Success, the Indians and You

[Yahweh Sabaoth]

How the hell do I make it as the Indians?

In playing out each and every civilization to some sort of victory on a huge world with continents/16 civs, I thought for sure that the Indians would be a cakewalk. They're religious, making cultural expansion a snap. And they're commercial, making early tech research and - eventually - giant empire maintenance a breeze.

Well, boy was I wrong. After a fitful weekend of being outexpanded or outresearched by all my neighbors, or losing out the tech race overseas, I must turn to Apolyton for some advice.

My predicament so far is this: if I start with plentiful neighbors, the Mongols and/or other expansionists will quickly outstrip my research efforts. The Koreans will be hestitant to trade with me, and all my neighbors - no one in particular - will crowd the map so much that REXing loses almost all meaning.

Or, assuming I start on an "Asian-only" continent, I can outexpand the passive Chinese, Japanese, Mongols and Koreans, perhaps even keeping them from a single source of iron - only to find that overseas, my competitors have been trading so agressively that I and my neighbors are now well behind in terms of tech.

So, what do I do? Typical REXing isn't working out... sometimes even researching Mysticism-Polytheism is yielding negligible results in trades... should I consider some form of archer rush? Swordsmen war perhaps? India isn't necessarily geared towards this tactic, but I see little other way.

Please help!

[CerberusIV]

I have never played very far into a game as the Indians for the reasons you describe, although I do quite like the Spanish who have the same civ traits.

The way I would do it is to start building a combined arms force towards the end of the REX phase and pick on a neighbour. If you can gain four or five cities that will boost your empire enough to progressively overrun a big enough area of land to go for whichever victory type you choose.

The difficulty with the Indians is that they don't have a killer UU (unless you delete iron from the available resources using the editor ) so you will need swordsmen, horsies and catapults together.

[Arrian]

I haven't played the Indians in a long time. They will shine in the mid-to-late game. In other words, they're slow starters. Commerical, though it does provide some extra cash, is really about lower corruption, which isn't an issue if your early expansion isn't good and/or you don't conquer anybody. To get the best use out of that trait, you need to big empire.

As for research, the polytheism route usually works pretty well (though I'd research a few other important techs at maximum first - like BW - so they're out of the way when you go to trade). The other option is Writing (embassies + good trading opportunities) and then mathematics. Being commercial, you have a head start on those techs. You also should have a decent shot at the GL.

-Arrian

[Yahweh Sabaoth]

I think I will give the writing route a shot... With many neighbors, I found myself in such heavy wonder competition, and with techs flying about like underwear in a college freshman's slumber party, I often lost the Great Library or HG (the only two I care about) by 1 or 2 turns to some other suckers... perhaps if I just get started earlier...

...and hints on REXing?

And yes, I do want many neighbors... I want to conquer them all later! And I don't want to be on the continent that "falls behind"...

[Arrian]

Well, an early granary can be a big help.

So can a quick swordsman war (IMO, the quickest force to put together. Barracks = 40 shields. Warrior = 10 shields. Warrior -> Swordsman = 40 gold + iron) with a neighbor. It depends on the situation.

-Arrian

[Yahweh Sabaoth]

Originally posted by Arrian
Well, an early granary can be a big help.

I've had mixed success with this approach (as the Indians).

So can a quick swordsman war (IMO, the quickest force to put together. Barracks = 40 shields. Warrior = 10 shields. Warrior -> Swordsman = 40 gold + iron) with a neighbor. It depends on the situation.

I guess you're right. How many "core" cities would you go with before starting this war? Who would you pick on first? Any civs to avoid (other than militaritists, obviously)

[Arrian]

How many cities? Not a hard number. It's more like "ok, I'm running out of room for peaceful REX... let's get a barracks or two up and start building warriors."

Obviously, this means you need IW, and Iron. This causes problems for the GL route. But since you are going to do most of your REXing before getting the barracks up & starting on vet warriors, you should have time to trade for or even research IW. Obviously, it's best to have it before you actually build vet warriors, since they're a waste w/o Iron.

Civs to avoid? Greece, Carthage, Rome w/iron. Anybody with a 3 defender. Don't fear militarists.

Depending on how many swordsmen you muster up, and how the RNG treates you, you can do quite a bit of damage with them against standard units.

I left Persia off the "avoid" list. I did this because though they're scary, that's precisely the reason why you shouldn't avoid them. Persia w/iron close to you? KILL THEM, for goodness sake, and do it ASAP. Otherwise those Immortals will probably come knockin'. Plus, even if they don't, Persia has a tendancy of "building up" well.

-Arrian

[monkspider]

Listen well to Arrian. In my experience, the Indians do indeed start of slow, but boom around the time you start cranking out war elephants. Have patience with them, they are one of my favorite civs.

[Tassadar500]

Haha. I remember when I was playing the indians once. Pretty much behind in the tech race so I was dragging behind in the military. All of a sudden the super power Germany sent their Panzer deep into my territory. I asked them to leave which they didnt so thus I had to declare war. I was sure I would lose and need to make peace but I quickly thought to make trade embargo's with nations that could make tanks. So Germany couldnt make the Panzers because they relied on other civs to make the Panzers. I had just recovered from a war against the Zulus so I had a few Great Leaders. And the German army was dependant on their Panzers. So I won the war

[Yahweh Sabaoth]

This is not really an India-specific question, but as it deals with one strategy the India player could use, I'll ask it: say I want to start a swordsmen war against one of my neighbors. When do I build the barracks? How many barracks do I build? How many veteran warriors do I build before the upgrade? How many swordsmen do I use to attack each city?

As a militaristic civ, at this point in the game, and on Regent level, I'd feel comfortable attacking with 4, give or take a few depending on circumstances, and augmenting my forces later.

What force would y'all use?

[Nakar Gabab]

Originally posted by Yahweh Sabaoth
This is not really an India-specific question, but as it deals with one strategy the India player could use, I'll ask it: say I want to start a swordsmen war against one of my neighbors. When do I build the barracks? How many barracks do I build? How many veteran warriors do I build before the upgrade? How many swordsmen do I use to attack each city?

1) When you can, perhaps building an early one in a city that will become a 'military camp.'

2) As many as you need. One in every city that's going to be making units and one in any border towns where you plan to station the forces pre-upgrade, then attack.

3) As many as you can afford to upgrade. Any more is essentially a waste.

4) Obviously it depends, but 4-5 per city against non-Greek/Carthaginian civs is a near-certain victory.

[Tassadar500]

Being a war monger that really doesnt use much thought in rushes I would say build a barracks before the war. And build them in your prime production cities. Well the number to attack each city depends so I cant answer you on this one.

[Arrian]

On a standard map (Monarch) I tend to use 10-12 swordsmen plus a couple of spears. I will most likely concentrate them in 1 or 2 big stacks. Overwhelming force.

Take city, quell resistance, poprush spearman, move on.

-Arrian

[Yahweh Sabaoth]

Originally posted by Arrian
On a standard map (Monarch) I tend to use 10-12 swordsmen plus a couple of spears. I will most likely concentrate them in 1 or 2 big stacks. Overwhelming force.

So, you'd be building a barracks or two at some point, and then saving about how much gold?

[Arrian]

Probably 2 barracks, then each city pumps out 5-6 vet warriors.

The money usually isn't an issue, because by this point I've probably researched 2 techs at 40 turn pace (IW, Polytheism) and/or nailed some barb encampments.

But 10 warrior -> sword upgrades will cost you 400 gold.

-Arrian