Is Offensive overpowered?

[TheMeInTeam]

I don't think anyone is arguing that one single idea is better than a fully completed idea group. Defensive gives other valuable bonuses -- the morale is just the most obvious one, and I believe it's better than any single idea in the Offensive line.

Morale << forced march (picking where you engage and/or catching people out is that valuable). However, it's probably better than most of the offensive tree other than that. The discipline is being underestimated here; casualties literally cause morale damage too. Also, in chasing a shattered retreat vs a big nation you've no guarantee you'll be able to win when you get there. Take for example big wars like Horde vs temple faction Ming or human Burgundy vs France. Those aren't situations where you normally want to chase too far into the territory straight away, but if you know you just shattered their 1 stack, FM, not defensive, is what lets you wipe it.

Inflicting more casualties also means you take fewer, so in any battle you actually win, 10% discipline > the morale in defensive unless a follow-up stack reaches you before you recover it.

Defensive relies a lot more on attrition + manpower, and its reinforce speed bolsters that angle. Unfortunately, by the time you get the base attrition rate booster it's too late to make much use of it. While the tradition IS nice for defensive, and synergizes well, the kit just doesn't add up to what you get from forced march + solid other benefits.

However, I can't emphasize enough that until late-game, none of this stuff beats tech. Western goes military early because if they don't, they can wind up "ahead of years" so far that they spam buildings or get stuck on 999. Nations like Indian, Chinese, and Nomad shouldn't even consider a military idea group until 1600ish. You *can* get "ahead of years" in the Indian/Chinese groups, but it's late that it happens and only if you don't take ideas. That's worth its weight in gold; those groups can field 50% or more pips than Muslim from tech 12-20, and the Indian 12 is 20 pip, 1 less than Europe's at that time. Europe can still beat you # for #, but if you're even on military tech, you can swarm them + crush them easily if you have full combat width and they don't, and you'll win even a small lead in #'s if you have the cash for chambered demi cannons.

When you can use someone like Hindustan to wreck Muscovy/Russia and take Siberia, you've some oomph . From techs 12-19, Indian and Eastern infantry have identical pip counts, so put down Russia while you can .

 

[mustachewarfare]

how about Plutocratic idea group?

That -10% tech discount sounds yummy. (Too bad most popular nations don't get to select this idea)

 

[TheMeInTeam]

how about Plutocratic idea group?

That -10% tech discount sounds yummy. (Too bad most popular nations don't get to select this idea)

There's a lot to like in Plutocratic, but not for direct military power. In fact, it does very little for military other than let you buy more mercs at once, speed up manpower recovery (which has odd synergy), and hand you an advisor's worth of morale. If you want combat ability, it sucks. However, all of its ideas other than heathen tolerance are consistently useful, and the prod efficiency is crazy cash for a MILITARY idea group, especially when coupled with the merchant. Think of it as a way to use military points to invest in economy.

 

[Shadowless]

I find this thread fairly interesting and I have to wonder how many people would say defensive is better if the morale boost was moved to the last slot instead of being able to receive it very early for 800 mil points. That IMO is probably the biggest thing with defensive, you get a large bonus very quickly whereas offensive takes some time to ramp up. Fighting AI's I don't think it matters all that much but against a human player I know I would rather face someone with defensive instead of having the ability to forced march(if i lacked that ability)

 

[Bibor]

offensive does seemingly nothing important. until you try fighting a nation that has it. By then its too late because you cant really engage the enemy. They start dictating what they siege, what stack they attack.
Only a major western european power can get away with not having it.

 

[Schleisen]

I'm an aggressive expander and I find this thread offensive.

 

[vranasm]

actually if you think about it... offensive and defensive are mil ideas you take every game... what differs is the order and the number of ideas you take before going with the other....

One drawback (which I am surprised wasn't mentioned yet) of offensive is that to have it work you need to have military leader at every stack... don't know how you guys, but after first 70 years I have multiple stacks, but only 1 good military leader since getting more directly cuts into your mil tech and ideas...

My usual strategy though is to take first 3 from offensive, first 3 from defensive and then finish the one that seems to me giving better benefit.
Oh and one other thing from defensive that I like is reinforce speed and seems to me that it helps with attrition somehow too.

I never use the mil idea from A (is it aristocracy?), used once quantity (not impressed) and eventually I add quality, which seems to have good bonuses, but very tough to spot actually in fights, since usually the deciding factors are mil. tech level, morale, discipline for winning battles...

oh and don't forget that even though 1 won battle rarely wins a war, series of won battles definitely wins wars and morale greatly helps with winning battles... and if you have better manpower then enemy (you should have, since it's you who decided to wage war in the first place!) it's not problem to have slightly higher casualties... you will eventually dry enemy out with won battles...

 

[Sovieticozasz]

I dont think there is anything better in this game for war than discipline and better combat hability. Those 2 mean more damage, so more casualities so more morale damage so faster and bloodier battles on your part so less manpower lost more stackwipes so less money expended on reinforcing. Discipline gives you battles, manpower and money. better stat ever in the game. Especially so when morale can be overlooked in the big picture in medium to large countries, engage on battle stay 1 round of fire 1 round of shock with your better discipline and better generals and then shatter retreat on purpose to a far away land. you woul've caused much more casualties for almost nothing in return. and if you are scared of pursuits in medium sized countries, position stacks of 1 merc on any province surrounding the battle, when the enemy is going to pursue, scorch land and delete the merc.

 

[Jorous]

Funny. One half is for offensive, the other for defensiv. Somehow i think. No matter what i say i will receive a -1 stab hit.

btw. For me its defensive > offensive. But mostly i try to take both in the first 4 groups.

 

[Bibor]

Just to add, arguably in the first half of the game, until tech level 12 that is, its always best to invest into tech first, then - in my opinion - offensive. The first 3 bonuses in Offensive are HUGE if taken very early. I'm not negating the benefit of +20% morale, but that early in the game you are more likely to pick your opponents.

Generally, I'd say start with first half of Offensive, then Fully unlock Defensive, then fully unlock Offensive.

 

[vranasm]

Just to add, arguably in the first half of the game, until tech level 12 that is, its always best to invest into tech first, then - in my opinion - offensive. The first 3 bonuses in Offensive are HUGE if taken very early. I'm not negating the benefit of +20% morale, but that early in the game you are more likely to pick your opponents.

Generally, I'd say start with first half of Offensive, then Fully unlock Defensive, then fully unlock Offensive.

hey! that seems like you stole my strategy!

 

[Thrake]

Depends on who you play. On muslim nations I don't find myself needing it at all. And Forced March is in my opinion the single strongest idea in the game.

I like that morale from defensive. Actually, I like defensive more than offensive. Spamming forts, +defensive buildings, and defensive idea can just keep AI busy besieging on one front while you clean another one. This, and lowered attri... I like more defensive because it allows for unique bonuses, while offensive is just "yet another unit buff".

 

[lordelenath]

Well, the upcoming patch which is distributed with Wealth of Nations will cut down the morale of the defensive idea group to 10%, at least in the current beta. Once that hits I'd say offensive is a no-brainer.

 

[vranasm]

Well, the upcoming patch which is distributed with Wealth of Nations will cut down the morale of the defensive idea group to 10%, at least in the current beta. Once that hits I'd say offensive is a no-brainer.

well if you're right and they hold onto it until release.... it's obviously "solution"

 

[mustachewarfare]

Well, the upcoming patch which is distributed with Wealth of Nations will cut down the morale of the defensive idea group to 10%, at least in the current beta. Once that hits I'd say offensive is a no-brainer.

umm sry for asking a possibly dumb question but where can i find this beta or beta patch note?

 

[lordelenath]

It was showcased in the last session of the Paradox Interactive Multiplayer Season.

 

[Korashy]

I take aristocracy some times as "f*** you" in MP to discourage people from taking my stuff. It becomes pretty good once cores are expired. It's overall not that terrible of a group, also providing free stab from events.

But I still think that Forced March is the single best idea in the game. I would put it right up there with Ottoman Ghazi.

 

[Comradebot]

Just to add, arguably in the first half of the game, until tech level 12 that is, its always best to invest into tech first, then - in my opinion - offensive. The first 3 bonuses in Offensive are HUGE if taken very early. I'm not negating the benefit of +20% morale, but that early in the game you are more likely to pick your opponents.

Generally, I'd say start with first half of Offensive, then Fully unlock Defensive, then fully unlock Offensive.

In my experience that 20% morale is a bigger difference maker in the early game.


They're both solid idea groups, no question, but I tend to lean towards Offensive. If nothing else, everyone can make use of the extra attrition. Meanwhile, in some games I've found Forced March to be completely useless (as a Westernized non-European in a lot of parts of the world you'll never need it beyond an undying urge to chase down and kill a lesser teched stack just a little bit faster). Of course, in other games Forced March is a god send... I couldn't imagine trying to fight Russia as Byzantium without it and its ability to quickly catch their smallers stacks before they can merge.

But still, defensive: higher morale, extra tradition will allow you to get better generals pretty easily (especially after you've smacked around maybe one or two smaller nations)... its just a great early game idea. But they really shine when used together, and can get all of offensives leader bonuses and stack them with your higher tradition... then take innovative for knowledge transfer to keep that tradition higher when possible.

And then if you're Songhai or Brandenburg (or anyone else that gets tradition from their NIs) you proceed to laugh at the rest of the world as you swarm around with a bunch of 6/5/5/4 generals, obliterating everything in sight.

 

[Alblaka]

Let's say Offensive is not OVERPOWERED but definitely one of the top 2 military ideas to pick from, the other one being defensive. The manpower boost + early shock aren'T to be triffled with and the Forced March vs AI is effectively a way of converting excess military power into instant massacres.

 

[aitaituo]

Well, the upcoming patch which is distributed with Wealth of Nations will cut down the morale of the defensive idea group to 10%, at least in the current beta. Once that hits I'd say offensive is a no-brainer.

That would be terrible! It would be fine if they simply moved the morale bonus to a different group. 10% gives a huge advantage to republics, Muslims, countries with unique morale boosting ideas, and high prestige/army tradition countries (who never need more buffs).