Ottomans are Weak

[Solo Joke]

Title. The Ottomans seem really weak compared to other civs. It feels like they are super expensive but don't get much for the extra cost.
Academys suck, their sipahi are weak, their jannisaries are weaker handcannons. They don't have any strong early units like early knights or men at arms, and they don't have crazy production bonuses like English or Mongols.

Does anyone have any good strats with them that make them not suck?

[Bubs]

Use jannisaries as ranged spearmen.

Don't build the schools until you have excess resources. If you build them immediately you wasted time getting stone, and likely can't afford to pay for units normally, and the schools are too slow to make up for that.

I believe the civ is somewhat slow to start, tedious to move all those guys into the siege engines, have right musicians in each unit, etc. They didn't fit my playstyle as best as I thought, so i switched to HRE.

[Solo Joke]

Originally posted by Bubs:

Use jannisaries as ranged spearmen.

Don't build the schools until you have excess resources. If you build them immediately you wasted time getting stone, and likely can't afford to pay for units normally, and the schools are too slow to make up for that.

I believe the civ is somewhat slow to start, tedious to move all those guys into the siege engines, have right musicians in each unit, etc. They didn't fit my playstyle as best as I thought, so i switched to HRE.

Jannisaries are meant to be ranged spearmen but they don't really do a good job. They are super weak to archers like spearmen are, but they cost an insane amount of resources by comparison.

If you don't build the schools then you're basically playing a civ that has no bonuses, a genetic civ, and you'll just lag behind the others who will either have strong eco bonuses or get crushed by civs with strong millitary or strong early rushes.

[Bubs]

it's good i switched then :D

[Solo Joke]

Originally posted by Bubs:

it's good i switched then :D

Yeah, I'm probably gonna switch back to French myself.

[Lexicon]

Their trade is ridiculously strong. You get faster trade carts/ships and you get +40% gold from trade. The great bombards are mangonels and bombards put together. Use trade to afford great bombards, defend (and repair) them with Janissaries and use springalds/culverins to counter enemy siege.

Ottomans probably seem weak compared to French (I'm a French main) because they're a late game civ and also require more overall micro. I personally like French the most because they're easy. No eco micro, just make vills, age up, spam knights and bring mangonels in case they try to counter with spears/crossbows. Ottomans aren't weak, just more difficult.

[Solo Joke]

Originally posted by Lexicon:

Their trade is ridiculously strong. You get faster trade carts/ships and you get +40% gold from trade. The great bombards are mangonels and bombards put together. Use trade to afford great bombards, defend (and repair) them with Janissaries and use springalds/culverins to counter enemy siege.

Ottomans probably seem weak compared to French (I'm a French main) because they're a late game civ and also require more overall micro. I personally like French the most because they're easy. No eco micro, just make vills, age up, spam knights and bring mangonels in case they try to counter with spears/crossbows. Ottomans aren't weak, just more difficult.

Trade happens in late game, Janissaries are age 3 and bombards are age 4. I'm saying Ottomans are weak because you're dead by then. You have no good eco bonuses, no strong early military options, and no strong late military options either, except for bombards, which are incredibly high cost and can do super quick to man at arms or cavalry.

[Modragor]

Originally posted by Solo Joke:

Title. The Ottomans seem really weak compared to other civs. It feels like they are super expensive but don't get much for the extra cost.
Academys suck, their sipahi are weak, their jannisaries are weaker handcannons. They don't have any strong early units like early knights or men at arms, and they don't have crazy production bonuses like English or Mongols.

Does anyone have any good strats with them that make them not suck?

There is a guide for an Ottoman early archer rush on youtube, look on the channel of BeastyqtSC2. It goes like Archers out of barracks and Sipahi out of schools. I haven´t played it, but seems to be nice.

[Subtle Butt ( >ω<)っ ♡]

Originally posted by Solo Joke:

Title. The Ottomans seem really weak compared to other civs. It feels like they are super expensive but don't get much for the extra cost.
Academys suck, their sipahi are weak, their jannisaries are weaker handcannons. They don't have any strong early units like early knights or men at arms, and they don't have crazy production bonuses like English or Mongols.

Does anyone have any good strats with them that make them not suck?

Military Academy is literally free units and they have a crazy production bonus that is faster production if you build near a blacksmith. Their buildings are also cheaper.

Best start with them is build an early dark age military academy and harass enemy gold with spears. Come Feudal you add a 2nd military academy and go for archers and kill them. In team games you can also start trade very early with Sultanhani Trade House and 40% increased trade. They are literally 2nd best WR civ across the board in 1v1s and they are quite strong in team games as well.

Think of military academy as an eco building. They give like 200 resources of units per minute. When you get them fully upgraded with vizir points and the blacksmith, its more like 400 per minute when you can pump out like 3 jans every minute out of them or 2 knights. And you can get up to 5.

Their armies are strong because of mehter giving flat 15% bonus attack speed and movement speed (if you got the vizir point for it). That is everything including your siege attacking faster. You remax faster than any civ because you get production bonus with your blacksmiths + with military school. This effectively means you always have more army than the enemy given you have the same economy.

Don't sleep on jans. Jans destroy cavalry. They are cheaper than HCs and still have decent damage output against anything. Say french goes vs otto. Otto will have knight + jan and French has knight + arbs. Jans kill the french knights much faster than the arbs kill otto knights. And you'll usually have a bigger army. Late game, they combo very well with your great bombard. Best counter to siege is cavalry, and cavalry will get mowed down by jans.

[Solo Joke]

Originally posted by Subtle Butt:

Originally posted by Solo Joke:

Title. The Ottomans seem really weak compared to other civs. It feels like they are super expensive but don't get much for the extra cost.
Academys suck, their sipahi are weak, their jannisaries are weaker handcannons. They don't have any strong early units like early knights or men at arms, and they don't have crazy production bonuses like English or Mongols.

Does anyone have any good strats with them that make them not suck?

Military Academy is literally free units and they have a crazy production bonus that is faster production if you build near a blacksmith. Their buildings are also cheaper.

Best start with them is build an early dark age military academy and harass enemy gold with spears. Come Feudal you add a 2nd military academy and go for archers and kill them. In team games you can also start trade very early with Sultanhani Trade House and 40% increased trade. They are literally 2nd best WR civ across the board in 1v1s and they are quite strong in team games as well.

Think of military academy as an eco building. They give like 200 resources of units per minute. When you get them fully upgraded with vizir points and the blacksmith, its more like 400 per minute when you can pump out like 3 jans every minute out of them or 2 knights. And you can get up to 5.

Their armies are strong because of mehter giving flat 15% bonus attack speed and movement speed (if you got the vizir point for it). That is everything including your siege attacking faster. You remax faster than any civ because you get production bonus with your blacksmiths + with military school. This effectively means you always have more army than the enemy given you have the same economy.

Don't sleep on jans. Jans destroy cavalry. They are cheaper than HCs and still have decent damage output against anything. Say french goes vs otto. Otto will have knight + jan and French has knight + arbs. Jans kill the french knights much faster than the arbs kill otto knights. And you'll usually have a bigger army. Late game, they combo very well with your great bombard. Best counter to siege is cavalry, and cavalry will get mowed down by jans.

When I looked at their win rates they were either worst or second worst, so I don't know what you mean by 2nd best.

Academy is free units but it's really, REALLY slow, even with the blacksmith buff. And spending the 350 res upfront really hurts your ability to get to age 2 fast, and in age 2 it hurts your ability to pay for units from regular production buildings, or to expand your eco.

The mehter seem like the only good thing about the Ottomans, but they aren't that good, they can be sniped pretty easily, and other civs usually heave cheaper or stronger units that make the mehter less powerful by comparison.

You won't have the same economy as your opponent because the Ottomans don't have good eco bonuses like other civs do, so sure, you can make military faster, but you'll have less resources to do so.

Jans are ass. They are cheaper than HC but they are a lot weaker, and they aren't as good against cavalry as spearmen are because of their lower health and higher cost. If you are fighting against the french you will never get to Jan + Knight, you'll be dead long before when the french early knights kill everything you can make in age 2. And arbs cost significantly less than jans, so they will have a larger army than you even if you do get there.

[Subtle Butt ( >ω<)っ ♡]

Originally posted by Solo Joke:

When I looked at their win rates they were either worst or second worst, so I don't know what you mean by 2nd best.

https://aoe4world.com/stats/rm_solo/matchups

huh?

[Solo Joke]

Originally posted by Subtle Butt:

Originally posted by Solo Joke:

When I looked at their win rates they were either worst or second worst, so I don't know what you mean by 2nd best.

https://aoe4world.com/stats/rm_solo/matchups

huh?

I was looking at quick match stats, which has them as 2nd from the bottom.

[Cacomistle]

Originally posted by Solo Joke:

Originally posted by Subtle Butt:

Military Academy is literally free units and they have a crazy production bonus that is faster production if you build near a blacksmith. Their buildings are also cheaper.

Best start with them is build an early dark age military academy and harass enemy gold with spears. Come Feudal you add a 2nd military academy and go for archers and kill them. In team games you can also start trade very early with Sultanhani Trade House and 40% increased trade. They are literally 2nd best WR civ across the board in 1v1s and they are quite strong in team games as well.

Think of military academy as an eco building. They give like 200 resources of units per minute. When you get them fully upgraded with vizir points and the blacksmith, its more like 400 per minute when you can pump out like 3 jans every minute out of them or 2 knights. And you can get up to 5.

Their armies are strong because of mehter giving flat 15% bonus attack speed and movement speed (if you got the vizir point for it). That is everything including your siege attacking faster. You remax faster than any civ because you get production bonus with your blacksmiths + with military school. This effectively means you always have more army than the enemy given you have the same economy.

Don't sleep on jans. Jans destroy cavalry. They are cheaper than HCs and still have decent damage output against anything. Say french goes vs otto. Otto will have knight + jan and French has knight + arbs. Jans kill the french knights much faster than the arbs kill otto knights. And you'll usually have a bigger army. Late game, they combo very well with your great bombard. Best counter to siege is cavalry, and cavalry will get mowed down by jans.

When I looked at their win rates they were either worst or second worst, so I don't know what you mean by 2nd best.

Academy is free units but it's really, REALLY slow, even with the blacksmith buff. And spending the 350 res upfront really hurts your ability to get to age 2 fast, and in age 2 it hurts your ability to pay for units from regular production buildings, or to expand your eco.

The mehter seem like the only good thing about the Ottomans, but they aren't that good, they can be sniped pretty easily, and other civs usually heave cheaper or stronger units that make the mehter less powerful by comparison.

You won't have the same economy as your opponent because the Ottomans don't have good eco bonuses like other civs do, so sure, you can make military faster, but you'll have less resources to do so.

Jans are ass. They are cheaper than HC but they are a lot weaker, and they aren't as good against cavalry as spearmen are because of their lower health and higher cost. If you are fighting against the french you will never get to Jan + Knight, you'll be dead long before when the french early knights kill everything you can make in age 2. And arbs cost significantly less than jans, so they will have a larger army than you even if you do get there.

Idk when you checked, but they're currently the second highest win rate.

Military school is not 350 resources, its 250. You start with 50 stone, so if you're rushing one in dark age its 200 that you actually have to gather. If you're including the blacksmith as if its the cost of a dark age military academy, that's stupid, because you can't build a blacksmith in dark age, and it doesn't cease to function as a blacksmith just because you built it around a military academy.

Jans are situational, but they're not situational because otto can't survive against French. They're statistically favored against French at all leagues. If you lose to a French player, its not because the matchup is inbalanced, it is because the French player played better than you.

[Cacomistle]

Originally posted by Solo Joke:

Originally posted by Subtle Butt:

https://aoe4world.com/stats/rm_solo/matchups

huh?

I was looking at quick match stats, which has them as 2nd from the bottom.

Why would you look at quick match over ranked? That's where people don't take the game seriously because its not ranked.

[Solo Joke]

Originally posted by Cacomistle:

Originally posted by Solo Joke:

Idk when you checked, but they're currently the second highest win rate.

Military school is not 350 resources, its 250. You start with 50 stone, so if you're rushing one in dark age its 200 that you actually have to gather. If you're including the blacksmith as if its the cost of a dark age military academy, that's stupid, because you can't build a blacksmith in dark age, and it doesn't cease to function as a blacksmith just because you built it around a military academy.

Jans are situational, but they're not situational because otto can't survive against French. They're statistically favored against French at all leagues. If you lose to a French player, its not because the matchup is inbalanced, it is because the French player played better than you.

I misclicked with the 350, and no, obviously I wasn't including blacksmith, but it's still a lot of resources to gather for something that produces units exceptionally slowly, it will still lower your age 2 time, which will allow your opponent to get to their strong options faster than you.

I never mentioned losing to a french player specifically, I was referencing the other guy's scenario with french knights+arbs vs ottoman klnights+jan.

Originally posted by Cacomistle:

Originally posted by Solo Joke:

I was looking at quick match stats, which has them as 2nd from the bottom.

Why would you look at quick match over ranked? That's where people don't take the game seriously because its not ranked.

It was the first thing that came up when I was looking for winrates, I missed the part where it said quick match. But according to the stats, does that mean Malians are the best civ and Rus is the worst?

[Cacomistle]

Originally posted by Solo Joke:

Originally posted by Cacomistle:

Idk when you checked, but they're currently the second highest win rate.

Military school is not 350 resources, its 250. You start with 50 stone, so if you're rushing one in dark age its 200 that you actually have to gather. If you're including the blacksmith as if its the cost of a dark age military academy, that's stupid, because you can't build a blacksmith in dark age, and it doesn't cease to function as a blacksmith just because you built it around a military academy.

Jans are situational, but they're not situational because otto can't survive against French. They're statistically favored against French at all leagues. If you lose to a French player, its not because the matchup is inbalanced, it is because the French player played better than you.

I misclicked with the 350, and no, obviously I wasn't including blacksmith, but it's still a lot of resources to gather for something that produces units exceptionally slowly, it will still lower your age 2 time, which will allow your opponent to get to their strong options faster than you.

I never mentioned losing to a french player specifically, I was referencing the other guy's scenario with french knights+arbs vs ottoman klnights+jan.

Originally posted by Cacomistle:

Why would you look at quick match over ranked? That's where people don't take the game seriously because its not ranked.

It was the first thing that came up when I was looking for winrates, I missed the part where it said quick match. But according to the stats, does that mean Malians are the best civ and Rus is the worst?

According to the stats yes. I think consensus of pro players does include rus as the worst civ (they're basically only decent on water), but I don't think malians are considered the best at a pro level (not sure what civ is though, I think its balanced enough that a lot of pros have different opinions).