Ok. so basically i always see the AI going for feudalism disregarding many other technologies.
and i always see them with their longbowmen everywhere.

i personally never go for feudalism first thing, i find serfdom and vassalage totally useless and longbowmen aren't even THAT great. (annoying yes) :mad:
machinery --> civil service much better to me.

but im just wondering.... is there some secret stragety that im not aware of that involves getting feudalism quickly because i cant really find any uses to it.....:confused:

If you want an interesting way of using feudalism, play as the native americans, do a oracle slingshot to feudalism, build totem poles everywhere, and take yoiur rediculously upgraded longbow to your nearest neighbour and conquer them. there is no counter to offensive longbowmans if you do a quick slingshot, and with totem poles, they have more upgrades then swordsman.

Maceman eventually counter them, but not anywhere near close enough if I gun for my slingshot. This means I have upgraded longbowman as an offensive force, that can whipe everything else out.

Other then with the Native Americans, I don't find them all that usefull. With no UU for longbowman, I can't imagine anyone leveraging them as well as the Native Americans, who's UB complements them very well, and their protective trait gives them free upgrades out of the gate.

To add to what Magnum said, I have found the same strategy works very well for the greeks (creative, philosopical). If you start your rush to fuedualism by rushing to writing, creative lets you build that first library very fast, then philosopical causes you to get the Great Scientist very fast, which gives you a very early Acadamy or Super Scientist, which makes the rush to Feudalism much faster than the Native Americans.

Although your longbowmen certainly aren't as upgraded, they come early for the greeks as explained above, which means that you will probably be facing weaker defenses. An overlooked advantage of attacking with longbowmen is that you can often select their promotion just before your attack to control which defender you target, which can be helpful in setting up favorable battles for a subsequent attacker. So it ends up working pretty well for the greeks too.

Other than that niche, I have found longbowmen to be generally useless.

BTW - I have pulled this off several times on emperor (epic speed). I have fun trying to capitulate neighbors as early as possible, so that they have time to recover, so they will be useful vassals. I am interested to try the new lowered capitulation threshold with the 3.17 patch to see if I can get the AI to capitulate to my longbowmen really fast (and still intact) :)

Yeah I should have mentioned the vassal part. Nothing better then capturing their capitol, and then leaving them with 2-3 crappy cities, but with it being early game watching them rebuild a huge empire, becoming a very productive vassal. This seems especially true as you get up higher in levels.

Although i do enjoy a good axe rush and whipping them off the face of the earth when they only have 1-2 cities.

Heh, go back to any thread I've ranted and raved about either A) my favorite unit, B) why protective is good and you'll get a host of reasons why Feudalism rocks ;)

i personally never go for feudalism first thing, i find serfdom and vassalage totally useless and longbowmen aren't even THAT great.

I hardly call 2 extra experience points for every unit built useless. With a Barracks, any city can create a unit with two promotions, giving you a nice advantage in a battle. And Longbowmen are one of the best defenders in the game, compared to the offensive units that are available for quite some time. 6 Strength, plus 25% city defence, the fortification bonus and access to the City Garrison promotions can make them a tough unit to take out with even a Maceman or a Knight. If you're trying to use them offensively, then you're missing the point. And you're also forgetting about the ability to turn another civ into your vassal. That alone makes Feudalism well worth it.

Totem Pole + Barracks + Vasslage + Theocracy + Protective Trait = Rambo Longbowmen. Add to that a great military instructor in your Heroic Epic city, if you've managed to pop a GG. Save these super units and upgrade them to riflemen later. If your city is on a hill with walls and a castle... they will need either tanks or a hundred trebuchets to knock you off. Ok maybe I'm exaggerating with the tanks bit, but you get the point. I've watched huge 20+ unit stacks crash into my walls and die! Meanwhile the Natives Americans inside (upon zooming in) are just singing and chanting all along, while the dog soldiers do their Ghost Dances! It's good fun :D. Provoke wars early on to generate GG's with them ;).