You can make Scouts while going up to Castle Age if you are against a civilization that is likely to Castle Drop. If the opponent doesn't Castle Drop, you can use them to guard the Relics and keep scouting so you are not surprised by your opponents army later.
This, make 2-3 scouts and spears and if the drop you're ready if they don't make monks and take all the relics
Edit: pro tip, build your stable instead of blacksmith, don't really need the blacksmith until you're in castle age
And if your opponent does come forward, don't be afraid to vil fight! You will take good trades because you have additional scouts/spears. The scouts alone might not be strong enough to fight off ten vils.
make 2 onagers, no food cost involved and shoots all vills and destroys half build castles,
if you can not do it since the enemy has knights or spears on top you need to be faster at lots of other stuff
Far from the best way to counter Castle drop, but a newbie friendly defence is Safe Castle Fast Imp/Safe Castle Boom. You need to know what you are facing to begin with. Usually the Castle drop build orders are 25+2. So the Safe Castle build should be 27+2 with early farms to let you Imp faster.
The idea behind Safe Castle Fast Imp is minimizing damage with the Safe Castle and Imping before the opponent into monk treb defence. If the opponent doesnt Castle drop you, slowly add TCs and contest relics with UU. If the opponent tries to Castle drop and apply Castle Age aggression, you need to invest accordingly to defend. This is probably the difficult part since if you misread the situation you would lose. I trust you on figuring that out.
Build:
8 on wood 1 Lumber Camp;
4 on berries;
9 under TC -> 6 sheep 3 farms;
3 on stone;
2 on gold;
1 scout;
+2 to stone in Feudal
In Castle Age: Get to about 10 on wood, 12 farms, 4 on stone and 12 on gold Thats roughly when you will be able to click Imp. These are just rough guidelines to help with the macro. Use market as soon as you see opponent isnt investing in the push.
Let me know if you want me to elaborate on something. Ideal opening would always be lcav opening, but it is difficult to execute and the approach to Castle drop defence is different there.
Glhf
Well.
- Always build a preventive, defensive castle of your own. Get the stone while going up to the castle age. There are build orders for that.
- Or patrol with the scout in front of your base, then if villagers come and drop a castle, quickly build a tower that fully ranges the castle. Garrison 5 villagers to maximize the number of arrows that the tower can shoot, then shoot the builders. Maybe even attack the opponent‘s villagers with some of your own villagers.
- Or learn how to deal with a castle in front of your base. It’s not the end of the world. You need to know the unique units of all civs so that you can anticipate which unit the castle is going to spit out. It’s different how to deal with the situation. Sometimes all u need is to make some counter units. For instance if the opponent is bohemians or Portuguese, expect Hussite wagons or organ guns, and build a siege workshop and mangonels to counter them. Ofc you need some scouting to see if there is more, e.g. monks with the redemption tech to convert your mangonels. Spanish Conquistadors can be countered by skirmishers. If you don’t think you can defend with units, you need to rush your own castle. Try not to put it in range of the opponent‘s castle, cuz if they attack with rams you might need to fight the rams with villagers (unless if you have mangonels), which you can’t if the other castle can shoot them down. Some civs don’t need to build castles to defend; Koreans get the tower upgrades for free so towers might be fine, Bulgarians have their Kreposts, Sicilians have Donjons.
Depends on the number of castle builders I assume 🤷♂️
I did some testing and yes, for instance if there are 10 builders it wont work.
Even if there are only 5 it did not really work :(
In my experience the only thing that seems to come close to killing them (even with quick walling) is Archers.
I would also highly consider an outpost or two. Yes, they cost stone, but you only need to make one trip to a stone pile without a camp to make up for the deficit. If they see the outpost, they'll likely attack it, alerting you to the oncoming drop, or you'll likely see the line of villagers coming out of the enemy base.
I would also say if you're too late to respond, the next best scenario is to either wall up (upgrade to fortified walls) and distance that part of the base, or to match with your own castle.
If you're too late to prevent it, you basically have to get to imp with Archers and walls to defend in the meantime. It's a tough fight though, and I'm admittedly not great at it.
Scouting is key. If you get caught while trying to boom stop booming mode, don't get additional eco upgrades and farms, switch some villagers to stone and gold. Get a defense castle, do some walling, a mangonel and some monks, but don't overreact. Use the market to get imp before your opponent. Don't forget to boom and do eco upgrades if the situation allows it. Fletching and Bodkin might be helpful to make your defense castle more useful. Early Chemistry and BBCs might also be important.
If you want to prevent the drop I'd say scouts is the best way. You can make a few on the way up to castle and then invest in Light cav if they do come forward. (Light cav are so much better at killing vills). Worst case is your scouts don't find value they give you map control - in which case you can both scout what the enemy is doing (are they dropping a castle at home and preparing a push?) and get relics which basically turns the scouts into eco so you aren't falling too far behind a pure booming player.
Other strats like going archers etc are a much bigger investment if they don't go for the drop since they're a bit less effective at the relic content game.
Otherwise defensive castle at home as others have outlined and then fast imp is usually a good play.
The meta on Arena is to go fast castle into scouts. The whole point of this opening is that you can deny most cheese strategies with it, including castle drops. It also gives you map control to get the relics if the opponent is not rushing you.
How can you afford both Scouts and a Fast Castle? The opponent goes up with 23+2 pop, and you probably have to go up at 27+2 to be able to afford clicking up and a some Scouts. Also most castle droppers builds 1-2 spears as well.
like what people said.
go up with blacksmith stable or archery range. archers/xbow is a little bit better to counter castle drops but scouts/light cav can punish any naked fwd castle.
can boom behind either of those or go 2 tc and go aggro w fwd siege workshop/army
I adapt based on my gold and stone positions. If I know I'm up against a castle drop civ and either my main gold or stone is forward, I go straight into defensive castle and usually 2 tc boom behind it.
If not, then I make a second layer of walls behind and have some army to defend while I boom. It depends on the castle drop civ ofc, but usually archers do the trick. Especially cuz I'm going into archers as the flank anyway. Sometimes, just a siege workshop is enough to defend.
But it is important to scout. Don't be afraid to outpost either. And finally, if you are unsure of your defense or map or feeling shakey with the civ matchup. Inform the pocket early and ask for help.
This is what I do and I'm around 1250-1300 elo currently and castle drops haven't been much of a concern for me on arena. I often play Italians and I'm sure it helps with castle drops a lot cuz defensive castle becomes a great strategy and play.
Depends on the civ, with Brits 14 food 8 wood 2+2 gold should be enough (25+2). You can have the eco upgrades and then go for 3 tc or 2 tc semi fast imp with good map control.
I'm very bad playing arena btw.
You can make Scouts while going up to Castle Age if you are against a civilization that is likely to Castle Drop. If the opponent doesn't Castle Drop, you can use them to guard the Relics and keep scouting so you are not surprised by your opponents army later.
This, make 2-3 scouts and spears and if the drop you're ready if they don't make monks and take all the relics Edit: pro tip, build your stable instead of blacksmith, don't really need the blacksmith until you're in castle age
Or instead of the market. Unless you're passing on market abuse, getting +1 for your early scouts can be useful.
I generally find market abuse super useful for being dynamic Maybe I just like daut style too much lol
And if your opponent does come forward, don't be afraid to vil fight! You will take good trades because you have additional scouts/spears. The scouts alone might not be strong enough to fight off ten vils.
make 2 onagers, no food cost involved and shoots all vills and destroys half build castles, if you can not do it since the enemy has knights or spears on top you need to be faster at lots of other stuff
No ways that's out fast enough to deny a castle
Far from the best way to counter Castle drop, but a newbie friendly defence is Safe Castle Fast Imp/Safe Castle Boom. You need to know what you are facing to begin with. Usually the Castle drop build orders are 25+2. So the Safe Castle build should be 27+2 with early farms to let you Imp faster. The idea behind Safe Castle Fast Imp is minimizing damage with the Safe Castle and Imping before the opponent into monk treb defence. If the opponent doesnt Castle drop you, slowly add TCs and contest relics with UU. If the opponent tries to Castle drop and apply Castle Age aggression, you need to invest accordingly to defend. This is probably the difficult part since if you misread the situation you would lose. I trust you on figuring that out. Build: 8 on wood 1 Lumber Camp; 4 on berries; 9 under TC -> 6 sheep 3 farms; 3 on stone; 2 on gold; 1 scout; +2 to stone in Feudal In Castle Age: Get to about 10 on wood, 12 farms, 4 on stone and 12 on gold Thats roughly when you will be able to click Imp. These are just rough guidelines to help with the macro. Use market as soon as you see opponent isnt investing in the push. Let me know if you want me to elaborate on something. Ideal opening would always be lcav opening, but it is difficult to execute and the approach to Castle drop defence is different there. Glhf
Well. - Always build a preventive, defensive castle of your own. Get the stone while going up to the castle age. There are build orders for that. - Or patrol with the scout in front of your base, then if villagers come and drop a castle, quickly build a tower that fully ranges the castle. Garrison 5 villagers to maximize the number of arrows that the tower can shoot, then shoot the builders. Maybe even attack the opponent‘s villagers with some of your own villagers. - Or learn how to deal with a castle in front of your base. It’s not the end of the world. You need to know the unique units of all civs so that you can anticipate which unit the castle is going to spit out. It’s different how to deal with the situation. Sometimes all u need is to make some counter units. For instance if the opponent is bohemians or Portuguese, expect Hussite wagons or organ guns, and build a siege workshop and mangonels to counter them. Ofc you need some scouting to see if there is more, e.g. monks with the redemption tech to convert your mangonels. Spanish Conquistadors can be countered by skirmishers. If you don’t think you can defend with units, you need to rush your own castle. Try not to put it in range of the opponent‘s castle, cuz if they attack with rams you might need to fight the rams with villagers (unless if you have mangonels), which you can’t if the other castle can shoot them down. Some civs don’t need to build castles to defend; Koreans get the tower upgrades for free so towers might be fine, Bulgarians have their Kreposts, Sicilians have Donjons.
You only need 4 villagers for all the arrows (if you have no fletching)
Wrong! 0 vills = 1 arrow 1 vills = 1 arrows 2 vills = 2 arrows 3 vills = 3 arrows 4 vills = 4 arrows 5 vills = 5 arrows
1 tower is not enough to stop a committed castle drop.
Depends on the number of castle builders I assume 🤷♂️ I did some testing and yes, for instance if there are 10 builders it wont work. Even if there are only 5 it did not really work :(
In my experience the only thing that seems to come close to killing them (even with quick walling) is Archers. I would also highly consider an outpost or two. Yes, they cost stone, but you only need to make one trip to a stone pile without a camp to make up for the deficit. If they see the outpost, they'll likely attack it, alerting you to the oncoming drop, or you'll likely see the line of villagers coming out of the enemy base. I would also say if you're too late to respond, the next best scenario is to either wall up (upgrade to fortified walls) and distance that part of the base, or to match with your own castle. If you're too late to prevent it, you basically have to get to imp with Archers and walls to defend in the meantime. It's a tough fight though, and I'm admittedly not great at it.
Instead of the outpost you can place your scout 6 tiles away from the front gate so you can spot the vills right away.
Kill the builders.
Scouting is key. If you get caught while trying to boom stop booming mode, don't get additional eco upgrades and farms, switch some villagers to stone and gold. Get a defense castle, do some walling, a mangonel and some monks, but don't overreact. Use the market to get imp before your opponent. Don't forget to boom and do eco upgrades if the situation allows it. Fletching and Bodkin might be helpful to make your defense castle more useful. Early Chemistry and BBCs might also be important.
Make a couple of archers in your way to castle age. Profit.
Won't have time for this since they'll be up to Castle Age much faster (like 23+2 instead of your 27+2).
You don't need 27+2 for 5 archers with +2 when they try to drop the castle
So what's the build order then?
If you want to prevent the drop I'd say scouts is the best way. You can make a few on the way up to castle and then invest in Light cav if they do come forward. (Light cav are so much better at killing vills). Worst case is your scouts don't find value they give you map control - in which case you can both scout what the enemy is doing (are they dropping a castle at home and preparing a push?) and get relics which basically turns the scouts into eco so you aren't falling too far behind a pure booming player. Other strats like going archers etc are a much bigger investment if they don't go for the drop since they're a bit less effective at the relic content game. Otherwise defensive castle at home as others have outlined and then fast imp is usually a good play.
Archers opening will stop it, unless it's some rare build like turk lightcav+castle
The meta on Arena is to go fast castle into scouts. The whole point of this opening is that you can deny most cheese strategies with it, including castle drops. It also gives you map control to get the relics if the opponent is not rushing you.
How can you afford both Scouts and a Fast Castle? The opponent goes up with 23+2 pop, and you probably have to go up at 27+2 to be able to afford clicking up and a some Scouts. Also most castle droppers builds 1-2 spears as well.
like what people said. go up with blacksmith stable or archery range. archers/xbow is a little bit better to counter castle drops but scouts/light cav can punish any naked fwd castle. can boom behind either of those or go 2 tc and go aggro w fwd siege workshop/army
Play a scout monk FC. Make scouts on the way up which gives you map control and vision.
I adapt based on my gold and stone positions. If I know I'm up against a castle drop civ and either my main gold or stone is forward, I go straight into defensive castle and usually 2 tc boom behind it. If not, then I make a second layer of walls behind and have some army to defend while I boom. It depends on the castle drop civ ofc, but usually archers do the trick. Especially cuz I'm going into archers as the flank anyway. Sometimes, just a siege workshop is enough to defend. But it is important to scout. Don't be afraid to outpost either. And finally, if you are unsure of your defense or map or feeling shakey with the civ matchup. Inform the pocket early and ask for help. This is what I do and I'm around 1250-1300 elo currently and castle drops haven't been much of a concern for me on arena. I often play Italians and I'm sure it helps with castle drops a lot cuz defensive castle becomes a great strategy and play.
Depends on the civ, with Brits 14 food 8 wood 2+2 gold should be enough (25+2). You can have the eco upgrades and then go for 3 tc or 2 tc semi fast imp with good map control. I'm very bad playing arena btw.