Chinese build order: Song Dynasty opening

[ARCAGNELL0]

Premise

Hello! It will not take much to know that I'm fairly new to AOE4 and am incredibly rusty at playing Real Time Strategy games, but I nevertheless bought this game after watching Turin start streaming it on YouTube and here I am.

I mainly tried to play Abbasid in the first...35ish hours in 1v1 skirmish, then got bored (and frustrated) and switched to the Chinese since they looked a lot more fun (there might be a vein of masochism in my civ choices, since they both do kinda suffer in the meta currenty), which brings me to this discussion I wanted to start.

I've recently had a VERY informative discussion with what I can only assume are much more experienced Chinese civ players about the ins and outs of the faction, so I wanted to create a separate discussion that will EXCLUSIVELY talk about a specific build order which I discussed with the folk in that thread, namely Cacomistle and Gundalf.

Without further ado, here's the actual reason for this discussion to exist:

Song Dynasty Open

The premise of this open
This is primarily to allow the civ to be rather flexible in what it wants to do against a variety of enemies, especially if the opponent plans to apply early 1 Town Center pressure. This build also should provide quite a big booming potential if the player can indeed transition to double TC and then go Castle age.

The "quirks" of this open
1)What this build does not do however is particularly endorse the use of the Repeater Crossbow unit, the Chuge-Nu.
While it can actually pose quite a threat against enemy archers and men at arms, possibly even rams (at least more than normal archers, especially if you have the upgrade advantage) the unit itself is prohibitively costly, sitting at a total of 120 resources (60 food, 30 wood and 30 gold) and can quickly turn an eco advantage you get from the Song dynasty into a resource pitfall that loses you the game
2)Apart from the real dynasty bonus we're looking for, the -35% villager production speed, the Dynasty also allows us to build a unique building, the Village. It increases the population limit by 40 despite only costing 100 wood to construct, making it twice as efficient as normal houses.

What's also interesting (and I have seen no case of it being used in such a way, anywhere) is that the Village also comes with 10 Garrison, potentially allowing a savvy Song Dynasty expert to use them instead of Keeps to keep villagers safe in case of light raiding, as they cost the same amount of wood as a Keep, without of course having any offensive/defensive upgrades of their own and no high vision range that sees though Stealth Forest. It does have 2000 health and 50 ranged armor tough.

Detailed build order
I've decided to include a full list of the town center activity and the villager shifting from building to other resource to make it as detailed as possible. You're welcome to provide me with what you think are better versions of builds that also use the Song Dynasty!


Edit: thanks to Cacomistle for providing a better build order pursuing the same thing, here it is :)

1. 5 vills to food, 1 vill to wood, lumber camp and mill near the berries are immediately built
   
2. Advisor is the first thing coming out the TC and it immediately goes to supervise the mill
   
3. 7th, 8th and 9th villagers go to food
   
4. Sheep are immediately moved to the mill and prioritized over berries by the villagers
   
5. Imperial Advisor needs to be microed to collect tax and drop it off every time the Mill reaches 20 tax
   
6. 10th villager builds a minig camp to gold, 11th villager goes to gold aswell
   
7. 12th and 13th villagers go to food, bringing the total of food villagers to 10
   
8. Barbican Of The sun begins building at 2:55 with 3 of the 10 food workers
   
9. 14th villager goes to food
   
10. 15th villager goes to gold, bringing the total of gold villagers up to 3
    
11. 16th villager builds a house and goes to food
    
12. 17th and 18th villagers go to fodd, bringing the total of food workers once the first landmark is completed up to 14
    
13. All 3 gold villagers are pulled to build the Imperial Academy at around 4:35
    
14. 19th villager goes to food, bringing the total of food villagers to 15 just before 6 villagers are pulled from food to wood, making it 7 wood villagers
    
15. 20th and 21st villager go to gold, bringing the total gold villagers once the ones building the academy return to 5
    
16. Imperial Academy finishes at around 5:40, thus beginning the Song Dynasty

And thus the "Song Dynasty Open" for the Chinese is concluded with somewhat of an open end, allowing anyone to choose what they want to do next. I have only done little skirmish practice (against the AI) to record what I was doing and to try and bring the landmark timings down as much as possible.

Let me know what you think of this build, I'll be sure to listen and correct/modify the build order with something as flexible but more efficient, should it be so!

[Tizon]

also does rams counter rams in AoE 4 like they do in AoE2? Generally the buildings would take care of the units if they early rush. It's the rams that's the problem. But if Chinese civs just build their rams to counter ram rush (as in rams can break rams fast) then that might be something.

[Cacomistle]

Автор сообщения: Tizon

also does rams counter rams in AoE 4 like they do in AoE2? Generally the buildings would take care of the units if they early rush. It's the rams that's the problem. But if Chinese civs just build their rams to counter ram rush (as in rams can break rams fast) then that might be something.

I don't think rams can hit siege units. I think they can only hit buildings.

[Antpile]

Автор сообщения: ARCAGNELL0

I would not try and counter longbows with a ranged unit that has half the range as longbows. The Chuge-Nu is virtually useless against English.

And yes your fears are well founded, I just got deleted by an english ram push with Longbows and spears plus rams and I could do nothing against it.

Well, what civ CAN even do something against the english longbow+spearmen feudal pushes now? This is a legit question. I'm out of ideas.

Am I supposed to spam wall sections with stone towers on them as soon as I see the English "all in" me in the hope they snipe the rams or something?

It is "only" 230 stone to get up, but it's a resource you're never gonna use for offense since it's stationary, not to mention it's got a limited firing arc, meaning you can litterally just retreat and approach from another angle, at which point I'm going to be FORCED to build stone towers to cover that angle too.

Talk about scraping the bottom of the barrel...

Zhuge nu have less range than long bows, but they do WAY more damage. The longbow hits that Zhuge nu for 6, or 7 with an upgrade before armor in feudal. That Zhuge nu hits the longbow for 9 or 12, depending on if you have the upgrade and if they matched it with an armor upgrade.

But, Zhuge nu are slow like the longbow. So longbows can always run if don't have horsemen beating on their back or something. It's still rough.

I tried the stone tower thing to hold rams. Doesn't work. Takes too many hits from a spring to drop a ram. Especially with this patch that upped ram ranged armor by another 15, further reducing springald damage against them.

The way to beat an early English push is to just have more stuff than him. His stuff is going to be better. No way around that. But they get no bonuses to their econ. No way to make things quicker (other than the council hall). No way to gather more wood. Building farms that early will slow them down, not speed them up.

Meanwhile, as China, you are getting 20% more wood, free gold (which is actually pretty decent now), faster blacksmith upgrades, and can produce units much faster than he can with imp officials. So you can boom with either a second TC or Song while he's making bows, then use your greater econ to catch up and outmass him pretty quickly once you scout that he's going for a ram timing.

[Tizon]

Автор сообщения: Antpile

Автор сообщения: ARCAGNELL0

I ...

Zhuge nu have less range than long bows, but they do WAY more damage. The longbow hits that Zhuge nu for 6, or 7 with an upgrade before armor in feudal. That Zhuge nu hits the longbow for 9 or 12, depending on if you have the upgrade and if they matched it with an armor upgrade.

doesn't quite work like that, when you mass long bow, it's who gets the first shot first. Your units can get 1 shotted at a time. The long bow player will not battle your Zhuge Nu 1v1 at a time. So you need to get in range fast some how for the damage to kick in. Also your higher damage when massed can sometimes be over kill damage. I'd bet my dollar on the higher range to come out on top in this fight.

but having said that, you will need to start the fight with surplus Zhuge Nu to sacrifice to get in range. Since even if you use imperial offical to pump them out 1 by 1, the long bow can just 1 shot them at a time. so army size matters in this encounter.

[Cacomistle]

Автор сообщения: Tizon

Автор сообщения: Antpile

Zhuge nu have less range than long bows, but they do WAY more damage. The longbow hits that Zhuge nu for 6, or 7 with an upgrade before armor in feudal. That Zhuge nu hits the longbow for 9 or 12, depending on if you have the upgrade and if they matched it with an armor upgrade.

doesn't quite work like that, when you mass long bow, it's who gets the first shot first. Your units can get 1 shotted at a time. The long bow player will not battle your Zhuge Nu 1v1 at a time. So you need to get in range fast some how for the damage to kick in. Also your higher damage when massed can sometimes be over kill damage. I'd bet my dollar on the higher range to come out on top in this fight.

but having said that, you will need to start the fight with surplus Zhuge Nu to sacrifice to get in range. Since even if you use imperial offical to pump them out 1 by 1, the long bow can just 1 shot them at a time. so army size matters in this encounter.

You could stall with them though. If you go song dynasty, your eco will get better than the english player. If you get a mass of zhuge nu even close to their longbow mass size, they will be forced to kite you. If they're forced to kite you, then you could kill the ram with vills.

I don't think that would play out too well (you might say kill a ram, but lose like 6-7 zhuge nu for only a couple longbow kills in the process, and obviously the vill idle time for the ram). But if you could get a good enough mass to take somewhat even trades before they ram push, which I think might be possible, if you take some trade like 6 zhuge nu and 1-2 vills and a bit of idle vill time for 4-5 longbow and half the hp of a ram that'd probably be worth it.

Don't know how it plays out post patch. We'll probably see though cause almost certainly some streamers/youtubers are gonna be trying out zhuge nu.

[Tizon]

in conclusion early game rams are too devasting for civs with no man at arms at age 2 (or their equivalent). Maybe easy fix without tempering too much with the game is just to make rams being able to break rams fast like AoE 2.

[Cacomistle]

Автор сообщения: Tizon

in conclusion early game rams are too devasting for civs with no man at arms at age 2 (or their equivalent). Maybe easy fix without tempering too much with the game is just to make rams being able to break rams fast like AoE 2.

I don't see how maa would help at all vs the english longbow push.

Knights are the unit I'd use against an english ram push. Or mongols (just the civ regardless of what you do could probably work).

[Tizon]

are you saying that the long bow + spearmen + ram push in age 2 is just as devastating for those with m@a in age 2? Basically English should win every game early then?

palace guards have only 1 less armour but can close gaps faster like running speed, and can do decent damage against long bow. I know in massed long bow situation that 1 less armour is multiplied by number of long bows you have. But I can't image that 1 less amour makes or breaks.

palace guard also beats spearmen, they do same torch damage to ram as villager.

If I run after the long bows with palace guards, they would have to retreat or die, then my villagers with textile can torch the rams. Spearmen is still a nuisance but they don't do range damage, so dps on my villagers are slow, only upon contact in comparison to ranged mass long bow shots.

I agree that lancer is a better counter for long bows, but the push typically has spearmen

[ARCAGNELL0]

Автор сообщения: Tizon

are you saying that the long bow + spearmen + ram push in age 2 is just as devastating for those with m@a in age 2? Basically English should win every game early then?

palace guards have only 1 less armour but can close gaps faster like running speed, and can do decent damage against long bow. I know in massed long bow situation that 1 less armour is multiplied by number of long bows you have. But I can't image that 1 less amour makes or breaks.

palace guard also beats spearmen, they do same torch damage to ram as villager.

If I run after the long bows with palace guards, they would have to retreat or die, then my villagers with textile can torch the rams. Spearmen is still a nuisance but they don't do range damage, so dps on my villagers are slow, only upon contact in comparison to ranged mass long bow shots.

I agree that lancer is a better counter for long bows, but the push typically has spearmen

That would be what I'm saying, actually.


I legit don't see any way Abbasids, Delhi, China, HRE, Rus and possibly even French could do to overcome a well timed english longbow+spearmen+ram push before they can both get to castle age and mass enough castle age units to contest them.

And that's the issue. You will NOT get to castle and have enough palace guard to even contest his frontline, while the longbows delete you. This applies to all civs but Mongols with their early mass scout harass and disgusting eco buying you time and giving you more resources.

Oh, also don't forget Mongol archers can get the Yam network on them, basically turning them into the equivalent of an AOE2 skirmisher, something no other civ gets.

[Tizon]

Автор сообщения: ARCAGNELL0

That would be what I'm saying, actually.


I legit don't see any way Abbasids, Delhi, China, HRE, Rus and possibly even French could do to overcome a well timed english longbow+spearmen+ram push before they can both get to castle age and mass enough castle age units to contest them.

And that's the issue. You will NOT get to castle and have enough palace guard to even contest his frontline, while the longbows delete you. This applies to all civs but Mongols with their early mass scout harass and disgusting eco buying you time and giving you more resources.

Oh, also don't forget Mongol archers can get the Yam network on them, basically turning them into the equivalent of an AOE2 skirmisher, something no other civ gets.

what if Chinese skip Song and go straight for clock tower and then nest of bees? They eat long bows, 3 bees can wipe a group of 20 long bows.

[Cacomistle]

Автор сообщения: Tizon

are you saying that the long bow + spearmen + ram push in age 2 is just as devastating for those with m@a in age 2? Basically English should win every game early then?

palace guards have only 1 less armour but can close gaps faster like running speed, and can do decent damage against long bow. I know in massed long bow situation that 1 less armour is multiplied by number of long bows you have. But I can't image that 1 less amour makes or breaks.

palace guard also beats spearmen, they do same torch damage to ram as villager.

If I run after the long bows with palace guards, they would have to retreat or die, then my villagers with textile can torch the rams. Spearmen is still a nuisance but they don't do range damage, so dps on my villagers are slow, only upon contact in comparison to ranged mass long bow shots.

I agree that lancer is a better counter for long bows, but the push typically has spearmen

That adds literally 1 civ, and yeah I think they should have a positive matchup vs HRE.

I also don't think the English ram push is unbeatable though. It was beatable with archers already because English have to spend a lot for rams, and rams did get overall nerfed so it should be worse. Towers help against it too (that's probably what I'd do on Chinese now, build a few towers so they have to eat some arrows to engage you. Idk how fast zhuge nu kill rams too but I'd imagine 20+ of them would force longbows to dive the tower beforr the ram dies.

So its not that I think English wins vs non rus/french/mongols (although I'd bet they have a good matchup on Arabia). I just don't think maa help you much. You need speed and +1 pierce before maa beat longbow and its hard to afford that. Maybe its doable with the blacksmith which might not suck anymore now that prelates aren't bugged (assuming they actually got that fix right).

[ARCAGNELL0]

Автор сообщения: Tizon

Автор сообщения: ARCAGNELL0

That would be what I'm saying, actually.


I legit don't see any way Abbasids, Delhi, China, HRE, Rus and possibly even French could do to overcome a well timed english longbow+spearmen+ram push before they can both get to castle age and mass enough castle age units to contest them.

And that's the issue. You will NOT get to castle and have enough palace guard to even contest his frontline, while the longbows delete you. This applies to all civs but Mongols with their early mass scout harass and disgusting eco buying you time and giving you more resources.

Oh, also don't forget Mongol archers can get the Yam network on them, basically turning them into the equivalent of an AOE2 skirmisher, something no other civ gets.

what if Chinese skip Song and go straight for clock tower and then nest of bees? They eat long bows, 3 bees can wipe a group of 20 long bows.

Moderate early pressure will prevent that.

You're going to have to invest into either outposts or archers of your own to contest even half a dozen longbows, delaying Castle Age even further.

Also, 3 Clocktower Nests Of Bees are 1200 wood and 1200 gold. No way you're getting that many of them before a well timed ram+longbow+spearman push comes along.

The english can get a ram all in at around 12-13 minutes tops, leaving you only one or two minutes of castle age to even get the "counter units" in the form of the Palace Guard and the Nest of Bees.

Getting 15 Palace Guard and 3 Nests Of Bees is 1500 food, 900 wood and 1200 gold, 3600 resources in total.

Now, Imagine that many resources invested by the english player in nothing but longbows, spearmen and 2-3 battering rams that can start massing from the feudal age onwards.

He will mass faster than you do, earlier than you can, making fast castle a very risky gamble.


There could be a use in mass Chinese Archers to try and contest Longbows, but they just don't trade all that favourably to give you an edge, and the fact you're going to need more archers than he does longbows basically means he could very well bait you into archer spam while he's actually going for Castle age himself.

It's a losing battle from the start, really. You only win if the English does significant micro or timing mistakes.
Would you like playing a civ that only wins if the enemy does massive mistakes and you play perfectly? That's China against the English right now.

[Cacomistle]

Автор сообщения: ARCAGNELL0

Автор сообщения: Tizon

what if Chinese skip Song and go straight for clock tower and then nest of bees? They eat long bows, 3 bees can wipe a group of 20 long bows.

Moderate early pressure will prevent that.

You're going to have to invest into either outposts or archers of your own to contest even half a dozen longbows, delaying Castle Age even further.

Also, 3 Clocktower Nests Of Bees are 1200 wood and 1200 gold. No way you're getting that many of them before a well timed ram+longbow+spearman push comes along.

The english can get a ram all in at around 12-13 minutes tops, leaving you only one or two minutes of castle age to even get the "counter units" in the form of the Palace Guard and the Nest of Bees.

Getting 15 Palace Guard and 3 Nests Of Bees is 1500 food, 900 wood and 1200 gold, 3600 resources in total.

Now, Imagine that many resources invested by the english player in nothing but longbows, spearmen and 2-3 battering rams that can start massing from the feudal age onwards.

He will mass faster than you do, earlier than you can, making fast castle a very risky gamble.


There could be a use in mass Chinese Archers to try and contest Longbows, but they just don't trade all that favourably to give you an edge, and the fact you're going to need more archers than he does longbows basically means he could very well bait you into archer spam while he's actually going for Castle age himself.

It's a losing battle from the start, really. You only win if the English does significant micro or timing mistakes.
Would you like playing a civ that only wins if the enemy does massive mistakes and you play perfectly? That's China against the English right now.

nest of bees are 300 300, so its 900 900 total.

If english waits till 12 minutes to ram push, you will overrun them with fast song dynasty. The problem is those 8 minute ram pushes where english just plays uses the ram to tank the tc while they trade out with your archers/vills and just back up to a tower if you ever have more units.

I think towers are the answer as Chinese. You'll outscale them, so all you have to do is either just not lose several villagers with song dynasty or make it to castle age and you're probably in decent shape. Easier said that done but a few towers will go a long way to make sure they can't just trade with your archers.

Not 100% sure though because for whatever reason, I've seen mass towers, and I've seen mass units, and pretty much never some of each.

[Harris]

You honestly shouldn't struggle vs English as China in 8324.

1) You get 20% free food from very beginning, and can put another official on wood as well.
2) You get tons of free gold in form of taxes over time, meaning you're pretty much like Rus instead you don't even need to go out and look for those deer and what not. This frees some of your vills for other things.
3) To vomit a feudal all-in, English needs to invest a metric ton of wood - wood it has no boni to producing. 10 longbows is 500 wood, 650 with blacksmith, a whopping 1250 wood with two rams.
4) Your get towers that go boom boom and counter m@a, should English decide to bring them along.

So however you look at it, China's economy is infinitely superior to English early on. You can even vomit archers faster than Council Hall if you put an official to it. It is not a problem to outproduce English and have more archers than them. From this point, there's not a lot they can do - they've invested way too much to ever recover.

Just don't be greedy as China. Key skill of Chinese player is knowing when you can boom and when you shouldn't.

[Tizon]

Автор сообщения: ARCAGNELL0

Moderate early pressure will prevent that.

You're going to have to invest into either outposts or archers of your own to contest even half a dozen longbows, delaying Castle Age even further.

Also, 3 Clocktower Nests Of Bees are 1200 wood and 1200 gold. No way you're getting that many of them before a well timed ram+longbow+spearman push comes along.

The english can get a ram all in at around 12-13 minutes tops, leaving you only one or two minutes of castle age to even get the "counter units" in the form of the Palace Guard and the Nest of Bees.

Getting 15 Palace Guard and 3 Nests Of Bees is 1500 food, 900 wood and 1200 gold, 3600 resources in total.

Now, Imagine that many resources invested by the english player in nothing but longbows, spearmen and 2-3 battering rams that can start massing from the feudal age onwards.

He will mass faster than you do, earlier than you can, making fast castle a very risky gamble.


There could be a use in mass Chinese Archers to try and contest Longbows, but they just don't trade all that favourably to give you an edge, and the fact you're going to need more archers than he does longbows basically means he could very well bait you into archer spam while he's actually going for Castle age himself.

It's a losing battle from the start, really. You only win if the English does significant micro or timing mistakes.
Would you like playing a civ that only wins if the enemy does massive mistakes and you play perfectly? That's China against the English right now.

Interesting, I did a 8m 34s castle with the Chinese, skipping Song, and went straight for the clock tower. But then the trade off is villager production and economy will be slow to build a resistance force in anticipation of the ram rush. You're right 3 nest of bees are very expensive. Also disclosure it was against hardest AI, but you said 12-13 mins is usually when the rush begins. Haven't tested what i can gather and build in 4 mins from that point forwards if I don't Song.

Also just brainstorm a few more ideas before I give up. Since the main threat is the rams and cover fire by long bows. They both cost wood, rams particularly a lot of wood. So feudal age cav harass on English civ woodline or as you suggested tower rush there will slow it down.

Finally, can monks convert rams? Although need a relic in hand, but could be well worth it if it does.