What makes Keshiks so good?

[ParadigmShifter]

Neigh!

(Although your post was full of whinny).

 

[plasmacannon]

"What makes Keshiks so good?"

Not having a human opponent playing Maya well.


The Holkan negates their first strike, kills Keshiks and doesn't require a resourse, so, can't be stopped.
Pair it up with some chariots and Elephants, and Mongolians cry.

Zulus do a pretty good job too.
They move speed 2 as well (inculding the keshik's mobility), start with combat1, cost less, and get terrain bonuses.
With Woods3, Impi's get 2 1st strikes, vs the keshik's 1, and can heal.
They can also take the vs. mounted promotion.

 

[vicawoo]

My first post here. Hello everyone.

So I take a look on the successful Keshik domination game. I have a couple questions, I am only referring to single player game. I am also only referring to medium to high difficulty (at least monarch)

Is it only good on warlord/ BTS with the unique building? In Vanilla they will only get 1 promotion. Also Vanilla do not have early spy, making Keshik useless after the enemy has longbowman because of high culture defense bonus.

How many cities do you need before you start building Keshik? Since horse archers are expensive (at that time) don't you need more cities to keep up production?

Since most of the cities are cottaged, won't they be not very productive?

The immortal domination strike the capital (or high production city) first to slow AI counter. But sometimes the enemies capital is simply not within reach. The whole point of the immortal domination is to be able to capture enemies top city in two turns.

I wrote up a horse archer guide, although there's no guarantees it's readable by people other than myself. You can go 2, 3, or 4 cities, depending on how you choose to boost your tech to horse archers (special commerce, libraries, cottages), how much you're willing to sacrifice the power of your rush vs speed.

It's preferable you send at least 3 horse archers (since free unit supply outside your borders should be about 3) to scout their land with open borders and find their metal, and pillage/raze the city on the first turn of war. Often you'll have enough angles of approach that you can the capital in 2 or 3 turns. Horse archer rushes are worst when they're on a narrow peninsula which forces you to march down a long corridor, with metal at the back.

Vanilla lacks stables? Pre-BTS horse archers received a 10% penalty attacking cities.

 

[NetGear]

The thread title reminded me of this one time when I randomed genghis in noble pangea.

It was mildy amusing to conquer the world before medieval era... as my military was disbanding to strikes. Hah.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

The Holkan negates their first strike, kills Keshiks and doesn't require a resourse, so, can't be stopped.
Pair it up with some chariots and Elephants, and Mongolians cry.

Somehow I don't think any of those units make AGG melee cry .

 

[plasmacannon]

I like the Mongols.
Genghis Khan was one of my early starting leader choices.
He builds settlers and their barracks quickly, so, I can get archers out, then Keshiks.

We have heard alot on how awesome the Mongols are.
We don't hear much about what will stop them in their tracks, if they encounter them.

Or for other Empires, not, to pick on the Mongols. They were just listed in this post.