British Strategy Thread

From the maker of the British Question Thread.....
Finally Heatedforce makes it.

Hi everyone. Im going to start with an easy strat i used when i first started playing on eso. A Longbow/musket rush. Very effective vs colonial units. Only problem is that since they are both inf, you need at least double rax or have to wait and take turns making them. The downfall is you cant destroy buildings easily. I dont remember what cards i had in my deck so i cant help you there except say choose whatever you like weather its muskets improvements or reasource cards. Im going to try an explain it but dont be sad if i do it wrong cuase im new to this.

Send 1 settler to herd animals towards your town center or just your settlers while the rest gather crates.
Build a house for every 135 wood you get. (every house you have to make one additional settler. Ex. 1 house=17 settlers 2 houses=18 settlers)
Make settlers and send them to your hunts. Gather until you get 800 food and have either 17 settlers or 18 depending on how many manors you have.
Age with philospher prince for 500 food to go towards your army.
Send most of your settlers towards trees for wood. About 12 or 13. Send 2 or 3 to a mine. Rest on food.
Build another manor or 2 so you have 40 or 50 total pop. But save about 150 wood so you can make a rax soon after you age.

Start making settlers again. Also have 2 or 3 settlers gather the food crate.
Set your settlers to 8 on food, 7 on wood and 3 on coin if you had 17 and build 1 house during age up. If you have more set 1 more on coin or food.
Build the rax. You can build a fb for a faster rush or stay back for more of a defensive incase of an even earlier rush
Make 5 lbs first(lb= longbows) Keep gathering wood for a second rax
After the lbs come out make 5 muskets. If you have 200 wood, make another rax or wait until you do and just make another set of muskets after the first batch.
Make the rax by now and make 5 longbows. Plus you have another 5 muskets coming for 15 muskets and 10 longbows total. If you want you could have the 5 longbows raid a little bit while waiting for the second batch of muskets but dont lose them!
Not sure what time this is since i havent done it in a while and its modified from what i orginally did. By now you should attack with 15 muskets and 10 lbs. You should also have a strong eco and can continussly make both units together.

I hope that i did a good job of explaining. This is more of a strating strat since you use lbs range for less micro that crossbows and muskets for cav and protecting the lbs against hi(heavy inf). Even though it is more of a strating strat to getting in with the Brits, it is an overall solid strat.

If anyone thinks this strat need any improvements or sugestions, please tell and ill adjust each british strat i put on that you guys think should be changed in some way.

one thing i would do different tht most high ranks do... figure out how to manor boom while makin ur units non stop... manor booms r deadly soz use tht to ur advantage

wat cards should u send for this?

One thing a british player should know is to always manor boom so i didnt include saying that. But you also need to know not to an all out manor boom as this is a rush. Well some cards would be 700 food and wood, yeomen, 6 muskets(for faster rush against cav and for your seige) and longbows (for faster rush and aganist inf), fencing school, exotic hardwears for a faster wood production. Those are some to be sugested using this strat. Of course i didnt put in obvious cards like 3 settlers, fort, and 2 factories..

hm ok..

for future posted strats jus tell the card order up till the main strat is done..

and i wondered bout the manor boom cuz since its a rush u might of wanted to skip it

Well i would boom as i rush. Like british players usally have 3 or 4 houses as they age to 2 so you wouldnt make more until the pop is almost full in rush senarios. But that is a lot more houses than most civs have by then so it still counts as a small boom. You know a boom as you rush strat, kinda.

Oh yea forgot to say Thanks Basset i will next time.

they do? i usually only see 2 if they r rushing... if they r booming they hav 6+ goin into age 2... ur a mix xD

Lol yea i am. i like to be versitile if the rush goes bad.

which apparently it does half the time based on ur win %

i wouldnt wanna rush wit brits if i ever started playin them lol.. they boom so well.. and turtle very well..

Ok im going to put my musket/grenadier rush up soon, so look foward to seeing it soon.

Oh lol Basset thanks for the compliment a while back. I never noticed it. Anyways why im here is..... A New Strat!

British Musket/Grenadier rush

Note:this will take sown buildings extremely fast! Problem is you wont attack until at least 7 mins with only 10 grenadiers and 5 muskets which is why i stopped using it as my main strat. It is still a good one none-the-less.
Recomended cards:3 settlers, advanced grenadiers, fencing school, 6 muskets, and 700 food and coin crates

Discovery age: The normal 17 or 18 settler age up. Send 3 settlers as your first card. (based on how mnay manors you have like previously stated in my last strat) Age with the philosipher(sp) prince (500 food).

During age up:Put 12 or 13 settlers(based on manors again) on wood, 2 on food, and 3 on coin. Make 1 manor during age up.

Colonial age: Build a barracks and artillery foundry. Send fencing school(reduces inf training time by 40% and muskets and grenadiers are heavy inf) as your second card. Put 9 on food, 6 on coin and 3 on wood. (Note: looking back this is probably better so I will put my revised version from now on. I didnt really do this in a game but it seems better)Que up one grenadier and 1 musket. Whenever you can add, to the batchs, preferably the grenadiers. You should have around 8 grenadiers and 5 muskets by around 6:30, possibly give 10 seconds. Send second card as advanced grenadiers and attack with your army! Hit the buildings first! Go for the barracks or stable(no more military production to face your small army) or houses(then they will over pop). Once you think their army is boxed in(by either no barracks or stable or no pop to make units), go for the settlers, and as they retreat to the tc take it down! It should only take about 20-30 secs with 10 grenadiers. Then GG.

Important facts: Always add to army while attacking. I would recomend after 10 grenadiers, start focusing more on muskets than grenadiers as you will probably see some more cav coming.
You might see attack buildings first and think"What?! has he gone mad?! Always atack settlers first!". The answer is no i haven't, British advanced grenadiers have mad stats just like British muskets have beastly stats. Advanced grenadiers in colonial have, 21 ranged attack, 3 area damage, around 16 hand attack(if i remember right), and 120 seige damage. (I cant remember their hp at this moment but i know its over 200) That means 10 grenadiers take down a house(1000hp) in 3 seconds!! And it only takes 6 or 7 attacks(give or take becuase of tc fire and minutemen) and a tc has 6000hp! So basiclly its better to attack buildings.
Grenadiers are expensive so dont go wasting them.
There were 3 settlers on wood so you can slowly manor boom. Always make manors with the wood.

So i think thats it. The british can afford a grenadier rush becuase of their great economy. If you vs an infantry army, grenadiers get a mulitplier vs heavy inf and have an area damage of 3 meaning they demolish inf. So no worries there. Weaknesses are:expensive units, small raiding army of 13 to 15, if there is all cav you will lose with only 5 muskets British or not and once you lose your army, it is hard to get the reasources to make it back fast enough. This is a good strat and i should know becuase i used it as my main strat but now its kinda retired for me and i use it occasionlly.

Oh yea please post what you think of it.

Taken from Aoe heaven becuase i didnt want to rewrite it. Porbably the best british ff ever! Unfortunatly, the British have the worst ff in the game as there is no point becuase your royal guard units(muskets,hussars, and possibly longbows, depends on the card yeomen is sent in age 3) are in age 2. I have used this before in a few rated games and it does work well.
Writen by Beatnik Joe: I edited a little bit of it though for the current patch. The ((....)) are my edits and comments.


BWKiC - The "Black Watch Kick in the Crotch"
This is an article describing a British Fast Fortress strategy. It includes a build order and 5 4 recorded games. (And yes, it works great in 1.06. Edit: nerfed in 1.08!)

Patch 1.08 \ Warchiefs update Beware the rush! With the FF nerfed and out of favor and the rush much more common, a straight FF is risky and requires careful planning. You may now find the strategy better to pull off in team games or in situations where you must counter an opponent's FF. For the time being, the FF is quite out of fashion, so be careful -- most games you'll get rushed. But hey, who knows? Maybe the FF will be back in business next patch!

Patch 1.06 update (with 1 recording!): Oh, it is on! 1.06 brought several British bonuses \ enemy civ nerfs that should improve this strat even further! I certainly won't start shouting "OP" just yet, but let's just say that this patch fills me with a sense of well-being. My belief is that aggressive BWKiC may now be correct in many situations. I believe Britain can now be played extremely aggressively. I think our patience as British players has at last paid off! ((Yes Britian can still be played aggressively))

1.06 Single-Player Recording
Here's a recorded game from 1.06! This is against the Sandbox AI to demonstrate BWKiC v2.0. It features:


6:57 Fortress time

8 Black Watch + 2 Falconets at 7:41 (faster than 1.05!!)

17 Black Watch + 2 Falconets at 9:47 (*)

Me managing to lose 1 Highlander to the Sandbox AI. It's worth watching just to see this n00bidity in action. It's so bad it almost takes skill.
(*) - It would have been 17 Black Watch if the AI hadn't killed one. So in reality it was 16. But 1 was with us in spirit.
I'll try to post the build order for this soon, but I will mention that I went with 1 less villager and used Ossian's enhancement of producing vills during colonial.

Main Article:
Having trouble with the British? Eaten alive by that Spanish fast fortress? Wondering what keeps you coming back time and time again to such an underpowered civ((apparently they were back before i was on eso online))as the Brits? Maybe it's time for a little help from the Black Watch!

I've tried colonial warfare((best strat currently but this is a great surprise)), I've tried to boom... but both approaches seem doomed in the current FF and shipment-dominated gameplay. Playing with Brits was destroying my record and there seemed to be no way to make the wood-heavy, sluggish Brits get off the ground. What was wrong with them? What was wrong with me?

But giving up is for people who actually care about their record. Not I! To paraphrase Mokon, you get a lot further if you blame yourself than if you blame the civ.

So I sat down and I studied the Brits, wondering what could make their Fast Fortress competitive. I noticed that they had the following things going for them:


The 2 falconet card, an excellent card indeed.

The opportunity to create 8 Black Watch highlanders from the church VERY quickly. Highlanders are great anti-cav units and all-around bruisers.

The Black Watch will always be delivered, even when you don't have enough houses. (This is critical!)

The Black Watch are delivered in seconds, unlike conventional merc shipments, which take 1 full minute.

The Thin Red Line((i do not recommend using this tech as it slows your inf)) is also available from the church.

Excellent economic recovery due to the manor boom.
It is this combination of highlanders and falconets that is the basis of BWKiC. With good luck and a good map, you can get this lethal combination out anywhere from 7:20 (on Carolina), but typically around 7:45-8:15 in the heat of battle.

To pull this off, you MUST get a trading post ASAP, and you must perform a solid fast fortress. The advanced church must be shipped during the age to fortress, and the falconet card must be shipped as soon as you hit fortress. Even though you will not have sufficient housing, you can still research the Black Watch, and miracle of miracles, they still show up (presumably to sleep in boxes under an overpass.)

That's it -- the rest is all based off of that. There are 2 styles of BWKiC -- the aggressive style and the defensive style. In the aggressive style, we will sneak a forward tower to the enemy base and attempt to bring this highlander + falc combo right to the enemy's door as close to pre-8:00 as possible.

First some warnings: this aggressive approach is not always effective against Spain or Germany -- you may sometimes prefer the defensive BWKiC. And above all, never attempt this strat on a map without trading posts (i.e. bayou.)

Without further ado, here is my typical build order for the aggressive BWKiC: Note: Will be updated for 1.06 as soon as I can.




3 vills to hunts and 3 to food crates. Note that if animals are close enough, you do not need to herd on your first shot. Queue villagers!

Collect wood crates once food crates exhausted. Once done, move 1 crate collector to hunts. You now have 4 hunters total. (down from the 5 recommended in patch 1.05, due to extra food crate.)

Remaining crate collector must build a house. Set your TC gather point to wood. You will now begin gathering wood for a trading post.

All new vills go to wood until you have the 250 necessary for a trading post. Build the trading post ASAP with your explorer (as he is fastest at this.) EVERYONE now moves to food, including TC gather point.((if i remember right, not building the tc gives you a faster age up time but you wont get as many shipments))

First card: 3 villagers

Stop producing villagers at 16((the standard british age up will give you a better econ)) (down from 17 in patch 1.05) (including the ones from your card.) Eat, eat, eat. Strongly consider eating some livestock (i.e. sheep and cattle) if you feel it will speed you up here.

Age up as soon as you have 800 food with your chosen politician. For aggressive BWKiC, we will choose The Governor for 1 tower + 200 gold((if you go philospher prince,500 food, it will give you a slightly faster age up but less defense)).

Make sure you have 100 gold before reaching colonial. If you do not, task 3-4 villagers to it until you do, then have them go back to food.

Queue 2 more villagers during the transition to colonial (for a total of 18.) Many thanks to Ossian for this great suggestion!

As soon as you hit colonial, play your 2nd card: 700 gold. Gather this gold, along with the 200 gold from aging up ASAP. Place your aggressive tower near the enemy base in a hidden spot.

Go to fortress. I prefer to age up with The Admiral of the Ocean Sea, who gives you 400 wood and a caravel. Queue one and only one villager to the town center. (We don't want to max our pop -- we still need to ship falconets.)

During the transition to fortress, place roughly 10 on food and 8 on wood, depending on your needs. Your goal: 250 wood a bit before fortress, and 1000 food shortly after that.

As soon as you are able, play your 3rd card: The Glorious Revolution (advanced church card.) As soon as you have 250 wood, build a church (before you hit fortress.)

You have now hit fortress age. You should have another shipment ready (thanks to your trading post.) ((if you choose not to make the tp, your black watch should be able to defend you until you get it or you can raid with them))Ship your 4th card: 2 Falconets.

Call the Black Watch from your church. Do NOT do this before you have shipped falconets. You will be over pop limit, but you can still call the Black Watch (it's magic!) Set the shipment arrival point to your aggressive tower. Also, try to get your caravel either fishing, whaling, or perhaps even harrassing for an econ boost.

Attack with 8 highlanders + 2 falconets (if performing aggressive BWKiC.) Optional: Research The Thin Red Line at the church for extra hitpoints at the cost of speed. Great for a defensive BWKiC, a toss-up for an aggressive BWKiC.

Begin pouring on military shipments of your choice while house booming at home. Keep 5 villagers on food to constantly produce from TC and build houses quick as you can! All new vills go to wood until you no longer wish to house boom. Quick production of houses will generate XP and drive your future military shipments. Build those houses! ((even though it doesnt say it, make units when you arent over poped. You should probably make them in the order of hussars first,if you can, then muskets and if you lose your falconets early, then falconets))Tune your shipments to your enemy -- 5 hussars, 11 longbowmen, 11 musketeers, and 6 grenadiers are your main choices. Research wood upgrades when you have the time.

From there, it's up to you! You should have a jumping economy at this point.

When attacking, you must use the highlanders to protect your falconets! They are great anti-cavalry. You will often see me goofing this in the recorded games, but do as I say, not as I do!

The BWKiC can also be used defensively (the preferred play against Spanish.) This involves choosing the 500 food politican (The Philosopher Prince) instead of the tower politician, shipping everything to your TC, and laying your fort as soon as you can. The 2 falconets and 8 highlanders work to protect your home base until the fort goes up. I especially like to use Thin Red Line here to get uber-Highlanders. From there, shipping 1000 gold for culverins is a good option, but there are many others that will work.

Thanks to Ender_Ward for (unwittingly) prodding me to release this article. You should also check out his thread Experimenting with British FF, which inspired me to get off my tuckus and finally publish this thing.

2nd.. meh it got flamed enough on the bad points @ heaven so ill leave it b

ur gren rush u age wit 400 wood(guessing) then u still hav all those vils on wood right? well manor boom and get this! ur grens weakness is.. cav! pike spam rather than musks as pikes rnt as hard on ur eco and u can mass more of em.. doin tht (w/out attackin) i had 30 pikes 13 grens @ 9 mins and makin some Lbows..it was like 15 pike and 10 grens at 7.45

basically leave ur vils on wood and send 700 food first (as u missed this on ur strat -.-") and manor boom like theres no tommorow(send those vils to food) while makin some grens.. then send 700 coin and use all tht up on grens then pike spam wit some Lbows...

btw since it wont b a fast rush anyway go for the 18 vil age up cuz u hav 1 more vil and lose mayb at most 10 secs from ur age time

That a great idea basset, but the british dont get the 400 wood politicain so we use the 500 food one. And to support the grenadiers you cant have 13 settlers on wood or youll be lucky to make 2 at a time. But yea ifyou wanted you could switch out muskets for pikes youwould just have a little different of a settler set up. And putting in another settler isa good idea too ill have to try. About the 2nd strat i didnt know it got flamed.I can see why being its the only british ff strat thats actully posted and since it as made in like 2006 its outdated, a lot. I just put it in here if people want a little surprise as no one would think the british would do a ff. Thanks for comments Basset,i like to see what people think is wrong with my strats.

FF sux cuz EVERYONE THT IS SMART rushes a british player unless ur dutch/germans.. otherwise they boom and their boom>>>ur boom

in other words they wont got resources to make an army to fight the opponent coming in at 6-7 mins

True which is why you shouldnt do it very often if at all. But still, it is a strat. Im thinking of other strats i can post on here.

i choose if at all cuz wats the point if ur gunna get raped.. i mean booming age 2 works much better

btw y did it take u so long to reply? lol

Oh thats cuase my computer was broke until now. Anyways i see your point. I think ill put up my hussar/musket rush sometime. The best of my all my british strats imo.

idk i think if u want ur eco to take off immediately wit just enough men to defend urself then id say go bows/pikes cuz their cheap and good early on... lets u full out boom faster imo

but musk/hussar is a pain to kill... bow/hussar is harder

Hmm maybe but the reasources are harder to get. Then you have to deistribute between food, coin and wood. I have discovered a way to get with the musket/hussar strat to get 16 muskets and 5 hussars out by 6:40 or 6:30, havent done it in awhile oviously, and still have a good economy.

well im jus thinkin try to keep the boom in the picture cuz then u will hav a monster eco..

Yea i see what you mean. Ill post my south sea bubble boom also.

i love the water boom..