Good build strategy?

[Razorboi]

Hello all

I have recently been playing several multiplayer games and unfourtenetly, I have lost almost all of them.

Many of the players seem to be able to tech up and spawn many units.

So I am asking what is a good begining build strategy? I can't seem to make a competing army. So any help will be greatly appreciated.

[COOLguy]

Hi. I think a balance is best key to success. But I'm a very conservative player, and so get my rear kicked a lot. But what upgrades do you have?

It depends a lot on the size of a map, but generally a lot of workers with always a few pikes and archers as safety. Then I focus on cavalry or siege works. A navy is most important on water maps.

[Alex486]

I usually kick people behinds 9 times out of 10.

Here is my basics strategy and I tweak it based upon map and other player known positions.

I like to take the US special forces approach to warfare (quick moving, high impact units, everyone goes in, everyone comes out attitude) over massive slow low performing armies (think China, Iraq) that could care less about if a solider comes back.

Building out
1) Light cav units produced first to go out and grab territory.
2) Build a black smith and start upgrading asap. On big maps, it is ambidexterity to make building cheaper to build, on smaller maps, I focus on archery first.
3) If you have crossbowmen upgrade, build an archery building and start the crossbowmen upgrade asap. swarms of crossbowmen are hard to beat, they are cheap to build (2 turns).
4) If you have heavy knight upgrade, build the stable and start that upgrade (Don't forget, the crossbow upgrade and the heavy knight upgrade converts all of your existing archers and regular knights into those upgraded units).
5) If you have the mission upgrade, I like to build at least 1 missionary, then the persuasion upgrade (since the missionary can start traveling to where I need them while the upgrade is going).
6) After I have a few workers, start the flight, the ballistic, then the area damage upgrades
7) Use 8 workers to build a 16 turn catapult in 2 turns. Yes it is a lot of clicking, but it is worth it.

Attacking:
1) I prefer fast units with range over slow none range units. Thus most of my fighting force is archer based and heavy knights. The other mounted units are a waste in my opinion. (Huesser takes 6 turns and my upgraded crossbowmen can wipe them out fairly easy).
2) When attacking someone base, most players make the mistake of focusing on the other players towers. I usually skip attacking the towers to focus on unit producing buildings unless there is something strategic with the tower (like blocking a passageway, housing a catapult). During an attack, most players workers are away and the player is too busy focusing on the attack, that they forget that they lost a stable, or barrack, or something.
3) Killing workers are secondary focus
4) Mix missionaries with your fighting force to heal and persuade.
5) Wagons are very useful for moving units quickly. A wagon with 3 knights already on it can move 5 spaces. The knights then move 5 spaces into another wagon, that wagon moves another 5 spaces. In all, 3 units just traveled 14 spaces. Archers and other foot men can cover 12 spaces.
6) Wagon full of cats or trebucets is a good way to punch a whole in someones army. Just be careful where you move the wagon, bc if it gets destroyed, you lose 2 of the 3 occupants if I am not mistaken
7) I like to the flying unit to attack cats and trebucets

Terrain:
1) Look for choke points to exploit.
2) consider the terrain as to the type of units to focus on. Lots of mountains cutting the board up, range and flying units are priority.
This is just some of my strategy that I use.

If you want to play a game, I'll be happy to coach you on a game.

[ollie444]

I now feel a lot less confident with my strategy

[RiverRaider 1097]

Keep that thought Ollie at least until our tournament game is over hehehe X)

[RiverRaider 1097]

Alex you use the same exact strategy as I do except missionary's but they are my first kill even before the structures

[Alex486]

I agree on killing the missionaries, didn't want to give away the entire farm.

[DoomCarrot]

I ALWAYS kill missionaries and workers when i can.

They are the most annoying bast**s in the game if your opponent uses them right

[RiverRaider 1097]

Definitely are my friend I don't like or use them, the AI uses them enough ). I do use the healer dude though if time allows

[Alex486]

The new templar knight become a favorite go to healer unit. Just need to try it out. Still like the missionaries