AOE3 Forums

Bart331:

I said u should harass, harassing isnt taking down tc;s , kill vills, destroy houses/military buildings, make hunting impossible. also u harass early colonial and should hit fortress not much later then him. Simply retreat when he hits fortress :)

And yes, harassing a FF is good. I never said otherwise. But from the perspective of the person doing the Semi-FF.. If you Semi-FF you usually create just enough military to defend yourself on your way to fortress and it's usually better to augment your Age3 shipments with your leftover Age2 military than run off losing them. Sure, you CAN harass, but odds are the person FFing is still going to make it to Fort unless he got screwed on hunts/gold mines and as soon as those Fort shipments arrive (Around 8:30-9 minutes), you're still in colonial, have a very small military (maybe 15-20 units?) and you're JUST getting ready to start collecting resources for Fortress.

Hence: A FF's "peak" in strength comes at the same time as a Semi-FF's "vulnerable" period.

I dont know who you have been playing but i call a rush when the attack comes asap in colonial.

Yes.. which supports my point.

Before 8 minutes = between 4:30-8. That covers about a 3.5 minute period of time. Anything happening after 8-9 minutes is not a "rush" anymore, as you have effectively allowed someone to build a military of their own, get rax down, tower up, or hit fortress.

 

no the vulnerable point is when the semi-ff hits fortress (around 9-10 minute mark), he doesnt have any fortress units yet and is facing a large colonial army.

In my experience a Semi-FF hits Fort between 10-12 minutes.. But whatever. Point is, the vulnerable period is when military production stops and collecting resources for Age3 begins.

Why?

Because as soon as military production stops you're allowing your opponent (Assuming he's doing an extended colonial) to continue creating military to surpass your own amount of military. This "vulnerable" period continues until you hit Age3 and get your first batch of units (and/or shipment).

Between 5-8 minutes or so, you're building military to defend against a rush. Rush doesn't come, so you swap your villies over to food/gold, and send whatever shipment necessary to help facilitate your quick age (maybe 700 gold, or whatever). Your opponent now has more military than you and you have just spent your shipment on forting, rather than defending..

So, between 8 minutes, and the time you age and get your first shipment (somewhere between 10-12 minutes depending), you're vulnerable. And again, this isn't set in stone.. Not all civs age at the same time nor do all civs send the same shipments. Spain has more shipments and they get a Tower in Age2 so this doesn't apply to them quite as much, etc.

 Thats why i said it were general rules of thumb, so they wont be valid in all cases einstein

 And.. I said that same thing? I never disagreed with you on this point. We're debating the details of what counters what and why.. Obviously theres some grey area.

お忍び:

Straight and naked FF's are obsolete. Semi's is what works these days. Do a French mirror, one naked FF vs a 5 hussar semi. ;)

I wouldn't say they're completely obsolete. Some civs still Naked FF. Spain, Dutch, sometimes German, sometimes Otto. If you run into one of those players who likes to (or decides to) Naked FF and you're semi-FFing and you're NOT anticipating his FF, it can be devastating.

But, as a general rule of thumb I agree. At higher levels of play, Semi-FF and "Extended colonial" strats are generally the way to go against *most* civs.

for the record, a semi-FF effectively counters an FF in almost all cases

it is, though :/

EtherImp:

If you are in a position to play aggressive early, yes. That's not always the case.

if you have units and your opponent doesn't how are you not in the position to play aggressively....? 

And yes, harassing a FF is good. I never said otherwise. But from the perspective of the person doing the Semi-FF.. If you Semi-FF you usually create just enough military to defend yourself on your way to fortress and it's usually better to augment your Age3 shipments with your leftover Age2 military than run off losing them. Sure, you CAN harass, but odds are the person FFing is still going to make it to Fort unless he got screwed on hunts/gold mines and as soon as those Fort shipments arrive (Around 8:30-9 minutes), you're still in colonial, have a very small military (maybe 15-20 units?) and you're JUST getting ready to start collecting resources for Fortress.

Hence: A FF's "peak" in strength comes at the same time as a Semi-FF's "vulnerable" period.

Once again: the idea behind a semi ff isnt to defend yourself to fortress (i dont call that a semi ff, would be more like a turtle or something), the idea is to attack and harass. And i have said 10 times the target isnt to destroy tc's or make it impossible for him to reach fortress, the target is to ruin his eco. You advance to fortress just after him (9-10 minutes) with superior eco. And you outspam him and type gg.

Yes.. which supports my point.

Before 8 minutes = between 4:30-8. That covers about a 3.5 minute period of time. Anything happening after 8-9 minutes is not a "rush" anymore, as you have effectively allowed someone to build a military of their own, get rax down, tower up, or hit fortress.

 yeah

In my experience a Semi-FF hits Fort between 10-12 minutes.. But whatever. Point is, the vulnerable period is when military production stops and collecting resources for Age3 begins.

Why?

Because as soon as military production stops you're allowing your opponent (Assuming he's doing an extended colonial) to continue creating military to surpass your own amount of military. This "vulnerable" period continues until you hit Age3 and get your first batch of units (and/or shipment).

Between 5-8 minutes or so, you're building military to defend against a rush. Rush doesn't come, so you swap your villies over to food/gold, and send whatever shipment necessary to help facilitate your quick age (maybe 700 gold, or whatever). Your opponent now has more military than you and you have just spent your shipment on forting, rather than defending..

So, between 8 minutes, and the time you age and get your first shipment (somewhere between 10-12 minutes depending), you're vulnerable. And again, this isn't set in stone.. Not all civs age at the same time nor do all civs send the same shipments. Spain has more shipments and they get a Tower in Age2 so this doesn't apply to them quite as much, etc.

Thats why you dont wanna age in 10-12 minutes but you want to age earlier :)  The risk that he comes in with his whole army and wtfpwns you when you reach fortress is bigger when it gets later.

 And.. I said that same thing? I never disagreed with you on this point. We're debating the details of what counters what and why.. Obviously theres some grey area.

ofc

SunilD93:

EtherImp:

If you are in a position to play aggressive early, yes. That's not always the case.

if you have units and your opponent doesn't how are you not in the position to play aggressively....? 

Just a few examples...

Germany vs Spain

 Spain will tear up 20 xbows (or a mix w/ pikes) with Rods, Dogs, Tower, and TC fire.

Germany vs Ottoman

Most of his Eco is coming from Trade Posts.. Xbows get owned by Spahi, Pikes get owned by Jans and don't do exceptional vs Spahi. Even if you pick apart his eco some he'll still be able to reach Age3 and most likely send Spahi. It's better to just hit Age3 yourself and get Black Riders. If you delay by semi-FFing your Age2 units are almost useless and you will not get your Black Riders in time to protect your villies.

Germany vs Dutch

Dutch have banks and they can protect the rest of their eco fairly easily and still hit fort, at which point you're wtfpwned. Again.. better to just match their FF, hit their eco and counter their units that way.

Of course, against Ottoman it's almost always better to Semi-FF because generally they do not naked FF but Semi-FF themselves, and you're going to want a few Xbows to protect against early Jan harassment.

Edit: 1 more point I'd like to make...

Germany is one of the few civs where they can hit Fortress at 8 minutes and have a pretty good Eco in doing so. Better than Spains for sure, and depending on how many TP's the Otto player has, probably better than his. Almost definitely better than Dutch FF eco.

That said, I mostly play 1 civ and I've never played at the higher levels (above Major/Lt Col), so I can't speak to how other civs counter each other or how it works out above Lt Col.

germans have pretty much the worst semi-FF of all civs because their second colonial shipment arrives very late. they are an exception to the general rule of semi-FF beating FF. germans are in all cases better off going colonial, only in very few cases is it viable to semi-FF, and for the record it's almost never viable to straight FF.

EtherImp:

SunilD93:

EtherImp:

If you are in a position to play aggressive early, yes. That's not always the case.

if you have units and your opponent doesn't how are you not in the position to play aggressively....? 

 

Just a few examples...

 

Germany vs Spain

 Spain will tear up 20 xbows (or a mix w/ pikes) with Rods, Dogs, Tower, and TC fire.

Germany vs Ottoman

Most of his Eco is coming from Trade Posts.. Xbows get owned by Spahi, Pikes get owned by Jans and don't do exceptional vs Spahi. Even if you pick apart his eco some he'll still be able to reach Age3 and most likely send Spahi. It's better to just hit Age3 yourself and get Black Riders. If you delay by semi-FFing your Age2 units are almost useless and you will not get your Black Riders in time to protect your villies.

Germany vs Dutch

Dutch have banks and they can protect the rest of their eco fairly easily and still hit fort, at which point you're wtfpwned. Again.. better to just match their FF, hit their eco and counter their units that way.

Of course, against Ottoman it's almost always better to Semi-FF because generally they do not naked FF but Semi-FF themselves, and you're going to want a few Xbows to protect against early Jan harassment.

 

Edit: 1 more point I'd like to make...

Germany is one of the few civs where they can hit Fortress at 8 minutes and have a pretty good Eco in doing so. Better than Spains for sure, and depending on how many TP's the Otto player has, probably better than his. Almost definitely better than Dutch FF eco.

That said, I mostly play 1 civ and I've never played at the higher levels (above Major/Lt Col), so I can't speak to how other civs counter each other or how it works out above Lt Col.

well no wonder you were saying semi-ff reaches fortress at 12 mins... Who semi-ff's with 20 xbows??? Dutch eco>germany's eco obviously.  

8 xbows from shipment and 10+ from rax.. That's not a lot, really.

And, I agree about Dutches Eco as the game progresses.. But early age2/3, 2sw+3sw = better early on, if both civs FF.

gs:

germans have pretty much the worst semi-FF of all civs because their second colonial shipment arrives very late. they are an exception to the general rule of semi-FF beating FF. germans are in all cases better off going colonial, only in very few cases is it viable to semi-FF, and for the record it's almost never viable to straight FF.

How are they better at staying colonial? German colonial sucks. :\

No muskets. Dopps are not cost/pop effective (or ranged). That leaves you with Uhlans, which are weak when unupgraded, pikes, and Xbows. . And we've all had the conversations about Xbows. They are better now than they once were but they're still not "awesome" at countering HI.

Granted.. I've seen Xbow spam dominate people. But if someone else Semi-FF's or FF's, a man can't survive on Xbows alone. And, if you want to spam Xbows/Pikes, you don't really have the eco to spam Uhlans. Of course, there's always the uhlans from shipments.

Semi-FF is not bad, I do not think. Although it may be slower... German Age3 shipments are incredible.

EtherImp:

gs:

germans have pretty much the worst semi-FF of all civs because their second colonial shipment arrives very late. they are an exception to the general rule of semi-FF beating FF. germans are in all cases better off going colonial, only in very few cases is it viable to semi-FF, and for the record it's almost never viable to straight FF.

 

How are they better at staying colonial? German colonial sucks. :\

No muskets. Dopps are not cost/pop effective (or ranged). That leaves you with Uhlans, which are weak when unupgraded, pikes, and Xbows. . And we've all had the conversations about Xbows. They are better now than they once were but they're still not "awesome" at countering HI.

Granted.. I've seen Xbow spam dominate people. But if someone else Semi-FF's or FF's, a man can't survive on Xbows alone. And, if you want to spam Xbows/Pikes, you don't really have the eco to spam Uhlans. Of course, there's always the uhlans from shipments.

Semi-FF is not bad, I do not think. Although it may be slower... German Age3 shipments are incredible.

german colonial is awesome because of their big eco and strong shipments. they age to 2 with 17 vills and get a 6 vill shipment in age2