Feudalism Slingshot

[alcaras]

Anyone have a guide or explanation on the best civ and tech path to pull this off with?

Thanks

 

[Hackapell]

Ahhhh, the feudalism slingshot. The leader I've really wanted to do this with is Sitting Bull. Beeline preisthood, then tech to writng while preparing for the Oracle. Tech monarchy, then go back and grab your dog soldiers for some crazy fun. I would also try this with Wang Kon; Fin can help towars getting monarchy earlier, and you have a leg up on the oracle with mysticism. then, your only a few techs from hwachas and lots of . really, you could try this with just about any protective civ, but I find Sitting Bull's 8 XP longbows to be too good to pass up
Just imagine churchill of the NA's pulling that off... Drill IV longbows out of the gate

 

[Loose Nut]

It is interesting with Brennus. It makes his UB marginally useful, and being spiritual means he can get some mileage out of serfdom at a stage in the game where it's pretty handy.

 

[kniteowl]

Saladin's a good option for this Slingshot, he's protective so you get a boost for longbows and he's also Spiritual so you'll get some use out of Vassalage and serfdom without loss turns of anarchy. He also starts with Myst tech so you have leg up getting Preisthood and ultimately Oracle.

 

[InvisibleStalke]

I've done this with Sitting Bull on Monarchy. I grabbed Pyramids as well which was greedy, but I had stone and it probably helped up my research enough to get Monarchy in time.

Go Writing before Priesthood. The rate limiting step is how fast you can research Monarchy and getting a library online earlier helps.

Its a gamble - I can't see that on Monarch or higher you could guarantee getting this before the AI. But there are so many shiny wonders around that you have a pretty good chance - and the AI doesn't research Priesthood so quickly anymore.

I highly recommend it - if only for how different it makes your game. Warring with longbows is a lot of fun. Not just drill promotions, but once you get theology you can make:

- Horse killer longbows (combat 1+2+formation)
- Axe/Sword killers (drill 2+shock+combat1)
- Archer killers (drill 2 + cover + combat1)
- City holders (CG2 + CG 3 + drill 2)

 

[gettingfat]

Wang Kon is a good one for this gambit. Go agriculture/fishing (to get food) => wheel => pottery, start cottaging early to get the research up. Throw in the bronze working somewhere as you need defence vs the barbs and chop/whip. Go for writing and chop a library in your research city before going the religion route. I'll take meditation instead of polytheism to save 2 turns. Once you have priesthood you research monarchy while building the Oracle. Chop and whip if you need it so you can have the Oracle built at the same turn or just after discovery of monarchy. With financial trait it can be done 50% of time at monarch level (I guess somebody can do better than me). I rarely can do it at emperor, but I haven't tried that in BtS yet.

Switch to vassalage and hereditary ruling and mass protective longbows. A mixed stack of protective Drill 3 + cover + shock longbows + combat II + medic longbows require no resource and can be awfully deadly.

 

[slobberinbear]

Minimum Necessary Techs:

Meditation or Polytheism
Priesthood
Writing
Monarchy

Priesthood is really key here, as it is a common prerequisite for the Oracle, Writing, and Monarchy (although there are other ways to get Writing and Monarchy, why not synergize?). I would start building the Oracle after researching Writing, making sure you finish Monarchy before the Oracle is completed.

I suppose you could beeline all of this, but it would be smoother to get most of your worker/military techs in before you go for Monarchy. At a minimum, I would want at least one solid food tech (fishing, agriculture, or animal husbandry), the wheel, pottery, mining, and bronze working. If I was trying to get early longbows from feudalism, I'd throw in hunting and archery early too.

The Protective civs are an obvious choice with feudalism-enabled free promotion longbows. Charismatic is also handy for cheap promotions. Some longbow comparisons, assuming Vassalage, Theocracy, and a barracks:

Churchill (Prot/Char): CG I, Drill I, two other promotions (7/8 xp)
Sitting Bull (Phil/Prot) (with totem pole): CG I, Drill I, three other promotions (10/10 xp)
Other protective civs: CG I, Drill I, two other promotions (7/10 xp)
Other charismatic civs: two promotions (7/8 xp)

In these examples, Theocracy only immediately benefits Sitting Bull; with just Vassalage and a barracks, the other civs still get 5 xp which is enough for two promotions plus any freebies from Protective. A Sitting Bull CG I / Drill IV longbow at 1000 BC is nothing to sneeze at, however.

Getting Theocracy going requires an additional minimum investment in Masonry, Monotheism, and Theology. Theology would be a worthwhile Oracle slingshot in itself if it wasn't for the fact that we're going for Feudalism here, which is the more expensive tech (by 200 beakers).

 

[madscientist]

Minimum Necessary Techs:

Meditation or Polytheism
Priesthood
Writing
Monarchy

Priesthood is really key here, as it is a common prerequisite for the Oracle, Writing, and Monarchy (although there are other ways to get Writing and Monarchy, why not synergize?). I would start building the Oracle after researching Writing, making sure you finish Monarchy before the Oracle is completed.

I suppose you could beeline all of this, but it would be smoother to get most of your worker/military techs in before you go for Monarchy. At a minimum, I would want at least one solid food tech (fishing, agriculture, or animal husbandry), the wheel, pottery, mining, and bronze working. If I was trying to get early longbows from feudalism, I'd throw in hunting and archery early too.

The Protective civs are an obvious choice with feudalism-enabled free promotion longbows. Charismatic is also handy for cheap promotions. Some longbow comparisons, assuming Vassalage, Theocracy, and a barracks:

Churchill (Prot/Char): CG I, Drill I, two other promotions (7/8 xp)
Sitting Bull (Phil/Prot) (with totem pole): CG I, Drill I, three other promotions (10/10 xp)
Other protective civs: CG I, Drill I, two other promotions (7/10 xp)
Other charismatic civs: two promotions (7/8 xp)

In these examples, Theocracy only immediately benefits Sitting Bull; with just Vassalage and a barracks, the other civs still get 5 xp which is enough for two promotions plus any freebies from Protective. A Sitting Bull CG I / Drill IV longbow at 1000 BC is nothing to sneeze at, however.

Getting Theocracy going requires an additional minimum investment in Masonry, Monotheism, and Theology. Theology would be a worthwhile Oracle slingshot in itself if it wasn't for the fact that we're going for Feudalism here, which is the more expensive tech (by 200 beakers).

You can get theocracy by beelining Aestetics after Monarchy (Not sure what other techs you need) and building the shwedylon Palace rather than the traditional monotheism/theology route. You can also lightbulb theology with a prophet if you can generate enough GP points.

 

[Scaphism]

You can get theocracy by beelining Aestetics after Monarchy (Not sure what other techs you need) and building the shwedylon Palace rather than the traditional monotheism/theology route. You can also lightbulb theology with a prophet if you can generate enough GP points.

Shwedagon Paya is a pretty bad choice for this gambit I think.

Sitting Bull is Philosophical and you've already built the Oracle (+2 GPP). That's 4 GP per turn, 100 needed for your first GP = 25 turns later.
That leaves Med/Poly, Monotheism as the only techs you need to pick up during that time, and Organized Religion is great for builder mode.

I wouldn't spend any time researching Aesthetics at that point - it costs 300 beakers while Polytheism (100) + Monotheism (120) only costs 220 beakers.
Furthermore the wonder costs 450 hammers (only 50 less than the Pyramids, 1/2 with gold). That's 9 longbows (at 50 hammers each). That GP will be generated without any further investment from you.

The last nails in the coffin: bulbing Theology gives you a good chance of founding the religion, and more importantly it gives you a missionary to spread to your best production city immediately. if you don't have a state religion then having Shwedagon Paya is useless. I would much rather have a shot at founding Christianity and getting a missionary, with no additional hammers and fewer beakers invested.

Those 80 beakers and 450 hammers will mean a world of difference in setting up an attack. Having access to Theocracy and Organized Religion is enough - one for war and one for building. If you were talking about a Spiritual leader then having access to pacifism/free religion early would be tempting, particularly since it would take 50 turns for your GP to be born.

In all I'd much rather invest those 450 hammers into extra longbows and infrastructure to support the war. Even if those longbows are at 8xp instead of 10 - that's just one victory away from another promotion (and the fast healing that goes with it).

If you've gone after a Feudalism slingshot, you probably have 2 cities. It's doubtful that you'd have 3. You can probably expect ~10 hammers per turn on average: ~ size 4 working 2 mines and some whipping thrown in. So you could build ~5-10 longbows in those 25 turns before you bulb Theology. That's enough units/time to start a crusade and take a capital. Your reinforcements can then be built with Theocracy's XP bonus - except around that time you'll probably get your first Great General.

----
And I've written an essay. Time to go back to work!

*Edit* Oops. I forgot you need Masonry to get Organized Religion. That's another 80 beakers. However you should be able to get some discount on it for knowing Mysticism+Mining and potentially from having neighbors who already know it.

 

[gettingfat]

If you've gone after a Feudalism slingshot, you probably have 2 cities. It's doubtful that you'd have 3. You can probably expect ~10 hammers per turn on average: ~ size 4 working 2 mines and some whipping thrown in. So you could build ~5-10 longbows in those 25 turns before you bulb Theology. That's enough units/time to start a crusade and take a capital. Your reinforcements can then be built with Theocracy's XP bonus - except around that time you'll probably get your first Great General.

.

I usually carry 3 or once in a while even 4 cities to go after the Feudalism slingshot. You have one city stuck with the Oracle for a while, another probably needs a library and is for research. A production city hooked up to a strategic resource to crank out a reasonable number of military units is critical to fend off the barbarians. The increase in maintainence can be offset if you also put a couple of cottages there. 4 cities are the limit though. Also if you only have 2 cities and you fail the slingshot, you will probably be in big trouble for being cornered.

 

[Scaphism]

3 cities should be possible. I was responding to the idea that Theocracy would benefit Sitting Bull the most, which isn't enough incentive for me to go after Shwedagon Paya.

1 of your cities definitely needs commerce focus. If you can get a third out, great, particularly if that can be a military/production city. Sitting Bull is really in an ideal position to pull this off though - he's not reliant on Metal for Dog Soldiers so he doesn't have to pick a city near a strategic resource. The commerce city could potentially work 2-3 commerce tiles (gold + cottage floodplains?) while slow-building another settler, and still bring in excellent commerce.

The Civs to fear most in that case are Persia and Egypt with their Chariot UUs. Both eat axemen and Immortals would tear up archers too.

 

[Dan Quale]

Longbows are terrible attack units, no city raider, about equal base offensive str as a swordsman. While you are making the beeline your economy suffers
I truly do not understand this slingshot, and will rarely build an archer let along a longbow.
If you want the same experience on your units, simply start some ancient wars and pop 2 ggs, boom there you go put them in your main millitary city, and the same exp granted by millitary civics without being forced to harm your economy.

 

[Percy]

I tried attacking with Protective Longbows with 5 XP, and couldn't do any damage at all. All my longbows crashed against the enemy cities. I don't see how you can afford not to bring siege.

EDIT: Thanks Dan, exactly what i feel like. I need people to explain why they think it is good.

 

[InvisibleStalke]

Longbows are great attack units if you understand when you get them.

Assuming Sitting Bull 10xp longbows in the BCs, then you are attacking archers, axes, chariots and maybe swords. But mainly archers.

With drill 4 or drill 2/cover/shock longbows, what can stand against them? You can take capitals with these guys.

Would you rather have a CR1 sword or a Drill 4 longbow? Personally I'd take the drill 4 longbow. Or the drill2 cover+shock longbow makes a pretty good city attacker since defenders will be vulnerable to either cover or shock.

And once you take a city, a CG3 longbow is a complete garrison in a single unit.

Eventually the AIs get longbows and your attack is less effective. You definitely need seige at that point. But you need seige with any other attacker vs longbows too (except rifles maybe ).

Even then you can still take cities - I had lots of longbows sitting around with 6 or 7 promotions. The seige needs to soften the city first and then the longbows can clean up damaged defenders.

 

[InvisibleStalke]

Longbows are terrible attack units, no city raider, about equal base offensive str as a swordsman. While you are making the beeline your economy suffers
I truly do not understand this slingshot, and will rarely build an archer let along a longbow.
If you want the same experience on your units, simply start some ancient wars and pop 2 ggs, boom there you go put them in your main millitary city, and the same exp granted by millitary civics without being forced to harm your economy.

I wouldn't do this with any leader other than Sitting Bull - you are right there are other ways of doing the same thing and the payoff isn't as high. 10xp units are pretty powerful though at that era of the game.

But your economy doesn't suffer - Monarchy is a great tech anyway and you only build a couple of cities so you are still researching quickly. What suffers is expansion, but once you have longbows vs archers, you expand very quickly into those cities the AI has built for you.

But the main reason for doing this is that its fun. Promotions are fun. Fighting with longbows instead of the same old swords and axes is fun. Going for Feudalism instead of the same old Code of Laws slingshot is fun.

 

[gettingfat]

Longbows are terrible attack units, no city raider, about equal base offensive str as a swordsman. While you are making the beeline your economy suffers
I truly do not understand this slingshot, and will rarely build an archer let along a longbow.
If you want the same experience on your units, simply start some ancient wars and pop 2 ggs, boom there you go put them in your main millitary city, and the same exp granted by millitary civics without being forced to harm your economy.

As invisiblestalker said, it's fun. Besides, a cover longbowmen is better than a CR1 swordman in attacking archers, requires no resource, and see basically no counter-units. And to pull off a successful Feud. SS, you need to get it done before 900BC, preferrably 1200BC, so most likely you will only see archers, axes and spears. In addition, the capacity to build longbows doesn't mean prevent you from building those "conventional" early units like axes(you need BW somewhere in your research path anyway). In that case you can start with CR2 or shock axes to complement your longbows.

And if you don't want wars, this SS gives you a very good 1000+ beaker trade commodity, far better than CoL. Monarchy is a very good civic. Longbows can stop any enemies at that point. If your're spiritual you may also use serfdom once in a while to get the tiles improved faster. So overall you can turn yourself into a serious tech/economy powerhouse. That's not too bad.

 

[kniteowl]

I'd only do this if I have the right leader and a Great commerce Start, possibly a gold mine in my FC.

It makes The beeline a lot smoother and the rush a lot quicker.

Btw Scaphism if you're lucky enough to get a religion you can build a temple and assign a Priest in your Oracle City for 5GPP which will give you theology in 20 turns. With Sitting Bull that's 10GPP, gets you the Prophet in 10 turns.

 

[Percy]

How do you get 10xp units in the BC? 3XP from Barracks, 3XP from Totem, 2 from Vassalage, and then?
And in your calculations, you keep "forgetting" to add in the culture defence of the cities you attack, the bonuses from Fortify, and the potential hill defence.
I had about five or six 2-promotion longbows who were crushed by two unpromoted Swordsmen in a city. I might have had a very bad luck, but the odds were at 30% at most anyway, so not that much.

I'm sorry, it's probably because i'm bad, but i just don't get it.

 

[Phrederick]

Would you rather have a CR1 sword or a Drill 4 longbow? Personally I'd take the drill 4 longbow. Or the drill2 cover+shock longbow makes a pretty good city attacker since defenders will be vulnerable to either cover or shock.

That's a false choice. A drill 4 longbow is assuming 10exp, which only comes about with theology/vassalage. You could build CR2 swords instead, which would be cheaper and probably better than longbows at taking cities. However, as you said, it's probabaly a lot of fun to attack with longbows, so I might try it some game.

 

[Loose Nut]

I'd only do this if I have the right leader and a Great commerce Start, possibly a gold mine in my FC.

It makes The beeline a lot smoother and the rush a lot quicker.

Yeah, these are the only times I have done it: Brennus had two gold mines by his first city when I went early feudal with him. I also managed to pull it off with Gandhi once, but that was a combination of good commerce (cottaged rivers IIRC), no copper or horses so I had the motivation, and luck, because I wound up building the thing pretty late.

Another drawback to the longbow rush is that longbows are pretty heavy on the resources for that stage of the game, so, as has been suggested, it's better to use double-promoted axes or swords for the city-breaking, and longbows to defend the stack and maybe mop up.

It's nice to get use out of feudal civics for a change: I almost always prioritize CS over feudalism so I rarely go into vassalage, and serfdom vs. slavery is not usually a contest, except for spiritual civs in the early game where there's lots of improvements to build, and maybe a couple other circumstances, like you're stuck with lots of jungle.