Nation preference?

[PTM]

I was wondering what everyone's national preference was and what their general strategies might be, because I'd like to try out a few new things that other players find are helpful/fun.

I generally use the Brits, and my strategy is usually to develop a good econ at the expense of military during the Ancient Age, and then siezing some enemy territory during the classical or medieval ages.

I usually am about third or fourth into the classical age due to my econ strategy, but the way I have it set up allows me to out tech moderate and tough AIs (haven't played any harder than that yet) by about two ages in the end. I usually miss the Classical Age by a few mins but then jump ages really quickly, usually landing me in gunpowder or enlightenment (enlightenment being my personal favorite because its the closest to civil war era weaponry, which is a personal interest of mine) while the comps are still trying to get into the medieval.

I'm big on land forces, but this makes my navy incredibly weak and my airforce almost non-existant. I'll find myself without any air power or sea power at all sometimes, save for the numerous cruise missiles I have.

My army consists usually of 50% infantry, 25% calvary, and 25% artillery. It generally breaks down like this:

1st Infantry:
- 1 General (to rally behind)
- 1-2 Supply trucks (to help with attrition)
- 20-30% heavy infantry (pikemen, fusiliers, etc)
- 50-60% light infantry (slingers, highlanders, etc)
- 10-20% ranged infantry (bowmen, machine guns, etc)
* Early on I have more ranged than heavy, but once I hit medieval these are the ratios I generally stick by

2nd Calvary:
- 1 General (to rally behind)
- 1-2 Supply trucks (to help with attrition)
- 80-90% heavy calvary (knights, curisaires, etc)
- 10-20% light calvary (hussars, etc)
* I mostly use my heavy calvary to attack the flanks of the enemy's ranged units, meaning light calvary aren't too useful; ranged calvary I haven't been able to find useful either, but I'm new as it is

3rd Artillery:
- 1 General (to rally behind)
- 1-2 Supply trucks (to help with attrition and rate of fire)
- 100% artillery types (cannon, howitzer, etc)
* I don't use anti-aircraft stuff in later ages that often; usually my bazooka men can cover it, or I'll send a few helicopters to help counter. Generally I don't have much trouble with air, but that's just so far. Things can be different every game

What I like to do is force an engagement with my heavy infantry up front and my light infantry/ranged units lined up behind that, so the enemy thinks it'll just be a shoot out. Then I bring in artiller on the left/right and calvary on the flank opposite the artillery. This surrounds them and flanks them badly, and if they try to retreat the calvary can encircle behind them pretty quickly due to the upgrades you can get on movement and the fact their on horses. I've won several battles where I was at a huge number disadvantage this way. I'd like to find a way to incorporate long range bombers into this in later ages and, ultimately, find a way to take care of helicopters, which always seem to be a major thorn in my side against Russian comps.

What do you guys do?

- PTM

[Caesar Saladus]

I play as France, and make sure I get the Versailles Palace wonder. I then have a ton of Supply Wagons and attack into enemy territory; the healing is so powerful that the army doesn't need to worry about reinforcements very much. It can push hard and far.

[Bridger]

Light cavalry is much more suited to the flank than heavy cavalry. Light cav can't take as much of a beating as the heavy cav, but they do extra dammage vs. supply wagons/seige (IIRC, or maybe that's just the russians?). Also the heavy cav are shock troops, they are best used to charge straight at the enemy (though if they do manage to get behind the enemy, that is a REAL crushing blow).

Cav archers are the raiders, they can fire on the move so send them at enemy civilians, 3 shots and dead civilian. Run then back and forth across farms/wood/mine camps.

[Q Classic]

i haven't played that many complete games, and i won't for the next two weeks or so, since i'm away from my home comp...

but of the games i've played, i've always been korean. i really like the citizen boost, although i think i might try the chinese next; i'm interested in the germans as well in the short term, since i tend to be a builder.

what i usually do, this has worked at moderate and below (i'd been ratcheting up the difficulty every game, so~), is to build a small defense force composed mainly of the hwarang archers, the pikemen, and a few horse units after building two cities; i then switch back to the construction of more cities, usually capping out at five or six, while devoting most of my resources after the initial unit construction to research, upgrades, and scholar/caravan/merchant/citizen production.

by the time modern age rolls around, usually all my ec levels are maxed, and i kill off enough citizens until non-combatant (excluding supply, general, spies) caps at 100; and i proceed to manufacture a huge army, and continue upgrading them.

i queue to the maximum, so they're replaced when they die; so the first army usually goes in, heads as quickly as possible towards the capital and take it down, ending that threat. the second army, which gets larger as time continues (deaths are unavoidable...) either goes in to assist or nails someone else, depending on circumstances.

[Carch]

I like "Random."

That nation gets more bonuses than any other!!!

[Nacht]

Originally posted by Carch
I like "Random."

That nation gets more bonuses than any other!!!

I did that too but I almost always ended up with the Bantu civ. So now I do them all in alphabetical order. I like those bantus though because I'm alway hitting that population cap since I left them

[Adagio]

Originally posted by Carch
I like "Random."

That nation gets more bonuses than any other!!!

[RKJanus]

I like Bantu a lot, the extra pop points and city go a long way. They also have goodground attack fighters, which can come in useful!

Other than that the French are also very good. I also enjoy playing as the Chinese (for the instant build citizens), the Turks and the British.

[miike]

Egyptians, because of the extra farms, and the farms also produce money. Not only that, Egypt can build wonders, one era sooner, and have 2 wonders per city. I usually shoot for the Tera Cotta palace as soon as possible, that way I save a ton on military. Which helps make up for the lack of military bonuses, that other civs have.