Unique and Devious Strategy

[Jaybe]

Onward with the argument!
Personally (especially with Republic), I find WW coming extremely slow when your losing a unit is extremely rare, say only 1 in 2-to-4 turns.

We have to remember that previous wars, even in a non-rep gov., may influence our anecdotal experience (including mine, of course).

[Catt]

I'm anxious to experiment with ScipioAfricanus' thoughts on drafting strategy because I'm playing AU 203 - the Power of Communism. Dovetails nicely.

Revisited an old test and enemy troops in your territory definitely adds to war weariness.

Originally posted by alva
Long time no see btw , Catt

Holiday, and then sick as a dog and in bed instead of on the computer. Seems like 'Poly has been pretty quiet through the year end.

I'm glad to see that the best avatar out there is back on display !

Catt

[Aeson]

I remember pondering whether or not to do a massive conscript Mech Infantry rush in a Huge/Deity game. I had quite a few excess Workers and captured Workers finishing up all the terrain improvements. Most of my cities were maxed out on population at the time (very few with hospitals).

I had over 400 cities all in WLTK day, and had built most of the Aqueducts and Marketplaces out of drafted units already, carefully keeping track of when each city's unhappiness buildup would dissipate. I could have drafted roughly 1200 MI within a few turns without creating any unhappy faces if I really wanted to. (many of the Workers would have had to be added and turned into Entertainers)

The only reason I didn't go through with it was because I finished up enough Hospitals through drafting/disbanding and gold rush by the time my 1600 workers got finished with the terrain that it wasn't worthwhile. Instead I added most of them to my population and turned them into tax collectors.

It definitely is a very powerful tactic, so much so that it's been deemed exploitative in the GOTM to add workers to cities just to draft them. If you can beat the AI to Replaceable Parts, it gives you a decent attacker (6 offense to their 6 defense) especially combined with Artillery. Just claim all the rubber you see with your hordes of troops.

Communism isn't required though.

[Nor Me]

Originally posted by Catt
I'm anxious to experiment with ScipioAfricanus' thoughts on drafting strategy because I'm playing AU 203 - the Power of Communism. Dovetails nicely.

Before playing the game I thought this kind of thing would be the obvious tactic (No Diplo victory and Longevity at sanitation!)(Unfortately alexman didn't use his Kremlin idea; then it would be silly.)
The big problem is that BRC has been too generous with the resources.
Still, I would be tempted to get sanitation before industrialisation and build Longevity and hospitals to prepare for this kind of rush.

Communism isn't strictly necessary but it makes it possible to get conscript units out of freshly captured cities in the window which they are still useful. This is not too hard since they usually have aquedects and are surrounded by irrigated and railroaded tiles. Things like using useless and unhappy foreign citizens to pop-rush marketplaces and even keeping them happy with the luxury slider help.

[ScipioAfricanus]

I normally employ this tactic far earlier than you are suggesting, seeing as how the units in the modern age are diverse and powerful enough to wage small, precise wars that can achieve the same ends as my massive rifleman horde.

Therefore, it would be prudent for a communist player, after researching far enough ahead so that his current massive army is obsolete, to get rid of it by disbanding in cities or something, building lots of factories etc.

Then construct the military which actually IS efficient, which actually CAN fight a war within around 10 turns or less, and which wont lose massive amounts of life on either side.

As much as I like conscripting, and as much as I do use it in the industrial age, the modern age army would undoubtably beat it to a pulp.

Also, when changing over from infantry horde to small but elite army, I usually find the time to change governments to democracy.

Using communism and democracy as a one-two punch in an overall strategy is actually quite a good idea, I think.