Powerful and Weak Civs

[Bridger]

Originally posted by Fayadi


Nobody would attack with just Siege unit!It is not easy to destroy Siege units combined with heavy and gunpowder inf in defensive mode protecting the siege.
I would state strongly that any expert player wont choose Maya as a civ.Maybe when playing Maya you havent met a good player.I have met a good player whom in Medieval age can come out with 2-3 siege combined with 4-5 cavalry + 6-7 light inf(18-21)+1-2 wagon,the exact numbers might be more.This good player can attack with such a mass number when everyone is building the economy in medieval age(to be honest I didnt survive the attack,my ally send reinforcement but was repelled).No matter how strong is your fortress or tower it wont be of no use.Those siege units will take out your buildings without being hurt.Whether you survive this attack depends on how many military units you have not how many defensive buildings you have.Relying on building for military defense is a bad idea I think.I will say that Maya might be the least favourite civ among experts because other civ advantages are more attractive.The Cynex Strategy guide book also mentioned that Maya unique bonuses are attractive for the beginners and also mentioned that experienced players wont like Maya's unique bonuses.
I think you underestimate the attacking power of the opponent when combined with siege(Remember that ppl dont just attack with siege units)
I believe that Maya civ is attractive to newbie players as expert will prefer other national bonuses?Do you(people) agree?

Erm, i think you misread my post, i said any non-seige attack would fail miserably vs. Maya. And seige units are so weak in the early game that some suicide light cav can easily take them out, forcing the enemy to build more expensive seige while you reinforce your defending army (garisoned inside the fort until your ready to counter-attack of course).

With maya it's all about booming until your forced to stop. Maya's building bonuses make it great for booming. You boom boom boom while building forts/towers and only minimal military. When the enemy shows up with his army, your extra hitpoints/firepower will give you plenty of time to switch from boom to military. I've used this strat plenty of times, boom boom boom until the enemy attacks, use the extra delay from your forts/towers to build up a military that is larger than his (since your economy is much better).

Mayan buildings are *not* your defence, they are your early warning system. The enemy can't attack until he takes down that fort, and it takes him a long time to kill that fort, even with trebuchets (and of course your ambushed light cav got his first seige to give you even more time).

[Ctulu]

Fayadi,

If played Mayan's for the second time in my life, and this against the Turks on Thougher. 3d time on Thougher and Finally won!

The map was an island map with 1 main Island and 3 small around this one.

I pushed to him early on thanks to the timber reduction when our borders met at a River, splitting up the island! He attacked me early on thanks to his better sesource gather rate(thougher *******'s), but without siege! I already had 1 (or 2 towers) close to my border city, and garrizoned some citizen's who were in the line of fire, the tower/city took out his units fairly quick, making me loose only 1 citizen(he was surounded when I wanted to garizon him :-/).

By that time I went for a risky strategy. I was already creating my core army (Light Inf/Light Cav's) accompanied by some of the rest. I decided to avoid unit upgrades unless they were ABSOLUTELY necessairy until enlightment age, hoping I would fend off his attacks. Meanwhile, I continued producing unit. I pushed to one of the islands, and send 2 spies to see what he had. Apparently he only had 3 cities, I had 4!

When I hit Enlightment he was attacking my poorly defended Island. I upgraded all my units and charged for his city on the other side of the river! He pulled back his invading army in defence (he should've pushed through! he would've had my city).
Meanwhile he was 1 age behind, so he didn't have Janisary's yet. But he defended his city beautifully! He had 3 of his siege UU's close to his city pummeling the hell out of me. I tried to take them out with my cav but they were like meat to a blender *bzzzzzzzzzz* dead!

I pulled back to the river and pummeled some of his buildings like his temple. I was suffering, but his units more, thanks to the age difference. He didn't ballance well his attacks, except for his siege weapons.

Meanwhile my economy was suffering, through the constant backup-units creation. When he hit enlightment and made Janisary's, my musketeers suffered. I had to pull back to my border fortress. most of his units followed and were killed by it.

I hit industrial after making some granary/smelter/lumber mill upgrades/buildings and went back with a core army of infantry and some commando's! It took me a while to create tanks but after I had some I destroyed most of his siege (THANK GOD). I took his city, tried to repair it, but he took out my citizen's out. I held it, got capped back, capped back, assimilated it and lost it again. he was still an age behind I believe. I pulled back to my fortress, and concentrated on hitting modern to develop nukes.

While all this was happening (my enlightment-industrial period) I was on his small island taking care of barracks and stuff with commando's but not to large avail! I was also sending some air units to his unit production!
I also managed to build versailles with my scarce resources to help my army.

I pulled up my oil production and hit Modern, bought myself a way to nuclear weapons! He was in Industrial and ammassed his troops at the border city, but seemed afraid to cross the river, just to get waisted by my fortress. I sent in bombers to his unit production and I nuked his city killing of most of his units! Took his city with my refreshed/renewed army, killed off a bunch of citizen with my riding machine gun's(forgot name) and nuked his capitol.

The game was in my favor from then on, and I won fairly easy. I had to take his third city also because I played conquest/no wonders victory/no territory victory

My point is, it takes a good player to play as Mayan, who are considered as *weak*!

If u want to see this rec I'll post it

[Fayadi]

Well,if you are indeed a good player,there is other more attractive national bonuses for offensive or booming playing style.British,French,Turks,Chinese they have more powerful national bonuses.Do you agree on this point?The bonuses of these nations need good players to play them too.Ppl requires more skills to make full use of the bonuses of these nations to be real deadly.DO you agree on the point that expert will choose other nations over Maya?

One more thing about Fortress and Towers,as I have already mentioned,I have met a real good player who can in Medieval age ,attack with a large army(Chevalier+Elite Javileener+Pikemen) with some siege units.Your 2 or 3 elite cavalry will probably be dead if you approach them.Fortress are going to be reduced from a long range while the large army are protecting the siege.SO generally expert will choose to play any civ that is economically better or militarily good to create powerful units.
As you mentioned the advantage of playing Maya is by giving time for the player to build up the army while the fortress are slowly taking hits.This is not a good idea though,6 siege units might take down anything in Medieval Age faster than you think.
That early warning system will be destroyed way too early.

Isn't it better to play a civ with better economy or military bonuses rather than some building bonuses whose playing style is to turtle and boom till quite late to attack.Booming is fine,but to counter rushes you must have an army available ,not with a tiny squad of infantry relying on Fortress to buy time while creating up an army DURING THE ATTACK.Besidess cheaper building doesnt give you much economic advantage.Egypt,France,British,German,Chinese,Turk s bonuses will give you more resources than Maya do.Well if you love to have more woods,why not play France ?It will give you more woods which is more attractive than Maya's bonus of cheaper buildings.France is my 4th favourite civ,but I believe it is TOTALLY better than Maya in national bonuses

Ok I will change my stance now,I believe Maya's bonus is unattractive but it is not necessarily weak.
Now,I do agree on the point RON's civ are nicely balanced,but just some civ's bonuses are unattractive

[Ctulu]

how can 1 have lots of units reaching medieval? wich nation did he play? just curious

[Adagio]

I hear a lot of talk about those wealth gaining Civs, but what is the point with it anyway? I haven't played as any of these wealth gaining Civs yet, but I have always, withing short time, got to the maximum commercial cap, even though I also have invented more of commercial, than usual... In my present game, I'm at Enlightment age, with a commerical cap of 600 (+ the Diamonds, which makes it 660), but still I'm only using about 50% of my commerce... I've only got like 4 caravans...

[Fayadi]

Originally posted by Ctulu
how can 1 have lots of units reaching medieval? wich nation did he play? just curious

The nation he play is France.He is damn good I think because he defeated me and when my ally send help,his reinforcement was repelled.But at that I am just an intermediate player,my skills have improved now I think
He attacked me with chevalier with elite javalineer attacking from behind with some siege weapons.
5 chevalier + 6-7 elite jav + 2 siege weapons attacking my fortress +1 wagon.Forget to mention that his territory is just beside mine,so it is near for his army to attack me

[Ctulu]

that I am just an intermediate player,my skills have improved now I think

Try playing on though if you already ain't, it's not THAT more difficult then moderate. AI comes with bigger armies, that's all

5 chevalier + 6-7 elite jav + 2 siege weapons attacking my fortress +1 wagon

that's not an unusual amount of units as you led to believe, and it should've been fairly easy to fend that attack off with 4-5 pikes/ 3-4 light cav's

[PTM]

Originally posted by ADG
I hear a lot of talk about those wealth gaining Civs, but what is the point with it anyway? I haven't played as any of these wealth gaining Civs yet, but I have always, withing short time, got to the maximum commercial cap, even though I also have invented more of commercial, than usual... In my present game, I'm at Enlightment age, with a commerical cap of 600 (+ the Diamonds, which makes it 660), but still I'm only using about 50% of my commerce... I've only got like 4 caravans...

If you reach the Com Cap, something I do alot, play as the Brits (my personal favorite nation, as you can see from my long and detailed post on page 1 of this thread). They have a Com Cap bonus of +25%, so if you were Brits and got those diamonds you're at +35%, which turns your +500 (I don't know how you got +600 in Enlightenment, because it maxes at +500 until Info Age End-Game Techs come around) into +675! An extra 175 food/wood/metal/wealth (and in industrial oil) is very, VERY beneficial if your someone who plays with a strategy like mine.

If you find you're having problems in Enlightenment, the British could be the nation for you. Not only do their Com Cap limits help TREMENDOUSLY, but their UU's (Highlanders at Enlightenment) will destroy other infantry, regaurdless of class (Gunpowder, Heavy, etc.).

- PTM

[deadfuse]

2 siege weapons would do jack against a Mayan fort. Forts are really easy to defend by putting a few siege weapons of your own next to them. That way you can barrage the attacker's siege, and if he tries to attack your siege with cav/infantry, he has to brave the fort (i.e. he'll die).

I do think Turks would be able to cruise right through the Maya with a siege rush. They would have more siege engines, and they would have a much longer range than the Mayan engines, so there would be no way to save that fort. You would just hope it takes them a while, and start building your army.

[Fayadi]

Originally posted by Ctulu


Try playing on though if you already ain't, it's not THAT more difficult then moderate. AI comes with bigger armies, that's all



that's not an unusual amount of units as you led to believe, and it should've been fairly easy to fend that attack off with 4-5 pikes/ 3-4 light cav's

My definition of Intermediate player is different from you,for me an intermediate player is a player who can beat tough com but cant beat very good players in internet and I do beat tough com.I believe that my skills have improved ,so I am confident now I can up to par challenging good players as I have been winning against people in internet.7-8 light inf+6-7 chevalier(heavy knight) can beat 4-5pikes/3-4 light cav.I am confident I can repel such attack now but the point I am arguing is this attack can reduce any Maya player whose playing style "creating an army while the enemy is attacking the fortress"

[Ctulu]

5 chevalier + 6-7 elite jav + 2 siege weapons attacking my fortress +1 wagon

7-8 light inf+6-7 chevalier(heavy knight) can beat 4-5pikes/3-4 light cav

try to be consistent, BIG difference

and pikes counter cav's, and cav's counter jav's, so their wouldn't be too much of a problem, just more needed

[Bridger]

What i'm saying is that it's much more effective to boom when you are assured your small militery will last as long as you need it to. With the british or the french, try booming against a player who attacks you in late classical/early midieval, you'll either have to have built a counter-force before he gets there (effectively ending your boom before it begins) or you will die as he runs over your undefended boom.

The advantage of the Maya is they can boom AND then fend off an attack, no other civ can really do this (cept maybe russia with their awsome light cav/attrition/spies bonuses).

[Adagio]

Originally posted by PTM
If you reach the Com Cap, something I do alot, play as the Brits (my personal favorite nation, as you can see from my long and detailed post on page 1 of this thread). They have a Com Cap bonus of +25%, so if you were Brits and got those diamonds you're at +35%, which turns your +500 (I don't know how you got +600 in Enlightenment, because it maxes at +500 until Info Age End-Game Techs come around) into +675! An extra 175 food/wood/metal/wealth (and in industrial oil) is very, VERY beneficial if your someone who plays with a strategy like mine.

If you find you're having problems in Enlightenment, the British could be the nation for you. Not only do their Com Cap limits help TREMENDOUSLY, but their UU's (Highlanders at Enlightenment) will destroy other infantry, regaurdless of class (Gunpowder, Heavy, etc.).

- PTM

I might remember wrong then, I didn't check... but the fact was, that I got more wealth than the limit allows... extremely much more... and that's without any Wealth Nations... I can't see how wealth nations can be at use at all, if I max out the wealth that quickly anyway

[Bridger]

ADG, did you build the collosus or taj mahal? Both increase your wealth cap.

[PTM]

Originally posted by ADG


I might remember wrong then, I didn't check... but the fact was, that I got more wealth than the limit allows... extremely much more... and that's without any Wealth Nations... I can't see how wealth nations can be at use at all, if I max out the wealth that quickly anyway

...Which is why British solve that issue, because if you were using them (that is, with Diamonds in your case) you'd have +35% more wealth coming in (due to +35% Com Cap). If you're in the Enlightenment age and your maxing your wealth out as a Brit it's time to age. You'll obviously have the resources if you're getting +675 wealth every 30 seconds. The Brits ability to increase Wealth inflow isn't their only advantage, as is the case with the other "wealth nations" you refer to.

- PTM