i'm tired of people just following what more experienced players are telling you what to do and how to do it, especially regarding some things that have become second nature to us, one such thing being that the pocket(s) in a team game should open scouts and get a quick castle age time into knight production, and that the flanks should open man at arms into archers or just straight archers. i have thought up an alternative, alebeit niche, strategy you can perform as a flank player.
keep in mind this strategy does require you to play as a civilization with a unique unit that can carry you back into the game from an army defecit (such as conquistadors), or one that has very good raiding potentional and can run away from bad fights (arambai, mangudai). you may also require assistance from your pocket or a defensive siege workshop to clear up their army of crossbows.
it starts off as a regular man at arms build, but instead of adding a second range in feudal age, you stay on one and start producing skirms. you also don't need to allocate more villagers to gold since you're only producing skirms, so instead just keep adding to farms and eventually stone. depending on how the game goes you might only have to make 5 skirms, but it might have to be more. whether you get archer armor or not depends on you, if you wanna play greedy and opt for going up early or if you stay in the feudal age for longer and have a safer eco, you could also go up early and defend with towers. i would advice adding a couple archers or spears with your skirms to protect them from scouts from the enemy pocket. once in castle age you drop a defensive castle and start pumping out your unique unit, again, a defensive siege workshop before adding TCs is not a bad idea.
i know skirms are pretty much banned in team games, but i wanted to try something new. if you have any criticisms that would be highly appreciated as i'm a new player looking to improve. the only thing that comes to mind for me is the army disavantage you'd have in early castle age, and the damage that can potentially do to your eco, and i found this to be the biggest flaw in testing, although i didn't execute the strategy perfectly.
keep in mind this strategy does require you to play as a civilization with a unique unit that can carry you back into the game from an army defecit (such as conquistadors), or one that has very good raiding potentional and can run away from bad fights (arambai, mangudai). you may also require assistance from your pocket or a defensive siege workshop to clear up their army of crossbows.
it starts off as a regular man at arms build, but instead of adding a second range in feudal age, you stay on one and start producing skirms. you also don't need to allocate more villagers to gold since you're only producing skirms, so instead just keep adding to farms and eventually stone. depending on how the game goes you might only have to make 5 skirms, but it might have to be more. whether you get archer armor or not depends on you, if you wanna play greedy and opt for going up early or if you stay in the feudal age for longer and have a safer eco, you could also go up early and defend with towers. i would advice adding a couple archers or spears with your skirms to protect them from scouts from the enemy pocket. once in castle age you drop a defensive castle and start pumping out your unique unit, again, a defensive siege workshop before adding TCs is not a bad idea.
i know skirms are pretty much banned in team games, but i wanted to try something new. if you have any criticisms that would be highly appreciated as i'm a new player looking to improve. the only thing that comes to mind for me is the army disavantage you'd have in early castle age, and the damage that can potentially do to your eco, and i found this to be the biggest flaw in testing, although i didn't execute the strategy perfectly.