_H2O wrote:Darwin_ wrote:Yeah I think that the 15f change really only affected team play. Personally I think that the build orders against certain civs have been refined, namely against france and brits, and have made previously imbalanced matchups far more even. Stuff like the 5-4-700w didnt seem to common before the tourney, but has really taken off as we have started to notice just how powerful strelets and cossacks can be together. Strelets do very well against heavy infantry, and cossacks really keep the raiding pressure up, and force them to make more heavy infantry, which is countered by the strelets. If they start cav, russia can just go musk-cossack and keep track of raids and put the pressure on.
As you said, I agree that we have started to mix stables earlier and abuse the strength of boyared (and even cavalry scouted) cossacks. Also, the strength of the timing push has become more widely known. Raiding, instead of just going under their TC seems to be the style, and then you now push in with 9 cossack, remaining musk, as well as 10 strelets and trying to get some sort of advantage, and then mixing the stable.
Agree, would love some discussion on how to timing push and when to go in. I think this also has gotten a lot sharper. Seems like Russia can just jam it in your base at several timings one after another.
Yeah I was playing rus vs. brits, and it felt like I could just keep pushing. Yes, my opponent admitted outright that he was not playing his best, but I thought he was actually playing quite well. I first pushed with my 5 musk+5 cossack, trying to kill the first batch of units, idle their vills and force mm. I did, so I just pulled back, waited for another 5 musk and 10 strel, as well as the 4 cossack, and made a pretty gnarly 7-7:30 timing push (9 musk, 10 strel and 8 cossack). That didnt kill him outright, but I killed a few vills and most of his army. I was also able to reinforce quite quickly after that, easily getting 10 musk and 5+ more cossack out by 7:30. Once 700w came, I mixed a stable and went pretty coss heavy. It was on Baja california, which is a fairly even map for the civs, as the rush distance is long for russia, but the hunts are on the lower end. This meant that I could raid heavily, and whenever I got into a fight, I could just have like 3-4 cossack on his vills.
This I think is a product of efficient units, as well as the strength of the blockhouse. It was very hard for him to push out and destroy my bh, because I had a great mass, and the ranged attack can actually deal quite well with cavalry. I think that it can kill a hussar in 8 shots, which is not insignificant. The efficiency of my units meant that I could take fights that other civs shouldnt and have a even trade, but be able to pull some of my cavalry away and raid. I think that EP russia has really turned into the starve-out king, being able to trade efficiently and raid well.
The first 3 fights I took were essentially even in terms of efficiency, though I did kill 8 or so vills from raiding and such. As I noticed in the graphs, the push that I made at around 11 minutes (I went 5-4-700w-700c-boyars) was amazing in terms of efficiency. My opponent commented after the game that my cossacks just wouldnt die, which was kinda true. I had around 15 cossack at that time, and my strelet mass made sure that he essentially had nothing to counter them besides his own hussars.
