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India: Fur Trade Fast Fortress

Posted: Mon May 12, 2008 11:02 pm
by DrWho42
Greetings Gentlemen,

I have been playing India almost exclusively since TAD premiered. I found them to be a fun and challenging civilization. Now that the patch has corrected some of their early flaws, they are a bit more competetive.

Now I have read several India strategies over the last several months, and most of the fast fortress ones recommend the Taj Mahal (500coin) wonder to age II. Against most players, I find this leaves me rather exposed. So I have devised a strategy that I have found to be flexible and offers a good age III time.

The main card that you will need for this is Fur Trade (age I). This card converts your food into gold at a rate of (1.25). What is nice about this card is the the conversion is instant (no gathering of crates required).

Here is a sample BO.

Collect crates and que as many villagers as initial wood allows. While some collect starting crates, get 2 or 3 vills on local hunts. All new vils and crate vils to food. When you hit 800 drop the Agra Fort near your TC. Let the wonder build itself (no villagers tasked to it).

During age up, shift 7 vils to wood, drop a house and que more villagers (to food). Either just before or during age up you will be prompted for you first shipment. On most land maps you should choose "Distributivism". If on a map like Deccan or Mongolia where you can collect lots of herdables, ship the Sacred Field rickshaw (the shipments will pour in)! If on a good water map (one with whales) ship "East Indiamen", this will allow you to build 70wood "villager" fishing boats.

Once at age II, you should have enough villagers on wood to keep up constant villager production, plus houses. All other villagers on food. You will need 800 food collected when Fur Trade arrives to receive the 1000 coin needed for age III, so send the card as your second shipment when you have about 650 ~ 700 food. If you can build a market and research hunting upgrades. If the card is about to arrive and you have 900 or more food, then que 1 or 2 rahjputs at the fort, and cancel them after Fur Trade has arrived. You should have 10 plus villagers on food at this point. Once you reach the 1200 food needed to age, put 4 of them on building whichever wonder you prefer. (On a typical map you should reach Fortress at 9 minutes).

During age II, the 2 sepoys can be used to help your explorers gain treasure, scout the enemy, or protect your villagers from raiding cav. The flexibility of this strategy is that you have the fort to fall back on both for its defensive fire and the ability to create whatever infantry you may need if pressed hard in colonial. You should also have the 5 sepoy card or 4 sowar card available for additional protection.

While ageing to fortress, build consulate, stables, rax and lots of houses. Shift your villagers to whatever resources you will need for the units you prefer in fortress.

Good Luck and Cheers!

Re: India: Fur Trade Fast Fortress

Posted: Mon May 12, 2008 11:11 pm
by Soccerman771
Seems like a solid strat. Do you have any recordings showing it's effective use? I think I'll give it a try.

Re: India: Fur Trade Fast Fortress

Posted: Tue May 13, 2008 4:24 am
by DrWho42
No recordings currently. I had experimented with this strategy against the computer several times before trying it out against human opponents. I have used it with mixed success in a few team games (the BO worked, but my ally sometimes didn't).

This strategy is really meant to give you lots of flexibility. In colonial you only need to collect wood and food. The food gather rate is faster than the coin gather rate. I still keep the 600 coin card in my deck in case I have to do some fighting in colonial. However, the general concept is not to build military in colonial if you can avoid it, instead using the Agra Fort and TC fire to blunt a rush. Then your wicked fortress shipments arrive to turn the tide!

Cheers