AOE3 Forums

Dont play vs. french in 1v1 ... obvious solution

 ports muskets in mele mode to beat cav. organ guns for skirms. with culvs and dragoons, dragoons for cav and cannons, and culvs for cannons

What one person above said... Its really all about winning the first battle and keeping pressure.

predatorfreak:

eliotyuhin99:

I find lancers take too long to take down artileries without missionaries.

An under-used unit with Spain is Hussar, which is absolutely excellent for exactly what you're talking about. Lancer are anti-infantry cavalry, Hussar are general heavy cav. They have differing uses, due to differing base damage.

Hussars are light cavalry, not heavy cavalry. although they are good against voltigeurs, they can be countered easily with gendarmes or dragoons.

If your opponent is using Gendarme/voltiguer combo, use skirmishers with dragoons in front to block his gendarmes. Meanwhile, you flank his voltigeurs with lancers. If you keep dragoons on the field, he wont be sending in too many gendarmes.

I wouldn't use Spain though, there are a lot better civs than Spain to counter France

Drüd:

Hussars are light cavalry, not heavy cavalry. although they are good against voltigeurs, they can be countered easily with gendarmes or dragoons.

Hussar are heavy cavalry (they're marked as such) in AOE, but in reality they were light cavalry.

Genderme actually loose to fully-upgraded Hussar, because Genderme have ranged resist, rather than melee and a maxed-out Hussar with 3 shipments to improve it will deal 70something melee damage. However, it is dumb to use Hussar versus Genderme.

Everyone here already knows Hussar are countered by Dragoons, the point of my post though, was to point out that Hussar are excellent for flanking and killing cannons.

wow ive seen alot of awful advice here.  number one, the only 2 civs that can beat france when both players are of equal skill are japan(in team games) or another france. if this is treaty this is based upon the andes map in quick france pwns at.  They just outpop and outeco you at every turn if theyr are actually a good player who doesnt just gerndarme lame, and once they get those native post, and they will its game over. france on france is your best hope but if its a team game japan can take them if your a good japan player(dont daimo lame youll get rocked); using japan you can match his pop and then outfight him, being a noob who uses france, he will get frustrated and push hard on you and then his score will drop extremely fast, yours will too but if you can boom well enough with japan you should actually out eco him late game if your eco is yumi based that is. and something else i saw that disturbed me is whoever said if your getting your army split your doing something wrong, the truth is that if you dont split your army your going to get your ass kicked against any good players

SIXmachina6:

Dont play vs. french in 1v1 ... obvious solution

Thats not really a solution

Hatamotos with diamyo and shogun will destroy his cuirassiers as fast as any other unit in the game, although you will want to take the cuirrasiers out quickly, retreat your hatamotos for another battle unless you are raiding, and use naginata against the skirks, or cannons

Savory \Beef:

wow ive seen alot of awful advice here.  number one, the only 2 civs that can beat france when both players are of equal skill are japan(in team games) or another france. if this is treaty this is based upon the andes map in quick france pwns at.  They just outpop and outeco you at every turn if theyr are actually a good player who doesnt just gerndarme lame, and once they get those native post, and they will its game over. france on france is your best hope but if its a team game japan can take them if your a good japan player(dont daimo lame youll get rocked); using japan you can match his pop and then outfight him, being a noob who uses france, he will get frustrated and push hard on you and then his score will drop extremely fast, yours will too but if you can boom well enough with japan you should actually out eco him late game if your eco is yumi based that is. and something else i saw that disturbed me is whoever said if your getting your army split your doing something wrong, the truth is that if you dont split your army your going to get your ass kicked against any good players

Lol, u are very wrong. Japan shouldnt have a single chance vs france.

Why? because the main unit japan will use is ashi, and the main unit france uses is the skirm. I dont know why everybody says take out the gends, coz france dont need gendarmes to win a fight. They have very strong artillery with gribauld + allmost the best skirm. Gendarmes should only be used to flank from time to time and defend a hand cav rush (naginata) vs skirm. 

Besides this, france eco has no trouble whatsoever keeping up full mili pop with their eco, for japan this is different, their eco dont last long.

O and for splitting up army, when u are spain u should not split up army coz thats plain foolish. At this moment no army can kill spains army head on.  

Tomo_Tanker:

Use Naginata's vs Skirm and use your Ashigarus vs his Cuirassiers. Use Attack Move with Naginatas en if Cuirassiers come, put Ashigarus in Melee Mode, so they do much more damage vs the Curs.

but u gotta consider they got u countered too. see ur ashigs can take the cururs and ur naginatas can take the skirms. but their skirms can take ur ashigs and their gendarmes cud pwn naginatas

Sneak around the back and spam Yamabushi from the shogun whilst pressing up front with yabusames and yumis. When mixed these can counter most, although naginatas are also appreciated here. Once the field battle is won, get a diamyo around the back and start spamming samurai. Try not to make as much artillery as usual, Japan get very good siege infantry which can also deal with cuirassiers.