TP-Samwise BO

[Mitoe]

I’m sorry rouga but you don’t know what you’re talking about this time. Most of the things you’re mentioning as ways to punish the build don’t work at all, which leads me to believe that this is mostly speculation on your part, whereas for me it’s experience.

I’ve played these situations out many times in the mirror. There’s no musk/huss timing vs 4v 700c if you go 4v 700w 700c unless you fb, and even if you fb the window is very very small. You simply finish your barracks at the same time the other player starts aging; there’s no way you can get musks into his base before he is up. Now 700w 4v 700c can have a small timing vs it, but again this one is also small unless you fb, though if you do fb it’s definitely a lot scarier with this build.

You definitely can get a good 10 goon timing vs 4v 700w 700c. You get into his base before he ages or just after he does, can trade your units off for a lot of damage, kill vills, idle, etc. You can safely send 1000w behind this, and no you can’t 2 tax off 700w and actually get 10 skirms at a time without falling behind in some other regard like goon count because you have to chop for more houses, and are being idled right after you age on top of it. There’s no counter skirm/goon timing like you seem to think there is.

Again this is coming from experience having played out the builds on both sides. You can definitely get advantages off of 4v 700w 700c, particularly on maps where his TP is more exposed, but because it’s so hard to scout if he’s also going 700w 2nd or if he’s aging with 700c until he’s already up, you often get nothing. You can get a small timing with 8-10 Huss before he has goons, but you often won’t have 10 Huss and even if you do it’s very hard to punish 5 Huss + MM in base with goons coming behind it in a few seconds.


Edit:

Let's look at the builds in more detail:

4v - 4v
700w - 700c

Okay, so these shipments arrive at the same time. One player can make some extra units and drop a 2nd military building (or a 3rd, if you're insane), and the other starts aging. Assuming both players gather them at the same time, the barracks will be placed before the 700c player starts aging, but finish after he starts or as he starts. Going 700c second you sometimes can't age immediately once it's gathered because of differences in herding, etc. assuming you've trained 5 huss, at least. So this time is a little bit variable. It takes 30 seconds to train a batch of musketeers, and about 35-40 seconds to move across the map with those muskets on a map like Hudson Bay, for example (I checked). The opposing player will likely be in Fortress before you even get into their base, and you'll only have 8-10 huss and 5 muskets to try to punish 5 huss + minutemen with the threat of dragoons popping behind it. Sounds not-so-great. Of course this is also assuming you somehow have perfect information and pushed instantly with your units instead of sitting around for a few seconds in uncertainty. Not to mention most people won't even train musketeers from here, but just go for more huss.

Is it possible to do damage? Certainly. Much damage? Not really. You might force some idle time, maybe force only 3-4 goons out of the stable instead of 5--resulting in a total mass of 8-9 dragoons. Maybe you'll kill a house if he's an absolute muppet with no sense of how to place buildings or defend them. You'll have a hard time escaping after the dragoons pop though. All of this potential damge is very unlikely to occur, however.

700c - 5 dragoons

These shipments will arrive either at the same time, or 700c will arrive ~20 seconds faster, depending upon how much xp they have, if it was a TP start, etc. So worst case scenario, when the 10 dragoons pop he'll be almost halfway aged already--perhaps a not quite this much if he waited to finish a villager before starting the age up or something. It takes you 20-30 seconds to move across the map with cavalry (again, I checked), so you'll get into his base as he's aging or just after he ages, against potentially only hussar, maybe a handful of muskets, you might have some trouble doing damage if he trained additional musketeers in transition, and if he calls minutemen, but overall the trade should be good for you if you micro well, and you can escape easily with dragoons vs pretty much anything once it's time to leave.

8 skirmishers - 1000w

Again, these shipments should arrive at pretty much the same time. At most you can have 13 skirmishers & 5 goons here, there's just no way you can possible have 18 & 5, especially since you most likely idled defending the 10 goon timing. Want to move out across the map to try to punish 1000w? Sounds very very risky, considering that it could also just be 3 cuir + a 3-5 batch from the stable, into instant GG. But again, if you somehow have perfect information you can push, but it will take you 35-40 seconds to cross the map again. The raxes will be up, possibly another shipment on the way, another batch of dragoons, and your army has no siege and very little damage against CDB. Doesn't sound like you can do much here.

Overall you will have a slight skirmisher advantage for a minute or two, but you're unlikely to be able to abuse it because of reinforcement times and defender's advantage. Really what most likely happens is that both players are roughly equal, but the player who did 700c is either ahead by ~300 wood (or more if their timing went really well and you didn't push instantly on yours), but might be down a TP depending on the map and how aware the opponent was. There are definitely imbalances between the two builds that could possibly swing it the other way in certain situations, but again not by very much. Overall 4v 700c is just a very solid option vs the standard 4v 700w 700c, unless there's a forward base.

[[Armag] diarouga]

That's from experience too. I used to punish these 4v\700c semi FF.
Also the game I posted shows you can punish this semi ff.

[Mitoe]

@[Armag] diarouga I just edited it. I really really doubt you're speaking from experience here. Haven't watched the video you sent yet, but I'll skim it now.

Edit: Watched it. Looks like Ryan just played bad. Hussars out of position and didn't move his vills fast enough. Realistically if his hussars are in a defensive position Garja can't really go for the punish without risking a reinforcing batch of hussars popping and/or minutemen. It's a greater risk for Garja than it is for H2O, IMO. On top of that H2O went for a 2nd TC off of 1000w which I think we can both agree is just not worth it at all. He even trained an additional hussar in transition instead of saving those resources for minutemen, which would have been much more effective at dissuading that pressure. Plus Garja just went for the same build, but I would argue it's worse. He should have saved his shipment for 1000w instead of sending 700w, especially with the advantage he got off of that timing, but realistically I don't think the timing should've been nearly as effective anyway.

[princeofkabul]

4cdb 700c unit card is totally viable in some matchups, especially good build in RE patch. meta has changed to more passive play style so people do think these kinds of builds are weird or bad when infact they were the meta at one point.
you weren't even playing back then diarouga.
but fre meta was something like this from my experience and knowledge.
2010: 700w rax/stable/traps no tp , 4cdb 700c /musk hus
2013: 4cdb stable traps no tp 700w 2 rax 700c musk/hus
2015: 4cdb stable traps with tp 700c age, unit shipment skirm/goon
current meta: 4cdb stable or rax traps tp, 700w 700c/600c or unit card "prolonged colonial into age" with 2 rax/ stable
or 4cdb tp traps 700w rax/stable no units naked ff skirm/goon

Garja can correct errors if there's any. The builds are just as viable as their previous version, the playstyles and mindset what is good and what is bad has changed.

[Kaiserklein]

It's all rock-paper-scissor. For example vils/700g (fast semi) > vils/700w/700g/600g or units (colo timing before aging) > vils/700w/700g (slow semi) > vils/700g. Some timings counter some others.
I love going 3sw 700w 700g 3 dops in ger mirror for that reason, you just auto win (right click tc) if opponent goes for bot 3sw 700w 700g cav semi. But if he actually decides to go 700g second card you can't go for that timing anymore, it will be too slow, you have to age.
The reason why people mostly do vils/700w/700g is because it's just the most versatile. It gives you a decent mass, good infrastructures, a rather quick age up, easy to adapt into colonial play if needed. It doesn't mean it's always the superior build though.

[[Armag] diarouga]

4cdb 700c unit card is totally viable in some matchups, especially good build in RE patch. meta has changed to more passive play style so people do think these kinds of builds are weird or bad when infact they were the meta at one point.
you weren't even playing back then diarouga.
but fre meta was something like this from my experience and knowledge.
2010: 700w rax/stable/traps no tp , 4cdb 700c /musk hus
2013: 4cdb stable traps no tp 700w 2 rax 700c musk/hus
2015: 4cdb stable traps with tp 700c age, unit shipment skirm/goon
current meta: 4cdb stable or rax traps tp, 700w 700c/600c or unit card "prolonged colonial into age" with 2 rax/ stable
or 4cdb tp traps 700w rax/stable no units naked ff skirm/goon

Garja can correct errors if there's any. The builds are just as viable as their previous version, the playstyles and mindset what is good and what is bad has changed.

4v/700c is viable in some MUs, not in French mirror.

[[Armag] diarouga]

It's all rock-paper-scissor. For example vils/700g (fast semi) > vils/700w/700g/600g or units (colo timing before aging) > vils/700w/700g (slow semi) > vils/700g. Some timings counter some others.
I love going 3sw 700w 700g 3 dops in ger mirror for that reason, you just auto win (right click tc) if opponent goes for bot 3sw 700w 700g cav semi. But if he actually decides to go 700g second card you can't go for that timing anymore, it will be too slow, you have to age.
The reason why people mostly do vils/700w/700g is because it's just the most versatile. It gives you a decent mass, good infrastructures, a rather quick age up, easy to adapt into colonial play if needed. It doesn't mean it's always the superior build though.

Yea vills/700w/700c>vills/700c, that's my point.

[Garja]

4v 700g is viable especially in French mirror.
And no 4v 700w is not better with a TP start. With a TP start you can skip colo entirely and it's very hard to punish the age up with 700w first, let alone with 4v 700w.

[Jaeger]

It's all rock-paper-scissor. For example vils/700g (fast semi) > vils/700w/700g/600g or units (colo timing before aging) > vils/700w/700g (slow semi) > vils/700g. Some timings counter some others.
I love going 3sw 700w 700g 3 dops in ger mirror for that reason, you just auto win (right click tc) if opponent goes for bot 3sw 700w 700g cav semi. But if he actually decides to go 700g second card you can't go for that timing anymore, it will be too slow, you have to age.
The reason why people mostly do vils/700w/700g is because it's just the most versatile. It gives you a decent mass, good infrastructures, a rather quick age up, easy to adapt into colonial play if needed. It doesn't mean it's always the superior build though.

By right click TC do you actually mean you can siege TC down, or just idle a lot?

[Garja]

Most likely just do damage and age up.

[tedere12]

4v 700g is viable especially in French mirror.
And no 4v 700w is not better with a TP start. With a TP start you can skip colo entirely and it's very hard to punish the age up with 700w first, let alone with 4v 700w.

Why do you think 4v 700c is viable in mirrors? I assume you would go for a defensive semi and try to counterpush while the opponent is still aging. I don't think that ever works out, at least it hasn't worked for me.

[Thrar]

This discussion is really interesting, would you be open to do a showmatch on this?

Seems there are two contrasting opinions about whether 4v 700c is beaten by 4v 700w 700c in the mirror or not. Maybe something like a BO5 matching up these two strategies on a few different maps can lead to some insight on the matter?

[Garja]

4v 700g is viable especially in French mirror.
And no 4v 700w is not better with a TP start. With a TP start you can skip colo entirely and it's very hard to punish the age up with 700w first, let alone with 4v 700w.

Why do you think 4v 700c is viable in mirrors? I assume you would go for a defensive semi and try to counterpush while the opponent is still aging. I don't think that ever works out, at least it hasn't worked for me.

You don't need to counterpush you just get tempo which means for example you can get away with 1k wood.

[Kaiserklein]

It's all rock-paper-scissor. For example vils/700g (fast semi) > vils/700w/700g/600g or units (colo timing before aging) > vils/700w/700g (slow semi) > vils/700g. Some timings counter some others.
I love going 3sw 700w 700g 3 dops in ger mirror for that reason, you just auto win (right click tc) if opponent goes for bot 3sw 700w 700g cav semi. But if he actually decides to go 700g second card you can't go for that timing anymore, it will be too slow, you have to age.
The reason why people mostly do vils/700w/700g is because it's just the most versatile. It gives you a decent mass, good infrastructures, a rather quick age up, easy to adapt into colonial play if needed. It doesn't mean it's always the superior build though.

By right click TC do you actually mean you can siege TC down, or just idle a lot?

I mean right click tc. You have 13 dops + 20 uhlans at 8:30, thats more than 1000 siege, so you'll get tc down in less than 20 sec. If he has only uhlans he's just dead. If he calls mm you kill them with uhlans, he cant buy time with pure uhlans vs dop + uhlan, he can't pop anything from his tc cause you're surrounding it. Only scary shipment is 5 dops but you might even get tc down before that.
I'm really talking about a counter to the bot cav semi here though, if he adds dops at some point, right clicking tc just won't work (though you can still do damage by sieging other buildings).

[SoldieR]

Ya this is like the most productive discussion on these forums in years

[deleted_user]

Ya this is like the most productive discussion on these forums in years

and also the most boring

[Sargsyan]

Ya this is like the most productive discussion on these forums in years

and also the most boring

Lets make it fun... *cough*

[deleted_user]

My pasta got 4k upvotes cross-posted to a sub full of people who feel good not getting satire. The world is a very strange place.

[Sargsyan]

It indeed is