Crazy Khmer

[Experienced Noob]

Been messing around with Khmer in single player to see what I can do with them. Just did a BF (and I never play BF so I'm not very good at it) and was Imp in 31 mins with 150 vills and could easily have had more I think. Hit Castle Age around 15:30 and dropped 3 TCs right away.

On Arabia I could Castle in 14:00 - 14:30 and knight rush. A couple attempts I had 5 knights out by 16:00, but that was going 2 stable, and I think 1 stable would probably be more efficient.

A big deal with Khmer is you don't have to do a 26+2 or whatever build, cause you can click Castle the moment you hit Feudal if you have the resources... don't need to wait for buildings to get made.

I see the other thread about Malay being OP... but Khmer is at least as OP as they are.

[Jineapple]

Yes it's extremely powerful, but it's also expensive AF. If your enemy can field a large army of them, you're probably doing something wrong. Also, since Ballista Eles are also siege, mass a few onagers and they will go down quickly.

[Jineapple]

100F 80G IS expensive. You get a lot for that price, but it's still a high price. And for Ballista Elephants to really be effective, you need a few of them.

Onagers will deal with Ballista Elephants quite well because of their anti-siege bonus. You can also go for Camels, Monks, a lot of Halbs, Magyar Huszars... They are strong, but they have weaknesses that can be exploited.

[Leston]

Why compare with scorps? They suck, even as celts.

[Envetel]

Originally posted by βαßγ£ση:

Khmer are OP not just because of not needing to build buildings to age up, but because their unique unit is nuts. 270 hp double shooting scorpion for 80 gold (compared to 40 hp scorpion for 75 gold) is unstoppable, especially when massed. Combine that with all the tech upgrades and lack of feudal age/castle age shortcomings, and there's really no way to counter it.

Combine that with the battle elephant and it's just out of control. Anyone who picks Khmer should be autokicked, and you should leave any match when someone randomly gets it.

Just field a group of monks like when you deal with Persian War Elephants, and the Khmer players won't feel they're OP, cause those elephants are prone to conversion as Khmer lack both Heresy and Faith.
Also the Ballista Elephants have significantly lower attack and range than regular Scorpions to ensure they're not OP AF when massed.

[grraf]

Halberds,Camels,Arbalest dont work against balista elefs especialy if they have even a modest amount of trash in front of them, doesn't even matter what it is... it wil simply be enough to make those units extreemly ineficient...
What works: huskarl+hand canon, eagle wariors+plumed archers, malian champs+gbeto/hand canon... also onagers&bombard canons if u can keep them safe(if u let them get destroyed u will lose a lot of gold real quick as costwise each bbc needs to down 3 e.b. eleffs and each onager needs to down 2 e.b. elefs to break even on theyr cost) pehaps paldins provided the khmer doesn't do halbs an unlikely scenario at best(why wouldn't he ?! theyr the perfect trash front for the balista elefs to hide behind)
PS: honorable mentions go to the monks if u can stomach all the need micro to use them efectivelly aaand keep them out of balista elef&lite cavs reach

[Leston]

Originally posted by βαßγ£ση:

...because they do the same thing that scorps do, and they don't suck if you know how to use them: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bmdb-xCv-aU

Thought about that one, too.
In fact, other than resonance says, celtic siege rush (fast castle + scorps) isn´t something no one ever did, but was discussed like 15 years ago.
The video shows a very specific situation: The saracen going for heavy feudal bow/skirms and the spot allows to defend it completely by just some little tight walling and a tower. The one mangonel wasn´t necessary and traded for 1 or 2 bows. On the other hand, saracen´s walling was that tight, too. It allowed the scorps (more range than archers) to hit the villies from almost every possible directions.
When saracen reached castle age (short after the scorps turned towards his base), he had decent food and gold, stable already up. As resonance pointed out, knights are good to deal with scorps. Massing 3-5 of them, maybe armor upgrade and adding some more later, would have been able to keep the number of scorps low. As vulnerable ranged units are nothing without being massed up, this would have been the better response, I´d say. Also think about the costs: A single scorp costs 150 ressources. Instead of massing scorps, the celt could also have built the same amount of knights, having some food left to pay the +1/1 upgrades. 17 knights would have ended this one faster than 17 scorps (and an additional knight for every additional scorp).
It´s just the fact, saracen spent a lot of ressources on feudal army and got absolutely no advantage from it. When the celt reached castle age with reasonably eco, it was almost over anyway. Yes, the feudal bows had no chance against the scorps, as they hadn´t against knights, light cav, xbows, elite skirms, mangonels or all possible unique units if he´d have decided to go heavy on stone and drop an early castle, offensive or defensive. Going scorps was an option just because of the huge strategic advantage in this situation. It did win, but wasn´t the best option I think.
When I say, scorps are crap, it´s about them being not cost efficient in any situation, more than any other unit.

On the khmer issue:
We talk about an expensive unit with expensive elite upgrade, getting their doubleshot by another upgrade with remarkable costs, built in castles. Massing just 10 of them costs 2000f 800g, upgrades not mentioned. To mass them in reasonable time (and replace units lost in battle) needs at least 2 castles, better more.
Of course a mass of them is very strong, but first the player has to get there.
Khmer lack any enduring eco bonus (talk about the no building bonus later) or military bonus in feudal/early castle age. As they don´t have arbalests, champions, hussars, camels or palas, their later castle age engagement with battle elephants (15% faster, unique upgrade +3 attack) is highly predictable. They are still quite slow and easily and cost efficient countered by camels, pikes or monks. Khmer could go cav archers, but without any bonus, they are no good choice for later castle/imperial age.
About the no buildings bonus: Allows very fast feudal age, but due to low villager count and no bonus on ressources income, is only good for very fast tower rush without pumping vils simultaneously. May work, but is risky. If the towers don´t cause enough effect, the khmer is gone a little later. When talking about fast castle, again the bonus allows to be reasonably fast, but the limiting factor is the costs for feudal and castle upgrade and the fact that the ressources are the lower the faster you advance. Again, khmer has no bonus on ressources income as many other civs have.
But we talk about massing the expensive ballista elephants in late castle/imperial age, so we don´t talk about fast castle time, but fast boom. Reaching castle age too early doesn´t help but delay the boom. The earlier you pause villager production for age upgrades, the less ressources you gather. Reaching castle age with the option of multiple tc spamming villagers needs enough ressource income to really instantly build these tc and really pump villagers. Possible fast advance time is worthless, income bonus is everything. No luck for the khmer.
To complete it, fast castle without eco or military bonus (battle eles are too expensive, too slow and too easy countered by pikes for early castle engagement) is just not worth to execute. It slows your own eco probably far more than the 2-3 early knights (or whatever) cause at the opponent´s eco. The only bonus I see is that you don´t need a rax to build a stable, saving 175 ressources.

In the end, we talk about a late game + intact eco advantage of a civ which lacks any real advantage to get there, with additional limited options to go aggressive in the earlier match. The only reasonable option, very fast tower rush, is a cheesy win or lose strategy and has nothing to do with possible advantages in post-imperial.
If you look at other civs with expensive postimp units talked to be too strong (e.g. frank palas, persians war eles), it´s just the same: Deadly when massed, but expensive to get there. To let them get there as opponent with probably advantages in the earlier match is what lets you lose, not the power of these units themselves.

The most mentionable unique bonus of khmer is, in my opinion, that you can garrison 5 villagers in every house. If necessary, you don´t have to micromanage it by hand, it works with tc town bell alarm, too. This option seems to help a lot especially to deal with feudal rushes or later on eco harassing. To see the real value, some more experience is needed, though.

[Experienced Noob]

Originally posted by Leston:

To complete it, fast castle without eco or military bonus (battle eles are too expensive, too slow and too easy countered by pikes for early castle engagement) is just not worth to execute. It slows your own eco probably far more than the 2-3 early knights (or whatever) cause at the opponent´s eco. The only bonus I see is that you don´t need a rax to build a stable, saving 175 ressources.

In addition to not needing the rax, let's say you normally do a 26+2 fast Castle with other civs, here you can do 28+0 (provided you scouted and know it's safe), because you don't need to wait for buildings to get made. Now you've got 2 extra villagers working during Feud upgrade for a bonus of close to 100 resources. You also don't need to immediately make a smith. You can get bloodlines before armor, and build the blacksmith later when you can afford it to start adding armor to the knights.

I just did a run vs AI on Arabia where I made 25 vills in dark, got 14:37 Castle time, and was able to make 5 knights out of each stable (10 knights total) before there were any gaps in production. Granted the only upgrades I had were double-bit and loom, but I didn't lure any deer in that test run, so my eco could have been stronger.

I think Khmer and Malay have such unique bonuses that they require their own build orders/strategies.

[Leston]

@Jimmy1Time
Turning the speed bonus into eco bonus (e.g. 28+0 instead of 26+2) is a nice option. Together with not building rax it comes close to mongols hunting bonus and should be a little better than britons fast sheperds (remember, only when going fast castle with no rax, not in general).
Also, bloodlines and no bs at first is nice. Getting first stable up and the upgrade paid (425 ressources total) fast enough to be bloodlined before reaching castle is necessary. Should work well with 28 vils, but not with really fast castle option like 24+0 or less.
But when will it work? Against feudal rushing opponent, it´s hard to get out of defense soon enough to compensate the lower eco. If the opponent fast castles himself, you may want to have a rax at home for some spears anyway. It´s quite pathetic to chase opponent´s knights with your knights around your base. If he does just nothing but eco, you may kill him this way or another.

[grraf]

Khmer does have a huge eco bonus remember it has no mandatory buildings so from the dark age assuming u would just do a normal build at least 1-3 of yr wood cutters will by default be asigned to food... as such excepting the mongols/brits no body is going to reach feudal&castle age before u... this translates either into early extra tcs or military presure aplied by the khmer to you via either feudal scout rush or a castle age knith rush to this u need to also factor in theyr own eco is raid proof : as soon as any military unit gets near the vilagers those go into houses so at best u idle a few of them for a while at worst couple of seconds later the khmer scouts/knits come to butcher yr army... also as a bonus cavalry armor also aplies to the balista elefants so u simultaneusly upgrade the scout&knith along with both elefant types so thas another indirect 'eco bonus' plus having a couple of monks will ensure the elefants last quite a bit.