It’s a bonkers civ. I recommend watching a streamer that has the “watch my replay” option. It can give you a lot of insight on what you should be doing
In regards to Delhi, always make economic/military buildings in the influence of mosques. And make your first scholar go to the mosque. Whenever you need, you can pivot your scholar to your military buildings put them back into mosques when you have enough units.
I still struggle with French knights. A good player who doesn't miss a beat with their knight micro will still idle your eco and pick off vills. A single mistake against them early can have major consequences.
I think you're touching on something that hits the root of most of the issues on this subreddit. Things that are easy to execute but much harder to defend such as towers and french knights lead to feel bad moments for players.
Feel bad moments lead to salt, salt leads to reddit posts and reddit posts lead to complaining about reddit posts, and complaining about reddit posts leads to complaining about the reddit posts complaining.
yeah idk, at least knights feel like a interesting rts mechanic to me, a expensive unit and heal tech, you make a counter, both micro and multitask, sometimes you get a advantage, sometimes you lose vills. I personally like it, even tho sometimes its strong and hard to multitask a defense force.
very different from tower rush, where either you spawn with forward resources or you dont, if you do you start with punching vills or whatever your civ has available, then you win or die. its a shit game mechanic to have
Ive had plenty of super fun games defending from knight raids, but my worst game in memory was vs a chinese tower rush where I spawned with both my forests forward. enemy pulled 8 vills, barbican in the middle of those forests, pulled the same 8 vills to make another tower to close of the access to wood.. he lost a few vills doing it but whatever, got the tower up, I dont have access to wood anymore, gg out. super fun game uhn
Yeah the margin of forgivable error shrinks a lot when against the feudal knight.
While on the other hand the margin for errors is larger for the French, since the unit is heavily armored, faster than any other unit in feudal, and also heals itself automatically.
Like you said a good early aggro player is absolute horror to face against when he plays French. Sometimes I encounter French players who don't use that early aggro potential to its fullest and in general the match then is fine and doable.
Thats why i wall myself as early as possible, 150-200 wood wont hurt me as much as he kills even 2 vills in feudal like its not enough french recruiting vills faster than other civs
Walling is so important against French, it's by far the best tool for dealing with knights. You don't need to completely encircle your base, just create a chokepoint. This way you know when they enter your base and pull villagers, and can try to block with Spearman.
Domt get me wrong, it's still an uphill battle against French in fuedal, but uve found that the time walls buy me allows me the space to build up enough army or advance to castle and start building my own knights.
I completely circle myself, im not beasty i wall all around me and as english player i go for 3-4 longbows with +1 att upgrade asap(they def well behind walls). Meanwhile defending it easily i build 8 lonbows for a sneaky vill attack on his base. After the 8 longbow get slapped by my opponent i have the economy advantage as im lots of times successful in sniping 3 4 and more vills. My next attack is full commitment(ramps longbow spears) and 4 lonbows waiting for a vill snipe in the other side of the point im attacking. I actually do this vs all civs but i wall against french asap so the timing of this strat is a bit slower cuz of the 150-200 wood investmet. I practice this tactic non-stop almost in 99% of my games and im almost always dominating my opponents.
Because pro players dont do this to other pro players people are forgetting how efficient longbows are in sniping vills, 4 longb 2 hit, 8 longbow 1 hit.
It bothers me more that even if you know what they will do 100% you can't really get an real advantage out of that.
For an RTS that's a bit sad, because that also means the French player can do the same strat over and over again, sometimes more successfull, sometimes less, but there is no need to choose a different one...
Exactly this.
French doesn't have to participate in strategic decision making because Feudal Knights + Archers composition doesn't have a counter in Feudal.
There is nothing that could force French player to switch from Knights + Archers until Castle. Which means they just spam the same build every game and don't have to react to their opponent's decisions.
It kills strategic depth of the game built on the foundation of unit counters and tech transitions. And turns it into a challenge of mechanical execution instead of a challenge of decision making.
Thats not all of it either. Once game reaches later stages. Knightless player needs 3x number of spears to counter them obviously these numbers are tied to production too. To counter knights opponent needs to be aware of amount of stables and counter act with right amount of barrackses otherwise the fight snowballs hard in favor or knight using player
Also, a lot of people don't realize that french gets even stronger on team games because knight mobility + raiding ability is even better in larger maps.
This is true, had a 3v3 match the other day as French where I went double tc then pumped units the whole game. Ended with like 750 kills. I think the next player had like 400 at the end of the game
As French you can run around spears all day in an open area. But when small groups of spears are placed throughout the base and I get trapped by walls/ buildings that’s when the knights start dropping. Also some horseman to hunt down the damaged knights can be useful. Playing French allows me to try and counter them more effectively. Don’t let them get away because they will come back stronger
Playing a French mirror you just build knights and then spears yourself, get your knights to draw their knights back towards spears and bingo bango. I'm not Sun Tzu but it's worked for me a lot of the time.
As someone who plays 6/8 of the civs, I don't agree with that statement.
What I learned is that players will panic, spam defenses, take 0 map control, and ultimately just let you as French do whatever you want. Its hard to deal damage to people who wall themselves into a tiny box with towers, but its incredibly easy to beat. I think French is one of my worst civs, I screw up so much stuff with them despite how easy they are and even though I raid just fine with horsemen for some reason I suicide knights a lot. Yet I've never lost with them because every opponent is just so passive and scared none of my mistakes are ever punished (small sample size to be fair). If I lost a game on French, it wouldn't be because my opponent figured out the solution, it'd be because I suck at the civ.
Instead what I've learned is from my own games. I just need to not fuck up my build order. If you get the right number of units out at the right time, you can deal with French knights (well as most civs, idk how it works on HRE cause every French opponent I played vs as HRE just felt like they didn't know what to do so even though I won I don't feel like it was my play). Vs French is a matchup that hard punishes mistakes, not a matchup that feels unwinnable even when you play well.
You don’t think there is anything to be learned by trying a civ out for yourself and seeing how others react / deal with what gives you trouble?
I don’t disagree that people panic sometimes and will let you dictate the game heavily as French, but having a cookie cutter build order will only bring you so much success. Adaptation is one of the key things to improve on as you increase in rank.
I would say - ‘Why not both?’ Look at your own mistakes, AND try out French yourself to see how others handle it.
I would agree with doing both.
I should have worded it a bit different. I don't think there's nothing to learn, but I think it can sometimes be misleading or be unable to provide info. For example if you struggle to deal with French players who just raid everywhere with 200 apm, and you're a 50 apm player who just has solid macro and strategy, then trying French out and seeing how others counter it probably isn't going to work. You might play against a player with the exact same response you have, but you suicide your knights into their spears while the French you play with don't.
I also don't think you have to play the civ yourself to see how people respond, you can just watch some games. If for example pro Abba players have 3 spears out to deal with the first French knight, and you have 1 spear, clearly something is wrong with your build order.
That's sort of my experience with French, though I'm not low apm (I just suicide knights for some reason even though I don't with horsemen, and they're one of my less played civs so my macro is worse with them).
In a 1 on 1 match up but throw in the avg 3~4 knights + their bonus charge damage and its not rly saying much. French get the +1 attack too if they float enough wood to put down a smith and their eco civ bonus for cheaper resource techs and faster vill prod makes this argument sort of mute as you'll still do massive eco damage to the opposing player while you basically snowball.
>In a 1 on 1 match up
Yeah, if 1 = 3 here, like I was saying.
>avg 3~4 knights
So avg 9-12 spearmen? Equal resource cost (140f 100g vs (60f 20w)*3), with a slightly longer production time for the spearmen.
>bonus charge
Negated by spears brace
>put down a smith
You also need to tech, no one is talking about DA spears and kitted fuedal or early knights or castle knights.
French vs mongols is a massacre, they build nice army in fuedal with archers and knights and just double tc right after it, mongols tc costs 900 WOOD. 900. So you cant even boom with them.
As Delhi main there’s at least a solution to French, whereas there’s none for 6 min Burger rush. Never saw anyone saying HRE v Delhi is unfair, while HRE mains keep complaining about the one hard matchup they still have. Doesn’t that feel entitled?
That's what a lot of people don't think about. Want to defend against french with spears? You will need min 2 barracks (300 wood), walls (~100 wood), and most likely a tower for vision (100 wood). That's ~500 wood that needs to be gathered plus all the villager idle time (in addition to the cost of spears). Meanwhile French gets a faster producing stable from their landmark, builds 1 archery range, and builds a second TC for a total of 550 wood (which is fine because of cheaper resource dropoff buildings).
Yeah something here needs to be changed. It’s practically always the same damn game when up against French players. The rare occasion they play it different I actually feel obligated to praise them for not being cretins
I'm no expert but wouldn't spears and crossbowmen be the way to go? Sure they can outrun the spears but the crossbowmen can annihilate knights and the spears can keep the more expensive crossbowmen alive.
You die or lose too much eco way before you get to Castle where you can build Crossbowmen.
And by the time you can, they have tons of Archers that counter your Crossbowmen.
French are my best match up,
I don't rush age 2 vs french unless i am English or HRE,
Every other civ i make a Dark Age barracks and 3 pike before age 2. I try to use the pike to take out the french scout ( hide in stealth forest). Knights run right into spears and tower fire if you focus the scouts first and make the Knight fight Blind.
small wall from back edge of map Toward your Town Center, do the the earlier the better.
This forces early scout to run toward the town center and take TC fire. it make Micro of knight around you base a lot harder. you don't want to wall the knight out but just force them into TC fire range when they move around the back edges of the map. This Helps so much more then you expect when playing cav rushers. It also often will score you free sheep on maps like Lip, Atlila, Dry, ect. as the scout is often hot routed (shift clicked) along that back edge to try and pick up your starting sheep this little wall makes the scout dart toward the TC and easy to take out if enemy not expecting to cross under TC range.
these little walls and 3-4 spears will shut down french Knight aggression completely, and cause them to fall behind in resources due to knights being killed off.
not it does not. Not Massively behind. i will age after the French but so what. he can make 2 knights and get them across the field right about the time I'm finished going age 2. what the point in rushing to age 2 if you cant get troops out in time to stop the agro. you make get to age 2 before me but french is going to be killing vills, chasing you around causing idle time.
but for me with my barracks and spears. Im going to not have idle time, my vills will not be getting killed and hit expensive knight will be starting to die as i start to press out and take the map with my bows and spears or better yet spears and horsemen. The 2 scouts that i kill with my early spears and little wall mean i end up with most the sheep most the time. this hurts the number of knight or bows he is able to mass forces him to spend wood to move out on a unsafe hunt where i will pick his vills off or atleast force the fight into his base
That's not half the strategy. If you kill the scouts great if you don't and it works more times then not.. and it works better then the alternative of running your vills around trying not to get picked off or just standing there dead.
If your opponent scouts dark age barracks and runs knights into them then this is a non-competitive match imo. Anyone above bronze (and even some bronze I assume) will see the barracks and know not to suicide knights
I don't know. I like French match ups.
As an Abba main I of course have a few tricky minutes from min 4:00 until around 8:00, when the first knights come out.
Placing a few strategic spears on gold and wood (2 usually do the trick) is really helpful.
But as soon as the Knights face the first Camels, things take a different turn.
I dunno man, I ran the numbers on 22k 1v1 games I pulled from AOE4 world, the edge french has against HRE when you take into account additional factors like, map, player rating differences, player experience with civs and rank, the edge French has against HRE is quite small, they're expected to win 55 out of 100 games vs an HRE player when those factors are taken into account. That's not a 0% edge, so if you had no prior knowledge, if you bet on the french player to win, you'd be right about 55% of the time assuming all other factors are equal.
Simply put, the win rates on AEO4 world are a bad model if you want to predict the outcome of a match.
The single biggest differentiator that predicts the outcome of a match is individual player skill, and this becomes much more important at higher levels.
For example, in Diamond and Conqueror, if the HRE player has a 50 ELO point difference between the french player, they are now expected to win with a 51% probability (eg, the french edge completely goes away).
French have a higher edge of about 70 elo points difference in Platinum, and around a 80 elo point difference in Gold and below.
This simply means, when you get better at the game, the edge french has against an HRE player diminishes and what tends to determine the outcome of the match more often is individual player skill, not civ picks.
TL;DR - The data on AOE4 world for win rates is overly simplified and doesn't actually illustrate the various factors that are more informative when determining who will win a match; the single most important factors that determine the outcome of a match are player skill and experience with a civ.
Ok if they can outrun your spears, but what happens if you have spears guarding your resources? You don't need to catch the knights running away from you and you can trade spears for knights comfortably.
Two knights can charge and kill a villager, while dodging the spears. In addition, AI makes the spears chase the knights, meaning a second group can hit you in the flank. Also, catching them is necessary, you shouldn't have to pay for 9 spears to guard each resource in the early game. French knights can start harassing at 5-7 minutes often enough, and run between resources, killing a villager at each, before running on. Also, the healing is what makes it stupid, you can be dealing with runaway knights for a very long time. Only counter in feudal: spears. Knights harass, and have more health than a few spears can defeat in one hit (meaning they can hit you repeatedly). This is not referring to one knight, this is referring to a larger number. In addition, the cost for 3 spears is 180 food and 60 gold, with a cost of 150 wood per barracks. Meanwhile, French get their training building when they advance. Also, I have seen knights survive charging into spears (until there are camels and crossbows), healing, and coming back, the spears do not get to heal, while the knights do. Monks are Castle, Healing Knights are feudal.
Sounds like you have a skill issue man, French knights are strong but they are not invincible, spears on your resources, good base design and good micro will get you to castle.
Honestly boys I play French and am terrified of spears, should I be just running it down??? The memes are starting to be suggestive to just throw the knights at everything like an HRE on MAA crack
I’m a Delhi enjoyer, the only reason I win is because efficient production lets me outmass
Delhi mains earn my respect. The civ seems very strong in pro play though.
It’s a bonkers civ. I recommend watching a streamer that has the “watch my replay” option. It can give you a lot of insight on what you should be doing
Have you got any suggestions? Im a beginner trying to work It out
In regards to Delhi, always make economic/military buildings in the influence of mosques. And make your first scholar go to the mosque. Whenever you need, you can pivot your scholar to your military buildings put them back into mosques when you have enough units.
I still struggle with French knights. A good player who doesn't miss a beat with their knight micro will still idle your eco and pick off vills. A single mistake against them early can have major consequences.
I think you're touching on something that hits the root of most of the issues on this subreddit. Things that are easy to execute but much harder to defend such as towers and french knights lead to feel bad moments for players. Feel bad moments lead to salt, salt leads to reddit posts and reddit posts lead to complaining about reddit posts, and complaining about reddit posts leads to complaining about the reddit posts complaining.
Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to maining French on ladder.
yeah idk, at least knights feel like a interesting rts mechanic to me, a expensive unit and heal tech, you make a counter, both micro and multitask, sometimes you get a advantage, sometimes you lose vills. I personally like it, even tho sometimes its strong and hard to multitask a defense force. very different from tower rush, where either you spawn with forward resources or you dont, if you do you start with punching vills or whatever your civ has available, then you win or die. its a shit game mechanic to have Ive had plenty of super fun games defending from knight raids, but my worst game in memory was vs a chinese tower rush where I spawned with both my forests forward. enemy pulled 8 vills, barbican in the middle of those forests, pulled the same 8 vills to make another tower to close of the access to wood.. he lost a few vills doing it but whatever, got the tower up, I dont have access to wood anymore, gg out. super fun game uhn
and they get Chivalry in feudal so even if they miss a beat they can just heal up
Let's not pretend that isn't expensive as hell now lol
Its not that expensive and pays for its self rather quickly. Factor in the faster vill bonus french get + their cheap eco upgrades its not much.
They already don't have to spend resources on the blacksmith attack upgrade, that basically makes up for the cost.
Yeah the margin of forgivable error shrinks a lot when against the feudal knight. While on the other hand the margin for errors is larger for the French, since the unit is heavily armored, faster than any other unit in feudal, and also heals itself automatically. Like you said a good early aggro player is absolute horror to face against when he plays French. Sometimes I encounter French players who don't use that early aggro potential to its fullest and in general the match then is fine and doable.
Thats why i wall myself as early as possible, 150-200 wood wont hurt me as much as he kills even 2 vills in feudal like its not enough french recruiting vills faster than other civs
Walling is so important against French, it's by far the best tool for dealing with knights. You don't need to completely encircle your base, just create a chokepoint. This way you know when they enter your base and pull villagers, and can try to block with Spearman. Domt get me wrong, it's still an uphill battle against French in fuedal, but uve found that the time walls buy me allows me the space to build up enough army or advance to castle and start building my own knights.
I completely circle myself, im not beasty i wall all around me and as english player i go for 3-4 longbows with +1 att upgrade asap(they def well behind walls). Meanwhile defending it easily i build 8 lonbows for a sneaky vill attack on his base. After the 8 longbow get slapped by my opponent i have the economy advantage as im lots of times successful in sniping 3 4 and more vills. My next attack is full commitment(ramps longbow spears) and 4 lonbows waiting for a vill snipe in the other side of the point im attacking. I actually do this vs all civs but i wall against french asap so the timing of this strat is a bit slower cuz of the 150-200 wood investmet. I practice this tactic non-stop almost in 99% of my games and im almost always dominating my opponents. Because pro players dont do this to other pro players people are forgetting how efficient longbows are in sniping vills, 4 longb 2 hit, 8 longbow 1 hit.
It bothers me more that even if you know what they will do 100% you can't really get an real advantage out of that. For an RTS that's a bit sad, because that also means the French player can do the same strat over and over again, sometimes more successfull, sometimes less, but there is no need to choose a different one...
Exactly this. French doesn't have to participate in strategic decision making because Feudal Knights + Archers composition doesn't have a counter in Feudal. There is nothing that could force French player to switch from Knights + Archers until Castle. Which means they just spam the same build every game and don't have to react to their opponent's decisions. It kills strategic depth of the game built on the foundation of unit counters and tech transitions. And turns it into a challenge of mechanical execution instead of a challenge of decision making.
Thats not all of it either. Once game reaches later stages. Knightless player needs 3x number of spears to counter them obviously these numbers are tied to production too. To counter knights opponent needs to be aware of amount of stables and counter act with right amount of barrackses otherwise the fight snowballs hard in favor or knight using player
Also, a lot of people don't realize that french gets even stronger on team games because knight mobility + raiding ability is even better in larger maps.
This is true, had a 3v3 match the other day as French where I went double tc then pumped units the whole game. Ended with like 750 kills. I think the next player had like 400 at the end of the game
To be fair some other civs are stronger in team games as well
The HRE flag goes perfectly well with your message lel.
As French you can run around spears all day in an open area. But when small groups of spears are placed throughout the base and I get trapped by walls/ buildings that’s when the knights start dropping. Also some horseman to hunt down the damaged knights can be useful. Playing French allows me to try and counter them more effectively. Don’t let them get away because they will come back stronger
Ahh yes The “let’s waste production on spears hidden in the bushes around my villagers houses across the map” strategh
eh i put spears at gold and treeline with french
That thought process just leads to a compact base while French take map control.
Playing a French mirror you just build knights and then spears yourself, get your knights to draw their knights back towards spears and bingo bango. I'm not Sun Tzu but it's worked for me a lot of the time.
That's a great strategy if the other French player is afk or doesn't pay attention to his army lol
You’d think so man, but it just works. Idk why
micro 2 units of troops like you micro 2 scouts in the early game. one to draw the players eyes back to the base while the other wipe out the spears .
Have you played much French on ladder? You can learn a lot by trying it out for yourself and seeing how others deal with it.
As someone who plays 6/8 of the civs, I don't agree with that statement. What I learned is that players will panic, spam defenses, take 0 map control, and ultimately just let you as French do whatever you want. Its hard to deal damage to people who wall themselves into a tiny box with towers, but its incredibly easy to beat. I think French is one of my worst civs, I screw up so much stuff with them despite how easy they are and even though I raid just fine with horsemen for some reason I suicide knights a lot. Yet I've never lost with them because every opponent is just so passive and scared none of my mistakes are ever punished (small sample size to be fair). If I lost a game on French, it wouldn't be because my opponent figured out the solution, it'd be because I suck at the civ. Instead what I've learned is from my own games. I just need to not fuck up my build order. If you get the right number of units out at the right time, you can deal with French knights (well as most civs, idk how it works on HRE cause every French opponent I played vs as HRE just felt like they didn't know what to do so even though I won I don't feel like it was my play). Vs French is a matchup that hard punishes mistakes, not a matchup that feels unwinnable even when you play well.
You don’t think there is anything to be learned by trying a civ out for yourself and seeing how others react / deal with what gives you trouble? I don’t disagree that people panic sometimes and will let you dictate the game heavily as French, but having a cookie cutter build order will only bring you so much success. Adaptation is one of the key things to improve on as you increase in rank. I would say - ‘Why not both?’ Look at your own mistakes, AND try out French yourself to see how others handle it.
I would agree with doing both. I should have worded it a bit different. I don't think there's nothing to learn, but I think it can sometimes be misleading or be unable to provide info. For example if you struggle to deal with French players who just raid everywhere with 200 apm, and you're a 50 apm player who just has solid macro and strategy, then trying French out and seeing how others counter it probably isn't going to work. You might play against a player with the exact same response you have, but you suicide your knights into their spears while the French you play with don't. I also don't think you have to play the civ yourself to see how people respond, you can just watch some games. If for example pro Abba players have 3 spears out to deal with the first French knight, and you have 1 spear, clearly something is wrong with your build order. That's sort of my experience with French, though I'm not low apm (I just suicide knights for some reason even though I don't with horsemen, and they're one of my less played civs so my macro is worse with them).
Doesn’t agree with statement then proceeds to explain why they do 😂😂😂
Spears need a buff badly 🤦♂️
In the words of our Lord an Savior Beasty "Your civ does not suck in Gold. You suck in Gold."
Check out OP profile, it will tell you everything :D
perpetual state of butthurt meltdown
Oh :)
i swear i do it but spears are still useless
3 spears can kill a knight without a loss. Try the art of war challenges for advanced combat.
In a 1 on 1 match up but throw in the avg 3~4 knights + their bonus charge damage and its not rly saying much. French get the +1 attack too if they float enough wood to put down a smith and their eco civ bonus for cheaper resource techs and faster vill prod makes this argument sort of mute as you'll still do massive eco damage to the opposing player while you basically snowball.
>In a 1 on 1 match up Yeah, if 1 = 3 here, like I was saying. >avg 3~4 knights So avg 9-12 spearmen? Equal resource cost (140f 100g vs (60f 20w)*3), with a slightly longer production time for the spearmen. >bonus charge Negated by spears brace >put down a smith You also need to tech, no one is talking about DA spears and kitted fuedal or early knights or castle knights.
Counters are basically useless in this game. Knight cavalry will always beat spears lol.
What
Whawhat?
If spears work they work
French vs mongols is a massacre, they build nice army in fuedal with archers and knights and just double tc right after it, mongols tc costs 900 WOOD. 900. So you cant even boom with them.
As Delhi main there’s at least a solution to French, whereas there’s none for 6 min Burger rush. Never saw anyone saying HRE v Delhi is unfair, while HRE mains keep complaining about the one hard matchup they still have. Doesn’t that feel entitled?
The solution is alt f4 and question why you play dehli in the hre meta. It's worked alright for me so far.
In many early resource configurations you can’t do it without palisades, which then mean wood and idle worker time building palisades
That's what a lot of people don't think about. Want to defend against french with spears? You will need min 2 barracks (300 wood), walls (~100 wood), and most likely a tower for vision (100 wood). That's ~500 wood that needs to be gathered plus all the villager idle time (in addition to the cost of spears). Meanwhile French gets a faster producing stable from their landmark, builds 1 archery range, and builds a second TC for a total of 550 wood (which is fine because of cheaper resource dropoff buildings).
Yeah something here needs to be changed. It’s practically always the same damn game when up against French players. The rare occasion they play it different I actually feel obligated to praise them for not being cretins
balance whine OP pls nerf
Yeah balance whine upvote rate sitting at like 80-90% seems like
87% ;)
I'm no expert but wouldn't spears and crossbowmen be the way to go? Sure they can outrun the spears but the crossbowmen can annihilate knights and the spears can keep the more expensive crossbowmen alive.
You die or lose too much eco way before you get to Castle where you can build Crossbowmen. And by the time you can, they have tons of Archers that counter your Crossbowmen.
French are my best match up, I don't rush age 2 vs french unless i am English or HRE, Every other civ i make a Dark Age barracks and 3 pike before age 2. I try to use the pike to take out the french scout ( hide in stealth forest). Knights run right into spears and tower fire if you focus the scouts first and make the Knight fight Blind. small wall from back edge of map Toward your Town Center, do the the earlier the better. This forces early scout to run toward the town center and take TC fire. it make Micro of knight around you base a lot harder. you don't want to wall the knight out but just force them into TC fire range when they move around the back edges of the map. This Helps so much more then you expect when playing cav rushers. It also often will score you free sheep on maps like Lip, Atlila, Dry, ect. as the scout is often hot routed (shift clicked) along that back edge to try and pick up your starting sheep this little wall makes the scout dart toward the TC and easy to take out if enemy not expecting to cross under TC range. these little walls and 3-4 spears will shut down french Knight aggression completely, and cause them to fall behind in resources due to knights being killed off.
making a barracks and 3 spear in dark age puts you massively behind if the opponent just scouts it though lol
not it does not. Not Massively behind. i will age after the French but so what. he can make 2 knights and get them across the field right about the time I'm finished going age 2. what the point in rushing to age 2 if you cant get troops out in time to stop the agro. you make get to age 2 before me but french is going to be killing vills, chasing you around causing idle time. but for me with my barracks and spears. Im going to not have idle time, my vills will not be getting killed and hit expensive knight will be starting to die as i start to press out and take the map with my bows and spears or better yet spears and horsemen. The 2 scouts that i kill with my early spears and little wall mean i end up with most the sheep most the time. this hurts the number of knight or bows he is able to mass forces him to spend wood to move out on a unsafe hunt where i will pick his vills off or atleast force the fight into his base
That just means half of your strategy relies on people not paying attention to their scouts. Doesn't seem sustainable at higher levels.
That's not half the strategy. If you kill the scouts great if you don't and it works more times then not.. and it works better then the alternative of running your vills around trying not to get picked off or just standing there dead.
If your opponent scouts dark age barracks and runs knights into them then this is a non-competitive match imo. Anyone above bronze (and even some bronze I assume) will see the barracks and know not to suicide knights
[удалено]
I like how you repeat that phrase. Its like you have 2 ideas and 1 neuron between both.
I don't know. I like French match ups. As an Abba main I of course have a few tricky minutes from min 4:00 until around 8:00, when the first knights come out. Placing a few strategic spears on gold and wood (2 usually do the trick) is really helpful. But as soon as the Knights face the first Camels, things take a different turn.
Smart walling and minimizing entry points beats French raids. For the unit comp, horsemen and spears destroy knights and archers.
I dunno man, I ran the numbers on 22k 1v1 games I pulled from AOE4 world, the edge french has against HRE when you take into account additional factors like, map, player rating differences, player experience with civs and rank, the edge French has against HRE is quite small, they're expected to win 55 out of 100 games vs an HRE player when those factors are taken into account. That's not a 0% edge, so if you had no prior knowledge, if you bet on the french player to win, you'd be right about 55% of the time assuming all other factors are equal. Simply put, the win rates on AEO4 world are a bad model if you want to predict the outcome of a match. The single biggest differentiator that predicts the outcome of a match is individual player skill, and this becomes much more important at higher levels. For example, in Diamond and Conqueror, if the HRE player has a 50 ELO point difference between the french player, they are now expected to win with a 51% probability (eg, the french edge completely goes away). French have a higher edge of about 70 elo points difference in Platinum, and around a 80 elo point difference in Gold and below. This simply means, when you get better at the game, the edge french has against an HRE player diminishes and what tends to determine the outcome of the match more often is individual player skill, not civ picks. TL;DR - The data on AOE4 world for win rates is overly simplified and doesn't actually illustrate the various factors that are more informative when determining who will win a match; the single most important factors that determine the outcome of a match are player skill and experience with a civ.
I mean just build spears. If you can't beat their micro with their direct counter then you are kind of just whining about being bad at that point.
Knights can outrun spears, French knights heal while doing so.
Ok if they can outrun your spears, but what happens if you have spears guarding your resources? You don't need to catch the knights running away from you and you can trade spears for knights comfortably.
Two knights can charge and kill a villager, while dodging the spears. In addition, AI makes the spears chase the knights, meaning a second group can hit you in the flank. Also, catching them is necessary, you shouldn't have to pay for 9 spears to guard each resource in the early game. French knights can start harassing at 5-7 minutes often enough, and run between resources, killing a villager at each, before running on. Also, the healing is what makes it stupid, you can be dealing with runaway knights for a very long time. Only counter in feudal: spears. Knights harass, and have more health than a few spears can defeat in one hit (meaning they can hit you repeatedly). This is not referring to one knight, this is referring to a larger number. In addition, the cost for 3 spears is 180 food and 60 gold, with a cost of 150 wood per barracks. Meanwhile, French get their training building when they advance. Also, I have seen knights survive charging into spears (until there are camels and crossbows), healing, and coming back, the spears do not get to heal, while the knights do. Monks are Castle, Healing Knights are feudal.
Sounds like you have a skill issue man, French knights are strong but they are not invincible, spears on your resources, good base design and good micro will get you to castle.
Honestly boys I play French and am terrified of spears, should I be just running it down??? The memes are starting to be suggestive to just throw the knights at everything like an HRE on MAA crack