Unit Strengths by Era

[Arrian]

vmxa1,

I was looking at the PtW unit stats as posted on CivFanatics. Perhaps they're wrong w/respect to the Sipahi. 7/3/3 would be better, of course. Still pretty hardcore.

EDIT: Sipahi is listed as 8/3/3 at CFC, 100 shield cost. That would be +20 shields from a standard cav. If it's 7/3/3 it's no big deal. If it really is 8/3/3, despite the increased shield cost, it's essentially unstoppable (by the AI at least) until replaceable parts.

I also checked further on the Arab UU, and CFC has it listed as 4/2/3, 60 shields. IIRC, the standard knight is 70, so the Arab unit is a cheaper, faster, weaker-on-D knight. A Rider with -1 defense.

-Arrian

[kring]

Arrian, those numbers you mentioned are what I see in the PtW Editor. The patch changed some numbers from the ones listed in the manual.

[vmxa1]

833 is from the readme for the 104F patch. It is a power house.

[Jaguar]

Gallic swordsmen are awesome because they don't die easily. They can defend against archers, attack, and retreat. The Celts are Militaristic so they start or become vet quickly. You don't have many of them, but you know each on personally. In my first game with the Celts, (deity) I built only 10 total. 5 became elite (all 5 started as vets from cheap barracks,) 3 of those elites produced GLs, 2 were lost (they were only regulars. One went down to a vet spear, the other to a reg pike) Of the last 3, they were all vet. 2 of them became vet, one was produced vet. I won by conquering during Musketeer time. (GS never attacked cities with Muskets. Just those longbowman that the AI sends out randomly. However the GS did 60% of the conquering)


But despite how fun they are, Gallic Swords are not overpowered because the MW is only 60% cost and nearly as good.

[player1]

Originally posted by Jaguar Warrior
But despite how fun they are, Gallic Swords are not overpowered because the MW is only 60% cost and nearly as good.

Exactly.

[aaglo]

I don't know if this has been mentioned here (I'm too lazy to check all previous pages)

The babylonian bowman is relatively powerful IMHO.
It is very versatile: decent offence, great defence. Tough unit in the ancient era.
In one game I was the romans (with lots of legions). Those bowmen appeared to be as tough as my legions...

[King of Rasslin]

Not as tough as legions, but still very tough! The early golden age hurts, but it could be enough to completely wipe out another civ.

They aren't as good now because the swordsman can upgrade to med inf or guerilla, but they are still an early game power unit.

[Zero]

what was the point of having started this thread if firaxis hasnt made a single change in unit stats? Or did firaxis feel there was no change to be made?

[Theseus]

I think they knew that they would eventually do an expansion with new civs and UUs...

[Arrian]

Actually, they made a rather significant change: they weakened retreat. The concensus was that Cavalry was BY FAR the most powerful, and potentially game-breaking unit in the game. Further, all mobile units were very powerful, and upgraded to Cavalry. Therefore, the automatic retreat ability (minus a battle in which the defender was at 1hp) was subjected to another RNG roll to determine whether or not the unit would retreat, subject to another multiplier dependent upon the unit's experience level (regular, vet, elite).

That was a BIG change.

-Arrian

[Zero]

i forgot about the retreat changes.. youre right. I was soley thinking on the stats of units.

And Theseus, PTW DOES balance some issues such as industrial age attacking unit w/o resource problems solved with guerilla and warrior upgrade path extended etc.. Ur right about that too.

But shouldnt they balance some units stats wise? Especially the musketmen? Ugh..

[Aias]

Conquistadors are crap!

[player1]

Exempt if you know how to use them (although even in that case they are a little but expensive).

[Nor Me]

think nuclear war.

[King_Henry]

Originally posted by Aias
Conquistadors are crap!

Yeah, they get killed every time I send them into the backlines to pillage! Longbows are 100% pure crap. The knights are THE power until cavalry. I wish there was a stronger between cavs and tanks, though.

[TacticalGrace]

there is: infantry backed up with artillery. During that period there is a shift away from mobile forces. Put enough infantry in a line with artillery and it can act as a big steam roller.

[joncnunn]

In addition, an Army of 4 Calvary will almost always take out a fortifed healthy vet Infentry in a size 13+ city.

The disadvantage is that an Army heals much slower, so my succesful attacks during the age of defense involved a stack of Inf + a stack of Art + all my armies of 4 Cav each + some loose Calvary.

First: Get the entire stack to a hill 2 tiles form the enemy city. Fortify the Infs. Start bombarding the city with artilery. It's okay for the Calvary & Army to be healing on the back and come in later. The bombardment will tell you how many units you'll need.

On the turn of attack: First bombard the city as usual. Next attack with each Army. (Remember to only attack 1 Inf per healthy army because there's a good chance that if an Army makes 2 attacks against an infentry, the army will be killed.) Next, the free standing Calvary finish the job, perhaps taking a loss in the process.

Right after success in the event of capturing the city: A few inf protect the artillery, but the rest of them + all the wounded units move into the city to get rid of the resistance.

If the town is instead Razed: A few inf are brought to protect the liberated peasents on their way to work your lands along with the victorious Calvary unit. The Armies and other wounded Calvary make it back safely on their own.

[aaglo]

My Immortal Beloved... I love immortals: they can hack through everything if they get the chance to attack

[MPatton]

I found another way to attack if your enemy defense gets to much. Use your best defense unit and some bombard units. The defense unit protects the bombard units and the bombard units go to town on your enemy. Besides it makes the city smaller which gets rid of that modifier. And if you have a highly cultural enemy. Then when you take it over they will be less resistant. probably the most annoying thing is cities over throwing your govenor. So always set it so I must press a button before letting the AI play and I save before I press the button. Then revolt comes I reload and move all units out of city and retake

[eismuli]

IMO marines and paras are underpowered. they should have a better defense value because when you get mech inf. it replaces normal infantry. and now you have no good defenders to move with the helicopter. (unless you "save" some inf.) also there should be the pick up in field option for helicopters for they are the most important modern transport(in reality). at least in friendly, neutral or controlled land (no units in the next squares).

and why can you load b2 bombres onto carriers???

[TriMiro]

nd why can you load b2 bombres onto carriers???

Well B2's are too heavy to load into a Carier. They cannot possibly fly off such a short runway.

I think that there should be some smaller aircrafts that will load on an Carier. They should also have less range and less attack.

Right now loading regular Bombers is just too powerful. With just a couple of them you can almost rase a city. Also there should be mobile Anti Aircraft unit(s).

[eismuli]

I agree with you on mobile anti aircraft. and IMO ships (at least Aegis cruiser) should be able to defend them selfs against aircraft. and also you should have the oppertunity to launch cruise missile from ships.

[TriMiro]

I agree with you on mobile anti aircraft. and IMO ships (at least Aegis cruiser) should be able to defend them selfs against aircraft. and also you should have the oppertunity to launch cruise missile from ships.

If you think about it, that was how things worked in Civ2. AESIC had double defence against missiles and aircrafts. This made it the unit with largest air - defence.

Also the cruse missiles could be launched from carierrs and submarines. ( i never tryed battleships ).

[eismuli]

yes you're right. but in civ 2 every unit could defend itself against airunits.

you couldnt launch cruise missiles from battleship but i think that's what it's like in reality

[Master Zen]

AEGIS cruisers should be able to fire missiles like SAM sites. That would make them much more useful for defending battle groups

[Zero]

Originally posted by eismuli
IMO marines and paras are underpowered. they should have a better defense value because when you get mech inf. it replaces normal infantry. and now you have no good defenders to move with the helicopter. (unless you "save" some inf.) also there should be the pick up in field option for helicopters for they are the most important modern transport(in reality). at least in friendly, neutral or controlled land (no units in the next squares).

and why can you load b2 bombres onto carriers???

I find that balancing marines and paras are the hardest to do when modding. Its either you totally undermine the usefulness of reg inf or you leave it as paras and marine ability offers very little potential (like it is now).

Usually I tinker with giving wider range for paras and maybe make them 6/9/1 and marines 9/6/1... but the best thing to do is just leave it the way it is.


BTW, longbows are not crap. If you cant build knights you'll need a viable solution to conquering a iron territory that allows you to do so. Trust me, all out horsemen is not a way to accomplish such task.

Besides... even if you acquired iron and horses, all those archers thats been built prior to swordmen/horsemen availabity can actually serve an important role in battle plans instead of just doing MP and "bonzai" charges agst nearly defeated cities.

[inca911]

OK, that was a lot of reading but here I am at the end of this thread with my one primary request (and a couple minor ones):

Please fix the unit micromanagement issues.

1. Player upgrading: Currently, I have to spend 10 minutes moving units into cities to upgrade them and then move them back to their field posts, even when I have railroads! How about we allow the field upgrade of any units connected to a city (with barracks, of course) via railroad? I say “railroad” and not “road” because of the infinite movement difference. This would include units stationed inside cities without barracks, but connected to cities with barracks via rails. Game quality will not be affected by this change but I guarantee that all Civ players here will be ecstatic! Very few software QA issues, coupled with the inability of this proposed change to affect game play should mean a high priority for this fix.

2. Pollution Cleanup: I think many Civ players here view pollution as a greater enemy than the AI. I frequently must manually change worker priority to clean pollution, even when I have 50+ workers! There should be a priority assignment for worker actions so that all Shift-A automated workers move to clear pollution first, and then do everything else. Again, a localized change in code with no game play effects that saves much hassle for the players is always a good thing! The AI could utilize workers much more efficiently, but does a good job overall.

3. Railroads: At the discovery of railroads, the AI should prioritize the connection of all cities via railroads above individual tile improvements. The increased movement efficiency for the civ is a huge benefit for both the player and the AI civs. Certainly the AI should intelligently assess which tile path requires the least effort to connect cities and progress accordingly. Again, this also saves the player from having to come off of automated workers and manually build a rail system before switching back to automation.

Some other unit-related issues:

A. As stated by others, the AI needs to learn to upgrade more efficiently. 20 warriors are not better than 10 swordsmen, but sometimes the AI’s behavior makes me believe that it thinks that way.

B. Early game, the lesser power of armies makes use of a Leader for army-buliding much less efficient that using the Leader for a wonder/FP. Perhaps one could also build an army by using only elite units? This would use up those units and make them non-Leader eligible, while at the same time giving the player something to work with. I’d like to have armies as an earlier option in the game or have another way to produce them. It’s great when you can finally just build an Army without a Leader and perhaps I just don’t follow the rationale as to why this is a bad idea early in the game.

Thanks for a great game!

[Zero]

Originally posted by inca911

B. Early game, the lesser power of armies makes use of a Leader for army-buliding much less efficient that using the Leader for a wonder/FP. Perhaps one could also build an army by using only elite units? This would use up those units and make them non-Leader eligible, while at the same time giving the player something to work with. I’d like to have armies as an earlier option in the game or have another way to produce them. It’s great when you can finally just build an Army without a Leader and perhaps I just don’t follow the rationale as to why this is a bad idea early in the game.

Thanks for a great game!

Usually, its a better idea to make ur first leader an army IMO. You can always disband an army and get huge amounts of shield to help build cheap wonders anyway. In the ancient age, army is just too powerful. (and not worth building cause they cost so much)

[Theseus]

Originally posted by Zero
Usually, its a better idea to make ur first leader an army IMO. You can always disband an army and get huge amounts of shield to help build cheap wonders anyway. In the ancient age, army is just too powerful. (and not worth building cause they cost so much)

AAARRRGGGHHH!!!!!!
%$#^#@#^^%#@^%$@%

Ahem.

There are, uh, better ways to use Armies than disbanding them.

And they're not too powerful, they are NOT (ignore please, Firaxis).

Zero, try this:
http://apolyton.net/forums/showthrea...threadid=46197

But you're right that they are good to build early!

[Master Zen]

inca911:

shiift+P is the automate pollution shortcut, press it and your workers will clean polution automatically, as long as pollution is still being generated, they will move automatically. Saves you A LOT of time