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That's basically exactly what I said in my first post here. Your questions are not dumb newb questions, in my opinion.
In fact, some I can only give my opinion on since there aren't clear answers for them. And if someone better (there are tons of players better than me, I'm like 1650-1700 at the best) tells you different, I'd say listen to them.

1. Hmm, I used to have this problem a lot. I would send the ranged units when I got to the point where I couldn't do any more damage with scouts (too many spears around or walled up). This didn't seem to work too well for some reason. Unfortunately, I stopped using stable/range too much while I got beyond the 1600-1630 level. My opinion would be to play around with different things and watch some expert recs of people doing stable/range and see what works for you.

2. If you've found all their res, I would say keep wandering around in front of their base. If you see a rax go up, there's not much to look for till they hit Feudal (you can look at how many vils they have on each res, but that's hard to interpret).

One thing you can do to find forwards is to use a building to "scout" them. Just grab a vil (doesn't matter which) and hit the B>(whatever building, usually a mill or LC works best) and don't place it, just move it around where you think they might be. If it goes red where it shouldn't (like on open, explored ground), there are vils there.

You can also use a farm to do this, but it won't find vils, just buildings already being made or already made.

You then know exactly where to send your scout and can get ready to repel the forward. If you send maybe 5-6 vils + your scout + spears (once Feudal) and drop at least a range, you can usually beat them if your micro is decent.

3. I've never heard this (not that it's not necessarily good advice). I wouldn't get it unless they Castle way before you and you need to defend with lots of spears. Obviously it's very necessary in mid-Castle when you both start going with CAs/pikes.

The main reason is that by the time there are lots of scouts to deal with, you should be on scouts/archers and spears won't be in use.

4. I do the same thing (in terms of late Castle times) and have had a lot of success with going with massed knights and booming with the stronger econ. Get all the econ ups immediately and pump knights from 3 stables. The only thing that can deal with them is massed pikes, which take a decent amount of res to make. They also do a lot of damage to an econ since they can kill a lot of vils quickly and then just run when a defensive army shows up.

After your econ gets going and they switch to pikes (if they see massed knights and don't mass knights themselves or go pikes they've already lost), start making CAs (get bodkin, obviously). I wouldn't use lcavs, though (except for raiding). Instead, use a ton of pikes (unless they go with eskirms, in which case lcav works great) as a sort of shield which block any melee units from getting to your CAs. Get some siege workshops by their base and start knocking down buildings. You can definitely use lcavs for raiders (make some stables and spam them into their econ), of course.

5. Don't worry about stone in Feudal unless you need towers or stone walls. You probably can't afford more than 2 TCs in early Castle and I would focus more on massing Castle units than on booming from more than 3 TCs.

6. From what I've seen in recs, going with scouts doesn't work TOO well. FC with knights will be a lot more helpful, since they can't easily counter with spears. Scouts will also die very easily to the other pocket's knights (and no one else will have anything much to counter them). That means you're all screwed because of those knights while you could have just be countering them with your own knights.

One thing that seems to work alright is to go with like 2 scouts and raid the opposing pocket's gold (since they probably won't have made spears). It takes a bit of micro to make sure the vils don't kill them, but if you can slow down their gold, they can't get knights too soon and you can go up about a minute later and hit with knights like normal. You can also do this with just 1 scout (not making any) if your micro is good enough.

Anyway, I hope that sorta helps.... I'm not that good so listen to better players first.

[This message has been edited by Gordon B (edited 11-09-2004 @ 10:23 PM).]

Thanks, That helped a lot

I have watched quite a lot of expert recs, where they use stable and range, but I really couldn't find a connection between the situation and the time they attacked with their ranged units. I thought there might be one, but I missed it.

Actually, I got the advice about infantry armour from watchers at a few Bskzone game. I tried it out, though, and it didn't seem to make much of a difference in feudal, as you said.

Another question - when someone forwards you and they advance to feudal earlier (likely), if you find their forward base, would it be worthwhile to build two militia from your barracks to attack with your vils? I've seen a lot of players do this.

By the way, is Bskzone down or something? I had stopped playing AoC for about 3 months and when I returned yesterday, Bskzone wasn't loading.

[This message has been edited by CutthroatSkunk (edited 11-10-2004 @ 01:32 AM).]

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IMO the sooner the beter, just make SURE you watch you're army and dont let them get killed

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Around 8 minutes put you're scout near his TC around the area his villis will have to go if he will FWD.

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Only if the fuedal age lasts a long time IMO

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If you have alot of spears get Pike upgrade, I think you should mass ALOT of knts till around 40 minutes then go pike/cav archer

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If you make a tower in feudal try while you are researching castle... if not I usually add a tc near a stone.

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If its 3v3 and you're pocket FC then pump knts like mad, either helping team mates or set gather on enemy base.

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Hehe, Actually you're English is pretty impresive for a newcomer.

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True

Thanks Iceage.

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The problem with doing this is that sometimes I play against people using two ranges, who wait a while before attacking. If I attacked too early, I'd probably have too few skirms to kill their spears before their skirms kill mine. However, if both of us stayed defensive, I would probably have to castle later than him due to the amount of food spent on scouts, and would be at a disadvantage. I've found that people get plenty of spears to defend their vils when they see I'm building a stable, and so scouts raiding alone aren't too effective.

[This message has been edited by CutthroatSkunk (edited 11-10-2004 @ 03:22 AM).]

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actually no. This is exactly the type of post we need more of. The nOOb post is the one that offers unsolicited and usually useless advice. This is what invites the flames. Your post stimulates discussion of topics that are not covered elsewhere (e.g. the Flush sticky)

You'll find that questions asked in good faith, that the poster has done due diligence before posting (using the search function, reading the stickies, etc.) will be answered without flaming (that is, until a nOOb weighs in with his assine opinions.)

As for your topic, I think the posters have said it all, anything I would add would just be redundant.

He's just like you were gordon!

^{maybe he'll be a mod someday}

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Sure, if it will win the fight for you. It's expensive, though. For 60 food and 20 gold, you get basically a vil that will autoattack and can't be used for too much after the fight. That means you have to mine gold before you can get fletching and you're out 60-120 food at the start of Feudal, which could delay vil production or getting important techs which could put you behind. I would personally prefer to just grab 2 more vils off of berries or wood to fight, but if militia will help you win, then you should go ahead and use them and win.

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Yeah, I can't see a trend either. It always seems to make sense when they do it, but I couldn't explain the criteria.

If you find yourself facing people who use spears and play defensive, you might prefer to go range/range, then add a stable around 15-17mins. You'll have a more solid econ and will have plenty of skirms to kill their spears. If they don't start fighting until later, you will still have scouts to fight with, but you'll have the advantage in terms of skirm volume.

This is also effective if you're dealing with a forward, since I find it hard to fight off a strong forward with a stable/range.

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From what I've heard, they were hacked twice and have decided to keep the site down for a bit. They also posted something about moving away from being a community site to being more of a clan site. The problem then becomes where to get recs. Legion has some great ones right now with WCL2 and players like Chris and Sutra playing all the top players. I would love it if AoKH had the capability for easy uploading and discussion of games, as we could likely get more skilled players here, but we don't so...

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What is wrong with the blacksmith? Is it the time it takes before the rec is uploaded?
What if someone with better "micro" *looks at gordon* would take charge of it?
If it was uploaded within 24 hours, I think it would still be acceptable...
If 2-3 persons share the duty, and are responsible for a couple of days each?

Not to go too much off-topic (since this is a good one )but it's not so much the delay between posting and it appearing (though that is a factor), as the way it's not integrated into the forums. There is no recorded games forum where people can post games and have them replied to in the same sort of space as here. When a new game gets uploaded, it's just not as obvious as a new post and doesn't get the same attention.

There is also the problem which I did not mention regarding the intelligence and skill level of the forumers at AoKH. Would we want a forum with a bunch of newbies posting themselves playing against the AI? Would a decent player want to post his/her games in that same forum? Even if our better players posted, you'd mostly have rook/inter games and who wants to watch that when you can see experts?

CutthroatSkunk: Welcome to the forum!
As others have said, you are the type of new member we like to see.
Reading the FAQ, posting in lucid english and good questions, that's excellent.
I should add "Not trying to lecture the better players" and "Not trying to seem smart by using terms like wawe cycle" hehe, that is what many n00bs do...

Since most of your questions seems to have been answered, I will just make some minor points
I really don't know too much about the game...:
A stong feudal will often defeat an earlier, weaker castle partly because of the resources
spent on the castle upgrade. But also beacuse massed FU fuedal units might well be stronger than
fewer, weaker castle units. (Also because there is more units, the combo can be better balanced.)

About the Knights: Someone said that your stables should be busy making knights in early castle,
probably because they are a lot more powerful, gold isn't as scarce and food is shorter.
The problem with the spearline counter is that they can't really counter knights.
They can defend aganst knights, but the knights can run off and harass other vils.
And if the defender tries to counter by scattering his spears, then the knights
can attack one place, and trade a knight or two for those spears and kill a few vils.
And scoutline are good for raiding as said, but knights will be more effective with some
more LOS, so a group of knights + scout/LCav is good. Although the scout tends to get killed first, just because of it's LOS, at least for me...

The reason stonemining should be avoided is that the gather rate is low, so the logic
is that a player could gather more of another resource, that is the argument anyway.

Gordon:

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Okay, so we would need a forum for discussing recs, it has an FAQ thread
that tells players how to upload their rec, how to link it etc. 1 game = 1 thread.

About the n00bs; I think it's the same as this forum, we flame the "I pj0wn3d t3h 4I 0n m3dium l0L!!!!11111" threads,
just like the NECT swoops down on "Wh4t ar3 y0u fa< community?" threads.
NECT? N00b Emergency Containment Team

Thanks for your help, all.

Another question I'd like to add is that when your opponent has his gold towards you, close together and in an open space, would it be better to use man at arms rather than the standard flush units?

i dont get that, could you re-phrase?

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His gold is far from his TC, towards you. Should you try to take advantage of
the open/exposed location by using m@a, and their auto attack propery? I'm unsure about the "close together" part though. (Drush?)

I think the advice given was that you should build your barrack in front of the gold(?) If you are the one with the bad gold, that is. So that you get some cover/LOS.

About m@a: I think they are not deemed to be so useful: they are vil strength, and cost gold.
They have auto-attack and are good against skirms.

[This message has been edited by scheming_monk (edited 11-10-2004 @ 09:22 PM).]

i've just played a game, while i was fowarding i noticed that one of my opp.'s minor gold piles was by my foward, so i took advantage of it and mined it (instead of putting my ex-berrie pickers on gold i put them on farms for a little extra food)

is that what you meant?

M@A really arent worth making. If you're goths ,japs, or celts. they could be worth it but with huns its better to just go standard flush units.

Thanks for the advice, I guess I'll stick with normal flush units.

DDRMAX2:
What I meant was that if you see that your opponent's gold can easily be covered by you, would it be effective to make m@a instead of standard units, because m@a are countered by archers. Archers cannot be made by him without gold.

[This message has been edited by CutthroatSkunk (edited 11-11-2004 @ 05:01 AM).]

Well if I do a maa rush, you are right...archers counter. What if we have a few skirms?

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What if I have scouts? Then you'll have spears. But I have archers! But you have skrims!!!!! But I have scouts...
etc.

But seriously, that sort of stuff has no place in a discussion about 1v1 Arabia. We all know what units counter what.

Anyway, listen to Icey. There's no point in using M@A with a non-bonused civ (except possibly to defend against EWs since they have a bonus against them). They're slow, expensive, and don't do anything unless they can actually catch their target.

If you can stop him from getting gold, though, that means you've either denied it with a tower or a wall or can win most battles and can control the area by his base (hard to do). If it's the latter, then you've already won. Otherwise, you might try going Castle a little earlier than normal since he won't be able to follow you up. Without archers, spears aren't that effective against knights (just run away) and you can kill econ and easily out-boom him.

Hi, this is a good thread indeed, and I hope Cutthroat doesn't mind me asking my questions about the Flush here too.

Well, I've finally got some more time to play some AoC (now that the stupid exams are almost over) and I'm practicing the flush. Problem is, my Feudal times are inconsistent (anything from 11:20-12:20) but I shan't go into that...

I'd like to know, is a full skirm-rush a good idea? I've been working on it (testing against the CP, nobody wants to play me on the Zone ) and I find it pretty useful. I start off with about 5 skirms and 5 spears, then gradually mass more skirms and eventually get a large army of them. In the meantime, just after my 5 forwards ahve finished forward building, I send them to wall up the opponent's gold and stone and maybe tower his forest.

So, I'm sure there're quite a few other players who like to do this too. I'm wondering, if I come up against someone who uses exactly this attack method, what is the best counter I should use? What are the best units to use against massed skirms?

*edit* I did a playthrough and here's a record just to better illustrate what I meant.

[This message has been edited by Duan Xuan (edited 11-11-2004 @ 08:58 AM).]

A big skirm rush is great, but just a few scouts can easily counter massed skirms, so you need to have spears around as well (which you do). If you both use massed skirms, the one who gets a stable first can usually do a lot of damage if their micro is good enough, since spears don't last long against big masses of skirms.

If you find yourself outmassed in terms of skirms, get up your own stable around maybe 15-18mins for some scouts. Or you can get up a blacksmith for fletching (always do that anyway), but fletching doesn't help much if they have scouts. (I might be wrong, I just got this explained to me recently. )

I would recommend watching some Chris games (not all, since sometimes he does that weird 22pop stable-at-home strat or something even crazier) since he does very well with massed skirms, but also (usually) gets a stable pretty early. He's also very fun to watch. Legion has a ton of new recs of him against some of the current top players like Rami, DauT (GoKu), and Sutra (the Sutra games are in a bunch of games posted by Sutra, but it's a great collection with some great games). And there's always some of the older ones to check out.

EDIT:
Speaking of which, I was just watching a Sutra vs Chris game and Chris went with skirm/spear combo all through Feudal. Sutra had skirm/scout and Chris got infantry armor to keep his spears from dying to the skirms as easily. It worked pretty well.
I would think that switching to scouts/archers might be easier on most players, especially if you like scouts better.

[This message has been edited by Gordon B (edited 11-11-2004 @ 01:04 PM).]

Another question just came to my mind - If youre playing against a meso civ opponent, instead of building an extra stable, wouldn't it make sense to build an extra range, and pump skirms from all? In the feudal age a meso civ has no counter for skirms except skirms itself.

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If you can build an extra Range, so can the Meso civ. If the Meso civ is the Aztecs, he can also produce Skirms faster than you can, unless you're playing as the Brits.

It's usually better to make Stables so that you can use Scouts to chase down his Skirms. Obviously, Spears counter Scouts, but Scouts/Skirms can beat Spears/Skirms just because of the mobility of the Scouts. With Spears/Skirms against Spears/Skirms, there is no clear winner (without taking into account Blacksmith techs or elevation).

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Arabia is like a big rock paper scissors game...

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Scouts/Archers have something Spears/Skirms don't. Speed.