Anyone use Explorers?

[Agathon]

I've found explorers to be completely useless. Every time I use them to explore an enemy's territory it starts an international incident. And by the time I get them most land is taken - so they suck big time.

[Theseus]

Not often... I have used them as *extraordinary* pillagers however.

[Spiffor]

I use explorers... to draw my pirate custom unit

[Kuciwalker]

nope

[Alfonso]

A good solution that the explorers appeared with the cartography.

[player1]

I use them.

Excellent and cheap pillagers.

P.S.
And nothing more, since there is nothing to explore.

[Kuciwalker]

I pillage with Cavalry, as I'm usually not expansionist.

[Inverse Icarus]

Originally posted by skywalker
I pillage with Cavalry, as I'm usually not expansionist.

explorers aren't scouts.

[player1]

6 tiles movment is better then 3 tiles movment if you try to pillage resources deeply in enemy territory.

And they are expendable (with their minor cost).

[Panag]

hi ,

give them an attack value of one and use them to fight barbs

they are great for pillaging and keeping a tab on the AI's units etc , .....

have a nice day

[Azeem]

Or how about create a new unit such as a sort of special forces unit and have the explorer upgrade to that? Give the explorer at least 1 attack so they can handle barbarians.

[Lord_Davinator]

I think they're pretty worthless since there are very few cases when I pillage and for that I generally use a defensive unit...

[Catt]

I think of them as "saboteurs" and usually build either 2 or 4 of them each game (as a reserve "insurance" force to be used if needed). I actually use them only about 5% - 10% of the time. Even in the age of RR a pair of them can penetrate 5 tiles into enemy territory and still pillage a resource, which means any undefended resources (luxury or strategic) within 5 tiles of a border are toast. Since they have no A/D values, they can frequently cross large stretches of neutral territory (ignoring the request to leave) without being forced to "leave or declare war." They're cheap 6-move units -- not much value for exploring (given where they arrive in the tech tree), but of potential value for deep strikes behind enemy lines.

Catt

[player1]

exactly

P.S.
If only Conquistadors were a little bit cheaper (like 50 shields).

[epics]

Never used them

PS
Can they travel trough RR?? In patch 1,07f they couldn't!

[Demerzel]

they're pretty useless indeed when they finally appear in the later game. so never used them.

[Cruddy]

Rarely. I usually don't pillage enemy tiles because I just having to improve them again after conquest (although I might do a quick pillage to keep an ally happy).

[Menlas]

Same for me...i never use them.

Could be interesting if 95% of the map wasn't discovered at the time you can build them...

[Kuciwalker]

Exploration needs to be cut back.

Perhaps making map trading wait until Navigation or even later?

[Spiffor]

Skywalker :
In my mod, map trading waits for navigation, and communication trading even later (radio). But it doesn't make the explorer any more useful :
- when navigation arrives, nobody resists the urge to trade maps before any single explorer is done.
- Almost all terrain has been settled and is under someone's authority anyway, so it is impossible to explore it without hostility.

[Kuciwalker]

A few ideas to fix that:

Settlers could cost three, even FOUR pop.
Settlers could cost sixty or seventy shields.
Make the Lighthouse come with Navigation - historically inaccurate, but necessary.

All of this would seriously limit expansion. At Navigation, suddenly there would be a huge burst of exploration of other continents and such, because it would be impossible until then.

[Spiffor]

If you rise the population needed to build a settler, you give an oustanding advantage to the human, at least with the current AI. The AI doesn't take into account the time when the town will reach enough population when it decides to build a settler. It results in the AI often waiting for the population to rise with a full production box. The more costly in pop. the settler, the longer the AI remains idle.

[Kuciwalker]

Okay then... just increase shields. A LOT.

[player1]

Or just play a very big maps with small number of players.

[MyOlde]

I've never used explorers but after reading this thread I'm going to give them a try! It never occurred to me that they could pillage and I like the idea of them getting in 5 or 6 tiles deep. Depends of course on how cheap they are to build, and I gather they're cheaper than, say, horsemen or cavalry.

Thanks

[Spiffor]

30 shields IIRC. As expensive as horsemen. But much, much faster on enemy territory thanks to the wonderful "treat all terrain as roads" trait.

[Panag]

Originally posted by MyOlde
I've never used explorers but after reading this thread I'm going to give them a try! It never occurred to me that they could pillage and I like the idea of them getting in 5 or 6 tiles deep. Depends of course on how cheap they are to build, and I gather they're cheaper than, say, horsemen or cavalry.

Thanks

hi ,

they are also great to be disbanded in a far away city or to block the movements of the AI

just give them an attack of one , they are so good in using that sword they have

have a nice day

[Demerzel]

seems a shame that the best thing we can do with the unit is something it was never intended to do

[Nym]

Rarely.

[Alex]

I use them as pillagers, but nothing else. I'll occasionally use them as advanced recon units, allowing me to know what's happening into the AI's territory, but this is rare, because, as others have pointed out, they are usually bound to cause some international incident.