Help me not suck at Toku

[budweiser]

Unclejj - I dont think you should discount the Samurai. They give 2 first strikes, a very nice window vs the longbow. I would use them to go from 6 cities to 12, then go gunpowder.

 

[dingding]

Unclejj - I dont think you should discount the Samurai. They give 2 first strikes, a very nice window vs the longbow. I would use them to go from 6 cities to 12, then go gunpowder.

IIRC, Samurai has 3 first strikes: 2 with unit's own capability and 1 with unit's free upgrade.

What is interesting it's Samurai gets much better odds face to Machine gun than Rifles.

 

[TCMIV]

Hard to believe Toku has such a bad reputation

Actually a couple of days ago I wrote a short battle report of Toku in Deity, maybe that would give you an example. Here is the link: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=355009.

From your screenshots I can say it's not a problem with Toku but mainly with some expansion skills: if you could make the second city (Osaka) at the place of Canterberry (fourth city of England), the game (and the rush) could have been much more easier - London is so close.

I can't see the difficulty you were playing in but from that you built the GLH in the second city I guess the difficulty is Emperor or below, in which agressive expansion and rush are quite feasible.

Remember just one thing, just one: the best way to use Toku's traits is to be at War, War, War.

My capital wasn't really great for producing settlers quickly in the early game, and no mining means I can't immediately start chopping them, so I really don't see how I could out expand Victoria from this position. I should have rushed I guess, but I went in to playing Toku with something of a plan and a rush wasn't part of it. I feel like early rushing with just axes gets pretty old.

Anyway I started a new Toku game and had a bit better starting position, no early war in this one either (except Mao DoW'ing semi early but I was ready). Samurai beelined and chopped up half the world already. Now it's just a little boring having pretty much sealed a victory but I might play it out anyway, love the samurai!

 

[vicawoo]

My capital wasn't really great for producing settlers quickly in the early game, and no mining means I can't immediately start chopping them, so I really don't see how I could out expand Victoria from this position. I should have rushed I guess, but I went in to playing Toku with something of a plan and a rush wasn't part of it. I feel like early rushing with just axes gets pretty old.

Why would your capital be bad at producing settlers? How much production do you expect from a good early settler capital? Also you have double farms, so you're set for worker techs until turn 27. Not to mention you can get agriculture/mining before your first worker finishes, so your worker is busy until turn 37, by which time you'll have bronze working.

I wouldn't say axe rushing is old until you can do a perfect axe rush.

Your own potential for improvement far outweigh any traits or leaders. In fact no traits would have significantly helped your expansion.

 

[TCMIV]

Why would your capital be bad at producing settlers? How much production do you expect from a good early settler capital? Also you have double farms, so you're set for worker techs until turn 27. Not to mention you can get agriculture/mining before your first worker finishes, so your worker is busy until turn 37, by which time you'll have bronze working.

I wouldn't say axe rushing is old until you can do a perfect axe rush.

Your own potential for improvement far outweigh any traits or leaders. In fact no traits would have significantly helped your expansion.

Well, in my opinion, an axe rush is just boring. Just like a chariot rush or a quechua rush, they just get old. Maybe it's necessary or helpful in games like this, but I don't like that style of play.

 

[dingding]

Well, in my opinion, an axe rush is just boring. Just like a chariot rush or a quechua rush, they just get old. Maybe it's necessary or helpful in games like this, but I don't like that style of play.

I think you might have misunderstood. Expansion is not equal to a rush.

As I mentioned before, to my mind it's quite feasible to get the Canterberry's place with your second settler. It's been a while I didn't play in Immortal or below, but even in Deity my second settler is often built at the same time of AI's fourth settler (two at the beginning, two are built later). (if you were playing Deity, you can ignore all I say here)

From your early scouting, it's not difficult to learn the place is quite limited and we should decide to take an aggressive expansion strategy by "rushing" settlers to give pressure to your neighbor. After this, it's a problem of military expansion: rush or something.

That's why he said:

Your own potential for improvement far outweigh any traits or leaders. In fact no traits would have significantly helped your expansion.

 

[UncleJJ]

Unclejj - I dont think you should discount the Samurai. They give 2 first strikes, a very nice window vs the longbow. I would use them to go from 6 cities to 12, then go gunpowder.

Samurai are quite good troops, but require iron and support from catapults etc. If you engage in significant medival warfare it will slow down your overall tech rate and hence attaining Toku's main strength, which I think is the drafting of gunpowder troops over a long period. I maintain that it is better to get to Nationhood and Gunpowder as quickly as possible, then trade for Machinery and Engineering. Then it's ok to build a few samurai (if you have iron) as specialist CR attackers (or upgrade some axemen) but the main strength of the Toku army is still the massed drafted muskets, then rifles, then infantry. Initially trebuchets are good support but you should research Steel for cannons (also requires iron) as soon as possible and usually before Rifling (depends on map and if enemy has cuirassiers).

I think Toku can be played as a middle of the road economy skipping wonders (except to gain failure cash) and basing the game on warmongering and not being afraid to bully to extort techs or cash between wars from those weaker AIs you intend to wipe out. Having a large and technologically backward empire is the ideal time to use espionage to control the game, stealing techs that are needed and disrupting any attempts at Space or Cultural victories. The combination of military power and espionage is strong in the late game.

 

[futurehermit]

I agree that Toku is a good candidate for espionage. However, I think that the best way to do that is through some dedicated spy specialist cities rather than through the espionage slider with cottage spam. That is because I think a cottage spam should take you into the renaissance/industrial eras, but then Toku's strength is really a mass workshop spam under CS/SP. It's not that painful to plow under all those villages/towns when you see your production go through the roof and you know a domination victory is not far behind.

I agree though that the Samurai is a tempting trap in most cases and that Toku should be played with a heavy heavy focus on economy early while getting to the gunpowder eras asap.

 

[Khan Quest]

Well, in my opinion, an axe rush is just boring. Just like a chariot rush or a quechua rush, they just get old. Maybe it's necessary or helpful in games like this, but I don't like that style of play.

I want to succeed using Toku, but I don't want to use his strengths.

 

[noto2]

Toku is NOT a weak leader, come on OP. He's like a work-horse, not glamorous, beautiful or glitzy, but he'll get the job done. He can't spam those shiny wonders, or work financial boosted cottages, or get early GP from philosophical, no, but he's a solid, reliable leader. Why? He's very flexible. If he gets copper he has aggressive boosted axes/swords as an option. Are you getting boxed in? No problem, axe rush and deal with the annoying neighbour. Samurai are very powerful units. When your siege weakens the enemy defenders, the first strikes mean your samurai will kill them while taking barely any damage. Also, samurai will defend the stack easier with those first strikes as well. Again, it's just an option. If you get great land at the start, no need to axe rush. You don't need to attack anyone with samurai either, if you're researchign well and everything is peachy. But, if an AI is getting too advanced and not building enough military you have samurai to teach them a lesson. So we already talked about 2 windows of opportunity - axes/swords, and samurai. Then comes the 3rd - gunpowder. Toku's gunpowder troops are seriously buff. You can build them, or you can draft them (probably better). Toku can draft riflemen that would beat redcoats. His muskets are great, his rifles are very strong, so he can again effectively wage war. Infantry/artillery is another option. Among all that, he has the protective trait from the start as well, so if you got surprise DOW'ed you have some protective archers to help save your cities, regardless of whether or not you have metals. The UB can help you gain a production advantage in a close game.
Anyway, Toku isn't a weak leader. He's arguably the most reliable war-monger, meaning his strenghts don't rely on any one particular unit or any one particular resource (like Rome, for example). In any game you should be able to play him as a strong military leader.

 

[The Almighty dF]

Toku is NOT a weak leader, come on OP. He's like a work-horse, not glamorous, beautiful or glitzy, but he'll get the job done. He can't spam those shiny wonders, or work financial boosted cottages, or get early GP from philosophical, no, but he's a solid, reliable leader. Why? He's very flexible. If he gets copper he has aggressive boosted axes/swords as an option. Are you getting boxed in? No problem, axe rush and deal with the annoying neighbour. Samurai are very powerful units. When your siege weakens the enemy defenders, the first strikes mean your samurai will kill them while taking barely any damage. Also, samurai will defend the stack easier with those first strikes as well. Again, it's just an option. If you get great land at the start, no need to axe rush. You don't need to attack anyone with samurai either, if you're researchign well and everything is peachy. But, if an AI is getting too advanced and not building enough military you have samurai to teach them a lesson. So we already talked about 2 windows of opportunity - axes/swords, and samurai. Then comes the 3rd - gunpowder. Toku's gunpowder troops are seriously buff. You can build them, or you can draft them (probably better). Toku can draft riflemen that would beat redcoats. His muskets are great, his rifles are very strong, so he can again effectively wage war. Infantry/artillery is another option. Among all that, he has the protective trait from the start as well, so if you got surprise DOW'ed you have some protective archers to help save your cities, regardless of whether or not you have metals. The UB can help you gain a production advantage in a close game.
Anyway, Toku isn't a weak leader. He's arguably the most reliable war-monger, meaning his strenghts don't rely on any one particular unit or any one particular resource (like Rome, for example). In any game you should be able to play him as a strong military leader.

His UU requires Iron, unlike the normal maceman which can work with copper as well.
His traits are -strictly- warmongering (Aggressive for early wars, Protective for later wars) and defense (Protective.)
I've gotta disagree pretty strongly on him being the most reliable warmonger.
I can give you at least that he's not the weak-est- leader, though. That probably goes to Saladin.

He has nothing that helps his economy, nothing that helps his empire, nothing that helps him tech... he only gets war benefits, and not even the kind of war benefits that the Mongols, Vikings, Zulu, or Carthage get.
I can't think of an area where Tokugawa really shines when compared to the other Civ leaders.

 

[budweiser]

I just don't get why people say he has nothing for economy. He starts with Fishing and The Wheel. Thats pottery and cottages as tech number one!

Heck with agg warriors and cheap barracks you could even go Pottery>Writing>Alpha and be fine. The pen is mightier. Chop a library and you can probaly bulb CoL or Philo or both.

 

[vicawoo]

Fishing alone gives +2 commerce for each seafood. The wheel will give you +2 commerce for the first city you connect, and +1 for each afterwards. That alone can be sufficient to keep you from stalling until the 5th city. Of course you may not want commerce techs early and want food/hammer techs, but that's a problem with excess.

People make it sound like the majority of traits help you economically, when only 4 do directly: financial, organized, philosophical, and charismatic. Imperialistic and expansive and industrious only help with hammers, spiritual is iffy, creative, aggressive, protective don't.

 

[Mudcrab]

Toku has fishing, and your cities have fish. So no need to worry over food/whipping. You could have tried whipping out an axe rush army, and take 2 of the closer englich cities. I say 2 because by that time you can opt for peace if you wish, otherwise go for more, depending on the strength of your SOD.

 

[noto2]

His UU requires Iron, unlike the normal maceman which can work with copper as well.
His traits are -strictly- warmongering (Aggressive for early wars, Protective for later wars) and defense (Protective.)
I've gotta disagree pretty strongly on him being the most reliable warmonger.
I can give you at least that he's not the weak-est- leader, though. That probably goes to Saladin.

He has nothing that helps his economy, nothing that helps his empire, nothing that helps him tech... he only gets war benefits, and not even the kind of war benefits that the Mongols, Vikings, Zulu, or Carthage get.
I can't think of an area where Tokugawa really shines when compared to the other Civ leaders.

When I say reliable, what I mean is his ability to war is more consistent than those of other leaders. Julius Ceasar, for example, can't do much without early iron. The charismatic and imperialistic traits can wind up being very powerful for the military, but they require more than the aggressive trait, which really only requires metal or gunpowder. The protective trait gives you boost without requiring anything. Imperialistic does nothing for you before your first general, and probably won't match aggressive until well into the game. Charismatic also does nothing for you militarily at first. It grows stronger as you get great generals, get into the mid-game and run war civics, and win combat. Again, it'll take a while for charismatic to match aggressive.
Let's look at the civs you mentioned.
The Zulu. Hmm...Toku has aggressive, as does Shaka, and he has protective as well. The impi is a nice choking unit, you can use it to invade an enemy and pillage resources, but I would hardly call it a better unit than the samurai. Toku has equal melee troops, better archer and gunpowder troops, and the samurai are very powerful UUs. I don't see how Shaka is a better warmonger than Toku.
Ragnar - same thing, it's aggressive vs aggressive, and now it's berserks vs samurai. Berserks aren't bad, but how are they much better than samurai? I'd say they're probably an even match. Again, Toku will have better gunpowder and archery troops than Ragnar. How is Ragnar better?
Hannibal? Numidian Cavalry, despite the fact that many people in this forum hate them, are not bad. Are they better than samurai? Umm... I'll be generous and say they're even. Now...charismatic vs Toku's traits. Well...Hannibal has no warfare advantage early game except for Numidians. Charismatic will give his troops an extra promotion if they are horse based (stables) and he's running a war civic, or if he's running both war civics. Toku's troops get free promotions just from being melee or archery. By the time you hit gunpowder, Toku's troops are again going to have an adge over Hannibal's. How is Hannibal better?
Finally, Gengis Khan. Well, he's pretty flexible too. Melee units get a boost, as do horse units from his UB. Keshiks really aren't that strong, though.

I never said Toku was a better overall leader than anyone, or even a better overall warmonger. He's one of if not the most consistent and reliable warmongers in that no matter what the map, no matter what resources, his military will be guaranteed certain advantages.

 

[vicawoo]

Shaka's not a good example, because expansive is an excellent support trait, and he has ikhandas.
Archers aren't very useful if you already have aggressive melee.
Genghis and Kublai are good warmongers, even without horses.

Contrary to what people think, in terms of pure early non-mounted war ability, charismatic is worse than aggressive. It's drastically worse at early exp levels, and is only better at like 49 exp.

 

[CarlH]

Contrary to what people think, in terms of pure early non-mounted war ability, charismatic is worse than aggressive. It's drastically worse at early exp levels, and is only better at like 49 exp.

Why do you say this?

As an extreme example i find having my exploring warrior getting woodsman 2 after its 3rd battle (often when the barb archers start showing up) means survival = fogbusting = less need for warriors = smoother early part of the game.

 

[vicawoo]

Well, I mentioned warring ability. Would you rather have an advantage at exp levels 0, 1, 2, and 3, or an mostly equal level at exp 4? An advantage at levels 5, 6, 7, or equality at 8? Etc. Moreover, you won't normally create 4 exp units.

In your warrior example, consider that a deity lion/panther has 50% odds with a non-aggressive warrior, whereas aggressive has around 15% better survival odds. Or a bear vs warrior in the woods (10%). Or a warrior vs an archer pre-level 4.

 

[futurehermit]

Explain to me the situation where you would ACTUALLY tech pottery FIRST with Toku.

The only situation I can think of is where you start on the coast with seafood and also have floodplains with no other land-based resources. But even then you'll be building workboats first and could easily tech something else (min-bw) before needing to tech pottery.

Generally speaking you want to improve FOOD SPECIALS first, meaning that if you start inland, you're going to be teching at least ag maybe hunt and/or ah first before pottery. Then, unless you have a few floodplains that you want to get cottages down on, you're going to be teching other important things: mining, bw, ah (horses) prior to teching pottery because you're not going to be working a grassland cottage when there's pigs to work.

I've never understood the argument: Toku starts with fish/wheel so you can go pottery first. I want to get to BW asap before I start thinking about cottages. Even DaveMcW preaches working resources first before cottages. And that means you need the techs to work them: ag, ah, bw (copper), hunt, etc.

Toku is ok-ish if he starts coastal and you can work a couple seafood. I really hate rushing with him though unless the neighbour is REALLY close, because if you get strung out a bit, economic recovery is really, really difficult compared to leaders with economic bonuses (fin, phi, ind, org, etc.)

EDIT: I stand by my previous comments that the way to play Toku to his strengths is to keep a compact empire early, focus exclusively on economy, and then come out of your shell during the gunpowder era. You just need to ensure space for ~8 cities where most of them can serve as drafting centers with at least one getting the GT. Then, if you can survive until gunpowder with at least tech parity, you should be able to conquer a civilization or two to give you what you need to go on to victory.

 

[azzaman333]

His UU requires Iron, unlike the normal maceman which can work with copper as well.
His traits are -strictly- warmongering (Aggressive for early wars, Protective for later wars) and defense (Protective.)
I've gotta disagree pretty strongly on him being the most reliable warmonger.
I can give you at least that he's not the weak-est- leader, though. That probably goes to Saladin.

He has nothing that helps his economy, nothing that helps his empire, nothing that helps him tech... he only gets war benefits, and not even the kind of war benefits that the Mongols, Vikings, Zulu, or Carthage get.
I can't think of an area where Tokugawa really shines when compared to the other Civ leaders.

Saladin has a very nice UB, and Spiritual. Those two factors put him way above Toku.

The only leader I might say is worse than Tokugawa would be Boudica. Pure military traits, crap UB, situationally useful UU, terrible starting techs.