ESOCommunity

Welcome to MU of the week. Every week a thread will be opened where we go over a certain match, set on a certain map. Hopefully the discussion will be in depth and top players will share their insight. Replays are definitely welcome so that people may support what they have to say. To make things even more interesting and engaging, we'll set the match-up on a certain map.

This week's featured match-up is India versus Russia, the map is Florida.



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You can vote on next week's thread here: https://goo.gl/forms/aJaEGXaIIxYi19kO2

You can find a list of ESOC maps here: maps.php

Here the match up table: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/ ... sp=sharing

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Welcome! Credit for this idea goes to @lemmings121 as well as @musketeer925 for building upon it. They are the masterminds behind this pretty nice idea!

Nice idea

India poops on russia, especially with livestock

Kaiserklein wrote:India poops on russia, especially with livestock

I always thought that the match up was quite even. Russia can kind of contain india and either age or just go for a nice timing. It's on india to break the contain or defend the timing enough to get out urumi or something, I don't know.

I feel like it's hard to age in that match up as India. I'm so clueless at it

kami_ryu wrote: Hopefully the discussion will be in depth

Kaiserklein wrote:India poops on russia, especially with livestock

Kaiserklein wrote:India poops on russia, especially with livestock

So what's Russia's best shot here? Stuck in this situation, what do they do?

Kaiserklein wrote:India poops on russia, especially with livestock

cmom, lets try to have a more constructive talk here instead of "a shits on b"

kami_ryu wrote:I always thought that the match up was quite even. Russia can kind of contain india and either age or just go for a nice timing. It's on india to break the contain or defend the timing enough to get out urumi or something, I don't know.

I feel like it's hard to age in that match up as India. I'm so clueless at it

nice, I mostly agree.

Imo no one can age up without opening a very dangerous window, game should be decided in late colonial.
From the india side, I think you should do defensive agra, and the build should be something like big trickle > 300e > 600g. You want to be greedy but you cant be too greedy. 300e can be 3huss+mm if russia is beeing agressive, or 4vill>3huss if russia is just containing. Free market on the start is good but too many market ups in the start will make india age up after 5mim and put them in a dangerous position vs a 5-4-13 rush. Ideally india tries to survive the first wave, and push out with zamb gurka.

From russia side, I would make a forward bh, and go 5cossac 700w 4cossac, trying to contain india while going stagecoach.

India > Russia in general. If Russia can somehow bring the midgame to fortress battle they are ok. This map has livestock and doesn't really allow stagecoach (can only get 2/4 of TPs) so I think India gets more advantaged than usual. So I think India is just better off. Also India is 2nd top civ on EP regardless.
Russia shouldn't rush. India can always adapt and hold. Russia should rather try to age up so that they get access to CA and 2 falcs (and other ups). Also should try to make as less musks as possible. Basically Russia should try to bank on faster age up and the fact that coss can work as anticav vs sowar for a while.

Hopeless mu for Russia, like most of them anyway....

Ok it was mean of me, I just thought it would be funny to pull a diarouga for once


Well let's say that I don't see what russia can actually do to pressure india early on. The 2 eles, the agra fort, the mm, the 2 sepoys age up... It's just a lot of stuff to deal with. 5 coss alone will never be able to do any damage in the indian base. So you basically need to be a bit all in with russia, otherwise rushing won't do anything. But well, being all in just sucks, I don't think it can work against a good indian player with a good micro. India can probably even just ship 4 sowars and make some sepoys, and crush the standard 5 coss + 10 strel rush. Or they can just play greedy and let russia die to tc and agra fire, while microing vils to gather without dying under tc. I think goongoon russia vs mitoe india, in the last finals, shows how russian all in doesn't work in this match up.

So if they can't really rush, they could try to simply contain. But india is just much better in that scenario tbh. They can hit a timing before russia starts to really shine. And russia will be in trouble with no real answer to gurkhas. They will be outranged, the only 2 solutions being a huge mass of strelets, which is very hard to get before mid-late colonial, and a decent mass of cossacks, which is actually not that hard to get, but will sadly not work because of how good zambs are against cav, especially since russia doesn't have a long range unit to snipe them.
This window also happens to be when india has a better eco than russia and outmasses, and even gets extra units "for free" from the consulate. So india will probably be able to timing push and break the contain, and then push russia off hunts and win.
Russia can try to get a stagecoach while containing, but if india identifies that, there is probably an early timing where they can just break the fb, then destroy the tps and grab them for themselves, and obviously win.

What is left now, I guess age 3 play? Well, I've played some ger and fre against the new india, and I can say it's actually not so easy to pressure india in fortress, even with these civs. Russia being way slower than ger/fre in early fortress, I doubt they can really push india. And then again, if they can't push india in early fort, it will be that same situation where india will have more eco and probably better units (a weakness being the 2 falcs, though), as well as better and more units shipments, so india will probably just deny mapcontrol and win. Russia would win in late fortress, where they would start to outboom and get these op upgrades in (boyards, cav combat for all cav, strel combat), but I'm afraid they can't ever reach that point.

standard 10 strel 5 coss rush to mind game them into age 2 play into semi ff i guess into early 2 falcs but ofc thats relying on a mistake from india

Hazza54321 wrote:standard 10 strel 5 coss rush to mind game them into age 2 play into semi ff i guess into early 2 falcs but ofc thats relying on a mistake from india

But... 5 4 13 2 :(

On Florida this is a particularly bad mu for russia as india can even go water. Also the market early helps india more so than russia since india always has more vils than russia early and getting the 50 50 50 market upgrade early in age 1 is just insane for india. You play this mu from russias side and you find that early in the game its impossible to hurt inida because of the elephants, the agra fort, the thread of otto mm etc and that india gets quite a big mass of units (either sepoy sower or gurka zam) at like 7-9ish minutes thats almost impossible for russia to deal with.

I wonder about Mitoe vs goongoon in the finals. I just watched it and it was fairly close, Mitoe had a bunch of villagers in the south part of the map, if goongoon had found those the game would have been his, no?

Livestock, free market, tp in base, good hunts. Trees and mines may be a small issue. Imo water might actually be in russias favor. Definitely should be a win for india.

I think the MU is quite even. Russia can do a lot with 10strels/5cossacks imo, and then go for a TP boom, and either play it from colonial with 2 blockhouses or age.
In my opinion, india should try to age as their late colonial isn't that great as people think, while mahouts and urumis rape Russia.

Cool idea btw @kami_ryu

you have to look at the map though. I agree that on other maps this mu can be quite close, maybe even. But on this map, you can't really tp boom. The other civ always has 1 safe tp, and agra or blockhouse can easily cover the other tp. i agree that india should age.

Can't wait for Brit vs Dutch.

My opinion on India vs. Russia on Florida, EP 4.1:

From indian point of view: You dont have to do anything else than sitting in your base behind agra fort and wait till your opponent arrives, doing nothing except for managing your vills, producing units and watching your army stand around. You leave your base only after 15+ minutes. If russia goes to age III, you go to age III yourself while staying in your base, waiting.

From russian point of view: India ages early now (to age II), which makes early russian attacks ineffective. Starvin india is not possible as they dont use food for vill production. In late colonial, india has a strong unit composition and many upgrade cards vs anything russia can do with cossacks. So if you (russia) want to stay colonial, you either go for a relatively early (8:00-10:00?) timing push with cossacks (boyars) or directly for musk+strel (no cossacks) late colonial. If you go semi-ff i dont know if you can win.

richard wrote:My opinion on India vs. Russia on Florida, EP 4.1:

From indian point of view: You dont have to do anything else than sitting in your base behind agra fort and wait till your opponent arrives, doing nothing except for managing your vills, producing units and watching your army stand around. You leave your base only after 15+ minutes. If russia goes to age III, you go to age III yourself while staying in your base, waiting.

From russian point of view: India ages early now (to age II), which makes early russian attacks ineffective. Starvin india is not possible as they dont use food for vill production. In late colonial, india has a strong unit composition and many upgrade cards vs anything russia can do with cossacks. So if you (russia) want to stay colonial, you either go for a relatively early (8:00-10:00?) timing push with cossacks (boyars) or directly for musk+strel (no cossacks) late colonial. If you go semi-ff i dont know if you can win.

found the 100% russia player.

lemmings121 wrote:

richard wrote:My opinion on India vs. Russia on Florida, EP 4.1:

From indian point of view: You dont have to do anything else than sitting in your base behind agra fort and wait till your opponent arrives, doing nothing except for managing your vills, producing units and watching your army stand around. You leave your base only after 15+ minutes. If russia goes to age III, you go to age III yourself while staying in your base, waiting.

From russian point of view: India ages early now (to age II), which makes early russian attacks ineffective. Starvin india is not possible as they dont use food for vill production. In late colonial, india has a strong unit composition and many upgrade cards vs anything russia can do with cossacks. So if you (russia) want to stay colonial, you either go for a relatively early (8:00-10:00?) timing push with cossacks (boyars) or directly for musk+strel (no cossacks) late colonial. If you go semi-ff i dont know if you can win.

found the 100% russia player.

found a 100% russia player. There are other ones ...

Yeah just need to go qs to find a ton of brainless 5 4 13 russia players

How very fking dare you

richard wrote:My opinion on India vs. Russia on Florida, EP 4.1:

From indian point of view: You dont have to do anything else than sitting in your base behind agra fort and wait till your opponent arrives, doing nothing except for managing your vills, producing units and watching your army stand around. You leave your base only after 15+ minutes. If russia goes to age III, you go to age III yourself while staying in your base, waiting.


From russian point of view: India ages early now (to age II), which makes early russian attacks ineffective. Starvin india is not possible as they dont use food for vill production. In late colonial, india has a strong unit composition and many upgrade cards vs anything russia can do with cossacks. So if you (russia) want to stay colonial, you either go for a relatively early (8:00-10:00?) timing push with cossacks (boyars) or directly for musk+strel (no cossacks) late colonial. If you go semi-ff i dont know if you can win.

"India ages early now (to age II)" Really? Why would they? Unless they 10/10 (in which case you're actually ahead on eco), they age late and you can definitely damage them with a 5/4 coss build.

"Starvin india is not possible as they dont use food for vill production" Yea they don't need a lot of food, they do need some gold though, and they have to contest the map, else the Russian player can just take the TP line on some maps and be ahead in eco.
"In late colonial, india has a strong unit composition and many upgrade cards" Yep, but so does Russia. With boyards, strelets become unstoppable since India has no real anti strel in age 2 (sowars are shit, they get killed by musks/coss/2bh fire before they can even attack the strels), and eventhough zams with upgrades are great, cossacks are still scary.
The only issue in late colonial is that most of the time, if you don't manage to do serious damages in early, you'll get outboomed ; but frankly, cost efficiently, Russian units are probably as good if not better than Indian's, and your 2 bh will help you a lot.

"So if you (russia) want to stay colonial, you either go for a relatively early (8:00-10:00?) timing push with cossacks (boyars) or directly for musk+strel (no cossacks) late colonial."
Do not go for early pushes, you'll end up wasting all your units vs agra+mm, and you have to make cossacks in late colonial because it forces the India player to make zams, who are trash against infantry.

Teach us clementine