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Trebuchets cause collateral damage, and so do knights. Individual trebuchets will lose to musketmen but as a group they will cause enough collateral damage to a

Trebuchets cause collateral damage, and so do knights. Individual trebuchets will lose to musketmen but as a group they will cause enough collateral damage to allow a stack of other units to finish them off. Grenadiers are a different story.

dragontamer 6y ago
> Trebuchets cause collateral damage, and so do knights. Individual trebuchets will lose to musketmen but as a group they will cause enough collateral damage to allow a stack of other units to finish them off. But Trebuchets only have 1 movement. You're not attacking a group of Musketeers in the open field unless your opponent is letting you do so. So now the question is: how do you get your Trebs close enough to the opponent's death stack such that you can effectively attack them with collateral damage? Hint: it involves a death stack of your own Musketeers. ---------- Lets game this out really quick. Lets have a simple field with 3 locations: * T . M Where "T" is the Treb-stack, and "M" is the Musketeer stack. Both units have 1 movement. Lets game what happens if the Trebs approach. * . T M Okay, that's the Treb's turn: 1-movement per turn. The Musketeers now murder the entire stack of Trebs, because 9-attack Musketers wreak 4-attack Trebs. All the Trebs die, the Musketeers spend maybe 2 or 3 turns healing up from combat. Musketeers don't even need collateral damage, they just kill the Trebs in straight combat. You might think things are symmetrical, but they're really not. The Musketeer stack does NOT have to stay as a stack. If the Trebs defend, the Musketeer turn happens as follows: * T m M Where "m" is just 1-Musketeer. Now what do the Trebs do? If you attack the "m" singular Musketeer, your Treb almost certainly dies without inflicting collateral damage (4 vs 9 strength is basically a guaranteed win for the Musketeer. Even with a 20% Retreat upgrade, we're looking at a near 80% chance of losing your Treb). You can attack the lone musketeer with multiple units (1st Treb dies, but maybe the 2nd or 3rd Treb wins). If you dedicate a 2nd or 3rd treb to the combat, you're left with the following situation: * T t M After the 2nd or 3rd Treb wins combat, they enter the tile, damaged from combat. And now its the Musketeer turn. They kill the Treb (9 vs 4 again, taking very little damage), and we're back to... * T m M A match that your Treb stack is almost certainly losing. ---------- The answer: The Trebs retreat to the nearest city, and hope that the Musketeers are stupid enough to chase. At a higher tactical level, the Musketeer owner will not be so dumb, but will instead invoke map control at this point. (Pillage and deny resources, find soft targets, etc. etc.). Attacking cities is very hard in all Civ games, so map-control is usually what you're aiming for. Answer #2: Have a death-stack of your own Musketeers, allowing your Trebs to approach the opponent stack. This only really works if you have more Musketeers than your opponent. Thereby: leading to the "Death-stack" game where both sides simply build bigger and bigger balls of Musketeers in order to do anything relevant in combat. ---------- > knights It has been a long time since I played Civ4, but I don't recall knights having collateral damage. I've checked the game manual (https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steam/apps/3900/manuals/manual.pdf?t=1526496862 https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steam/apps/3900/manuals/manu...) as well as the Civ4 Wiki, no mention of collateral damage. What Knights have are Flank attacks (https://civilization.fandom.com/wiki/Flank_attack_(Civ4) https://civilization.fandom.com/wiki/Flank_attack_(Civ4)), which allow them to wipe out Treb-stacks with ease. But this does NOT apply to Musketeers.
- 29athrowaway 6y ago
  I stand corrected regarding the flank attack / collateral damage confusion. Thanks for the link. You have no considered first strikes, which are an important factor. For example Japanese samurais (Macemen) have 2 first strikes and Musketmen are not effective against them. Then, because cities have a tile bonus for defense the AI might prefer defending a city rather than engaging in a regular tile. As an invader you can protect yourself in hills and forests, and also using rivers to your advantage (there's a penalty for an attacker if it involves crossing a river) until you reach a city, not to mention a coastal drop. But I really do not think Musketmen are as powerful as you say. They're the first gunpowder unit and a good defensive unit, but are not an unstoppable force. Then, once cannons/artillery and air units come into play, death stacks are very vulnerable to them.
  - dragontamer 6y ago
    > But I really do not think Musketmen are as powerful as you say. Its not Musketmen that makes the strategy annoying. Its the death-stack mechanic in general. The tactical possibilities of a Death-stack are boring: its just bigger is better. Engaging in a death-stack is similarly boring: if your stack is smaller, you retreat. If their stack is smaller, you advance. Musketmen are just the example I'm using because they're the "all-around" unit from the mid-game. I don't really need to know the composition of your military if I'm using Musketmen around the time they come out. It has nothing to do with Musketmen in general, the boring part is just throwing 20 of anything down onto a single tile stack. ----------- It doesn't matter if the stack is composed of Axemen, Samurai, Infantry, Gunships, Tanks, or whatever. Its all the same to me: you make a big ball then wreak things without thinking too much about the individual strategy. In contrast: Civ2 was extremely punishing against stacks in general, only a well-defended location (ie: City or Fort) could support stacks. In the open field, it required careful consideration of the board whenever you were moving. Maybe a stack was worthwhile (ex: moving onto a Fortified Musketeer in Civ2, since you're confident in its defense). Or maybe not (well maybe you'll lose 3 units to their Artillery). Civ5 and Civ6 get the right idea by preventing death stacks: it means that choke-points truly exist in those games. However, the lack of stacking messes with the movement of both games, and moving units (especially in the endgame) becomes EXTREMELY tedious. Civ2's "kill the whole stack" allowed you to have simplified endgame movement and tactical gameplay. It was the best of both worlds, albeit with just the occasional newbie complaining about killstacks. > Then, once cannons/artillery and air units come into play, death stacks are very vulnerable to them. Cannons and Artillery only have one movement, and have the same problem as the Trebuchet. Mobile artillery has 2-movement, but everything in the game has 2 or more movement by that point (Tanks / Mechanized infantry) Bombers, sure. Bombers finally give an answer to the deathstack right before the game ends. But Gunships (Helicopters) and Fighters don't do anything vs stacks. And it only takes a single Fighter running interception missions (100% interception rate) to deter any Bombers from your stack. Stealth Bombers with 50% evasion, finally give a way to reliably attack stacks in the absolute endgame.

dragontamer 6y ago

> Trebuchets cause collateral damage, and so do knights. Individual trebuchets will lose to musketmen but as a group they will cause enough collateral damage to allow a stack of other units to finish them off. But Trebuchets only have 1 movement. You're not attacking a group of Musketeers in the open field unless your opponent is letting you do so. So now the question is: how do you get your Trebs close enough to the opponent's death stack such that you can effectively attack them with collateral damage? Hint: it involves a death stack of your own Musketeers. ---------- Lets game this out really quick. Lets have a simple field with 3 locations: * T . M Where "T" is the Treb-stack, and "M" is the Musketeer stack. Both units have 1 movement. Lets game what happens if the Trebs approach. * . T M Okay, that's the Treb's turn: 1-movement per turn. The Musketeers now murder the entire stack of Trebs, because 9-attack Musketers wreak 4-attack Trebs. All the Trebs die, the Musketeers spend maybe 2 or 3 turns healing up from combat. Musketeers don't even need collateral damage, they just kill the Trebs in straight combat. You might think things are symmetrical, but they're really not. The Musketeer stack does NOT have to stay as a stack. If the Trebs defend, the Musketeer turn happens as follows: * T m M Where "m" is just 1-Musketeer. Now what do the Trebs do? If you attack the "m" singular Musketeer, your Treb almost certainly dies without inflicting collateral damage (4 vs 9 strength is basically a guaranteed win for the Musketeer. Even with a 20% Retreat upgrade, we're looking at a near 80% chance of losing your Treb). You can attack the lone musketeer with multiple units (1st Treb dies, but maybe the 2nd or 3rd Treb wins). If you dedicate a 2nd or 3rd treb to the combat, you're left with the following situation: * T t M After the 2nd or 3rd Treb wins combat, they enter the tile, damaged from combat. And now its the Musketeer turn. They kill the Treb (9 vs 4 again, taking very little damage), and we're back to... * T m M A match that your Treb stack is almost certainly losing. ---------- The answer: The Trebs retreat to the nearest city, and hope that the Musketeers are stupid enough to chase. At a higher tactical level, the Musketeer owner will not be so dumb, but will instead invoke map control at this point. (Pillage and deny resources, find soft targets, etc. etc.). Attacking cities is very hard in all Civ games, so map-control is usually what you're aiming for. Answer #2: Have a death-stack of your own Musketeers, allowing your Trebs to approach the opponent stack. This only really works if you have more Musketeers than your opponent. Thereby: leading to the "Death-stack" game where both sides simply build bigger and bigger balls of Musketeers in order to do anything relevant in combat. ---------- > knights It has been a long time since I played Civ4, but I don't recall knights having collateral damage. I've checked the game manual (https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steam/apps/3900/manuals/manual.pdf?t=1526496862 https://steamcdn-a.akamaihd.net/steam/apps/3900/manuals/manu...) as well as the Civ4 Wiki, no mention of collateral damage. What Knights have are Flank attacks (https://civilization.fandom.com/wiki/Flank_attack_(Civ4) https://civilization.fandom.com/wiki/Flank_attack_(Civ4)), which allow them to wipe out Treb-stacks with ease. But this does NOT apply to Musketeers.

29athrowaway 6y ago
I stand corrected regarding the flank attack / collateral damage confusion. Thanks for the link. You have no considered first strikes, which are an important factor. For example Japanese samurais (Macemen) have 2 first strikes and Musketmen are not effective against them. Then, because cities have a tile bonus for defense the AI might prefer defending a city rather than engaging in a regular tile. As an invader you can protect yourself in hills and forests, and also using rivers to your advantage (there's a penalty for an attacker if it involves crossing a river) until you reach a city, not to mention a coastal drop. But I really do not think Musketmen are as powerful as you say. They're the first gunpowder unit and a good defensive unit, but are not an unstoppable force. Then, once cannons/artillery and air units come into play, death stacks are very vulnerable to them.
- dragontamer 6y ago
  > But I really do not think Musketmen are as powerful as you say. Its not Musketmen that makes the strategy annoying. Its the death-stack mechanic in general. The tactical possibilities of a Death-stack are boring: its just bigger is better. Engaging in a death-stack is similarly boring: if your stack is smaller, you retreat. If their stack is smaller, you advance. Musketmen are just the example I'm using because they're the "all-around" unit from the mid-game. I don't really need to know the composition of your military if I'm using Musketmen around the time they come out. It has nothing to do with Musketmen in general, the boring part is just throwing 20 of anything down onto a single tile stack. ----------- It doesn't matter if the stack is composed of Axemen, Samurai, Infantry, Gunships, Tanks, or whatever. Its all the same to me: you make a big ball then wreak things without thinking too much about the individual strategy. In contrast: Civ2 was extremely punishing against stacks in general, only a well-defended location (ie: City or Fort) could support stacks. In the open field, it required careful consideration of the board whenever you were moving. Maybe a stack was worthwhile (ex: moving onto a Fortified Musketeer in Civ2, since you're confident in its defense). Or maybe not (well maybe you'll lose 3 units to their Artillery). Civ5 and Civ6 get the right idea by preventing death stacks: it means that choke-points truly exist in those games. However, the lack of stacking messes with the movement of both games, and moving units (especially in the endgame) becomes EXTREMELY tedious. Civ2's "kill the whole stack" allowed you to have simplified endgame movement and tactical gameplay. It was the best of both worlds, albeit with just the occasional newbie complaining about killstacks. > Then, once cannons/artillery and air units come into play, death stacks are very vulnerable to them. Cannons and Artillery only have one movement, and have the same problem as the Trebuchet. Mobile artillery has 2-movement, but everything in the game has 2 or more movement by that point (Tanks / Mechanized infantry) Bombers, sure. Bombers finally give an answer to the deathstack right before the game ends. But Gunships (Helicopters) and Fighters don't do anything vs stacks. And it only takes a single Fighter running interception missions (100% interception rate) to deter any Bombers from your stack. Stealth Bombers with 50% evasion, finally give a way to reliably attack stacks in the absolute endgame.