posted 08-21-08 09:08 PM EDT (US)
Alright, I made this guide for my clan and I thought I'd post it here too so that more people can be helped by it/give me input. This guide isn't done yet but it has the most basic strats and I'll add to it as I get time. I'd really appreciate any suggestions for making it better, since I'm only an average player (1st lieut). This isn't anything new really, it's just a compilation of strats and a guide for new French players. Anyway, onto the guide. Enjoy!
Alright, so I’ll start this off with a quick guide to the main units you will use as French. This isn’t every French unit, but the one’s you will probably use most:
Coureur des Bois – The French settler. Equivalent to 1.25 regular settlers in their ability to gather resources. Useful for fighting off rushes due to their high hp and attack (for a settler), especially when upgrade at the market.
This is a good solid rush with mostly x-bows and then pikes to take out cav and buildings. (btw, when I say deck skeleton, that means you should fill it in with personal preference cards)
Age 1:
Age 2:
Age 3:
Age 4:
-Standard 14 cdb age-up (gather crates que up a cdb ASAP, build a house, all cdb on food, ship 3, age-up with 14 cdb. Age with 13 if more speed is needed)
-Age using the quartermaster (400w)
-5 cdb go on wood, 2-3 of them at a forward location.
-If you don’t have at least 50c, take 1 or 2 food cdb and put them on coin until you get 50, then move them back to food.
-Once you have 100w, build a market and research first food and wood techs once you have the resources.
-Que up a couple cdb.
-Get another house up if you can.
-Ship 700w. Use this to build a couple houses. It’ll also supply enough wood for some x-bows/pikes.
-Gather the 400w and build 2 barracks w/ your forward cdb.
-Put new cdb on wood
-Once barracks are up, train 5 x-bows in each. Then train 5 pikes. You want mostly x-bows but you always want some pikes in case he gets cav or if you need to take down some buildings quickly.
-2nd age 2 ship is 8 x-bows or 3 hussar.
-Start harassing your opponent with your 10 x-bows. Attack when you think you have enough troops, but don’t wait too long.
-If he looks like he’s FFing and you don’t think you can get his TC down, build pikes and take down as many houses as possible. Chances are he’ll hit fort before you take down his TC. If you’ve killed enough houses to stop him from sending shipments, you’re in good shape. Just keep him constantly trapped in his TC and make sure he doesn’t have any vils off to the side collecting resources/building houses. Even if he does fend you off your eco should be quite a bit better than his if you’ve been constantly building vils
-3rd ship is 4 cdb for eco boost and then ship whatever you need. If you’re finding you have a surplus of resources you can ship the creation speed boost.
-If the guy is rushing try and get down his rax, but don’t make mostly pikes. Just keep enough for if he’s building cav off to the side.
-Balance out your cdb so that you can pump out as many x-bows and pikes as possible. If the fighting goes on for a while you may want to research the coin tech, switch some cdb over from wood to coin, and get a stable and start getting hussars. You can also go to age 3 if you think it’s safe.
The French have a good solid FF with skirm/goon or skrim/cuir being nasty combos to try and beat.
Age 1:
Age 2:
Age 3:
Age 4:
-Standard 14 vil age-up
-Age with 500f
-9 cdb on wood, build a market and research first food and coin ups
-Once you have that, move all those wood vils to coin
-Que up 3 cdb (Important to do this before you hit age 2 because 4 cdb ship puts your pop at 21/20)
-Ship 4 cdb
-TC waypoint to coin
-Gather food crate with 1 coin cdb and then move him back after
-Shift around cdb if needed to get 1200f and 1000c ASAP
-Age with either skirms or hussars
-Put some coin cdb on wood and then have about the same amount on food/coin with maybe a few more on food.
-Research market wood up
(If you know for sure you won’t be attacked soon (like with a turtle or defensive boom) and you want a strong eco, ship economic theory and research the next market ups. You can still follow the next steps, you’ll just be a bit slower. The bonus is you have 30% extra gathering on all resources, not to mention the first market ups.)
-Get a stable and some houses.
-Que up a couple cdb
-Ship a military shipment (usually skirms)
-Start building either goons or cuirs. Goons/skirms is better if you didn’t do the economic version because your eco isn’t usually incredible right when you hit fort and cuirs cost a lot. If you have a good eco then cuir/skirm is better.
-Make sure your wood is being put to good use. Get lots of houses. Also try to get a rax as soon as you have enough houses to support everything you’re building.
-From this point on it’s up to you to decide what shipments you want to send. If you want to boom you should send 1000w which is almost enough to get you 2 TC’s.
Often you’ll find yourself getting rushed as you try to FF. Usually you should have scouted enough to find a forward base, indicating that he’s rushing. Here’s what you should do:
-You should already have a market when you see that, so once your food and coin ups are done, research the cdb hp and attack techs. Cdb are pretty strong with the market techs and can hold their own vs pretty much everything but cav in age 2. (cause of their range resistance) You’ll probably need more vils on food to make up for researching the techs
-Try to start aging as soon as you possibly can.
Now, how do you hold him off while you age?
-First send a couple cdb away and out of sight so you can build houses if needed.
-Put 10 cdb in your TC, and have the rest fighting off the units. If he starts focus-firing on your cdb, use this tactic: Set all cdb as a control group and garrison them in your TC. As soon as the TC fires a shot, pop the cdb out and make them all shoot at a unit. Hit the bell on the TC and let it fire a shot. Pop them out and make them fire, and do that over and over again.
Basically the key is to fend him off with your vils and then once you age use the units you get + a shipment + minutemen (if you still have them) to beat him off so you can take full advantage of your age. If he stops pressuring you then he’s probably following you to fort. Start harassing him ASAP and attack if you have enough units. Likely he’ll have dropped all military production so it shouldn’t take much.
This is a slower version of the FF but you’ll damage your opponent’s economy to make up for it.
Use your FF deck, though it’s nice if you have the 3 hussar card if your FF deck doesn’t.
-Standard 14 vil age-up
-Age with 400w
-Put about 7 cdb on wood, build a market and research first food and coin ups
-Once you have that, move all those wood vils to coin
-Que some cdb
-First ship is 700c
-Gather the 400w and build a stable and 2 houses.
-Train 5 hussars and start raiding with them
-Train a couple more (3-5). More hussars give you more raiding but it’ll slow you down more, use discretion.
-Ship 4cdb as soon as you have the shipment.
-Get your resources for aging as quickly as you can and age with whatever you think is best.
-Research first wood market up
-Put around 6-7 cdb on wood and try to get a rax and some houses up. Split vils on food/wood with slightly more on food.
-Keep raiding the guy as much as possible, build some more hussars if needed.
-Start massing skirms and either goons or cuirs. Again, goons will let you get more and quicker, but cuirs will be stronger. Basically go with what the other guy’s building. I usually go for goons first because you should have most of your hussars left.
This is a kamikaze strat that can be fun in unrated games. I’ve only done it once or twice but I thought I’d share it anyway.
For the deck copy your rush deck, just make sure you have the vil hp upgrade cards (age 1 one is the most important)
-Standard 14 cdb age-up
-Age with 400w
-6 cdb on food, 8 on wood
-Get a market up and research the vil hp and attack ups
-Send 2 cdb off to a well hidden location, slightly forward if possible.
-1st ship is 4 cdb
-Gather the 400w and build a rax with the forward vils, build 2 houses at your base.
-Keep building pikes and cdb until you get your 3rd shipment, send the age 1 vil hp card.
-Attack with your cdb and pikes. Use pikes to tear down buildings and coureurs to fight off units.
-Remember that your first punch needs to be big enough to beat him or cripple him cause if it doesn’t, you pretty much lose. You have to find the balance between speed and power.
-For the next ship you can send military or the other vil upgrade card.
This is mostly a defensive FF. It's good against any rushes that are mostly HI or cav. It'll do ok against soft counters like x-bows if you have coureur back-up, though other strats may be better if you know it's coming. Definitely don't use it vs hard counters like skirms. It will work vs a pure FF much the same as the Hussar semi-FF because you can really harass his vils. It's also nice because you can very easily slow down your aging to build more troops to defend.
Needed Cards
Use your FF deck, just make sure it has 3 hussars and 8 x-bows
Age 1:
-The usual: build 1 house and put all cdb on food
-1st shipment is 3 cdb
-Age with 14 cdb using 400w
-Gather so you have 225w
-Build a house and a market
-get 10 cdb on food and 4 on coin
-Ship 4 cdb, put 2 on food and 2 on coin
-Use the 400w to build a barracks and a house
-Research market techs for food and coin
-Start building musketeers (keeping cdb production up)
-How many muskets you build depends on what your opponent does. If he FF's, just build 10 and go harass his vils with them. If he rushes, build 15 and defend.
Micro Tip: upgraded cdb will do far better against ranged infantry than muskets will.
-2nd ship is 700 of either food or coin to get to fortress fast or to help you finish building muskets; 8 crossbowmen or 3 hussars if you really need the extra troops
-Right after you get your muskets, re-arrange your cdb so that you can age as quickly as possible
-Age using 6 skirmishers or 4 hussars
-Switch around 6-7 cdb to wood and then split the rest mostly evenly between food and coin
-Research the market wood up
-Try to get a stable up and as many houses as you can
-Ship either skirms, cuirs, or goons, depending on what his army is. Usually you'll use skirms.
-Start pumping either skirm/goon or skirm/cuir out of your stable and rax.
-Basically follow through like you would with any other FF
This one is obviously map dependent. Do this on maps that have good natives. This one also changes a lot because with different natives you'll need to gather different resources and build different units.
Age 1:
Age 2:
Age 3: Same as rush deck but w/ native boost
Age 4: Same as rush deck
-Standard 14 cdb age-up with 400w
-Put 9 cdb on wood and get enough to build a tp. Get your explorer to build one at the best native village
-Balance your cdb to build that native + an age 2 unit. Here it's up to you to pick the best unit combo based on your native.
-Try and get up a market and research based on what res you'll need (this will carry on into age 2)
-Que a couple cdb
-Start building natives
-Ship either one of the resource crates (based on the unit you're building) or 8-xbows if you plan to attack right away.
-Gather 400w and build either a rax or a stable (based on your unit combo choice) and 2 houses.
-Start harassing as soon as you can and then go for an all-out attack once you have enough troops.
-2nd ship is either res or 8 x-bows, whichever you didn't send
-3rd ship is 4 cdb
-After that just keep spamming your combo and watch out for a church. A smart player will build spies to counter your native so make sure your other units focus on any spies.
For an interesting twist to this strat you can send early skirms and build skirms with your native. Then you can use the card that boosts both skirms and native hp. Only do this against civs that are likely to spam HI.
A nice alternative to the x-bow/pike rush. Muskets are a more all-round unit that's a lot stronger than the pikeman while still having decent siege. Hussars will beat ranged infantry and can raid as well.
Basically use your rush deck, but try and get the 2 cav combat cards in there. Switch out whatever you use least.
-Standard 14 cdb age-up with 400w
-Leave 9 cdb on food, put rest on wood (2 forward) until you have a market.
-Research first market up and make sure you have 80c left over.
-Try and get a house up. Once that's done, put 2 wood vils on food.
-Que up a couple cdb, gather point on coin.
-Ship 700c ASAP
-Collect 400w and build a stable then a rax with fwd cdb.
-As soon as your stable is up, que up 1 hussar. Your coin crates should come in soon enough to make it 5. Harass and raid with these
-Start queing up muskets once your rax is built.
-3rd ship is 8 x-bows or 3 hussars
-Balance your cdb depending on whether you're focusing on cav or muskets. Make sure you're not having a surplus of coin. This strat requires a lot more food than coin especially if you're focusing on muskets.
-4th ship is 4 cdb
Well, those are all the strats for now. More to come soon as long as I have time to do it.
Coming Soon (hopefully):
-X-bow semi FF
-Gren FF
-FI (If I can ever figure out how to do it effectively...)
-Actual screenshots of the decks
-More unit pictures
[This message has been edited by SoC_crazymoose (edited 08-25-2008 @ 01:51 AM).]
i'll get to this one i na bit
