using a GL to build FP? Feels like a waste, compared to building Great Wonders, but I knew I wouldn't have any GWs to build for 20-odd turns, and I wanted the FP, and I wasn't generating any leaders while the one was alive.

Hermann,


Q1I [posted some of the details below to another thread, but it is more appropriate here:]

Because I have battle animations off most of the time, I have only been monitoring attacking elite troops.

Apart from the 47 elite attacks while I discovered you couldn't get two leaders, my results were:

9 attacks (and 29 successful defends) -> GL
1 attack -> GL
10 attacks -> GL and built Heroic Epic
(47 attacks while I had GL sitting there - doh!)
11 attacks -> GL
6 attacks -> GL
7 attacks -> GL
1 attack -> GL
9 attacks -> GL
2 attacks -> GL
2 attacks -> GL
20 attacks, got a GL on a successful defense.

I am playing the Militaristic Aztecs, and have been purposefully used elite horse units (and later tanks) in the better chances of surviving.

I am also assuming that a successful attack is one in which the target unit is killed, even if the elite unit has to retreat because it is attacking a stack.

Incidentally I am playing a standard Pangea 60% land map. With the Aztecs I dominated early, and now have a few high tech neighbours to subjegate. There has been *plenty* of war.

It is possible I missed the odd one, but it looks like an average of around 1/7 before the Heroic Epic, and around 1/8 afterwards. I've been done!!!

So I am pretty sure you can't have two leaders. This would seem to be confirmed by the box on the Army screen showing 'available leader'.

Q2 1st for a forbidden palace?
My FB seems to always take 100 turns, so using a GL to rush is always a priority. But now I know you don't get a second, if I am playing a militaristic game I will use it asap rushing a Wonder if I don't require the FB yet.

[Hermann the Lombard]

Thanks, Dodgy! And thanks for all the other replies.

Now one more question: how many of you use up a GL to generate an army to in turn be able to build Heroic Epic?

[SirSchwa]

I always use my first 3 GLs to build armies so I get the Heroic Epic. That way I don't have to worry about getting GLs in the future to generate an army. When I get another GL after building the HE, I always use it to complete a Wonder.

[Arrian]

The way I used to do it:

GL #1 = Forbidden Palace
GL# 2 = Army, build heroic epic
Any further GL's build Great Wonders

The way I do it now:

GL#1 = Forbidden Palace
Any further GL's build Great Wonders, UNTIL I'm so far ahead it no longer matters (or I'm at a stage where there are no wonders to be built for a while), at which point I may build the army for the heroic epic/military academy/pentagon.

-Arrian

p.s. Lately I've been getting between 3 and 6 leaders per game, playing non-militaristic civs.

[Xin Yu]

While some people reporting getting GL easily, some claimed very few GLs from wars. I remember GL is more likely to appear when you win against a better enemy unit. This could be the reason. Now what constitutes 'better' units?

[Willem]

Originally posted by Xin Yu
While some people reporting getting GL easily, some claimed very few GLs from wars. I remember GL is more likely to appear when you win against a better enemy unit. This could be the reason. Now what constitutes 'better' units?

If that does have an effect it would simply mean winning against other Elite units, I would imagine.

[Aeson]

I don't think the type of unit that your elite beats makes a difference, all that matters is on what point in the random number line they win. Each hp taken off in battle uses a random number. If a battle uses 6 random numbers and generates a GL, any elite unit that wins on the 6th event will generate a GL, regardless of the unit it is attacking. Any other unit that wins on the 6th event will be promoted. You can reload from before when a non-elite unit gets promoted, attack with an elite unit to win on that same event, and get a leader. If you have an active leader already though, it won't work.

I almost always use my first leader for an army. The second for a forbidden palace, and after that whatever wonders are available.

[SirSchwa]

I've noticed that GLs will spawn more often when you’re up against a more powerful civilization as opposed to a more powerful unit. Also, I notice that unit status will escalate up the ranks faster if it is defending an attack.

[Platypus]

Aeson: You can reload from before when a non-elite unit gets promoted, attack with an elite unit to win on that same event, and get a leader.

I haven't found that to be quite the case. I done some experimenting with reloading, and I've found that when a veteran got promoted to elite, reloading and attacking with an elite (of the same type of unit) sometimes did and sometimes did not produce a leader. Anytime a battle produced a leader, reloading and fighting with a veteran resulted in a promotion to elite. My theory is that there is a greater set of random numbers that produce a veteren to elite promotion than produce a great leader leader (and that the great leader set of numbers is a subset entirely within the set of veteran promotion numbers). However, I have only tested with the German, a militaristic civilization, so it could be that Aeson's observation is true for non-milaristic civs.

[Aeson]

Platypus -

I only tested this a few times, so it's entirely possible I was just getting lucky. The only times I didn't get a GL were when I had another already active. What was the ratio that you were seeing? My testing was with a non-militaristic civ (Greeks) with the Heroic Epic built. That would change the 1/16th chance of a GL to 1/12th, while not changing the promotion chances right? It might be that this resulted in both chances being the same, or at least closer together. Militaristic Civs have a better chance for promotion, so in any case there should be a difference depending on the Civ trait.

[Platypus]

Aeson,

I only did a small set of tests. I got two leaders as results of the tests, and had at least two cases where I could get a veteran to elite promotion but could not get a leader from an elite unit fighting the same battle. I did not have the heroic epic built. If I can get a leader or two in my next round of expansion, I may finally build my first army and then the heroic epic and try another set of experiments.

[vmxa1]

I am playing as Babs and no EPIC and have around 6 leaders so far (1450AD), but I have been at war almost continuosly (Monarch, small map). One was FP and the rest wonders. Since I am now in control of the game, I may make an army, just in case the EPIC/MA adds to score.

[Hurricane]

My test results are very similar to Aeson´s. I didn´t get a leader if I already had one, but if I reloaded and used the first leader, I would get another after the same exact attack. This sure shows that it, if not impossible, is much less chance to have two leaders at the same time.

Check out this thread:
http://apolyton.net/forums/showthrea...threadid=36623

PS. My nickname is Hurry there (I only now remembered the password to my original nickname).