First off,
The deck
The BO I've been doing is very straighforward and something I found almost immediately after picking up the civ.
Simply, drop 2 houses and chop for a third, ship 2 llama and age on 12 vill with 2 WH (eating one fat llama). There is no idle time unless you screw up herding or don't eat the llama fast enough.
In transition chop for 3 houses (though tbh market + HD + house might be better). Ship 600w upon aging.
Switch all vills to food (eating the other fat llama).
Use the 600w to drop 3 more houses (you have 9 now), and train a double batch of units from your warhuts.
- For an earlier timing, ship units after 600w.
- For a later timing, swap some vills to wood and ship 4 fat llamas.
- For a balanced approach simply ship 600w again and drop houses/make units as desired.
Whenever you plan to make your timing, eat your skinny llama and push for BB + unit shipment + as many units as possible from 2 WH. I strongly suggest to only go bow/pike. The coyote equivalents are utter garbage.
What works
- This might be the best bow/pike rush civ in the game, at least unit-wise. The units are very strong and your warchief is a beast with his special attack.
- Your units cost mostly food while still having good stats, meaning you beat out other food/wood units on cost efficiency and can drain opponents of their mines while yours are untouched. I beat a higher ranked Otto who was using Jan/Abus simply by trading archers for his abus til he ran out of mines, while I had the whole map of food to eat.
- 2 builder travois == 2 WH is an incredibly strong ageup. You get an extremely strong FB that you can pop double batches out of.
- The American Allies card is somewhat janky and can let you do a weird nat all-in on the right maps. Basically skip 2 llamas and ship this card instead (making 2 houses age 1 instead of 3), use one of your builder travois for a nat post, and ship native treaties for a very weird push that's a bit stronger than the normal build, and whose strength is dependent on the nats you get. If you're on a map with good cav nats it might be worth it.
What doesn't
- You have no cav unit. This means if you lose the bow mass advantage against other bow civs, you probably lose the game. Also means you can't snare easily, so you end up fighting battles of attrition.
- Your eco is quite weak and you have to supplement with crates/llamas. Not the end of the world, but it will put you behind vs civs like Brits who have a good age 2 boom.
- Fortress is the no-go zone, for you or for your opponent. Don't take the game to fortress. Trading ageups with pretty much any civ is bad for you. I have clicked up to fortress maybe twice in ~15 inca games today, and I'm happy with that.
Notes:
-> Chicha brewing is pretty weak. It's equivalent to 5 vills with HD at ~11 houses, which is 2 from max. I would only recommend sending it after you've sent 600w twice to add houses in.
-> The TC card is fine, but I think it gives too much tempo away. If your opponent gets up to fortress and gets 2 falcs, you are 100% boned, so you need to keep up the pressure and gathering coin for the shipment plus dumping food into a second TC is probably the best way to lose quick. It is good once you've forced your opponent to commit to colonial and you think he can't age, at that point you can use it to solidify your advantage.
-> Don't underestimate the age 2 unit speed card, it gives you a solid kiting advantage with your bows (which already start with 4.25 speed) and lets your pikes reposition more quickly and potentially even catch some cheeky snares.
-> Just never train the coyote units, you'll be better off.
-> Priestesses are a meme, and tbh the firepit doesn't seem nearly as useful with Incas as with Azzy. This is I think the biggest difference between the two civs. The XP is nice but not necessary, and you have to commit either a shipment for the priestesses or vill time to train them, neither of which sounds better than just having more bows out.
