Ummmmm, so recently played as English vs French on Boulder Bay I think its called. I aged up before my opponent had more ships that him and lost water because the Hulk in Fuedal is just OP. I suppose that’s what people feel like vs English Longbow however at least Longbow can be countered to some extent. It seems like there is no way to beat French in Fuedal as English. My Food resources were a little high and I definitely could have castles early however at the cost of water. The other alternative is I had a very small amount of vills on food so possibly have them on Wood and Gold to get a larger mass of ships out. The final alternative is once Fuedal hits I just accept I’m losing water, use the early food eco to castle and then go uber land aggressive and be wide open to Knight raids to my eco from transport ships. So to be honest it feels like I have one play on that map and its set up for a super aggressive castle with a ram all in. I’ll be honest here, Boulder bay needs to be removed from rotation or some sort of water balance needs to take place. Against any decent player they’ll age up the same time as me and I won’t even have early advance advantage. Leaving me???
Open to any thoughts here. I also recognize that perhaps I should learn French just to play Boulder bay. Which seems dumb that a civ can’t be played on any map.
Naval maps rn are not very balanced atm which is one of the reasons why Devs removed archipelago and warring islands from QS.
Atm Rus and french are by far the best water civs.
If you are playing as English the best option you have is to use a transport ship and sneak vills on the other side of the map and make proxy barracks and try a ram timing.
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I think RUS currently dominates Boulder Bay. Its not problem with french. Its general problem with water. But I don’t think water is necessary after the patch. In 2v2s, even as french I don’t go water as its huge investment, delays your age uo a lot, and you need to invest in water eco to defend.
Also there is counter play which you can do by noy going to water and aging up early. You can either deny their water in Feudal or just push into their base as they are late in age up.
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Water is still big on boulder bay. Not only it has deep fish, there is also the naval trading post too, so you really can’t let your opponent get away with having water all for themselves, specially when it comes to the rus as their fishing boats are more effective. Also any aggression in boulder Bay is hard to pull off because of the big walking distance and if you fb and it gets scouted it’s pretty much gg.
On another note too, it’s nice that we players are not forced to go water anymore and have a lot more options on land, but being forced to go land because your opponent’s civ is too good on is just as bad.
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