Are the Incas broken? (1400elo)

Age of Empires III: DE III - Discussion
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Information about me- I played Aoe3 DE now for quite some time and it really goes on my nerfs, that around 20% of the games, I play against Incas.

Landunits of the Incas- I never lost a game yet against Incas, but without longbows I would have lost most of the games. I dont know what was the idea behind getting Kallankas in age2 but for me, it was one of the worst ideas ever entering this game. Theres basically no chance getting the huaracas, when they destroy your buildings. 30 range in age 2 is basically impossible to beat. Normally you can easily build Cav against them, but thats also not that easy, due to the speerman they have. a five speed spearman can easily defend these huaracas against cav. Also the Junglearcher, which is also a very strong unit, can kill with poisoned arrows everything. I saw games, where 40 junglebowman, easily halflived a mahout, what is basically ok, if the poison bonus wouldn’t make also damage.

Chimu runners - What I don’t understand about Chimu runners is, that they are quite as fast as husars, what is not understandable for me. Also they can get produced in masses, due to the Kanchas.

F. eX.: I played against a friend, Inca vs Turkey and the Chimu runners in combination with junglebowman is extremly hard to beat. He tried to safe his cannons against the chimus, didnt work, even though he put the janisarrys in melee. The Junglebowman easily killed the 5 spahis without heavy casualties and then went on to kill the janisarrys. I don’t know how I won that fight, but we have equal numbers and we both were age 3 (I had much more Chimus then junglebowman).

Water - The Incas are a ok balanced nation on water, but the Chincha ship is extremly strong in comparison to european ships. The low cost makes them extremly efficient against several ships and also their fire rate is extremy strong.

Kanchas - The houses of the Incas got quite expensive(180 wood), but with your economy you can still handle to build them quite fast, because you can allow it to keep more setlers on wood. When you got all 12 kanchas up and you got the upgrade in age 2 for them, they are very efficient for the rest of the game

Towncenters - 2 Tc’s in age? around 7 Tc’s overall? In my mind the strongest thing they could have done is giving a nation a second Towncenter in age 2. The Inca economy is alrdy strong enough and with the kanchas producing food its also very easy to build masses of spearman and junglearchers, because they mostly cost food.

Macchu Picchu/Fort - What I ask myself the most, why is it possible to stack units in it?- This is a very broken mechanic for the Incas and its always so nerfsdestroying to finally kill them, because they can do it all day long.

There are also a few other buildings, which are also very strong, but -i think these were the most broken of the Incas, but there’s much more. Also the Huaracas are a very strong unit, but in lategame they just shoot to slow to be usefull.

Overall, after Japan they are for me the strongest country in this game. They have very good military and they have strong and usefull buildings, which are sometimes broken. I hope they will fix it in the novemberupdate.
If I am wrong at some points, just tell me in the comments and I’ll change it. :slight_smile:

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They are a bit over the top right now but will be nerfed in the next patch, so I don’t think it is worth spending too much time over it.

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Well, it’s not the first time, they tried to nerf them. So it’s really hard to trust them this time again, because sadly at some points the nerfs were complete useless, because they buffed other points to extrem, I feel like there’s sometimes no good balance in the updates. But I hope this will finally change in the next patch, because I love the gameidea etc., but sometimes it’s just not that what it could have been. :confused:

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The latest patch buffed them a bit too much in age2, way overcompensating the nerfs, so they turned out OP. They were fine before.

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They were a bit weak before the most recent patch, some great changes overall with the villager shipments, changes to politicians, bolas getting buffed etc all were needed especially the change to allow them to get wood late game.
The 2 kallankas was a bit op, they’re changing huaracas range down to 12 now so even usa musk will out range them, that was more than enough of a nerf, making the card cost 500w to send is too much now and it’ll never be used.

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Well, 24 range my guy, it’s 31 range with the 4th age card and both upgrades.

I’m not a high ELO rating man, I barely got into the [top 1000] at 1v1 supremacy, but as an Inca main I think I can share a few weaknesses of the civ for making the field more fair :slight_smile:

If you guys don’t like the “Wamani” card (2 Kallankas age II), worry not, for it’s getting a +500w cost to ship in the november update, and huaracas are getting an age 2 nerf of 12 range (Both normal and siege attack).
That should be enough to stop the “age II mortar”.

Exactly… the Wamani card now only saves you only 100 resources, it’s pretty much for saving the building time and getting the Kallanka units. Won’t be used much anymore.

Now, with the Kallanka military problem out, how do you beat the war hut units?

  • The jungle bowmen: Ok, to be fair, haven’t tested it out, this is only by experience, but I do believe this unit can’t win fights against other age 2 light infantry with equal resources, the weaknesses are the slow fire rate and the overkill waste that they do without superfluous micro. Besides, they have only 20% range resist, which is lower until age 4 when comparing to for example a skirmisher, Hp (90) and range (16) is also low.
    SO, if you can’t take them with cavalry due to spearmen, just mass any unit with more than 16 range and good ranged armor and go to town on them.
    Unless they have the curare and the attack cards, don’t worry about the poison damage too much.
  • The plumed spearmen: These guys are like pikemen on steroids, they are a bit similar in stats to a halberdier but not as good with their attack. Since they are more focused for cavalry, you can use your own superior heavy infantry to beat them down, samurai wreck them, just like dopps, so let them catch the melee while your ranged units do the real work.
  • The chimu runner: Imagine them like uhlans, but slippery ones since they can ignore snare with their ability and also are smaller than cavalry, giving them better pathing. So, the best way to destroy a chimu mass is to mass your own cavalry (So you can catch them easily), they are awfull against hussars, the HP and base speed draws them back a lot, and anything with an area of effect will stop them dead on their tracks from reaching any artillery, with or without their sprint ability, so Spahi, Cuirassier or dopps is the way to go.

Ok, so you beat the military, can you go siege?

I wouldn’t recommend it, like, at all, not until age III.
They have powerful buildings as you guys found out already, Kancha houses are 2000HP and all can get greater with the age 2 building card. That card also improves TC fire, and since they can get 2 TC in age II, you will waste a lot trying to get in.
SO, unless you have an army of pikemen which somehow survived the bowmen, you should wait for artillery to siege them down.

Remember, they are more of a turtle civ, so any booming civ should stick to booming instead.

Anyway, hope that gives you any new ideas, good luck :grin:

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The standard counter to an incan age 2 comp is actually just musk huss I think( for the civs that can do that) while for those that can’t ff is probably the best option.

Chimmus have lower range resist then cav so they take more damage from musk and while there are spears and archers to worry about, with enough mass as long as the cav make contact with the archers you can just push them to death.

But I think the best BO for inca right now is a naked ff into bolas and hurracas and lancers, you can get to age 3 by like 6-6:20 and can pressure before any ff civs get their skirms out with like 15-20 bolas at the 7 min mark

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I often better end up with Pike-Long or Musk-Long, the cav often bugs around when im attacking the enemys base

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Yeah that can happen, musk huss operates best if you are attacking them on the open field, if you are in base then yeah pikes will perform better against buildings.