War for leaders??

Worthingtons · January 20, 2002, 20:38

I was thinking, This is probably a very talked over stratagy already, but a war, even for a peaceful empire, could be beneficial for purposes of Leader Creation.

If you have a weak neighbour, who does not have any potentially damagine alliegences, Then it seems a war could be very beneficial, If you fight the war by defending the bordering cities with a Few Veteran Strong Defensive units, it's unlikely you'll use Units or Cities, and just get a nice Stream of Leaders When the Computer attacks your well defended units in vain...

On the Mathmatical side, a decent Wonder can take , say, 750 Sheilds, whilst a few pikemen (early days) and a Barracks will cost a fraction of that, and could yield several leaders..
Any thoughts on this stratagy..?

Willem · January 20, 2002, 21:52

Quote:

Originally posted by Rothy
I was thinking, This is probably a very talked over stratagy already, but a war, even for a peaceful empire, could be beneficial for purposes of Leader Creation.

If you have a weak neighbour, who does not have any potentially damagine alliegences, Then it seems a war could be very beneficial, If you fight the war by defending the bordering cities with a Few Veteran Strong Defensive units, it's unlikely you'll use Units or Cities, and just get a nice Stream of Leaders When the Computer attacks your well defended units in vain...

On the Mathmatical side, a decent Wonder can take , say, 750 Sheilds, whilst a few pikemen (early days) and a Barracks will cost a fraction of that, and could yield several leaders..
Any thoughts on this stratagy..?

Leaders are extremely rare, even if you're a Militaristic civ, so it's not that simple to "get a nice stream of Leaders" as you say. By the sounds of it, even those whose style of play is sheer war mongering might expect to get 5 or 6 throughout the whole game. Nice idea in theory, but it doesn't quite work out as easily as you're thinking, though it would increase your odds of getting one. BTW, you need Elite units to create a leader, not Veterans.

vmxa1 · January 21, 2002, 00:22

Yes 5 or more leaders would be a good number, I have done worse. The only sure way to increase the chances is to make the Heroic Epic and have the same Elite unit fight every time you can until it yields one, then switch to another Elite. 1/16 is the norm and the Epic gives 1/12. Remember the people will get tired of war regardless of how it was started, if it goes on and on.

Nakar Gabab · January 21, 2002, 02:45

Quote:

Originally posted by vmxa1
Yes 5 or more leaders would be a good number, I have done worse. The only sure way to increase the chances is to make the Heroic Epic and have the same Elite unit fight every time you can until it yields one, then switch to another Elite. 1/16 is the norm and the Epic gives 1/12. Remember the people will get tired of war regardless of how it was started, if it goes on and on.

Not if you're in despotism/monarchy/communism!

Worthingtons · January 21, 2002, 11:02

I'm aware they come from Veterans, I simply siad create Veterans because they are 2 or 3 battles closer to Elite than Regulars...

The probability is 1/16 to gain a leader, but I can 16 battles in any one turn when at war!!!, Sometimes 30 or 40 battles, inlvolving many Elite Units.

But still, lets say war only yields 6 Leaders in a game, Presuming you can use them all, thats 6 good wonders. If they average 750 shields per wonder (cos you're gonna want to chose the best wonders!) then thats 4500 Shields, Which is nothing to Sneer at.

I guess, that there is no way to quantify this stratagy thought, unlike food velocity in despotism. It is very circumstancial, but in one of my games, where i have many Elite Units, and can produce decent Veteran Units, I seems beneficial to me to continue my war with the french for the leaders it may help me achieve.

Willem · January 21, 2002, 11:12

Quote:

Originally posted by Rothy
I'm aware they come from Veterans, I simply siad create Veterans because they are 2 or 3 battles closer to Elite than Regulars...

The probability is 1/16 to gain a leader, but I can 16 battles in any one turn when at war!!!, Sometimes 30 or 40 battles, inlvolving many Elite Units.

But still, lets say war only yields 6 Leaders in a game, Presuming you can use them all, thats 6 good wonders. If they average 750 shields per wonder (cos you're gonna want to chose the best wonders!) then thats 4500 Shields, Which is nothing to Sneer at.

I guess, that there is no way to quantify this stratagy thought, unlike food velocity in despotism. It is very circumstancial, but in one of my games, where i have many Elite Units, and can produce decent Veteran Units, I seems beneficial to me to continue my war with the french for the leaders it may help me achieve.

Until you decide to become a Republic or a Democracy, then waging war might not be worth it because of the war weariness. Certainly it's worth considering waging war for Leaders, but to me it's not enough of a motivation. For the amount you get, it might be more beneficial running a nice, peaceful Democracy that tries not to bother anyone.

Ironikinit · January 21, 2002, 11:15

If your war weariness isn't bad and you aren't losing, why end the war? Offensive troops become obsolete until you get tanks, so use your elites while you can. May as well wipe out the French.

Willem · January 21, 2002, 11:22

Quote:

Originally posted by Ironikinit
Offensive troops become obsolete until you get tanks, so use your elites while you can.

What?? I think you're mistaken here, you can always build offensive troops.

Ironikinit · January 21, 2002, 11:25

Well, I mean offensive troops like swordsmen and longbowmen. Even horsemen/knights/cavalry eventually become obsolete and cannot be upgraded. Further, elite troops become vets when upgraded. Sorry I was unclear. All I really meant was, if you can, may as well extend a war to increase the chance of getting a leader with your existing elites.

Arrian · January 21, 2002, 11:41

I generally don't upgrade elite units, unless they have gotten hopelessly outdated. The most common leftovers I have are usually elite Cavalry. My veteran Cav get disbanded while I build Tanks, but the elites get to stick around. Why? Because there will always be AI units that Cavalry can kill. The AI always has tons of spearmen and other ancient units kicking around, and my elite Cavalry will be used on them, if possible. I've gotten leaders this way.

As to the strategy of picking a fight to get leaders... well, war weariness is certainly an issue there. My though would be that you should pick the fight to gain the territory, but prolong the enemy's death until war weariness begins to kick in. Pick the AI apart... use your elites as much as possible, even if it means delaying attacks for them to heal and things like that. Then, when your people start babbling about "giving peace a chance" wipe out your opponent. That ought to maximize leader generation.

Sitting back and hoping for the AI to attack fortified cities is unlikely to work. The AI knows when the odds are against it (on a unit level... not empire wide), and will avoid such battles usually. They will instead run around ripping up roads and mines until you kill them.

-Arrian

Worthingtons · January 21, 2002, 13:50

Hmm, The War Wearyness is certainly an Issue here, But I am rarely Democracy or Republic.
BUT, can someone clarify this for me -

If you are at constant war with One civilisation, will the war wearyness differ to if you were at war with 6??

and if so, by how much??

Hermann the Lombard · January 21, 2002, 14:45

I was able to generate a couple of early leaders by provoking the Aztecs (tough job, right?). I didn't end the war (despotism), but they seemed to give up. "Boo-hoo! They wouldn't come out to PLAY!" So I ended the war and got almost all their cities. Now I'm kinda hoping the furious French (only other civ on my continent) actually attack, so I can get another leader.

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.

Bautou · January 21, 2002, 21:53

Quote:

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.

Actually, I think that using a leader to build the FP is one of the better uses you can put a leader towards.

Normally, the place where you want to build the FP is so hobbled by corruption that it'll take hundreds of turns to complete. A leader can bypass all this waiting and get that city, and all the surrounding ones, running in no time flat. You can then use the increased production from these cities take pressure off your core cities so that the core cities can quickly build Great Wonders later.

That way, if you get the advance necessary for building your future wonder at the same time as the AI, you should be able to beat the AI to completion as it tends to waste a turn or two before focusing on building the wonder, whereas you can start up right away due to your excess capacity.

Worthingtons · January 21, 2002, 22:19

Absolutly Right, The Forbidden Palace should ideally be well away from your Capital, around a cluster of cities, and as we know, Waste in a city far away makes building the thing seemingly impossible in the first place, Unless of course a GL can do it nice and smoothly for you

roadcage · January 22, 2002, 00:58

I suspect that this will get me flamed, but...

Great Leader unit is a poorly executed in the game. Great leaders come from elite victory but the are more or less random for any given elite victory. The value of a Great Leader unit is several hundred shields. This is too large of an event to be determined by chance. Civ3 would be a better game if:

.) The "value" of a great leader were less, but the probability of leader formation were greater.

.) Leader formation were based on some CUMULATIVE elite victories. Every elite victory puts point(s) in a leader box. You get enough points, and a leader is formed. This makes leader formation process transparent and certainly less random.

.) There were civ specific ways to use a Great Leader. For example, a scientific might pop a few techs, while a commercial might get some serious gold.

.) There were other paths to leadership. Culture? Diplomatic coop? etc

Comments anyone?

roadcage

Xin Yu · January 22, 2002, 02:03

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 · January 22, 2002, 02:18

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 · January 22, 2002, 07:45

Quote:

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 · January 24, 2002, 14:32

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 · January 24, 2002, 15:15

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 · January 24, 2002, 15:15

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 · January 24, 2002, 15:30

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 · January 24, 2002, 15:46

Quote:

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 · January 24, 2002, 16:45

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 · January 24, 2002, 16:50

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 · January 24, 2002, 17:06

Quote:

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 · January 24, 2002, 18:28

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 · January 24, 2002, 21:20

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 · January 25, 2002, 05:12

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 · January 25, 2002, 06:41

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).