Civ IV

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Then there's not much of a point in attaching your general to a group of units.

But on the other hand, mounted units tend to be the units with the highest strength as well, at least for a large part of the game, up to cavalry, which I don't seem to be able to upgrade for a long time with the way I normally go through the techs (I tend to put a low priority on air units and go for modern armor and mechanized infantry).

The good thing about mounted units is that you can give them the Flanking upgrades to give them the ability to withdraw from combat. With your GG attached, you also get the option to choose Tactics, to further increase your chances for withdrawing. The downside to doing this is that if you'd chosen the strength upgrades instead, your survival chances would've increased indirectly as well.

But the best chance for survival would still be not to take on opponents with a low chance of success, to have a stack to hide in, and to have the stronger units. If you usually attack by throwing many weak units at their defenses to wear them down, then you're probably better off settling your general in a city for the extra xp bonuses.

I went on a bit of a rampage with that game, and came to one conclusion: conquest is annoying at times, but I love to level up my units.
I continued that game for a few turns, defeated the stack of 5 catapults you see there, and you'll be happy to know that the cavalry GG got to 131 xp

 

My best experienced unit was similar to henkie's, and I actually got him mostly from defending! I think he finished with somewhere around 120 xps. It was originally a landsknect (the Holy Roman Empire Unique Unit, replacing the pikeman), and he got his initial buffing by taking down a hoard of cavalry, barely surviving in the process. Following the battle, I got a great general and attached it to him. I had him up to combat II, with two first strikes, and a 25% bonus against seige weaponry. The unit was like a medieval Rambo. 100% bonus against cavalry and melee units with two first strikes - game over.

 

I got mine from a mixture of defending and attacking. I was truly amazed at how many units the AI can produce in a very short timespan, though. Especially with the Celts (the second opponent) it was amazing how many units he could throw at me.

 

I must be taking too many chances with my GG as they never live to get that experienced.

 

The safest thing is to make sure they are part of a stack. Any unit by himself can be taken out by enough enemy units. I always make sure I carry a defensive unit or two along with my great general. For example, if it's attached to a cavalry unit, make sure there's a rifleman or a machine gun there too to take some heat off of him

 

Aldeth the problem is that the GG unit is often the one defending and that means that any bad luck and the unit is dead. How do you make sure that the other unit gets to be the one that is attacked?

 

By having multiple other units with the GG means he won't face repeated attacks. Sure, he might have to defend the initial attack, but assuming he survives that attack, the other defensive units will take on the next attacker(s). If your great general cannot survive even a single attack, then it isn't a particularly powerful unit in the first place.

 

Actually, my last Great General was attacked twice before getting killed (and there were other units on the tile but it must have been the most powerful). As a Combat IV Samurai (with melee and cover promotions) it was no pushover but it still got killed anyway.

 

There is always the chance aspect of the combat. Personally, I always have the option 'new random seed on reload' on, just because of this. Losing a strong unit to a far weaker unit, especially if I've invested in that unit through a general, will only make me quit playing the game, so I like to keep the option Power Word: Reload open. Hell, I do it in every other game, so why not in this one?

 

OK then - the BEST way to keeo your Great Medic alive forever is to never upgrade it. You assign your first Great General to a Chariot (so that it will always be able to move with any stack) and then you keep it your stack from then on. It will never been called on to defend because it will always be the weakest unit and it will obviously never be used for attack. It's job is to provide superfast healing to all the other units, so you're actually not achieving anything by upgrading it beyond Chariot.

 

Sounds less risky than what I had in mind. I'll give it a try in my next game. Thanks for the tip Harbourboy!

 

With all the intense discussion and sharing of ideas here, are any of you managing to succeed at higher levels than you were before?

 

I dont like higher levels, the AI doesnt get smarter it just cheats more. I find that frustrating. To succeed at levels beyond monarch or prince you basically have to "cheese" it. I know the game inside and out and played countless hours on all Civs but never enjoyed playing on anything harder than the setting where AI and player is equal or the AI just get a small edge. Do not like facing a horde of magically appearing units or losing an almost finished wonder to the AI when they get it more or less for free. Playing on harder difficulties feel like playing with one hand behind your back, sure itis harder but it isnt any more fun. Never liked games where higher difficulty basically means that the AI just cheats and gets stuff for free especially not a strategy game.

 

I still have to give Prince a shot. I've been playing with the Earth 18 map a lot so perhaps I'll play my next game as Caesar. Praetorians should make the game much easier. Perhaps that's too cheesy and I'll try a random game.

 

I don't think Praetorians are cheesy. In fact, the Romans and Aztecs are IMO, the only civs where it's worth it to build swordsmen (and in the case of the Aztec, that's only true if you don't have access to copper or iron). Otherwise, I find swordsmen to be quite a waste, as the most effective counter to swordsmen is axemen, and due to the development in the tech tree, you're almost always going to run into an opponent with axemen by the time you can build swordsmen.

Praetorians are the only swordsmen unit that will have an advantage against axemen, and it's slight (8 vs. 7.5). Of course even then, axemen are still your best option as a counter. The advantage with Praetorians is that there is nothing in the game that matches your combat strength at the time you can build those units. However, that doesn't mean they are unstoppable. If you plan on using them to attack cities, you're still going to need to bring a ton of them with you. Axemen defending inside a city with a decent culture bonus (or behind city walls) will still beat a Praetorian.

 

If you build enough swordsmen you can make mixed stacks (some with shock and some with cover) and still get some results. Of course adding a few chariots won't hurt when you expect loads of axemen. In fact I like chariots as they can be really useful (for a little while at least).

The real danger for praetorians is the Greek UU. Even with shock promotions the praetorians will have a hard time defeating them.

Later on you really need catapults but early praetorians can get by in the meantime (before culture bonus gets too high and before walls).

Playing the earth 18 map I think I would tech for Iron Working, build a worker, barracks and then enough warriors to take out a neighbour civilization (preferably Louis and Isabella). Then move on to Alexander and possibly Elizabeth. Alexander may be a danger so it may be a better idea to take him out before but the French culture and possible Spanish early religion will pose problems.

Then the goal will be to contain Catherine while preparing to take her out (possibly with Genghis Khan and Qin Shi Huang) and expand towards the middle east to get a hold of the oil fields there and then take over the world!

How does that sound?

 

I don't build many chariots, but then again, I also don't do much in the way of conquest early in the game either. I find that if I put a spearman and an axeman in each of my cities that they can pretty much handle anything thrown at them. I will also build an archer if I happen to have archery as a technology from a goody hut, but I never specifically research it.

You see, that's the thing that gives me problems. I wait for catapults, because from my experience, even a city with only enough culture to expand to its usable resources is a tough nut to crack. That 20% bonus is for me often the difference between winning and losing, and if they have walls, forget it.

I played on Earth once. The map is freakin huge. I chose a random civ, got the Babylonians, and for some reason started on Australia. WTF?

 

The secret to a pre-catapult rush, using warriors, archers, axes, chariots, or horse archers - is to do it QUICKLY. In my latest monarch game as Charlemagne, I researched archery straight away, built 6 archers and marched directly to the nearest AI capital. 6 archers (especially Protective ones with the extra strike) beats 2 sitting in a capital with minimal culture that early in the game. Securing an enemy capital site that early ensures you're ahead of the game right from the start.

A rush is exactly that. You focus on the rush, do it quickly, get it over with then focus on something else. In this case, my next focus was chopping out the Oracle to get Code of Laws early to be able to build Rathauses sooner.

Sitting around waiting for catapults is OK, but works better if you're a financial or philosophical leader who has a better chance of researching the required techs quickly.

 

But how on earth do you research archery and build six archers (I'm assuming the only city you have is your capital) before the enemy gets bronze working and has axemen waiting for those archers? I can see how six archers attacking two archers can work. I can't see it working against a pair of axemen.

 

As far as difficulty is concerned, I'm with Joacqin. I find no satisfaction in beating the game at higher difficulties, as I'm playing the game for fun and relaxation, not for the challenge. In other types of games I might be more inclined to try harder difficulties, but not in this game. That just leads to frustrations and me not playing the game anymore.

I'm wondering this as well. What kind of build order do you use for this, and do you need to get lucky with the settler placement at the beginning of the game?

Also, is there something special about a second capital? Isn't it the same as any other city you can build wih a settler?