Composure of Ancient Offensives

Yahweh Sabaoth · October 20, 2003, 11:52

How do you compose your early offensives? I want answers for the following situations:

1. Your empire is the largest, but not MUCH larger than your neighbors. You have access to iron and horses.

2. Your empire is smaller than the others. You have access to access to iron and horses.

3. Your empire is neither large, nor small; you have access to horses

4. Your empire is neither large, nor small; you have access to iron.

Assuming you use the warrior->sword or chariot->horse upgrade, how many warriors/swordsmen do you build, how many chariot/horsemen do you build, and how many spearmen do you build? Do you build any archers?

Note that I left "you have access to nothing" off the list as that can mean only one thing: an archer rush, which I feel has been explored thoroughly here.

Answer these questions as you would for your typical game. Don't worry about Total War, OCC, etc., unless you happen to play Total War etc. outside of the context of an AU course or specific challenge. In other words, I'm looking for rough numbers for a game where you have a victory of SOME sort in mind, but don't necessarily know right off the bat - an opportunist game.

Yahweh Sabaoth · October 20, 2003, 12:04

I'll answer my own questions first. I recently moved up from Regent to Monarch, but I'm not having difficulty with it. However, I do not assume to put myself on the level of many of you whom I expect to respond. Hence, you "newbies" out there should NOT necessarily take my advice.

1. With a large empire, I generally do no research whatever, following the 40-turn minimums, saving gold for a mass upgrade. I'll typically upgrade about 25 warriors, and have built an additional 8 horsemen. I often have more warriors in stock to be upgraded when I have more money. I only build 1 or 2 spearmen at first, to be moved into border cities. After my first offensive is done, I won't build any more warrior/swordsmen... all new units will be horsemen or spearmen, at about a 3:1 ratio. Later on, I will upgrade my remaining warriors and use them as I see fit.

2. In this situation, I might be content with 10 swordsmen and 5 horsemen. I will remain in a war footing until my offensive has doubled, or near-doubled, the size of my small empire.

3. This would throw my strategy largely out of whack... in fact, I've never been in this position, but it would be interesting to see how to handle it. Most likely, I'd build about 15 chariots, or as many as I could before I got Horseback Riding (typically from the GL; I'm a GL freak). I would certainly be tempted to build more spearmen, maybe 1 for each city in my empire (or about 10). I might even consider building archers if I was worried about not have enough cash to upgrade my chariots.

4. This would change my strategy little, except that I wouldn't worry about the time associated with building swordsmen from scratch. I'd upgrade my 25 and keep cranking out swords until I captured a source of horses.

Obviously, "it all depends". Still, I'd say those are pretty typical numbers for me, even for civs with swordsmen UUs. As the Iroquois, I would go MUCH HEAVIER on the chariots, and as the Celts, I would restart and play as a different civ.

(Actually, as the Celts I'd build only 1 or 2 Garlic Swordsmen to trigger my GA and do the rest of the work with the more reliable, and far more affordable, horsemen).

But I am a rookie. Let's hear from the pros...

Harovan · October 20, 2003, 13:09

On crowded maps or without resources, I will archerrush after I have 2-4 cities (depending on space), either one neighbor with 5-6 archers and 2 spearmen around 1800BC or 2 neighbors around 1500BC, with 10-12 archers and 4 spearmen.

If I have medium space, I will use Arrians upgrade recommendation, building 10 vet warriors and 20 vet chariots, for 800 gold upgrading to 10 swordsmen and 20 horsemen, attacking somewhere between 1000BC and 500BC. The Horsemen are for attacks on open ground, the swordsmen nutcrackers for forests and hills.

If I have plenty space, I will not fight ancient wars whatsoever. I can outrex the AIs with a couple of granary cities and/or a settler flood from the rest. I'm typically pretty vulnerable in these games, but if the AIs have space too, they're too busy expanding themselves.

Aeson · October 20, 2003, 14:51

I'll attack with my 1st Warrior, wait till my 100th Cavalry, or in some extreme cases, 200th Modern Armor. No 'typical'!

Economics (food being king) wins/loses wars against the AI IMO. If you dump enough shields/cash into just about any unit they will do well. I tend to build what is available, favoring offense and mobility, but also accounting for production efficiency. I often go several games between building any Spears, Pikes, Muskets, or Rifles though. The exceptions being with the Zulu or in the rare game where I feel using bombardment units will be necessary/enjoyable.

What the numbers are don't matter. 30 Swordsmen on a Small map would often be an 'end game' force, but would be relegated to a 'situational' or even just a laughable force on a Huge map. The only typical in my games is: "Compared to the AI, am I at the strongest I can get peacefully, and/or would I be able to make peace before the AI could hurt me?" If the answer is yes, I attack.

Stuie · October 20, 2003, 15:04

I usually find myself aiming for a ratio of 2:1:1 (attacker:mobile:defense).

So....
1. 2xSwords 1xHorse 1xSpears per city I plan to take and hold from my enemy.
2. Same as #1, but usually I'm a lot more hesitant to attack, so it's more likely I'll be drawn into a war not of my choosing at a time when my forces are not where I would like them.
3. If I have to use archers... 3xArchers 1xHorse 1xSpear per city I plan to take and hold.
4. 2xSwords 1xArchers 1xSpears per city I plan to take and hold.

Of course all of that is subject to change based on how I actually find myself playing. Nothing is written in stone, and often I find myself jumping into a war of opportunity (is that a Settler I see under that Spearman?) without having my forces at some optimal level.

Yahweh Sabaoth · October 20, 2003, 15:32

I encourage everyone to keep posting. I'd like to see the whole array of opinion here...

Arrian · October 20, 2003, 16:28

It really depends on what I intend to accomplish.

I will often start wars early on when I see targets of opportunity (settler teams, or even just unprotected workers). Those wars often involve a small number of basic units (warriors, archers, maybe a spearman). The purpose is to hamper/cripple the AI civs nearby and fish for Great Leaders.

Later, I'll come back with some swords and horsies. 10-15 of each, I'd say, off the top of my head. That's standard map, Monarch.

I've been thinking of using swordsmen earlier on (in smaller numbers). The way I tend to do things now, I end up compiling my swordsman force last - using fairly built-up cities to produce warriors in 1-2 turns each, ramping up to 10-15 of them in practically no time at all. Prior to that, I'll be using archers in those distruption wars I was talking about, or building chariots. But why not aim for 5-10 swords earlier instead, and devote fewer shields to archers?

The only downside to that approach is that you cannot "cover" an elite swordsman with a less-than-elite spearman. Whereas a regular spear will defend first over an elite archer. Thus, the elite unit is "covered" from AI attack, and survives. Elite swords have a nasty tendency to soak up archer counterattack. At the least, the elite sword is probably damaged. At worst, it is killed. I hate that.

I've taken to building fewer spearmen. I still make sure I have a few vet spears, but I devote more production to chariots earlier on than I used to (I used to go waaaaay overboard on defense - 1 spear per city, plus extras for invasion forces). This often gives me a sizeable chariot (and therefore horseman) force earlier than I used to get it.

Since I've snapped out of my defense-heavy mode, in fact, my sword/horse wars have gone extremely well. So well, in fact, that I now face the problem of winning too quickly/easily: no leaders. Especially if playing a non-militaristic civ, one needs a bit of a slugfest (lots of battles) to have a reasonable shot at getting a leader.

I also have to force myself to build a couple of catapults. Cats aren't war-winners. If you're in a fight for your life, spend those 20 shields on a combat unit. If you're sure you will win, but you want to increase your chances of getting leaders (indirectly), a few cats can be quite useful. They really help prevent the loss of elite units to horrible RNG results.

-Arrian

vmxa1 · October 20, 2003, 16:43

Quote:

Originally posted by Arrian

I also have to force myself to build a couple of catapults. Cats aren't war-winners. If you're in a fight for your life, spend those 20 shields on a combat unit. If you're sure you will win, but you want to increase your chances of getting leaders (indirectly), a few cats can be quite useful. They really help prevent the loss of elite units to horrible RNG results.

-Arrian

Cats are very useful if you are facing 2 move units with mostly one move units or weak units. Here I am thinking about Zulus sending Impi's to one of you frontier cities and they are not your neighbors. Those units can escape form say Immortals and may kill a horsemen, but if the cats drop them to 1 HP, they are not going to do either very often.
This is one of the few times I use cats.

Arrian · October 20, 2003, 16:50

Hmm, yeah, damaging rampaging Impi would be a good use for cats.

I hate Impi. Hate 'em.

-Arrian

Yahweh Sabaoth · October 20, 2003, 16:51

Wow! I've got a lot to learn, if 1 spearmen per city plus a few extra is considered going "waaaaaaay overboard".

Aeson · October 20, 2003, 17:12

I think Cats (and bombardment units in general) are a failsafe means of conquest against the AI. The worse the situation militarily, the more I use them, because the AI has no ability to counter Defender/Bombardment stacks (used offensively or defensively) even when given several times the production capacity.

The only problems with Defender/Bombardment are that it's borderline exploitative against the AI and it's also usually more efficient to blitz AI, because they just don't defend well when on anywhere equal terms economically.

Arrian · October 20, 2003, 17:29

Quote:

Originally posted by Yahweh Sabaoth
Wow! I've got a lot to learn, if 1 spearmen per city plus a few extra is considered going "waaaaaaay overboard".

Yep. Interior cities require no garrison. Having a spearman sitting there is wasteful.

-Arrian

Yahweh Sabaoth · October 20, 2003, 17:46

Quote:

Originally posted by Arrian
Yep. Interior cities require no garrison. Having a spearman sitting there is wasteful.
-Arrian

Certainly there's some value to them, in so far as military police are concerned? I stay on Monarchy typically into the industrial era. OK, I know that practice is debately, or perhaps just wasteful, but assuming I keep that practice for now, aren't those interior troops useful to act as police?

And what about those Germans who are walking through your civ? Do you really want to leave undended cities for their taking?

Harovan · October 20, 2003, 17:51

I use veteran warriors (from barracks or barb'ed up) for city garrison and MP early on. Later, when I'm a Republic, I build spearmen for the border cities and important highground points and upgrade the vet warriors to swordsmen. Interior cities remain undefended.

Yahweh Sabaoth · October 20, 2003, 18:04

Numbers! Gimme numbers!

Harovan · October 20, 2003, 18:17

Numbers depend on map size

And the # of spearmen depends on the length of the border you share with your neighbors. As for the warriors, well, I try to have 2 in each city to max my population without having to increase the luxury slider. So if I have 10 cities, that makes 20 swordsmen. This usually leads to yet more cities.

vmxa1 · October 20, 2003, 19:52

Yahweh Sabaoth, often you are better off to forego the MP and use the slider. Better still if you can gets some luxs. If you are in an easy game, it does not matter, otherwise it could be the edge you need to go thin on defense. Maybe not as thin as Dom, but thinner than you normally do it.

peterfharris · October 20, 2003, 22:44

Umh, interesting thread. Me thinks my garrisons may be too large after reading this. I like to keep two defenders and an attacker in each frontier town and coastal town and one defender and two mobile attackers in each interior city (more if a city is particularly valuable). I also like to keep a few loose mobile units running around as a sort of rapid response team. The idea is to withstand a sneak attack anywhere at any time (including sneak attacks from trespassing AI units) and immediately kill anything that invades. I usually play at Warlord or Regent and sometimes Monarch so I don't see those big invading SOD's anyway.

I tend to be a bit paranoid as you can see.

Umh, vmax, Arrian, Aeson. What do you do to prevent opportunistic sneak attacks by the AI? Do you have your neighbours constantly sending a unit or two directly to your nearest undefended interior city? Do you dare to grant ROP's? (I very rarely dare to grant ROP even with all of my cities heavily defended).

I would love to reduce my garrisons if I dared so your further responses would be appreciated.

eric2075 · October 21, 2003, 00:14

I have the same question. If I leave a city undefended, AI units walking past it CANNOT resist the temptation to capture it. And you don't dare demand that they leave unless you're ready for war.

vmxa1 · October 21, 2003, 00:39

I had a long response for this, but the IE crashed on me and I did not have it saved.

First, I can not even recall my last RoP, but I have done a few, only when I have a need or want to help a very weak civ.

Undefended cities and no having MP's are two different things.

vmxa1 · October 21, 2003, 01:01

MP's are only valid in unrepresentive forms of government, so once I get to Republic, I can not use MP's. I am likely to get to it as quick as I can, within reason.

So if I am in despotism, it is early in the game (normally) and I do not have to worry about AI units too much. In std maps, they are not likely to be on top of me right away. Once I have located them, then I can determine where threats are going to come form and will have defenders in that area. Front line cities will have defenders, be they MP's or just defenders. The AI is not going to launch an attack with its one wandering warrior very often.

After you have played enough games at the level you are currently using, you get to know what to expect from the different civs under most all condiions. This is what lets you cut corners a bit.
If I am in despot or Monarchy I will try to get by with either luxs or the slider or if it is only one large city you may have to calculate what is cheaper, an entertainer, MP's or the slider. This city is not likely to be exposed, it will be an interior city.

I am not going to have front line cities exposed to an attack, be it a civ or barbs. You may just have a sentry out to alert you and give you time to recover. Now if you are in the middle of several civs, then you may have to take a different tactic.

Once you have gotten most of your expansion done and are in contact with a neighbor, then you will start to build up troops and put them where they make sense.

I do not have much trouble with the AI crusinig through my lands, unless they are at war with some other civ. In that case I may just ignore them, but ensure they do not have a free shot.
If they are sending a settler/escort that is another story. I like to whack them and make them suffer for their carelessness and get the two free workers. They will not cross your cultural borders, unless you are considered weak.

Aeson · October 21, 2003, 03:06

Quote:

Umh, vmax, Arrian, Aeson. What do you do to prevent opportunistic sneak attacks by the AI? Do you have your neighbours constantly sending a unit or two directly to your nearest undefended interior city?

I don't believe in having neighbors...

I like to use Swordsmen/Horsemen, Knights, Cavalry, and then Tanks/Modern Armor as my 'defensive' force.

If I'm sharing a border, I make sure there is a 1 turn buffer zone so I get first shots if the AI invades. Normally the setup is something like a bunch of Knights sitting on the Hills/Mountains around my cities, and nothing actually in the cities. The AI will strike for the cities always, leaving their units exposed to counterattack. Bombardment units work really well in a support role here.

Keeping the AI's waring with each other is another very good way of keeping your borders safe. Declare war on civs hopelessly far away from you, and then sign up the civs around you to alliances against them (just don't do it if you would be between the two). That will draw a lot of the AI's units away, and basically all they will have left in their homeland are their defensive units. Even if you don't take advantage of the opening, the neighbor AI's are much less likely to turn on you, and will be out of position if they do.

Harovan · October 21, 2003, 03:06

Quote:

Originally posted by vmxa1
If they are sending a settler/escort that is another story. I like to whack them and make them suffer for their carelessness and get the two free workers. They will not cross your cultural borders, unless you are considered weak.

I like to "herd" settler/escort pairs with my mobile reserve (chariots, horsemen) to a single tile and cage them there. Once I had six russian settlers on a grassland tile this way, escorted by four warriors and two spearmen. This made up twelve foreign workers one turn after the next war with Russia started. Of course this behavior is exploitative, but so is bombarding, tech whoring or using the luxury slider. And it is at least an opportunity to punish the little AI cheat of knowing the whole map and all resources from the start and ignoring your borders.

rush · October 21, 2003, 05:44

I hardly built any Spears. maybe max 10 in a game (normal map size) - 1or 2 Spears for the capital , 1 each for say the 3 largest cities, and the rest follow my attack force. I do built lots of Warriors for Swordmen upgrade, and subsequent MI upgrade. Usually first attack comprise of 10 Sword plus 3 spear. Sometimes, when i don't feel too comfortable, eg enemy city on Hill, difficuilt terrain, I may go with 15-20 Swords. The captured cities will be defended by the Sword, which has the same defensive quality as the Spear, but has higher attacking points.

Only problem is when there are no Iron and i panic. The usual solution is : quickly built 10 Archers plus 3 spear plus a few warriors plus worker and shoot straight for the nearest city with Iron and capture the city. Try and rush the barrack and connect the Iron asap. Upgrade the Warriors.

I admit I never master the skill of attacking with Horsemen. I lose far too many horse even with the Retreat capability. So it's always Swordmen & MI for me.

Yahweh Sabaoth · October 21, 2003, 09:49

Quote:

Originally posted by rush
I admit I never master the skill of attacking with Horsemen. I lose far too many horse even with the Retreat capability. So it's always Swordmen & MI for me.

Well I'm not the "master" of anything, in fact, I'm not that good a civ player, so perhaps I shouldn't be saying this to you, but: LEARN to use those horsies! Horsemen are very valuable units... I'm still adjusting my tactics to Monarch from Regent level, and it seems to me that Horsemen might, in the future, make up a greater amount of my attacking forces... say, half-swords half-horse instead of a 2:1 ratio... the ability to retreat combined with the fact that it's not really THAT hard to kill a spearman with a horseman (and REALLY irritating to lose a swordsman to a spearman), and finally considering the upgrade to knights/cavalry, seem to give horsemen an edge... sure, swords are needed as nutcrackers, but I would encourage you to use horsemen as much as possible...

Next time I play without iron in my starting area I might go with a horseman offensive instead, and see where it takes me. I'm sure there's an AU course on this somewhere, right, guys?

Arrian · October 21, 2003, 10:02

There is no trick to using horsemen, all you need are numbers.

I don't often grant RoPs. I'll sometimes do it really early on when the AI is still in REX mode (and thus highly unlikely to sneak attack me) in order to explore their territory. Early on, my cities will have troops in them (I will be stockpiling vet warriors & chariots), so it's not that big a risk. Herding/cutting off the border can also be done.

In the hotseat game I've been playing with my girlfriend (monarch, standard, 6 ais), I just opened up an attack on my nearest neighbor, China. I'm Carthage, so there are no spearmen in this example. My numidians (I have about 5) are reserve forces only to be used in desperation. The invasion force was 12 swords and 3 archers. I also have ~15 Chariots standing by, so that when I beat HBR out of China, I can ride down to Persia and pay those bastards a visit (the turn prior to my invasion of China, Xerxes moved archers into my territory, and declared war when told to leave. It's all good - I enlisted Korea to fight him while I dealt with Mao). Ideally, I would have liked to have upgraded the chariots and brought them along to China. But I was getting impatient, frankly. Hotseat, though infinitely faster than PBEM, is still slow. Anyway, by the time I get into warfare with Persia and/or Korea, I should have 10-15 of each (swords/horses) running around breaking things. If I wasn't carthage, I'd have some spearmen (consider the 5 numidians roughly equivalent to 7 spears).

-Arrian

Yahweh Sabaoth · October 21, 2003, 10:13

10-15 swordsmen and horsemen TOTAL, or EACH? And by "breaking things," what do you mean exactly? Seizing small cities? Seizing major cities? Razing cities? Leaving cities untouched and just "levelling up" in the fields?

Arrian · October 21, 2003, 10:19

Each. So 20-30 attack units total.

"Breaking things" is my term for warfare. This includes killing units, capturing/razing cities, and/or pillaging if necessary.

In this particular case, it's going to mean selected city capture/destruction to prevent the Persians getting iron, followed by just killing their units at a leisurely pace, hoping for a leader. I'll probably switch back and forth, beating on the Persians and Koreans in turn. This only changes if one of them actually manages to build the Pyramids. In that case, I will go for the jugular sooner rather than later.

-Arrian

Yahweh Sabaoth · October 21, 2003, 10:32

Thank you for the clarification, sensei.

This is OT, but I really hope the "scientific leaders" in C3C make huge map, max. enemies games more than just war, war, war your tribe gently cross the map... as fun as that can be at times...

peterfharris · October 22, 2003, 19:10

Quote:

Originally posted by vmxa1

If they are sending a settler/escort that is another story. I like to whack them and make them suffer for their carelessness and get the two free workers.

You are a bad influence.

I thought of this quote last night when I spotted a French settler so I just whacked it without further ado.

I finished up with all of France.

Nice little stack of 6 swordsmen with a few reinforcements did just nicely for the first war. (I researched iron working first and the war started just after I connected my iron). I had 8 spare swordsman for the second war which commenced on the same turn as the first war ended because we were alone on a big island (trying out the "Arrian deception").