Introducing the "Play all Civs" challenge

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Re: Introducing the "Play all Civs" challenge

Post by CR_Joops »

CR_Joops wrote:I think there's a lot of micro required with Germany. If you z-move your uhlans melt to musk, goon, other cav (basically everything) while over on the right flank 12 war wagons all shoot at the same 3HP strelet.

I've been too used to z-moving with Russia and Dutch :(
Take it all back. These boiz are sick when you learn all you need to do is do the 400w age up, mine coin, age up quick then spam those age III ships. :mrgreen:
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Re: Introducing the "Play all Civs" challenge

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Post by Squamiger »

Mr_Bramboy wrote:
Squamiger wrote:
Mr_Bramboy wrote:@Squamiger Have you heard of our lord and savior the 14v Dutch build?
nope, i don't know any builds. i am like a simple child
Get yourself a coffee and climb the ranks to top 100 within a week
oh yes, this rules. i already feel like im playing dutch better than any of my attempts to play ports or germans. heres some recs if anyone would care to give me a few pointers. yes they are both ego recs where i've won, but thats only bc i havent lost yet doing this strat
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Re: Introducing the "Play all Civs" challenge

Post by Mr_Bramboy »

@Squamiger I was going to take a look, but for some reason I cannot open your recs? Other recs work fine for me.

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Re: Introducing the "Play all Civs" challenge

Post by Squamiger »

@Mr_Bramboy uuuh hmm I don't know, they play fine for me.
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Re: Introducing the "Play all Civs" challenge

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Post by Thrar »

Progress Update - USA

Week 3 with the USA is completed. I played around 25 ranked games trying out a few different approaches since there doesn't seem to be much of an established meta. The openings I liked most were 12/10 with French immigrants (early aggresssion or rush defense) and 13/20 with Chinese immigrants and capitalism, getting 3-4 TP stagecoach right after aging up in economic matchups. As the game went on, I mostly used state militia plus regulars or huss depending on the opponent's composition. I probably didn't use gatling guns as much as I should have, in fact I'm not sure if I ever built an artillery foundry.
By the end I felt like I understood the units reasonably well, but still wasn't able to come up with a consistent gameplan against some civs and didn't want to spend my limited time on one-trick builds like marines. I enjoyed playing the US, even though my lack of strategy understanding meant I wasn't able to get my rating, still tanked from the Aztec week, back up.

Next up will be the Indians.
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Re: Introducing the "Play all Civs" challenge

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Post by Thrar »

Progress Update - Indians

Week 4 with the Indians is completed. Having some more time than in the past weeks, I played nearly 40 ranked games gaining 100 rating points in the process. I never ran into a serious water matchup so it was all either defensive or offensive Agra into either lots of units, age 2 eco, or semi-FF.
Between some failed offensive Agra play here and my misadventures with the Aztecs in week 2, I've concluded that I need a lot more practice in exerting early pressure. I've lost way too many sepoys on ineffective pushes. On the other hand, I feel this week has given me a better understanding on how to defend with moderate eco play (foreign logging, Ottoman villagers, market) while not losing vils or being idled too much. In drawn-out age 2 games it was also a good exercise in how to balance sufficient military with making eco in the back and eventually overtaking the opponent that way.

Overall, India was fun, a very flexible civ allowing for versatile strategies and unit compositions in different matchups.

Next up will be the Haudenosaunee.
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Re: Introducing the "Play all Civs" challenge

Post by Squamiger »

Dutch went well for me. I need to work on cannon micro but otherwise the 14vill age up was pretty solid and I won a lot. I think after this challenge is done I will try to rotate Dutch as one of my mains, along with Haud and India.

next up: Brits. They seem easy to me bc I'm just gonna manor boom and spam musk huss but I feel like there's a lot more nuance to the civ that I don't understand yet, like when to age to 3, when to go for VC, when to mix in lbows and dragoons, and how to do the world famous tower FI @callentournies
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Re: Introducing the "Play all Civs" challenge

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Post by callentournies »

Thanks for asking mate. I am about to unveil my secrets.

So the world famous tower FI has recently underwent a makeover. The old Legacy version, much less successful than the New Aoe3 BO, was VC, 3v, advanced buildings?, 700w, 5v, church card, elmeti. I would build ~5 manors in age 1 before macroing to age, and build towers in transition (if needed). Because I sent 5v, I'd max out at ~47 ish vills, but this is more vills than you need, and this version is more liable to being pressured (weaker vills, no CM).

The New Version™ is VC, 3v, pioneers, CM, church card, elmeti. It benefits from the new TC age up politician (synergizes with CM, provides extra xp, and gives you a 2 TC eco follow up, and another place to age if opp all-ins on your first TC). I now build 20 manors in age 1 (and towers). The real trick to this build is scouting and deciding how many towers you need to build and when (and where, placement is key). You age to III immediately after hitting II, and age to IV immediately after hitting III. Ideal IV click up time vs no aggression is 9:40 w/42+ vills.
Details
This build kind of struggles on stagecoach maps. Try to mix in a TP in age 1 if you ascertain opp is going for TPs. I've adapted this build for water, by incorporating schooners and advanced dock and building age 1 outposts all over the coast. I make up for the xp deficit by getting mercantilism with water eco. I've done a water version of the build vs no aggression and no opp water deck, and the IV timings were identical but I just had 80 vills instead of 42.
Follow up
If I were a petal
And plucked, or moth, plucked
From flowers or pollen froth
To wither on a young child’s
Display. Fetch
Me a ribbon, they, all dead
Things scream.
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Re: Introducing the "Play all Civs" challenge

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Post by callentournies »

tl;dr: boneng is bae
If I were a petal
And plucked, or moth, plucked
From flowers or pollen froth
To wither on a young child’s
Display. Fetch
Me a ribbon, they, all dead
Things scream.
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Re: Introducing the "Play all Civs" challenge

Post by iNcog »

callentournies wrote:Thanks for asking mate. I am about to unveil my secrets.

So the world famous tower FI has recently underwent a makeover. The old Legacy version, much less successful than the New Aoe3 BO, was VC, 3v, advanced buildings?, 700w? 5v, church card, elmeti. I would build ~5 manors in age 1 before macroing to age, and build towers in transition (if needed). Because I sent 5v, I'd max out at ~47 ish vills, but this is more vills than you need, and this version is more liable to being pressured (weaker vills, no CM).

The New Version™ is VC, 3v, pioneers, CM, church card, elmeti. It benefits from the new TC age up politician (synergizes with CM, provides extra xp, and gives you a 2 TC eco follow up, and another place to age if opp all-ins on your first TC). I now build 20 manors in age 1 (and towers). The real trick to this build is scouting and deciding how many towers you need to build and when (and where, placement is key). You age to III immediately after hitting II, and age to IV immediately after hitting III. Ideal IV click up time vs no aggression is 9:40 w/42+ vills.
Details
This build kind of struggles on stagecoach maps. Try to mix in a TP in age 1 if you ascertain opp is going for TPs. I've adapted this build for water, by incorporating schooners and advanced dock and building age 1 outposts all over the coast. I make up for the xp deficit by getting mercantilism with water eco. I've done a water version of the build vs no aggression and no opp water deck, and the IV timings were identical but I just had 80 vills instead of 42.
Follow up
I've actually specifically gone to your youtube to watch you pull these off. tons of fun
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/incog_aoe
Garja wrote: ↑
20 Mar 2020, 21:46
I just hope DE is not going to implement all of the EP changes. Right now it is a big clusterfuck.
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Post by Thrar »

Progress Update - Haudenosaunee

Week 5 with the Haudenosaunee is completed. I played 30-40 games and ended up with a roughly even win rate. What really stood out to me is how incredibly flexible the civ is, with viable options ranging from fast rush, to full age 2, timing push with age up behind, semi-FF, and straight FF. Coupled with the 3 different openings - dock, TP, or farm - and the available unit compositions that opened a huge array of possibilities.

One week was far too short to really explore all of these in different matchups, so what I ended up doing most of the time was FF with 5 vils and 600c (faster) or 5 vils and astute trading (slower but better long term), or an age 2 push with big button, 2-3 unit shipments, and 2-3 batches of tomahawks/aennas into an age up behind. Once in age 3, as I've often seen mentioned, the civ played very similar to the French as a skirm/goon civ, with slightly better units to make up for the lack of artillery support. I kept reminding myself to build a community plaza and use attack ceremony or bring back the fallen war chief, but somehow I kept forgetting about it in the game.
As for lessons learned, I've been more successful this past week in applying pressure for an incremental advantage, taking good trades, map control, and aging up behind. In the India and especially Aztec weeks I often found myself committing too many resources without achieving enough in return. Still lots of room to improve, but perhaps I'm gradually figuring out how to strike a better balance.

Thanks @callentournies for writing up the tower FI. I ran into a Brit player once who tried to do it (badly) against me. Thanks to knowing what to expect I was able to contain him fairly well, restrict his resources, get stagecoach behind, and outmassed him by a fair bit once he tried to make his age 4 stand.

Next up will be the Swedes.
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Re: Introducing the "Play all Civs" challenge

Post by aligator92 »

what is astute trading?
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Re: Introducing the "Play all Civs" challenge

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The native silversmith equivalent, 20% gather rate and 20% gather yield. In a matchup where I'm expecting extended age 3 fighting I found it quite handy since Haudenosaunee go through mines rather quickly.
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Re: Introducing the "Play all Civs" challenge

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Progress Update - Swedes

Week 6 with the Swedes is completed. I played a bit over 30 games and ended up with a roughly even win rate, not counting the 2-3 games where the opponent resigned in the first 10 seconds.
For the second time in this series, I'm glad that the week is over, but for very different reasons than the first time. Back then, with Aztecs, I felt overwhelmed, too many things to take care of and too much to learn about a civ that was just so different. With Swedes, it was the opposite: Playing felt like a chore because it was just so dull. Build torps, make caroleans. Make some more torps. Occasionally a stable for hussars, and some artillery later. Barely anything to micro except the occasional charge and melee.
After playing Haudenosaunee last week, a civ that can seemingly do everything, a civ that only does one thing felt incredibly boring. I'm aware that there are a handful of non-meta builds but one week is too short to explore them properly, so just like with the other civs I prefer to stick with the meta.

The main things I learned were coin mine distributions on different maps, and just how important it is to challenge the mines when playing against Sweden. If the opponent just boomed or just pushed, I could usually handle it, but if they did those things while also having a batch of pikes going around sieging torps, that's when it became tough.

Next up will be the Lakota.
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Re: Introducing the "Play all Civs" challenge

Post by dansil92 »

@Thrar I want you to know that I look forward to your weekly updates, they have quickly become a highlight of my sunday evenings
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Re: Introducing the "Play all Civs" challenge

Post by Kanoo »

Mine too!
thebritish wrote: ↑
19 Jan 2016, 09:58
So, you are saying that if i watch H20's rec, i can beat anyone below H20's level because i know his BO?
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Re: Introducing the "Play all Civs" challenge

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Thank you, glad to hear that! Maybe we can do the same thing again when AoE4 comes out and have more people join in!
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Re: Introducing the "Play all Civs" challenge

Post by Squamiger »

Thrar wrote:Progress Update - Haudenosaunee

Week 5 with the Haudenosaunee is completed. I played 30-40 games and ended up with a roughly even win rate. What really stood out to me is how incredibly flexible the civ is, with viable options ranging from fast rush, to full age 2, timing push with age up behind, semi-FF, and straight FF. Coupled with the 3 different openings - dock, TP, or farm - and the available unit compositions that opened a huge array of possibilities.

One week was far too short to really explore all of these in different matchups, so what I ended up doing most of the time was FF with 5 vils and 600c (faster) or 5 vils and astute trading (slower but better long term), or an age 2 push with big button, 2-3 unit shipments, and 2-3 batches of tomahawks/aennas into an age up behind. Once in age 3, as I've often seen mentioned, the civ played very similar to the French as a skirm/goon civ, with slightly better units to make up for the lack of artillery support. I kept reminding myself to build a community plaza and use attack ceremony or bring back the fallen war chief, but somehow I kept forgetting about it in the game.
As for lessons learned, I've been more successful this past week in applying pressure for an incremental advantage, taking good trades, map control, and aging up behind. In the India and especially Aztec weeks I often found myself committing too many resources without achieving enough in return. Still lots of room to improve, but perhaps I'm gradually figuring out how to strike a better balance.

Thanks @callentournies for writing up the tower FI. I ran into a Brit player once who tried to do it (badly) against me. Thanks to knowing what to expect I was able to contain him fairly well, restrict his resources, get stagecoach behind, and outmassed him by a fair bit once he tried to make his age 4 stand.

Next up will be the Swedes.
I posted in the strategy wall about using astute trading with Hauds a long time ago and no one replied to the thread. Glad to see someone else has experimented with it! I was using it for a while, but I've found that there's a better option if you are in a matchup where you don't feel pressured and you want to go greedy with eco: the agrarian ways FF. Drop a farm with your starting travois, ship 3vill-5vill-800res crates, build a warhut with your second travois, build a stable with the wood from the crates, and then build a plantation with your age 3 travois. Then send agrarian ways as your first card in fortress, and max out the food and gold gathering upgrades at the farm and plantation. Works even better if its a high livestock map since you can fatten on the farm. Astute trading is great but I think this is just a superior greedy eco build, for a land map where you can't dock start. Maybe on a water map a greedy play would be to dock start and then go astute trading.

Also you have to learn the 500c cherokee / mantlet age 2 timing! Hauds are such a fun civ.
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Re: Introducing the "Play all Civs" challenge

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Ok, for my progress update, I played Brits and just tried to get the tower FI down. Had some successes where the opponent played passively, had some failures where the opponents put on age 2 pressure. Overall I just don't find Brits very interesting though. They are a strong civ obviously and they are good for teaching yourself to never lose villagers, but I don't see myself ever maining them.

I kinda fell off this since I just got tired of losing and I wanted to experiment with Aztecs, and after that I went back to my mains of Haud and India. But I think I'm going to try to get back into things.

This week will be the Ottomans! I'm getting to the end of my rope though. I just can't bear the thought of having to spend a week playing the last civs on my list, Inca/Swede/Japan/USA, that sounds like such a chore tbh.
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Re: Introducing the "Play all Civs" challenge

Post by Kanoo »

@Thrar & @Squamiger , once you've completed the challenge, would be interested to know the order of civs that were:
1) easy to pick up
2) had most fun with
Thanks!
thebritish wrote: ↑
19 Jan 2016, 09:58
So, you are saying that if i watch H20's rec, i can beat anyone below H20's level because i know his BO?
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Post by Squamiger »

Kanoo wrote:@Thrar & @Squamiger , once you've completed the challenge, would be interested to know the order of civs that were:
1) easy to pick up
2) had most fun with
Thanks!
I can try, but I feel like these things are so dependent on my total AoE3 playing history, rather than these last few weeks. For me, the most fun civs to play are my mains and semi-mains-- Haud, India, China, Russia. The easiest to pick up, well of the civs I've tried so far in the last few weeks, I would say Dutch has been the one where I felt like I started playing at the level of my main civs the fastest, but that's probably because of Harrison's great 14v Dutch guide. I think the main thing I am going to take away from this experience is to add Dutch to my normal civ rotation. Germany definitely felt like the most complex and difficult to get good with.
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Re: Introducing the "Play all Civs" challenge

Post by Squamiger »

Update, I feel like I'm about done with Ottomans now. I mostly just messed around with tower FF, The Build with 4 TCs, and the Spahi FF (ask dansil). Spahis are super fun, they feel like skull knights but with more speed. The one thing I did not get to was water booming, which feels like it would be very strong with Ottos. Overall, the civ is interesting but definitely feels like its a bit weak.

Next up: Inca!
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Post by Thrar »

Progress Update - Lakota

Week 7 with the Lakota is completed. I played a total of 40 games with an even win rate, the most games I've played in any week of this challenge so far.

Lakota was the most fun civ for me so far. They were relatively easy to get into, have a diverse set of viable units, and their mobility means they can often play their own game and force the opponent to react.
In most games I aimed to get to age 3 for a wakina/bow rider or wakina/axe rider combination, staying in age 2 only long enough to hold off whatever early pressure I might be facing. I did not significantly explore extended age 2 play in the available time. Most wins came down to either an overwhelming age 3 timing or catching the opponent out of position. Most losses came from either strong early age 2 pressure (especially from Aztec, Ottoman, Russia) or from me falling back into old thought patterns and engaging their stronger army head on instead of using mobility to go around it and hitting them where it hurts.

Back in the Haudenosaunee week I felt like I was losing more vils to early pressure than I should, and the same happened here, contributing to my poor performance against early attacks. I think I'm having a bit of a problem with the native civ graphics here: Everything is kind of brown. Buildings (especially tribal marketplaces) are brown, most hunts are brown, some maps have a brown-ish color scheme (Saguenay autumn being the worst for me), infantry units are brown, and villagers are brown. I wouldn't mind the building color scheme that much, but the problem for me is that the units and especially villagers wear very subdued colors so they don't stand out nearly as much as the bright blue or red uniforms other civs wear.
Under pressure, I found myself dragboxing the entire front of my base just to make sure I didn't miss any vils that needed to be moved out of harm's way. Then I'd have to deselect any military in the dragboxed group so I could garrison the vils. This felt really inefficient and frustrating, and I often lost several vils needlessly because I just didn't see them.
I've also had some difficulty telling villagers and cetan bows apart when standing still, even their wind-up animations look somewhat similar I think. I'm sure this will get better with more native civ practice, but I think a mod making the units pop out more would be really helpful. Does anybody know if such a graphics mod would be compatible with ranked play? For those who play native civs more regularly, how did you overcome this issue?

The main lesson I started to learn was how to use mobility, to flow around the enemy and make them react instead of trying to attack their army head on. Even at the end I still wasn't doing that enough.
I didn't use the community plaza enough and teepees barely at all, those are definitely things to improve if I play Lakota again in the future.

Next up will be the Germans.
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Re: Introducing the "Play all Civs" challenge

Post by Squamiger »

i hate inca everything about this civ feels terrible i give up
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Re: Introducing the "Play all Civs" challenge

Post by Squamiger »

garbage units, too slow with everything, no clear objectives besides make all the kanchas and just hold on till super late game somehow

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