Latest / Start the game already! / [ENG] Civilizations #07: Inca

Transcript

[ENG] Civilizations #07: Inca · Start the game already!

• 0:24
  The Inca have been introduced to the game in 2013 with the HD
• 0:29
  edition, and they have seen a lot of changes over the course
• 0:33
  of the past 13 years. Maybe their biggest change was
• 0:37
  with the release of the last Chieftains DLC, which brought 3
• 0:41
  S American civilizations to the game as well as an overhaul of
• 0:45
  the Inca. This timing is no coincidence
• 0:49
  because the Inca have been the only South American civilization
• 0:52
  in the game until then, so it made a lot of sense to make sure
• 0:56
  that the Inca are up to date with the South American balance.
• 1:00
  Up until today, we put the Inca together with the Aztecs and
• 1:04
  Maya and called them Mesoamerican civilizations.
• 1:07
  Even though this was only true for the Aztecs and Maya, I'm
• 1:11
  hopeful that from now on we'll differentiate between
• 1:14
  Mesoamerican South American civilizations.
• 1:17
  To further cement this, I'd like to talk a little about who the
• 1:20
  Inca were. So please get comfortable and
• 1:23
  join me on a short journey high into the Andean Mountains to a
• 1:28
  land of breathtaking peaks, sophisticated engineering and a
• 1:32
  vibrant culture that defied the odds and listened to the history
• 1:37
  of the magnificent Inca Empire. Imagine a time just a few
• 1:42
  centuries ago when the largest empire in pre Columbian America
• 1:47
  flourished. It stretched for thousands of
• 1:50
  miles along the western coast of South America, encompassing
• 1:54
  parts of modern day Peru, Ecuador, Bolivia, Argentina,
• 1:58
  Chile and Colombia. This was the Tahuan Tinsuyu, the
• 2:04
  land of the Four Quarters, as the Inca called their empire.
• 2:08
  It had a population of 10 million across different ethnic
• 2:12
  groups and languages. Our story begins not with an
• 2:15
  empire, but with a small, powerful Kingdom centered around
• 2:19
  the city of Cusco, nestled in the Highlands of Peru.
• 2:24
  For generations, the Inca people, led by their Sapa Inca,
• 2:28
  their divine emperor, were just one of many groups in the
• 2:31
  region. But they possessed a unique
• 2:34
  drive, a genius for organization, and an unwavering
• 2:38
  belief in their destiny. The founding myth tells of Manco
• 2:42
  Kapak and Mama Oklo, children of the sun God Inti.
• 2:47
  Emerging from Lake Titicaca. They were given a golden staff
• 2:51
  and told to establish a city where it sank effortlessly into
• 2:55
  the earth. That place, of course, was
• 2:57
  Cusco. While this is a powerful myth,
• 3:01
  the historical reality points to a more gradual rise, solidified
• 3:05
  by brilliant leadership. The true expansion began in the
• 3:09
  15th century under a ruler named Pachakuti.
• 3:13
  His name, fittingly, means Earth shaker.
• 3:16
  And shake the earth he did. Around 1438, a rival group, the
• 3:21
  Chunka, attacked Cusco. The Inca were on the brink of
• 3:24
  defeat, but Pachakuti rallied his people, and against all
• 3:28
  odds, they achieved A stunning victory.
• 3:31
  This wasn't just a military triumph.
• 3:33
  It was a psychological turning point.
• 3:36
  Pachakuti saw this as a sign of divine favor.
• 3:39
  He transformed Cusco into a truly imperial city and began A
• 3:43
  systematic campaign of conquest and integration.
• 3:46
  And this part of the Incan story is what you can play and
• 3:51
  experience when you play the Incan campaign in Age of Empires
• 3:54
  2. Now, conquest might conjure
• 3:57
  images of brutal warfare, and there was certainly that.
• 4:02
  But the Inca were also masters of diplomacy and administration.
• 4:07
  For example, when they approached a new territory, they
• 4:10
  often offered an ultimatum. Join the Empire, become one of
• 4:15
  us and enjoy the benefits. It's roads, it's food security,
• 4:19
  it's protection. Or resist and face the
• 4:22
  consequences. And of course, many chose to
• 4:26
  join. Once integrated, the local
• 4:28
  leaders were often allowed to maintain their positions, but
• 4:32
  their children were brought to Cusco for education in the Inca
• 4:36
  way, ensuring loyalty. The Empire wasn't just about
• 4:40
  taking, it was about connecting and what connections they built.
• 4:45
  The Inca were unparalleled engineers for their time.
• 4:49
  They constructed an astonishing network of roads known as the
• 4:53
  Kwapak Nan or Royal Rd. This wasn't just a single path,
• 4:58
  it was a complex system stretching over 25,000 miles,
• 5:02
  connecting mountain passes with coastal deserts traversed by
• 5:06
  swift chuskis, or relay runners, who carried messages and goods
• 5:11
  across the vast empire. Just try to imagine, well,
• 5:16
  basically an ancient network, but with human messengers.
• 5:21
  Along these roads they built tumbles, roadside Inns for
• 5:26
  travellers and Imperial officials.
• 5:28
  They mastered terracing, agriculture, turning steep
• 5:33
  mountainsides into productive farmland.
• 5:35
  Which, by the way, is also shown in one of the campaign missions,
• 5:39
  creating a surplus of food that could feed millions.
• 5:44
  They built sophisticated irrigation systems, channelling
• 5:47
  water through arid lands. And then there are their city.
• 5:52
  Machu Picchu, the lost city of the Inca, is perhaps the most
• 5:56
  famous breathtaking testament to their architectural prowess,
• 5:59
  built high in the cloud forests. But there were many others like
• 6:04
  Olan, Taitambo and Pisak, all showcasing their incredible
• 6:08
  stonework. Their craftsmanship allowed
• 6:11
  their structures to even withstand centuries of
• 6:15
  earthquakes. The Inca Empire was a highly
• 6:18
  organized society. At its head was the Sapa Inca,
• 6:22
  considered a direct descendant of the Sun.
• 6:25
  Below him was a complex hierarchy of administrators.
• 6:29
  There was no money. Instead, the economy was based
• 6:31
  on a system of tribute and reciprocal labour called mita.
• 6:36
  Citizens contributed labour to, well, imperial projects like
• 6:40
  roads, temples, terraces and in return the state provided for
• 6:45
  them, especially in times of hardship.
• 6:47
  Kind of like a precursor to a social safety net.
• 6:51
  Communication and record keeping were managed by a unique system
• 6:56
  called the. Kipu.
• 6:58
  These were intricate collections of coloured knotted strings
• 7:01
  which recorded numerical and perhaps even narrative
• 7:05
  information. I say perhaps because we don't
• 7:08
  know it's, it's lost. Actually, we, we don't speak the
• 7:12
  knotting language anymore, so there's no way of identifying
• 7:16
  what information these knotted, intricate collections actually
• 7:22
  carry. Just imagine trying to read a
• 7:26
  book or a text and instead of letters there's knots to read.
• 7:31
  Religion permeated every aspect of Inca life.
• 7:35
  Inti the Sun guard was paramount, but they worshipped
• 7:38
  many deities associated with nature, the moon, the stars, the
• 7:42
  mountains and the earth. Mother Pachamama sacrifice,
• 7:47
  often of lamas and Guinea pigs, and sometimes even humans in the
• 7:51
  times of greatest crisis, was part of their religious
• 7:56
  practices aimed at appeasing the guards and maintaining cosmic
• 8:00
  balance. When it comes to religion, the
• 8:02
  Inca may have very different gods, but they share their
• 8:05
  devotion with the Aztec and Maya.
• 8:08
  The Inca Empire at its peak was a marvel of organization,
• 8:12
  engineering, and cultural achievement.
• 8:16
  But it's reign, though brilliant, was tragically short.
• 8:19
  Just as the empire reached its zenith in the early 16th
• 8:23
  century, a new, unforeseen threat was approaching from
• 8:27
  across the sea. In 1532, a small band of Spanish
• 8:31
  conquistadores, led by Francisco Pizzaro, arrived in the Andes.
• 8:36
  They brought with them steel weapons, horses, and firearms,
• 8:40
  technologies completely alien to the Inca.
• 8:43
  But perhaps their most devastating weapon was invisible
• 8:47
  European diseases like smallpox, which had already ravaged the
• 8:51
  empire even before Pizzaro's arrival, killing millions and
• 8:54
  throwing the leadership into chaos.
• 8:57
  Pizarro faced the Inca with the same European weapon as
• 9:00
  cortested with the Aztecs. He brought a disease without a
• 9:04
  cure. At the time of the Spanish
• 9:06
  arrival, the Inca Empire was reeling from a brutal civil war
• 9:10
  between two brothers, Vaskar and Attajwalpa, who were battling
• 9:15
  for control after their father, Sapa Inca Huayna Kapak, and his
• 9:20
  chosen heir died of smallpox. Atahualpa had just emerged
• 9:24
  victorious, but the empires weakened and divided.
• 9:29
  Pizarro, cunning as he was, ambushed, Atahualpa capturing
• 9:33
  him. Despite being vastly
• 9:35
  outnumbered, the Sapa Inca offered an incredible ransom, a
• 9:39
  room filled once with gold and twice with silver.
• 9:42
  The Spanish took their treasure but then betrayed them
• 9:46
  nonetheless, executing Atahualpa.
• 9:50
  Typical medieval European behaviour, I'd like to say, but
• 9:53
  the fall of the Inca Empire was not instantaneous.
• 9:56
  There were decades of resistance, notably from Manco
• 9:59
  Inca Upanqui, who established a Neo Inca state in Vilca Bamba,
• 10:06
  battling the Spanish until his death.
• 10:08
  But the combination of superior Spanish weaponry, the
• 10:12
  devastating impact of disease, and the internal divisions of
• 10:15
  the empire proved too much. By the late 16th century, the
• 10:20
  great Taiwan Tinsuyu, the land of the Four Quarters, had
• 10:24
  ultimately fallen. It's sophisticated
• 10:27
  administrative system was dismantled, it's religion
• 10:31
  suppressed, and its people subjected to colonial rule.
• 10:34
  Yet the legacy of the Inca endures.
• 10:38
  Their descendants still live in the Andes, speaking Quechua, the
• 10:42
  language of the Inca, and maintaining many of their
• 10:44
  ancient traditions. The ruins of their cities stand
• 10:48
  as eternal monuments to their ingenuity and spirit.
• 10:51
  The terraces fields still feed communities, and the roads they
• 10:55
  built are still used today. The story of the Inca is a
• 10:59
  powerful reminder of human potential to build, to organize,
• 11:03
  to create beauty in the most challenging environments.
• 11:07
  It's also a poignant tale of how quickly even the most powerful
• 11:10
  empires can fall when confronted with unforeseen forces.
• 11:14
  With this knowledge in our minds, let's take a look at how
• 11:17
  well the new Inca in the game represents their historical
• 11:21
  heritage. I believe we should start with a
• 11:25
  couple of things that the Inca have in common with the other
• 11:27
  three South American civilizations.
• 11:30
  So let's begin with the settlements.
• 11:34
  This is a regional building that serves as a drop off point for
• 11:37
  all resources and increases the population cap.
• 11:41
  You cannot build mills, mining camps, or lumber camps as the
• 11:44
  Inca or in fact other South American civilization.
• 11:49
  And that means it serves as a prerequisite for building farms
• 11:52
  and the market. And the South American sieves
• 11:56
  will also be the only civilizations in the game that
• 11:58
  only need one building to click up because the settlement is
• 12:02
  enough. Kind of implying that it's both
• 12:04
  a lumber camp and a mining camp or a mill.
• 12:07
  So you will see the Inca players farm around the settlement as
• 12:10
  well as use that building as a drop off point for gold, stone,
• 12:13
  and wood. Usually when resources spawn
• 12:16
  close together like gold on a wood line, that's actually a bad
• 12:20
  sign because you'll have very awkward building placements.
• 12:24
  But with the Inca and other South American sieves, that's a
• 12:27
  different story. You'll actually want them close
• 12:30
  to one another because it'll save you building another
• 12:33
  settlement. Settlements look like a huge
• 12:36
  house, and they are in fact as big as a Polish forewark, so 3 *
• 12:40
  3 tiles, which means they're not just giving you maximum value,
• 12:44
  but they're also incredibly pleasing to farm around, much
• 12:48
  like foreworks. Speaking of which, they share
• 12:52
  another feature with the settlements, which is giving
• 12:55
  five extra population space. However, settlements cost 125
• 13:00
  wood, so the combined cost of a camp and a house.
• 13:04
  Inca can of course still build regular houses, and whether
• 13:08
  you're building a house or a settlement, you'll benefit from
• 13:12
  the Inca civilization bonus that these two buildings give 10
• 13:16
  instead of only 5 pop space. Each of the four South American
• 13:21
  civilizations have a unique bonus affecting their
• 13:23
  settlements, and doubling the pop space is the one by the
• 13:27
  Inca. This is going to be interesting
• 13:30
  for build orders and fast up times as the Inca.
• 13:34
  You will still. Start with one house, because
• 13:36
  starting with a settlement is bad for your food economy, but
• 13:39
  instead of a second house, you'll build your settlement,
• 13:42
  which is a total of 25 pop space.
• 13:45
  Once you've built these two buildings and you're saving lots
• 13:49
  of wood, which begs for an early barracks and a militia rush.
• 13:53
  Sorry, I mean champion rush, but we'll get to that in a minute.
• 13:58
  If you're lucky, you'll get a gold close to your wood line and
• 14:01
  one settlement is all you need in order to play Men at Arms.
• 14:05
  Sorry champion runners. This enables you to do super
• 14:10
  fast up times like you do with the Khmer, but you're not forced
• 14:13
  into food units and I can guarantee players will get very
• 14:18
  creative with their Inca builds on maps where resources spawn a
• 14:22
  bit more predictable than on Arabia.
• 14:25
  Getting five additional pop space with their houses and
• 14:27
  settlements is such a quality of life upgrade because it lowers
• 14:32
  the chances of being housed, which is probably the biggest
• 14:35
  crippling economy factor that every player encounters
• 14:38
  throughout a game. This bonus equals in a lot less
• 14:42
  idle TC time, and it saves you a lot of wood early on in the game
• 14:46
  as well. Of course you'll save wood
• 14:49
  throughout the entire game, but I'd like to argue that the woods
• 14:53
  you save with houses is mostly important early on when
• 14:57
  resources are tight and you really want to put your wood
• 15:00
  into farms instead of houses for pub space.
• 15:04
  It's actually not just that you're saving wood, you're also
• 15:07
  having much more efficient villages can work more on
• 15:10
  collecting resources instead of building houses.
• 15:13
  In my experience. This Bodos also promotes playing
• 15:16
  aggressive, which is in the nature of the Inca.
• 15:19
  Since you don't need as many houses, I tend to wall less,
• 15:23
  play more open, and therefore use the wood to produce wood
• 15:26
  heavy units like skirmishes and Spears, which goes well with a
• 15:30
  different bonus that we'll get into later.
• 15:34
  The Ink. I've always had the bonus that
• 15:36
  their houses give additional pop space and because of the
• 15:39
  settlement building, we finally know where the developers were
• 15:43
  drawing their inspiration from for this bonus.
• 15:47
  The Feudal Age settlement seems to be inspired by the
• 15:50
  traditional Mallocca buildings of various Native South American
• 15:54
  groups from the lowland areas of the Amazon and Brazil.
• 15:59
  Mallocca's were large, sometimes 100 meters long structures where
• 16:04
  housing, food storage and ritual practices took place in one
• 16:09
  single building. At first, Mallocca looked to me
• 16:14
  like just a massive communal long house, a giant structure of
• 16:17
  hardwood and palm thatch. But to the indigenous peoples of
• 16:22
  the Amazon, the Mallocca was not just a house and more of a
• 16:26
  communal space. The door was always facing the
• 16:30
  rising sun in the east when entering.
• 16:32
  You step into a space that can house an entire clan, sometimes
• 16:37
  over 100 people. But you aren't just stepping
• 16:40
  into a room, you're stepping into a cosmic model.
• 16:43
  The four massive central pillars holding up the roof aren't only
• 16:48
  made of wood, they represent the four mythical ancestors who hold
• 16:53
  the world together, and the floor beneath your feet is the
• 16:56
  Earth Mother. I've even read that in some
• 16:59
  traditions, ancestors are buried right there beneath the
• 17:03
  floorboards, so that the spirits of the past remain A literal
• 17:07
  part of the daily life of the living.
• 17:10
  What's truly fascinating is how the malaka functions as a great
• 17:13
  solar clock. Architects have found that many
• 17:17
  are built with such precision that as the sun moves across the
• 17:21
  sky, a beam of light travels through triangular openings in
• 17:24
  the roof, striking specific pillars or spots on the floor.
• 17:29
  This tells the community exactly when to plant, when to harvest
• 17:33
  and when it's time for sacred rituals.
• 17:35
  But the heart of the Malaka is its centre.
• 17:39
  This is where the private lives of families, arranged in
• 17:42
  hammocks around the perimeter, meet the public life of the
• 17:45
  tribe. In the centre, elders sit to
• 17:48
  chew coca and tobacco, debating the laws of the community.
• 17:53
  In the Malacca, you cannot really hide from your neighbor.
• 17:56
  You are forced to live in a state of constant communal
• 17:59
  harmony. There is a beautiful philosophy
• 18:02
  here that stands in stark contrast to the Inca.
• 18:07
  The Inca built with stone because they wanted their empire
• 18:10
  to stand forever. But the people of the Mallocca
• 18:13
  kind of seem to have known that everything is a cycle.
• 18:18
  When the soil nearby is exhausted, or when a great
• 18:21
  leader passes away, the community often abandons the
• 18:25
  Mallocca. They let the jungle vines and
• 18:27
  the rain reclaim it, returning the materials to the Earth, and
• 18:31
  they move on to build a new universe somewhere.
• 18:34
  Else. If this is really true, then
• 18:37
  it's the perfect building to put an Age of M bias too, since this
• 18:41
  is what we generally do once the resources are depleted, we
• 18:44
  abandoned our camps and rebuild them somewhere else.
• 18:48
  There is one thing though with the settlements that I've
• 18:51
  noticed during the past few days that I was playing the campaign.
• 18:56
  It's kind of hard to refresh your settlements when you're
• 19:00
  chopping wood. So what I mean by this is for
• 19:03
  efficiency reasons, we usually refresh our lumber cams once our
• 19:08
  villagers chop through one or a couple of lines of wood just so
• 19:13
  we reduce their walking time. And that is quite easy to do
• 19:18
  just because the lumber Cam is a 2 by 2 tile big building, but
• 19:23
  with the settlement being three by three tiles.
• 19:26
  It's actually a little bit. Harder.
• 19:28
  So before you can refresh your settlement, you actually have to
• 19:33
  chop through at least three tiles of wood.
• 19:39
  And therefore, I feel like for me, the way I have established
• 19:45
  my routine of refreshing lumber cams whenever, whenever I wanted
• 19:49
  to do it with the settlements, I realized I can't do it yet
• 19:52
  because I need to wait for one more line of woods or or or
• 19:58
  forest to be chopped. So this definitely will, at
• 20:03
  least for me and my routine, take some time to get used to,
• 20:07
  But it doesn't mitigate the fact that the settlement is a
• 20:11
  generally very strong building. Let's move on and talk about two
• 20:16
  regional units that the Incanal have and they share with the
• 20:19
  other South American civilizations.
• 20:22
  The Champion and the Slinger Let's let's start with the
• 20:26
  champ. The South American civilizations
• 20:28
  do not have access to the militia line.
• 20:30
  Or. Eagle Line, So the Inca.
• 20:33
  Much like the other South American civilizations, they
• 20:35
  need something else to compensate.
• 20:38
  If you've listened to my podcast about the Aztecs, this makes
• 20:42
  perfect sense because only the Mayan Aztecs were known to have
• 20:46
  Eagle Warriors. The Chumpy is therefore the only
• 20:49
  infantry unit for the Inca that costs gold, aside from their
• 20:52
  unique unit. As is the case with the
• 20:55
  settlements, all four South American civilizations have a
• 20:58
  different unique bonus affecting this unit, and I'll talk about
• 21:02
  the Inca bonus later on. For now, I want to focus on
• 21:05
  explaining what role the Chumpy actually plays.
• 21:09
  First of all, it is your scout unit at the beginning of the
• 21:12
  game, which is why there is a Dark Age version of it called
• 21:16
  Chumpy Scout. You can upgrade the Champy scout
• 21:18
  to champy runners in the Feudal Age, and then to Champy Warriors
• 21:22
  in Castle Age, and finally to Elite Champy warriors in the
• 21:26
  Imperial Age. It is a speedy, Archer
• 21:29
  resistant, generalist kind of unit resembling something in
• 21:34
  between the Militia and the Eagle.
• 21:36
  Comparing the Castle Age variance base stats, you'll find
• 21:39
  the Champy Warrior being a little slower than an Eagle
• 21:42
  Warrior and faster than a long sort.
• 21:45
  It has three Pierce armor and 55 HP like an Eagle Warrior, but
• 21:49
  nine attack and the creation time like his long sword.
• 21:52
  Their costs and their bonus damage puts them closer to a
• 21:55
  long sword than an Eagle. While Eagles are more gold,
• 21:59
  heavy and cheap on food, it's the opposite for the Militia and
• 22:03
  the Champi Lions. The difference between these two
• 22:06
  is that the Champi cost 5 less food and five more gold than a
• 22:09
  Militia, making it a little bit harder to play a drosh with
• 22:13
  them. Because Chompy Warriors do plus
• 22:15
  one damage against shock infantry, plus two against
• 22:18
  buildings, and plus three against siege.
• 22:21
  They're not exactly a clear counter against eagles like the
• 22:25
  militia line is, or against the infantry like other infantry
• 22:30
  units are. Shock infantry units are Eagles,
• 22:33
  Giant Sourceman of the Woo and Fire Lances, and the new Temple
• 22:38
  Guard unit that's unique to the Muisca.
• 22:40
  This means that they are less of a counter against Eagles than
• 22:44
  the Militia line is because they're doing less bonus damage
• 22:46
  against these kind of units, but they're also not hard counted by
• 22:50
  the Militia line themselves because the Champi have the
• 22:54
  armor class of infantry units, not shock infantry.
• 22:58
  But this was their castle age comparison to other standard
• 23:02
  gold infantry units. But I think we also need to talk
• 23:05
  about what happens when a dark aged Chompy Scout meets a Scout
• 23:09
  Cavalry or an Eagle Scout. And once again, we have to nerd
• 23:14
  out a little and look at some numbers.
• 23:17
  First of all, let's look at the dynamic of these units from
• 23:19
  before the change in the dark Age.
• 23:22
  An Eagle Scout would always win against a Scout Cavalry just
• 23:26
  because they have 50 HP, which is five more than the Scout
• 23:29
  Cavalry and also one more attack.
• 23:33
  However, however, the scouts were a little faster and could
• 23:37
  run away. Once in feudal age, the tides
• 23:40
  are turning and the scout would get a little hidden buff and
• 23:44
  actually win the one we won against an Eagle Scout.
• 23:47
  The Champy scout has 35 HP, so 15 less than an Eagle Scout and
• 23:52
  10 less than a scout cavalry. It has the same speed and attack
• 23:57
  as an Eagle Scout, so it can't run away from a Scout Cavalry.
• 24:01
  They all have the same melee armour, so that's kind of
• 24:05
  irrelevant. So what exactly does this mean?
• 24:08
  Well, Champy Scouts will probably lose against Eagle
• 24:12
  Scouts in the Dark Age as consistently as Scout Cavalry
• 24:16
  do, and will trade 5050 against Scout Cavalry.
• 24:20
  Once in the Feudal Age, it'll lose to both the Eagle Scout and
• 24:23
  Scout Cavalry. However, if you research Champy
• 24:27
  Runner, which is their equivalent to the Men at Arms
• 24:30
  upgrade, they will beat scout cavalry even with bloodlines and
• 24:34
  also eagle scouts if all units are fully upgraded.
• 24:39
  It's also worth noting that they.
• 24:40
  Keep the Eagles. Line of Sight which is 5 tiles,
• 24:44
  so they have that as an advantage over the cavalry Scout
• 24:47
  which has one less. This results in exploring your
• 24:51
  base much faster and increasing the potential of going forward
• 24:54
  to lame your opponent if you choose to do so.
• 24:57
  Either way, you should be quicker to scout your enemy just
• 25:00
  like you are with an Eagle Scout, so a drush is easier to
• 25:03
  pull off. You can also use the auto scout
• 25:06
  feature with the champ. However, what makes them really
• 25:09
  stand out is the fact that they can also build outposts.
• 25:14
  Once again, this is true not only for the Inca, but all for
• 25:18
  South American civilizations. All right, let's.
• 25:21
  Pause for a second and talk about something that sounds
• 25:25
  boring on paper but is actually going to break the high level
• 25:28
  meta. The Champi Scout and the humble
• 25:32
  outpost now. If you're a.
• 25:35
  Casual player, you probably almost never build outposts.
• 25:39
  And why would you? They cost 5 stone, they don't
• 25:42
  shoot back, and sending a villager across the map to build
• 25:45
  1 is basically a suicide mission.
• 25:47
  What do you gain from it? Of course, vision on the map,
• 25:50
  But for that you'd have to use the mini map.
• 25:52
  And who does that right? Most of us would rather save
• 25:55
  that stone for a castle or a third Town Center.
• 25:59
  But the Champi Warrior changes the math entirely.
• 26:02
  Because the Champi is a mobile military unit that can build
• 26:06
  these things on the fly, you'll probably not worry about the
• 26:10
  stone loss anymore. And who knows?
• 26:13
  Maybe you'll realize that extra information on the mini map is
• 26:16
  actually quite important and useful and start using it.
• 26:21
  Think about it. Normally, to get vision on your
• 26:23
  opponent's goldmine, you kind of had to keep your scout standing
• 26:28
  there. If that scout dies, you're
• 26:30
  blind. With the chompy you can run into
• 26:33
  a neutral zone, drop an outpost in a couple of seconds and keep
• 26:37
  moving for a tiny investment of 25 wood and five stone.
• 26:41
  You now have a permanent eye on that resource.
• 26:45
  You'll know the exact second your opponent tries to take that
• 26:47
  gold or expand to another resource.
• 26:50
  Hell, I will 100% of the time plain place an outpost on every
• 26:55
  gold and stone mine I can find on the map.
• 26:58
  I can build 20 outposts and buy back the 100 stone later on if
• 27:03
  need be. But think about it, it's such a
• 27:06
  cheap way of getting important information it's ridiculous.
• 27:11
  But you can use that defensively as well.
• 27:13
  As a South American civilization, you can surround
• 27:16
  your base with a couple of outposts and never be surprised
• 27:19
  by an enemy attack. It turns the fog of war from a
• 27:22
  mystery into a playground. If you aren't using your
• 27:25
  champions to scout and light up the map in this DLC, you are
• 27:30
  playing at a massive disadvantage in my opinion.
• 27:33
  We've seen this being used extensively when playing with
• 27:35
  The Ethiopians because their outposts don't cost any stone.
• 27:40
  But I would. Like to argue that this might
• 27:42
  even be a better feature than the Ethiopian one.
• 27:47
  That's because you're generating 0 seconds of idle economy time.
• 27:51
  You aren't hurting your economy to gain intelligence because
• 27:54
  you're not using a villager walking across the entire map
• 27:57
  and not gathering resources, but you're using the unit that's for
• 28:02
  scouting anyway. Also don't forget the town watch
• 28:06
  and town patrol technologies at the town centre.
• 28:09
  I think we'll see lots of pro players researching town watch
• 28:13
  early in feudal age with the South American civilizations
• 28:16
  like Jordan used to do back in the old days.
• 28:20
  They increase outpost line of sight significantly in the late
• 28:24
  game. A few champi built outposts with
• 28:27
  town patrol can basically reveal an entire quadrant of the map.
• 28:32
  It's a total game changer for map control and I'm really
• 28:36
  excited to see people make use of it.
• 28:38
  In short, the Champi warriors are probably going to be played
• 28:41
  like eagles, serving as an anti Archer unit with a high Pierce
• 28:46
  armor with a bit less HP but also less gold costs and they
• 28:51
  will place outposts on key places of the map.
• 28:54
  They are less vulnerable to the militia line but more vulnerable
• 28:58
  to cavalry compared to eagles when it comes to their upgrades.
• 29:02
  Champion units are not affected by Gambesons, which is why none
• 29:06
  of the South American civilizations have access to the
• 29:08
  technology since they have no units that could be affected by
• 29:12
  it. Inca can get both Arson to
• 29:15
  improve the damage of Champi against buildings and Squires to
• 29:19
  improve the Champi's speed, and the Inca can research all attack
• 29:24
  and defence upgrades from the blacksmith for their infantry
• 29:28
  units. It took me a while to understand
• 29:30
  this unit, but after putting together all these information,
• 29:34
  I'm actually quite excited to play around with them.
• 29:37
  There's only one tiny little hiccup that's kind of making it
• 29:41
  hard to get the most out of these outposts, and that's not
• 29:46
  the fact that you kind of need to upgrade your Champion scouts
• 29:49
  to Champion runners. Otherwise even with the starting
• 29:53
  Eagle Scouts and Scout Cavalry, you stand no chance against them
• 29:58
  and they will simply kill the Champion Scout.
• 30:00
  And you don't even have a way to run away since most
• 30:04
  civilizations have scout cavalry units at the start of the game
• 30:07
  and they are always going to beat your Champion Scout in
• 30:10
  Feudal Age. You'll need to make sure not to
• 30:13
  get spotted, have reinforcements ready, or upgrade your champion
• 30:17
  scouts to runners. Finally, in the late game,
• 30:20
  they'll probably be used as a raiding unit because of their
• 30:23
  high Pierce armour. They'll be less effective than
• 30:27
  Eagles, but much more affordable to spam because of their lower
• 30:30
  gold cost. Of course, this still needs a
• 30:33
  lot of testing and figuring out, which we haven't done yet, and
• 30:37
  I'm kind of hoping that what I'm predicting here based on stats
• 30:41
  will hold true over time. For what I've played with the
• 30:44
  Inca over the past two days and the Champi Warrior, I am
• 30:49
  actually quite confident that I'm right in my assessment.
• 30:53
  In the Inca language, the Champi refers to a star headed Mace, so
• 30:58
  a weapon. If you look at the unit Sprite
• 31:00
  in game, you'll see that iconic pointed club.
• 31:04
  The Champion was the most common weapon in the Incan arsenal.
• 31:08
  It consisted of a wooden shaft with a heavy, usually star
• 31:11
  shaped stone head. The star shape was chosen
• 31:14
  because it increased the damage of the strike.
• 31:17
  They were designed to crush bone and Pierce through the heavy
• 31:20
  quilted cotton armor that was standard in South America.
• 31:24
  It ensured that no matter what angle the Mace struck an
• 31:28
  opponent, at least one sharp point would make contact, making
• 31:32
  it devastating even against wooden Shields.
• 31:36
  So why can a maze man build an outpost?
• 31:39
  Well in the Inca and Muiska cultures the line between
• 31:43
  soldier and engineer was almost non existent.
• 31:48
  The Inca army was famous for building as they marched, laying
• 31:52
  down roads and stone way stations called Tumbos.
• 31:56
  Tambo is the word that comes from the Quechua Tampu.
• 32:00
  It was a type of building that was built along the roads and
• 32:03
  roads that made-up the Kwapak Nyan or Camino de Linca, so the
• 32:09
  road that worked of the Incan Empire.
• 32:12
  The tambos were erected every 20 or 30 kilometers, which was the
• 32:17
  approximate distance that could be covered in a day, and served
• 32:20
  as shelters for the messengers, officials, soldiers and
• 32:24
  high-ranking people, leaving the lower classes probably excluded
• 32:28
  from the right to use it. This is probably why we upgrade
• 32:32
  our champion scouts to champion runners.
• 32:35
  It's a nod towards the messengers that the Inca used to
• 32:38
  communicate throughout their empire.
• 32:41
  In this sense, the traffic could be intense, since the army and
• 32:44
  the gangs of workers destined to carry out public works also pass
• 32:49
  through these roads. They were also used as
• 32:52
  warehouses, either to store food, weapons, wool and other
• 32:57
  things that might be needed in an emergency, not uncommon in a
• 33:00
  land often struck by earthquakes, bad weather or war.
• 33:05
  Each tumble was supplied by the closest communities, and the
• 33:09
  inhabitants of these were also the ones who had to provide the
• 33:12
  corresponding service in them. Through the shifts.
• 33:16
  Established in the meter, a rotating system of communal
• 33:20
  work. You see, these weren't just
• 33:22
  randomly built outposts, but actually functioned as key
• 33:27
  infrastructure to maintain the vast empire of the Inca.
• 33:31
  In my opinion, the outposts in Age of Empires 2 are the closest
• 33:36
  building we have for the way stations that were the Tumble,
• 33:39
  so it's a fine choice all right. Let's shift gears and talk about
• 33:44
  a unit that is finally moving out of the shadows.
• 33:48
  The Slinger. For years, the Slinger was this
• 33:51
  weird niche unique unit exclusive to the Inca, but with
• 33:56
  the last Chieftains DLC, it's officially becoming a regional
• 33:59
  unit. That means if you're playing as
• 34:01
  the Mapuche, Muiska or Tupi, the Slinger is now a core part of
• 34:07
  your archery range. And they've changed a lot of
• 34:09
  things about the slingers, so much so that this is basically a
• 34:13
  new unit on paper. The Slinger looks like a worse
• 34:17
  Archer. It has one less attack and in
• 34:20
  some cases it's even slower to fire.
• 34:23
  All other stats are basically the same because they've lost
• 34:26
  5HP and now they have 35 HP, which is as much as a
• 34:30
  crossbowman but 5 less than an obelisk.
• 34:34
  But here's what's different about the Slinger.
• 34:37
  It is a ranged unit that deals bonus damage against infantry.
• 34:42
  Think about that for a second. This makes the Slinger kind of a
• 34:45
  hybrid unit between an Archer and a hand cannoneer, which is
• 34:49
  great because these civilizations don't get hand
• 34:52
  cannoneers. Before the update that was their
• 34:55
  main role simply because of the high bonus damage they were
• 34:58
  doing against infantry units that was plus 10.
• 35:02
  This basically melted all infantry units so fast it was
• 35:05
  hard to fathom. Today they still count infantry
• 35:09
  units, but not as hard. Their former 10 bonus damage
• 35:13
  against infantry units was reduced to only four.
• 35:16
  But now they're also doing 4 bonus damage against monks,
• 35:19
  which is important for them when fighting for relics since they
• 35:22
  have no unit that has a conversions resistance like
• 35:25
  Eagles and Scouts have. And they have three bonus damage
• 35:29
  against siege. And this is something I want to
• 35:32
  talk about real quick. I've seen Vipers snipe scorpions
• 35:35
  with slingers like they were flies.
• 35:38
  The bonus damage is clearly visible and I think that they
• 35:42
  can easily run under castles and snipe traps if need be.
• 35:46
  If you're thinking about old slingers, you may consider
• 35:48
  diving under these castles. Pretty wasteful and I'd agree,
• 35:52
  but the new slingers have completely been stripped of
• 35:55
  their gold cost and instead turned into a trash unit.
• 36:00
  The Slinger was 40 food and 40 gold.
• 36:03
  Quite the expensive unit, especially for being quite
• 36:06
  fragile with only 40 HP. Now there are 70 food and 10
• 36:11
  wood, basically like a scout. And to be clear, they're a trash
• 36:16
  unit now, so diving a castle to quickly take out some traps is
• 36:20
  going to be easily justified. They are so much easier to spam
• 36:24
  now and it'll be very interesting to see how they
• 36:27
  interact with other units and masses.
• 36:30
  If you're fighting against Archers, you'll always have the
• 36:33
  disadvantage that you can start massing Archers from the Feudal
• 36:36
  age, whereas slingers are only trainable once you've reached
• 36:39
  the Castle Age, so keep that in mind.
• 36:42
  Also, you can't upgrade slingers because there's no elite
• 36:46
  version. The fact that the Slinger is now
• 36:48
  a regional unit is quite important because with this
• 36:52
  change, the slingers have lost their unique unit armor class,
• 36:56
  and instead were given the Skirmisher armor class.
• 36:59
  That means that they benefit from the same upgrades Archers
• 37:02
  and skirmishers do, including Ballistics and chemistry.
• 37:07
  Their way Thumbering effects them is still the same as before
• 37:11
  this rework, meaning they do get their increase in accuracy from
• 37:15
  90% to 100% for units that aren't moving, but they're not
• 37:19
  getting a decrease in reload time which is set to a fixed 2
• 37:23
  seconds, which means they fire slower than other raged units
• 37:27
  with Thumbering. Crossbows are always going to
• 37:30
  win against slingers. I've tried to fight against big
• 37:34
  mass of crossbows with my slingers and I failed miserably.
• 37:37
  Even though you might argue that it's kind of cost efficient
• 37:42
  because they are using gold units and you are using trash
• 37:46
  units. But then again the skirm is the
• 37:48
  much better counter. However, once you're fighting
• 37:52
  against arboles in the imperial age, there is just no way it's
• 37:56
  even going to be cost efficient. As a rule of thumb I would say
• 38:01
  with slingers don't fight against Archers.
• 38:04
  Slingers are neither an alternative for Archers nor for
• 38:07
  skirmishers. They have a specific role
• 38:10
  countering infantry and now monks and siege.
• 38:14
  However, the Slinger is similar to a skirm in one way that makes
• 38:18
  them micro intensive, which is that they have one minimum
• 38:22
  range. This means that if you get
• 38:24
  caught out by infantry and not microwring your slingers back
• 38:27
  when fighting them, they won't be able to defend themselves.
• 38:31
  This shouldn't really happen to you, but it's more likely than
• 38:35
  before if you're not careful because of the reduced bonus
• 38:38
  damage against infantry, so it's easier for them to survive an
• 38:42
  engagement with the Slinger. Still.
• 38:44
  It's more likely that cavalry units will have an easy time
• 38:47
  cleaning up your Slinger masses. I want to linger on the Slinger
• 38:52
  for a second because there's a huge misconception that these
• 38:55
  were primitive weapons in the 16th century.
• 38:59
  The Spanish conquistadors, men with steel swords and early
• 39:03
  guns, were absolutely terrified of the Andean slingers.
• 39:08
  The weapon they. Used was called.
• 39:09
  The Varaca, which might sound familiar to you if you enjoy
• 39:13
  playing Civilization 6 or 7 because that's what they call
• 39:18
  the Slinger in those games. It was a heavy woven sling made
• 39:22
  of llama, wool or leather. And these guys weren't just
• 39:26
  picking up random pebbles to throw at you.
• 39:29
  They used smooth egg shaped river stones that were hand
• 39:33
  selected for their weight and balance.
• 39:36
  And if you're wondering why chemistry is affecting the
• 39:39
  slingers, in some accounts, Andean warriors would wrap
• 39:44
  stones in cotton soaked in pitch, light them on fire, and
• 39:48
  sling them into Spanish camps to burn down thatched roofs and
• 39:51
  supply tents. I also have an explanation why
• 39:55
  blacksmith upgrades improve their damage.
• 39:58
  While less common than stone, some elite units used cast lead
• 40:03
  and bronze bullets, which were smaller, harder to see in
• 40:06
  flight, and hit with significantly more density.
• 40:10
  Think about the physics here. When an Inca warrior whipped
• 40:13
  that sling, the stone could reach speeds of over 100 mph.
• 40:18
  Unlike an arrow, which relies on a sharp point to Pierce, a sling
• 40:23
  stone relies on blunt force trauma.
• 40:25
  Even if a Spanish conquistador was wearing high quality steel
• 40:29
  plate armor, the kinetic energy of a sling stone could break the
• 40:34
  bones underneath or cause a massive concussion without even
• 40:38
  breaking the metal. There are historical records
• 40:42
  from the Spanish saying a singer stone could shatter a steel
• 40:45
  sword or crack a helmet open like an eggshell.
• 40:48
  It was so effective that the Spanish actually started wearing
• 40:52
  thick quilted cotton jackets over their metal armor just to
• 40:57
  absorb the shock. In the Siege of Cusco, Spanish
• 41:01
  sources tell of literal bombardments by Inca slingers.
• 41:06
  And here's a cool detail for the lore fans.
• 41:10
  Because in my mind, a sling was always an inferior weapon used
• 41:14
  by warriors who couldn't afford a better weapon.
• 41:17
  Something that somehow made its way to the game from Age of
• 41:21
  Empires one. But I could have not been more
• 41:24
  wrong about this. I found a source stating that
• 41:29
  the sling was actually a status symbol.
• 41:32
  The best slings were beautifully dyed and woven with complex
• 41:36
  patterns. A warrior would wear his sling
• 41:39
  as a headband or a belt when he wasn't fighting.
• 41:42
  So when you see that Slinger unit in the game, you aren't
• 41:46
  looking at a low tier skirmisher, you're looking at an
• 41:49
  elite, highly trained specialist who could outrange and out hit
• 41:53
  almost anyone on the battlefield.
• 41:57
  I must admit that I kind of fell into a rabbit hole when
• 42:00
  researching the sling because there's actually a lot of cool
• 42:03
  scientific research done on this weapon.
• 42:06
  I found a paper that experimented with a sling to
• 42:09
  figure out just how far the stones could be slung, and a
• 42:12
  2021 paper found evidence that the Maya have also used slingers
• 42:17
  as weapons, so we might need to add them to mesosifs as well.
• 42:23
  I'm going to link these studies in the show notes for anyone who
• 42:26
  wants to read up on that. As I said, the settlements,
• 42:30
  chumpy and slingers are what all four South American
• 42:33
  civilizations have in common. So we've got one.
• 42:36
  Regional building and two regional units.
• 42:39
  In my initial script for this podcast, this is where I was
• 42:43
  pivoting to the civilization bonuses, but when I was
• 42:46
  finishing up the script I realized that there is another
• 42:49
  new regional unit that needs a bit of explaining.
• 42:52
  So bear with me while I'll introduce you to the Catapult
• 42:56
  Galleon. This is an anti building ship
• 43:00
  available in the Imperial age and it serves the same role as a
• 43:04
  Canon galleon or Droman. It's called a regional unit, but
• 43:08
  it's really not because it's shared.
• 43:10
  By all the. American civilizations, so
• 43:13
  including Aztecs and Maya and completely random the Cumans
• 43:18
  who? Were.
• 43:18
  Definitely not in the same region as the other
• 43:21
  civilizations. There's a good reason for it
• 43:24
  though. Well, not a good one I should
• 43:27
  say. There is a reason for it, and
• 43:29
  that's because if they weren't to include the Cumans, the
• 43:33
  Cumans would be the only civilization in the game without
• 43:36
  a siege ship. Most civilizations have the
• 43:39
  Canon galleon. Armenians, Byzantines, Goths,
• 43:42
  Huns, and Romans have the Dromans.
• 43:44
  The Chinese civilizations have the Lo Chuan.
• 43:47
  Except for the Kitan. They also have Canon galleons
• 43:51
  and now the American civilizations and the Cumans
• 43:55
  have the catapult ship. You only need Imperial Age to
• 43:59
  get access to it, so no need for chemistry.
• 44:02
  And out of all the siege ships it's the cheapest, costing only
• 44:05
  100 gold and 225 wood. It benefits from Siege Engineers
• 44:11
  for one range and 20% extra damage against buildings, and
• 44:15
  from Chemistry for one additional damage, as well as
• 44:18
  Careening and Dry Dock for some extra PS armour and carvel hull
• 44:22
  and Clink Construction for extra movement speed.
• 44:25
  Stat wise it's a little worse than a Canon galleon, but it
• 44:28
  costs 100 gold instead of 150, so I'm not sure whether it makes
• 44:33
  up for the stats by being more cost effective.
• 44:37
  With that out of the way, let's focus on the Inca and their
• 44:42
  civilization bonuses. I've already talked about the
• 44:45
  first, which is that their houses and settlements provide
• 44:48
  five additional population space.
• 44:51
  So let's talk about a bonus that has shaped the Inca in recent
• 44:55
  times. Their military unit cost less.
• 44:58
  Food throughout the. Ages 5% less in the Dark age
• 45:03
  -10% in feudal -15% in Castle Age, and -20% in the Imperial
• 45:11
  Age. This bonus is what gives the
• 45:14
  Inca the identity of the ultimate counter civilization,
• 45:18
  much like the Byzantines, because they can cheaply build
• 45:22
  lots of skirmishes, Spears, and now even slingers without
• 45:26
  delaying their up times too much.
• 45:28
  There's not a lot of sieves in the game that you want to open
• 45:31
  trash with, but the Inca are definitely one where you'll feel
• 45:35
  totally fine when doing so. Since the Slinger is a food
• 45:39
  heavy unit now, getting a discount of 15 or even 20% in
• 45:43
  the Imperial age on them is highly significant.
• 45:48
  It'll be especially useful after fast castling and closed maps
• 45:51
  and when you're contesting relics.
• 45:54
  I would argue that this bonus is the backbone of the Inca play
• 45:58
  style. If you've played as or against
• 46:00
  the Incas lately, you've noticed they can pump out an insane
• 46:04
  amount of troops without their economy collapsing.
• 46:07
  That's all thanks to their military food discount.
• 46:10
  By the time you hit the imperial age, your military units are 20%
• 46:15
  cheaper on food. If you're playing as the income,
• 46:18
  just think about that 20%. Every fifth unit you train has
• 46:23
  no food cost. Age of Empires 2 is a very macro
• 46:27
  oriented game and maximizing your resource spendings is very
• 46:31
  important, so this bonus is a massive advantage.
• 46:35
  It allows you to stay aggressive while still clicking those
• 46:39
  expensive technologies to upgrade your units or move on to
• 46:43
  another Age. We'll talk about the
• 46:45
  implications for strategies in more detail in the next section,
• 46:49
  but let me say this This bonus has gotten much stronger now
• 46:52
  that the Slingers are so food heavy and the Champy have
• 46:56
  replaced the Eagles, and it's always been a very strong bonus.
• 46:59
  To begin with, Champions are going to cost 28 food and 25
• 47:03
  gold. In the Imperial Age, that's
• 47:05
  ridiculously cheap. Slingers go down from 70 food to
• 47:09
  56 food, Skirmishes down to 20 from 25, and Helps are
• 47:14
  discounted to 28 food. Like the Champion, the amount of
• 47:17
  food that is saved for creating these units is opening up
• 47:21
  possibilities for the Inca that hardly any other civilization
• 47:25
  can pull off. When looking for a historical
• 47:28
  explanation for this bonus, the best I can come up with is once
• 47:31
  again the significance of the weigh stations they've built
• 47:34
  everywhere. These were essentially massive
• 47:37
  warehouses built every few miles along the mountain roads.
• 47:42
  While European armies of the time often went hungry or had to
• 47:46
  spend days looting local farms just to survive, the Inca army
• 47:50
  just marched. They arrived at the tumble and
• 47:54
  the food was already there, dried and ready to eat.
• 47:58
  They had state sponsored rations that would get refilled by
• 48:02
  locals every time they're used up.
• 48:04
  So that food discount you see in the game is probably the
• 48:07
  developers way of representing that incredible infrastructure.
• 48:11
  It's not that the soldiers are cheaper to train, it's more that
• 48:16
  the Inca state is so efficient at feeding them.
• 48:19
  That the cost to the war effort is lower.
• 48:22
  It makes the Incas the kings of attrition war.
• 48:25
  They can simply out eat and outlast you on the battlefield.
• 48:30
  Believe it or not but this bonus was even stronger when it was
• 48:33
  introduced in April 2023 because it was 5% more in every age, up
• 48:39
  to a 30% discount in Imperial Age 30%.
• 48:44
  Half a year later it was nerfed to the bonus we had before the
• 48:47
  new DLC, which started to 10% and maxed out at 25 in Imp.
• 48:52
  So they've been nerfed again with this DLC, which in my
• 48:55
  opinion was a great decision. The bonus is still incredibly
• 48:59
  strong and this little nerf will not affect how we play with the
• 49:02
  Inca at all. Anyway, while I was researching
• 49:07
  this, I stumbled upon reports of the Inca diet.
• 49:10
  The Inca had a very different diet depending on what altitude
• 49:14
  they were living in, drawing different kind of crops if
• 49:17
  possible. The magic ingredient was in fact
• 49:20
  the potato native to that region, especially in today's
• 49:24
  coastal Peru. If you're interested in the
• 49:27
  history of potato, I recommend listening to the episode History
• 49:31
  of the Potato by Riley Knight and his wonderful podcast Half
• 49:35
  Assed History. Potatoes were highly valued for
• 49:39
  their wide diversity and adaptability to different
• 49:41
  environments and climates and there were hundreds of different
• 49:45
  kind of potatoes back then. Another high altitude plant in
• 49:49
  Inca cuisine is Lupinos mutabilis, also known as Tarovi
• 49:53
  or Choco. High in protein.
• 49:56
  This plant was often eaten with chilies and onions after being
• 49:59
  carefully treated since improper treatment can leave the crops
• 50:04
  poisonous so don't go about picking those crops.
• 50:08
  Then there was Ahipa, another crop in Inca cuisine.
• 50:12
  It grows rapidly and has a high yield rate of the tubers that
• 50:16
  were cherished for their sweet taste like water chestnuts.
• 50:20
  Meat was of course also an important staple of the Inca
• 50:24
  diet. The meat of the common folk was
• 50:27
  the Guinea pig. They were domesticated by 2000
• 50:31
  BC and were easy to keep and multiplied rapidly.
• 50:36
  The Inca have also developed a way to preserve their meat, the
• 50:40
  origin of modern day jerky. That's how they stored their
• 50:44
  food up to a year without it going bad in the weigh stations.
• 50:49
  Apart from Guinea pigs, both alpacas and llamas had been kept
• 50:53
  for food and their wool. In the Inca Empire, llamas were
• 50:57
  the only beasts of burden, and many of the people dominated by
• 51:01
  the Inca had long traditions of lama herding.
• 51:04
  There are theories among historians that link the rise of
• 51:07
  the Inca Empire with a large amount of lamas living in the
• 51:11
  southern Peruvian Highlands, and it does make sense to me.
• 51:15
  Later on, I'll tell you about how the Inca used wool from
• 51:18
  lamas to make their armor and Shields.
• 51:21
  They've used lamas for food, and when they built their roads
• 51:24
  throughout the empire, they made sure that they were always lama
• 51:28
  friendly to walk, especially the stairs.
• 51:32
  If you're thinking about llamas when building stairs, surely
• 51:35
  they must have been vital for their everyday life.
• 51:38
  Anyway, I find it extremely fitting that the Inca have a
• 51:42
  team bonus that allows them and all their teammates to start the
• 51:46
  game with a free llama. This is basically an additional
• 51:49
  sheep that you can use as a food source.
• 51:52
  It spawns directly under your TC and is actually very valuable in
• 51:56
  lots of ways. Obviously it's an additional 100
• 52:00
  food for free that's just there for the taking.
• 52:03
  It also means that you can use more of your sheep initially to
• 52:06
  scout your base if you have the APM for it.
• 52:10
  But since this is a team bonus, it makes for some very
• 52:13
  interesting team synergies. For example, if you're in a team
• 52:17
  with the Chinese, they will be absolutely grateful to you since
• 52:22
  they can instantly start collecting their food, resulting
• 52:25
  in less idle time. If you've ever played as the
• 52:28
  Chinese, you know the pain of having to send your sheep to the
• 52:31
  TC first, or depending on the map, even having to find your
• 52:35
  starting sheep entirely. This is hands down an amazing
• 52:39
  team bonus for the Chinese. Another civilization benefiting
• 52:42
  from the free llama is the Gujara, who can Garrison their
• 52:46
  sheep and sheep like livestock into their mill to get that
• 52:50
  trickle of food. Having a free Llama is making
• 52:53
  the start of the game very smooth because you have a faster
• 52:56
  food source than the berries and you can delay pushing your deer
• 52:59
  a little to find your remaining sheep.
• 53:01
  And if the map spawns chicken instead of deer, the free llama
• 53:05
  is pure bliss. The free llama can also save the
• 53:08
  day on Nomad maps, where the llama will automatically spawn
• 53:11
  as soon as you finish building your first Town Center.
• 53:15
  It happened more than once that I had an unfortunate beginning,
• 53:19
  not finding any sheep whatsoever, unable to scout for
• 53:22
  resources close to my TC, ultimately having to resort to
• 53:26
  scouting with a villager, and each time I was thinking how
• 53:31
  nice it would be to have that free llama.
• 53:34
  All right, we're getting to the last two civilization bonuses,
• 53:38
  and I would like to cover these two together because there's
• 53:41
  some interesting history behind this, something that forced to
• 53:45
  change the civilization in the past by merit of the first
• 53:49
  bonus. Inca villages are affected by
• 53:52
  infantry blacksmith upgrades starting in the Castle Age.
• 53:57
  By upgrading your infantry units, you'll also upgrade your
• 54:00
  villages. This is awfully helpful when
• 54:03
  you're being raided, because your villagers can fight back
• 54:06
  more effectively and also survive much longer when trying
• 54:09
  to flee from enemy units. This is especially useful when
• 54:13
  you're sending your villagers on risky missions, for example when
• 54:16
  building forward castles, a forward siege workshop, or
• 54:20
  repairing your Mangonells in Mangonell fights.
• 54:24
  It's also going to help you if you decide to tower rush and
• 54:28
  extend that tower rush into the castle age, especially because
• 54:32
  it's not unlikely that you'll go for that strategy since you have
• 54:36
  a 15% discount on the stone cost of buildings.
• 54:40
  Inca towers are almost 20 stone cheaper with this bonus.
• 54:43
  Instead of 125, they cost only 106.
• 54:48
  Building a castle saves you almost 100 stone.
• 54:51
  It's only 553 stone instead of 650, which is exactly the same
• 54:57
  As for the Francs in the Castle age.
• 54:59
  You're even saving 15 stone on TCS, which by the way means that
• 55:04
  you can easily build a tower for defense and still add ATC
• 55:08
  without having to mine stone. By now I'm sure you get why
• 55:13
  these two bonuses work very well together.
• 55:16
  If you get the infantry upgrades in the Castle Age, Inca
• 55:18
  villagers will pack a punch and there's no way an enemy will
• 55:22
  dare to get into a will fight with you.
• 55:24
  However, the sad truth is that tower rushing in the Castle Age
• 55:28
  is not really a viable strategy. Usually that's just too late to
• 55:34
  disrupt an enemy economy and the enemy will have siege weapons to
• 55:38
  fight back against the towers. But there was a time when tower
• 55:42
  rushing with the Inca was the meta, and that's because in the
• 55:46
  past the villagers benefited from blacksmith upgrades
• 55:49
  starting in Feudal age. This gave birth to the famous
• 55:53
  Nobel Rush, which consisted of invading the enemy with armoured
• 55:58
  villagers in the feudal age and rushing them with towers being
• 56:01
  viewed as one of the most annoying strategies to counter
• 56:05
  because the Inca villagers could tank up to 40 villager hits,
• 56:09
  putting them at a high advantage to both rush and defend
• 56:12
  themselves. The strategy was so obnoxious
• 56:15
  that it led to moving the bonus effect starting at the castle
• 56:18
  age in May 2021, completely killing the strategy.
• 56:23
  I have dedicated a whole podcast episode on the Noble Rush, so if
• 56:28
  you haven't heard that yet, please find it in the podcast.
• 56:31
  Feed. Before we get to the unique
• 56:34
  text, it's time to talk about the Inca unique unit, which is
• 56:38
  the Kamayuk. The Kamayuk is an infantry unit
• 56:42
  wielding a long spear that allows attacking at range, and
• 56:45
  it deals lots of bonus damage against cavalry units.
• 56:49
  They have one range so they can be easily microed effectively in
• 56:53
  large groups as they are able to attack from behind one another.
• 56:57
  The range also allows them to tack through walls, making them
• 57:00
  good at defending or attacking in walled areas.
• 57:03
  Same as step Lancers. However, it is not recommended
• 57:07
  to fight against swordsman because they deal too much bonus
• 57:10
  damage against the Kamayuk and it would take a lot of micro to
• 57:14
  survive that fight. It's much better and cheaper to
• 57:17
  use slingers for that. They have ADHP cost 48 food and
• 57:21
  45 in the Imperial age, along with 30 gold, and they are a
• 57:26
  little faster than halps which makes them more effective
• 57:29
  against calf. They are produced in 10 seconds
• 57:33
  from the castle, which are also cheaper for the Inca, so they're
• 57:37
  quite easy to mass for a unique unit.
• 57:40
  The Kamajoke is basically a stronger version of the halp,
• 57:44
  serving the same role as a counter unit against Calvary.
• 57:48
  However, the Inca do have fully upgraded halps in the Imperial
• 57:51
  age that also benefit from the food discount and unlike the
• 57:55
  Kameyuks they cost no gold. So why would you ever go for
• 58:00
  Kameyuks over helps? I think there are two scenarios
• 58:04
  in which you prefer Kameyuks over helps. 1 is a player that
• 58:09
  is very all in on cavalry units. Having the one range on the
• 58:13
  Kameyuk makes it so much stronger when fighting against
• 58:16
  Cav units because you get to deal your bonus damage more
• 58:20
  often than with the helps. The second scenario is where you
• 58:24
  cannot afford or wait to get a mass of gold units on the field
• 58:27
  to push your enemy. For the Inca, they would need to
• 58:30
  accompany their helps with either champi or arps, most
• 58:34
  likely the latter, and they take a while to take into and they
• 58:38
  also need quite the mass. Imagine you're facing an enemy
• 58:42
  all in Castle H rushing you with Knights.
• 58:45
  If you defend with monks and Pikes, you will probably survive
• 58:49
  the attack, but you have no army to go and retaliate.
• 58:54
  With a Kameyuk that's a little different because they are much
• 58:57
  more effective at taking down buildings because of their
• 58:59
  higher base damage which is 7 compared to the Pikes four, and
• 59:03
  much better at killing villagers and preventing rewalls because
• 59:07
  of their range. They also survive a lot longer
• 59:10
  because they have 15 more HP. I agree that the unit is very
• 59:15
  situational and that most of the times helps will probably be
• 59:19
  more cost effective choice over the Kameyuk, but I wouldn't
• 59:22
  underestimate its usefulness in the situations I just described.
• 59:27
  But what about researching the elite upgrade?
• 59:30
  Well that's even more situational in my opinion.
• 59:34
  You'll get 10 more HP and one more attack for 900 gold and 500
• 59:39
  food. If you have a lot of them and
• 59:42
  you plan on building them more because you have a lot of gold
• 59:45
  to spare, then it's probably worth it, but I'd rather spend
• 59:49
  those resources on transitioning into helps for the late game.
• 59:53
  On the other hand, it's worth mentioning that elite Kamayuks
• 59:56
  are visually much more intimidating than regular
• 59:59
  Kamayuk. They get an awesome looking Cape
• 1:00:03
  and their Spears are decorated with bright feathers or knots.
• 1:00:06
  Not really sure what they are but they look good.
• 1:00:09
  And I mean, you can't really put a prize on these kind of things,
• 1:00:13
  can you? Now you might be wondering why a
• 1:00:17
  mountain dwelling civilization used such long Spears.
• 1:00:20
  Usually long Pikes are for flat open plains, right?
• 1:00:25
  Well, the Inca used them to create what was essentially an
• 1:00:28
  Indian phalanx. The Spears could be up to 12 to
• 1:00:32
  20 feet long, which is 3 to 6 meters or something between two
• 1:00:37
  and four times the size of a soldier.
• 1:00:40
  On the narrow, winding mountain paths of the Andes, a line of
• 1:00:45
  kamauks was an impassable wall. There was no room to flank them,
• 1:00:49
  and because the paths were so tight, you had to face the
• 1:00:52
  points of 20 Spears at once. These Spears were typically used
• 1:00:56
  by warriors in the rear ranks to provide a solid defensive core.
• 1:01:01
  They were used to thrust over the heads of the frontline
• 1:01:04
  troops. Army squads were organized in a
• 1:01:06
  series of lines. The front lines were initially
• 1:01:09
  occupied by slingers and Archers who would go at the back of the
• 1:01:13
  formation once they fired their first shots.
• 1:01:15
  The lines behind them were occupied by stormtroopers with
• 1:01:19
  clubs and axes. These were followed by short
• 1:01:22
  spear bearers, and closing the formation were long spear
• 1:01:25
  bearers like the Kamayuk. However, the Kamayuk was not
• 1:01:29
  always equipped with these Spears.
• 1:01:31
  In fact, they rarely were. The spear seems to be a weapon
• 1:01:35
  exclusive to Kamayoks from Cusco.
• 1:01:38
  Kamayoks from other regions used a variety of different weapons.
• 1:01:42
  In fact, Kamayoks weren't even necessarily warriors.
• 1:01:46
  This confused me at first because I didn't find any
• 1:01:49
  reliable sources about Kamayoks. Being Kamayok was a high status
• 1:01:56
  role, basically making someone an administrator of something.
• 1:02:01
  They were often experts in specific types of warfare or
• 1:02:04
  logistics. For example, there were Kippu
• 1:02:08
  Kamauks who handled the knotted string records and Caski Kamauks
• 1:02:12
  who handled the messengers, but the military Kamauks were the
• 1:02:16
  ones who kept the empire together.
• 1:02:18
  When the Spanish arrived, they were stunned by the discipline
• 1:02:21
  of these units. Unlike many other tribal groups
• 1:02:24
  that would break and run after a few volleys, the Kamauk units
• 1:02:28
  moved in total silence, shifting their formations with surgical
• 1:02:32
  position based on a whistle, command, drum beats, and
• 1:02:36
  trumpets. When I was looking at Inca
• 1:02:38
  warfare, almost everyone of rank was a Kamauk.
• 1:02:42
  Because that's just a term for being in charge of something.
• 1:02:46
  Heck, I found a post about a Kamayuk from 2025 who is well
• 1:02:52
  and alive. He's a waka ah Kamayuk, someone
• 1:02:55
  who is devoted to the old Inca gods and who keeps the old
• 1:02:59
  culture alive. If you ever travel that region
• 1:03:02
  and meet a Kamayuk, you needn't worry that he's going to poke
• 1:03:05
  you with a spear. Instead, show them the respect
• 1:03:08
  their culture deserves. Now it's finally time to talk
• 1:03:13
  about the unique technologies. But trust me, it was important
• 1:03:16
  to talk about the units first because both unique texts affect
• 1:03:20
  the military. The Castle Age unique technology
• 1:03:22
  is called Andean Sling and once again nods to the unique weapon
• 1:03:27
  used by the Andean tribes and civilizations.
• 1:03:30
  It has not been changed with the rework and takes away the
• 1:03:33
  minimum range of slingers and skirmishes as well as giving
• 1:03:36
  slingers one additional attack since slingers are working off
• 1:03:40
  their bonus damage mainly. The one additional attack is
• 1:03:43
  very nice, but you're getting this technology to get rid of
• 1:03:46
  the minimum range. The minimum range for slingers
• 1:03:49
  and skirmishes is 1, so by getting rid of that they can be
• 1:03:52
  micro just like Archers. They can fight against units
• 1:03:56
  that are right next to them, not having to awkwardly step to the
• 1:03:59
  sides to be able to fight. This is especially helpful when
• 1:04:03
  trying to microbe back from some nights or light calf that feel
• 1:04:06
  like the natural counter against slingers and skirts.
• 1:04:10
  Of course, it's also very valuable when fighting against
• 1:04:13
  infantry units. When you're migrating back
• 1:04:15
  against those, it adds to the value of these units, and in my
• 1:04:19
  opinion, is well worth the 200 food and 300 gold you need to
• 1:04:22
  spend for it. Would I research it in Castle H
• 1:04:26
  though? Probably not.
• 1:04:28
  Only if it's safe to assume that I'm so all in that I'll never
• 1:04:31
  reach the imperial age anyway, andient thing is a tech you want
• 1:04:35
  to get in the late game when you have lots of skirms and a trash
• 1:04:38
  wall. I've already told you all my
• 1:04:41
  historical knowledge about the sling, so instead I'll give you
• 1:04:44
  a fun fact about it. By researching this technology,
• 1:04:48
  you also remove the minimum range from Janitors, which you
• 1:04:51
  can build from your range if you're teamed up with a Berber
• 1:04:55
  player. The Genitor is a mounted
• 1:04:57
  Skirmisher unit after all, and the Barber team bonus gives all
• 1:05:00
  team members access to the Genitor once they reach the
• 1:05:03
  Castle Age. Fabric Shields is the Inca
• 1:05:07
  unique tech from the Imperial Age.
• 1:05:10
  Researching this technology costs 600 food and 600 gold, and
• 1:05:13
  gives Kamayuks, Slingers, and Champ units plus one melee armor
• 1:05:18
  and plus one Pierce armor. This technology has been changed
• 1:05:22
  and nerfed a little with a new DLC.
• 1:05:25
  The change comes from Inca losing Eagle Warriors who were
• 1:05:28
  also benefiting from this tech and getting Champion Warriors
• 1:05:31
  instead. The nerf has addressed the
• 1:05:34
  Pierce armour and formally you'd get +2 Pierce armour which has
• 1:05:38
  now been reduced to only one. This nerve is of course
• 1:05:42
  significant, but Inca have been considered one of the best
• 1:05:45
  sieves ever since they have received that massive Foos
• 1:05:48
  discount. And I believe this is.
• 1:05:50
  One way to adjust the civilization.
• 1:05:52
  That seems very fair to me. Kamauks, Slingers and Champi are
• 1:05:56
  all unmounted units and therefore usually unable to
• 1:05:59
  easily escape fights. These kind of units usually
• 1:06:03
  depend a lot on their armor, so it's a very strong technology
• 1:06:07
  for the late game. Keep in mind that the Inca have
• 1:06:10
  no real mobile rating unit since they're missing out on the
• 1:06:13
  stable like every American Sift does.
• 1:06:16
  The best rating unit is actually the Champi Warrior, which is a
• 1:06:19
  gold unit and in that spirit, similar to the Eagle before.
• 1:06:23
  Having extra armor on it is making your units more durable
• 1:06:27
  and that's important, especially when resources are starting to
• 1:06:30
  run out and you still need to sacrifice your units in order to
• 1:06:34
  hurt your opponent's economy. While getting both melee and
• 1:06:38
  Pierce armor is nice, you're mainly getting this tech for the
• 1:06:41
  Pierce armor I believe because big groups of Archers counter
• 1:06:44
  slingers and kamaukes very well, whereas you'd probably try and
• 1:06:48
  avoid fighting melee units whether you have fabric Shields
• 1:06:51
  or not. The Champi warrior is a bit
• 1:06:53
  different because it wants to be accountable unit for Archers
• 1:06:57
  which are usually protected by some kind of melee unit, so
• 1:07:00
  champies benefit from both types of armor in the same way.
• 1:07:04
  I wouldn't go as far as to say that fabric Shields is a must
• 1:07:07
  have technology for the Inca because they have the tools to
• 1:07:11
  finish a game in the Castle Age long before this technology is
• 1:07:14
  available. If.
• 1:07:16
  You are committed to it, but it is definitely unique tech you
• 1:07:19
  want to pick up when it gets to the late game.
• 1:07:22
  If it really is that important though, how much should you
• 1:07:26
  prioritize it? Well, your blacksmith upgrade
• 1:07:29
  should always be the first priority.
• 1:07:31
  Plate mail armour gives you more armour for a little less than
• 1:07:34
  1/3 of the total resource cost of fabric Shields.
• 1:07:38
  So the unique tech should be on top of your regular upgrades,
• 1:07:41
  not prioritized before them. Now you might look at that tech
• 1:07:45
  and think, wait, why am I spending resources to give my
• 1:07:49
  soldiers cloth armour? Isn't that a downgrade from wood
• 1:07:52
  or metal? Actually, it's one of the most
• 1:07:55
  historically accurate upgrades in the game.
• 1:07:58
  In the Andes, they didn't have large deposits of iron for plate
• 1:08:02
  armor. Instead, they became the world's
• 1:08:05
  leading experts in textile defense.
• 1:08:08
  The clothes were made of thick fabric which completely absorbed
• 1:08:11
  arrows, and their Shields were essentially the Kevlar of the
• 1:08:16
  15th century. They were made of dozens of
• 1:08:19
  layers of tightly packed cotton and llama wool, woven so densely
• 1:08:23
  that a stone or an arrow couldn't actually punch through
• 1:08:27
  an arrow or a sling. Stone hitting this fabric
• 1:08:30
  wouldn't shatter it like wood or Pierce it like thin metal.
• 1:08:34
  The fibers would stretch and catch the projectile, preventing
• 1:08:37
  it from reaching the body. Even the Spanish were impressed.
• 1:08:41
  There are records of conquistadors ditching their
• 1:08:43
  heavy steel breastplates, which were hot, prone to rusting and
• 1:08:47
  clunky, and replacing them with the Andean style of padded
• 1:08:51
  fabric armour. It was lighter, it offered
• 1:08:54
  incredible protection against the weapons of the region, and
• 1:08:57
  it didn't turn you into a human oven in the South American sun
• 1:09:01
  or put weight on you while you were hiking through the
• 1:09:03
  mountains. Much like their clothing, they
• 1:09:06
  also armored their Shields with textile materials.
• 1:09:10
  Some Shields featured a long piece of fabric that hung down
• 1:09:13
  from the bottom of the frame. This fringe was a brilliant
• 1:09:17
  tactical addition. It protected the warrior's legs
• 1:09:20
  from sling stones without adding the weight of a full-sized
• 1:09:24
  wooden shield. In the game, this is reflected
• 1:09:26
  in the plus 1 + 1 armor bonus, protecting the unit from both
• 1:09:30
  arrows and melee hits. It's even reported that some
• 1:09:35
  warriors had tall fabric Shields on their back that they carried
• 1:09:39
  like a backpack in order to protect themselves from behind,
• 1:09:42
  and a smaller wooden shield that they had in one hand which had
• 1:09:46
  the aforementioned fringes to protect their legs.
• 1:09:50
  It's quite genius if you think about it because it gives you
• 1:09:52
  maneuverability and protection at the same time.
• 1:09:57
  There seems to have been some sort of psychological warfare
• 1:09:59
  behind it as well. When a line of kamauks stood
• 1:10:03
  together, the Shields formed a continuous, brightly colored
• 1:10:07
  wall. To an enemy, it didn't look like
• 1:10:10
  a group of men. It looked like a solid, shifting
• 1:10:13
  geometric block that seemed impervious to damage, like a
• 1:10:18
  dangerous wall was closing in on you.
• 1:10:20
  You would fire arrow after arrow, sling your stones, but
• 1:10:24
  they would only get stuck in that wall that keeps coming
• 1:10:27
  closer. It's hard to understand how
• 1:10:30
  smart it is to use fabric this way.
• 1:10:32
  We don't have access to steel and metal.
• 1:10:35
  With that, we've covered all civilization bonuses, unique and
• 1:10:38
  regional units, as well as the unique technologies.
• 1:10:42
  And now it's time to take a closer look at the strategic
• 1:10:45
  options of the Inca and their army compositions by analyzing
• 1:10:49
  their tech tree. The Inca are clearly an Archer
• 1:11:07
  and infantry civilization. They might not have a stable,
• 1:11:10
  but don't let that fool you. This is a civilization with an
• 1:11:13
  incredible toolkit, especially when you hit the late game.
• 1:11:17
  I don't believe that getting champion losing the Malaysian
• 1:11:20
  Eagle line makes too much of a difference.
• 1:11:23
  They are a hybrid of these two units after all.
• 1:11:26
  They've got all upgrades for their champion line and fully
• 1:11:28
  upgraded helps for that anti cavalry trash.
• 1:11:32
  If you're adding kamiuks to the infantry mix you have a
• 1:11:35
  situational anti cavalry unit with an extra bit of punch
• 1:11:38
  that's great for breaking through enemy defenses as well.
• 1:11:41
  In the department of ranged units the Inca have fully
• 1:11:45
  upgraded skirmishes and arbalists and on top of that a
• 1:11:48
  second trash alternative with the Slinger that serves as a
• 1:11:52
  cheap anti infantry unit. To sum it up, you have a perfect
• 1:11:56
  counter civilization. To counter ranged units they'll
• 1:11:59
  use skirmishes or champion warriors.
• 1:12:01
  To counter infantry they'll use slingers, and to counter cavalry
• 1:12:05
  they have habs or camo yokes. All of these units cost food and
• 1:12:10
  therefore benefit from the food discount.
• 1:12:13
  The later the game goes, the cheaper the units get.
• 1:12:16
  In order to do damage, the Inca use their gold units, so Arbs
• 1:12:19
  and Champion warriors. And as I mentioned, like all
• 1:12:22
  American civilizations, they cannot build a stable and
• 1:12:25
  therefore have no cavalry units. Unlike the Mayans, the Incas
• 1:12:30
  actually get Redemption so you can convert a stable and make
• 1:12:34
  Schlattle warriors from them, which is the unit I have covered
• 1:12:37
  in the Aztec podcast, so if you want to know more about it, have
• 1:12:40
  a listen to that episode. Since you can't research any
• 1:12:44
  cavalry upgrades in the blacksmith, it's pretty
• 1:12:46
  pointless to go for that unit anyway.
• 1:12:49
  Having Redemption also means that if your opponent tries to
• 1:12:51
  shut down your Archers with Mangonells or scorpions, you can
• 1:12:55
  use monks to snatch that siege right out from under them or
• 1:12:59
  convert their buildings, which is especially useful if they try
• 1:13:02
  to forward you. Looking at their monastery
• 1:13:04
  texts, they are missing out on atonement so they can't convert
• 1:13:08
  enemy monks and they have no access to further so their monks
• 1:13:12
  will be forever slow. By the way, they are one out of
• 1:13:16
  only 5 civilizations with no access to fervor, the others
• 1:13:20
  being Dravidians, Malay, Slavs, and Vietnamese.
• 1:13:24
  Both atonement and fervor are important in monk wars, so that
• 1:13:28
  shouldn't be a strategy you're going for as the Inca.
• 1:13:32
  Using monks to help defend against cavalry though is
• 1:13:34
  perfectly fine. Since they're getting all other
• 1:13:37
  upgrades. Their siege is pretty
• 1:13:39
  respectable. They can research Siege Ram and
• 1:13:42
  Heavy Scorpion, but they're missing out on Siege Onager.
• 1:13:46
  Like all American civilizations, the Inca have no access to
• 1:13:49
  bombard cannons, so you'll either need to convert those or
• 1:13:52
  rely on your trebuchets. Their university is also pretty
• 1:13:55
  great. Only architecture and Bombard
• 1:13:57
  tower is unavailable. While the latter makes perfect
• 1:14:01
  sense, I do wonder why they're not getting architecture, since
• 1:14:05
  architecture was actually Co part of the Inca Empire.
• 1:14:08
  The Inca Empire employed a system of tribute to the Inca
• 1:14:11
  government in the form of labour called mita that required all
• 1:14:16
  males between 15 and 50 years old to work on large public
• 1:14:21
  construction projects. Inca architecture is widely
• 1:14:25
  known for its fine masonry, which features precisely cut and
• 1:14:29
  shaped stones closely fitted without mortar.
• 1:14:32
  Even though this was mostly the case for buildings of higher
• 1:14:36
  status, if you take a close look at the South American
• 1:14:39
  architecture set in the game, you'll be able to spot this when
• 1:14:43
  you research fortified walls. They are the most beautiful
• 1:14:47
  walls in the entire game. The Incas have also developed an
• 1:14:52
  extensive Rd. system spanning most of the western length of
• 1:14:54
  the continent and placed their distinctive architecture along
• 1:14:58
  the way, thereby visually asserting their imperial rule
• 1:15:02
  along the frontier. I guess it's a balancing thing,
• 1:15:05
  even though I don't believe that giving them architecture would
• 1:15:08
  suddenly turn them into a defensive beast.
• 1:15:11
  So what's their biggest weakness?
• 1:15:13
  Definitely the lack of gunpowder and cavalry.
• 1:15:16
  But honestly their slingers do such a good job of compensating
• 1:15:20
  for that missing hand cannon your tech that you'll barely
• 1:15:24
  notice it, especially now that they are trash units.
• 1:15:27
  Of course stat wise it's hard to compare those two units since
• 1:15:30
  the hand Canyon will always outperform a Slinger in every
• 1:15:33
  single way. But hand canonias are expensive
• 1:15:36
  in gold and even harder to mass since you need Imperial age and
• 1:15:41
  chemistry for it, whereas slingers can be masked starting
• 1:15:44
  in the Castle age and they are strong even without a single
• 1:15:47
  upgrade. The second weakness of the Inca
• 1:15:49
  is of course mobility, simply because they have vocabulary
• 1:15:52
  units. Despite the Champi being faster
• 1:15:55
  than militia, you're still not really able to be as mobile as
• 1:15:59
  cavalry sips. As the Inca, you want to keep
• 1:16:01
  track of enemy units and make sure you're not easy to rate
• 1:16:05
  when playing against Cav sips. The most mobile unit they have
• 1:16:09
  is probably the Chompy Warrior, and that is always as a
• 1:16:13
  disadvantage when it comes to mobility compared to Cav.
• 1:16:17
  So much for a general assessment of their tech tree.
• 1:16:20
  Now let's talk army compositions and strategies.
• 1:16:24
  Before their rework, eagles and halves were a deadly late game
• 1:16:28
  composition, and I'm curious to find out whether the champion
• 1:16:31
  will be able to replace the eagles in this comp.
• 1:16:34
  Out of all the South American civilizations, the Inca will
• 1:16:38
  most likely have the deadliest combination of these units
• 1:16:41
  because they are significantly cheaper and with fabric Shields
• 1:16:45
  they're also much more durable. It's a beautiful rock paper
• 1:16:49
  scissor set up. If your opponent brings cavalry
• 1:16:52
  to stop your champi, they run straight into your helps.
• 1:16:55
  If they bring Archers to mount your helps, the champi hopefully
• 1:16:58
  close the gap and shred them. And the best part?
• 1:17:01
  It requires almost 0 micro. You just send the wave in and
• 1:17:06
  while they're busy fighting the frontline you can peel off a
• 1:17:08
  group of champi to raid their wood line.
• 1:17:10
  Or food economy, of course. If you do.
• 1:17:13
  Have micro then all the better if you aren't feeling the
• 1:17:16
  champi. Maybe you're up against a
• 1:17:18
  heavily fortified base where a rating isn't an option.
• 1:17:22
  Try the help Kameyuk and siege ram combo.
• 1:17:25
  This is the. Ultimate mid control play for
• 1:17:27
  maps like gold rush. Use the Rams to soak up all the
• 1:17:31
  aero fire and try to take down their walls while you're
• 1:17:35
  kameyuks and help stand behind them ready to impale anything
• 1:17:38
  that gets close to them. When you show up with champion
• 1:17:41
  helps most players gut reaction would be to build champions to
• 1:17:45
  counter you. Many civilizations would have to
• 1:17:48
  scramble into a slow arch attack switch to handle that.
• 1:17:51
  But not the Inca. You just drop some slingers
• 1:17:54
  against the infantry. They get that bonus damage
• 1:17:58
  against infantry immediately. No expensive upgrades required.
• 1:18:03
  It's a nightmare for Archers to deal with because they can't get
• 1:18:06
  close enough to the slingers without getting hurt by the fast
• 1:18:08
  champy warriors. Finally a quick note on the
• 1:18:12
  early game and the feudal and castle ages.
• 1:18:15
  If the champion are anything like eagles were, they aren't
• 1:18:19
  the unkillable Archer counters they become in the imperial age.
• 1:18:23
  A good player with solid micro can still kite your eagles with
• 1:18:27
  a group of crossbows and look at looking at the champion stats
• 1:18:30
  that will still hold true. To shut that down, mix in
• 1:18:34
  skirmishes. They add the extra layer of
• 1:18:36
  threat that forces the Archer player to retreat.
• 1:18:40
  They are dirt cheap and if you're adding them to champy
• 1:18:43
  warriors, your opponent will have a tough time to find an
• 1:18:46
  answer outside of expensive siege and cavalry.
• 1:18:49
  And if they realize that and mix the Knights to snipe your
• 1:18:52
  skirmishes, well, that's what your cheap herbs are for.
• 1:18:56
  It's all about having an answer for every question your opponent
• 1:18:59
  asks of you. And the Inca are.
• 1:19:01
  Well. Equipped to find that answer
• 1:19:04
  very quickly. One of the biggest
• 1:19:06
  misconceptions in Age of Empires 2 is that a civilization without
• 1:19:10
  a stable must be 1 dimensional. But with the inkers, that
• 1:19:15
  couldn't be further from the truth.
• 1:19:17
  The detectory allows for almost anything, of course, minus
• 1:19:20
  cavalry, and they do it all at a discount.
• 1:19:24
  Toss in their solid monks and you have a civilization that can
• 1:19:26
  adapt to almost any situation. Then the rework might have made
• 1:19:30
  them even better in the early and mid game.
• 1:19:34
  Back when the Inca had Eagle Warriors in the feudal age, to
• 1:19:39
  be honest they were often a let down.
• 1:19:41
  They trained slowly, they forced their economy to be extremely
• 1:19:45
  gold heavy, and ironically they can still lose to the very unit
• 1:19:49
  they're supposed to counter, enemy Archers.
• 1:19:51
  Eagle Warrior got really good in the late game, but it's not an
• 1:19:56
  easy thing to pull off. The Champi Warrior seems to be a
• 1:19:59
  unit that becomes relevant from the start of the game, but it
• 1:20:02
  might not be as strong in the late game as the Eagles were.
• 1:20:06
  Still, you might want to open with Archers first.
• 1:20:09
  Use that early game range to apply pressure, and then while
• 1:20:12
  you're clicking up to the Castle Age, make that transition into
• 1:20:15
  champion. It's a much smoother curve for
• 1:20:18
  your economy and catches your opponent off guard right when
• 1:20:21
  they think they've got your Archers figured out.
• 1:20:24
  Inca Archers themselves are pretty generic, but when where
• 1:20:27
  they shine is in the champion runner opening, which is a weird
• 1:20:31
  thing to say, but it's basically what was once the man at arms
• 1:20:34
  opening. Even though the food bonus on
• 1:20:36
  those three initial champion might seem marginal, it's
• 1:20:39
  actually lifesaver for such a demanding build order.
• 1:20:43
  Food is always the bottleneck in the early game, so that extra
• 1:20:46
  bit of foods you save makes it significantly easier to afford,
• 1:20:50
  and also to afford your blacksmith and Archer upgrades
• 1:20:53
  as you follow up the rush. But there's more to the Inca
• 1:20:56
  than that. You can play off meta
• 1:20:58
  strategies. For example, do you remember the
• 1:21:01
  days when the Inca were infamous for their unstoppable tower
• 1:21:04
  rushes with their super strong villagers?
• 1:21:07
  Well, the villagers aren't as tanky as they used to be, but
• 1:21:11
  the military units got of massive buff through the food
• 1:21:13
  discount. No other civilization does this
• 1:21:16
  opening as efficiently as the Inca.
• 1:21:19
  You get the food savings on your champion scouts and the stone
• 1:21:22
  savings on your towers. The strategy here is all about
• 1:21:26
  economic disruption. Yes, sending villagers forward
• 1:21:29
  to build towers cost you idle time in your own base, of
• 1:21:32
  course, but it forces the enemy of their resources.
• 1:21:36
  If you're up against a civilization with a strong late
• 1:21:39
  game economy, one that might outscale the Inca, you can use
• 1:21:43
  the strategy to pull them back down to your level.
• 1:21:47
  It's a perfect opening against civilizations that have a slow
• 1:21:50
  start in the feudal age. You keep them busy, you deny
• 1:21:53
  their gold, and you set the pace for the rest of the match.
• 1:21:56
  This was much stronger once before, but it's still an
• 1:22:00
  amazing strategy to play with the Inca.
• 1:22:03
  Now the Incas can pull off a trash rush that rivals the
• 1:22:06
  Byzantines. You flood the map with
• 1:22:09
  skirmishes and Spearman pure counter units since they're so
• 1:22:13
  cheap. You can comfortably combine this
• 1:22:15
  with a tower rush taking advantage of that 15% stone
• 1:22:18
  discount, and this is devastating because your
• 1:22:21
  opponent has to spend much more real resources like gold or high
• 1:22:26
  food costs just to keep up with your trash units.
• 1:22:30
  The goal with towers isn't necessarily to kill them, it's
• 1:22:34
  to make their life so miserable that your cheaper follow up army
• 1:22:38
  can walk right in and drive them crazy.
• 1:22:41
  Even though you've invested so many resources into skirmishes
• 1:22:45
  and Spears, if all goes well, you'll still be the first to be
• 1:22:48
  up in the castle age. It's very frustrating to play
• 1:22:52
  against, and even though it's very demanding, it's a great way
• 1:22:55
  of having fun and breaking the matter in a team game
• 1:22:59
  environment. The Incas are best suited for
• 1:23:02
  the Archer role. Chambe warriors can't keep up
• 1:23:05
  with Knights when it comes to raw HP and movement speed.
• 1:23:08
  If you're playing in the pocket position, you really want that
• 1:23:11
  heavy cavalry and the Inca just don't have it.
• 1:23:14
  As a flank player focusing on Archers, the Inca brings some
• 1:23:17
  subtle but powerful economic perks to the table.
• 1:23:20
  You get early wood savings with your houses and settlements, and
• 1:23:24
  that starting llama is a huge help for smoothing out those
• 1:23:28
  incredibly tight Archer build orders in team games.
• 1:23:31
  While the Inca Archers themselves are generic, meaning
• 1:23:34
  they don't have built in discounts or unique combat
• 1:23:37
  traits, they are fully upgraded. You get every single blacksmith
• 1:23:41
  and university technology, giving you a reliable top tier
• 1:23:45
  arbalister in the late game. However, you're wasting pretty
• 1:23:49
  much every bonus that the Inca have in a team game, and neither
• 1:23:53
  the unique unit nor the unique text will help you out.
• 1:23:57
  Playing the Inca in team games is either generic Archer play or
• 1:24:01
  you need some serious out-of-the-box thinking.
• 1:24:04
  For example, if you're matched IN2V2 with an even better Archer
• 1:24:08
  civilization, like for example The Ethiopians, why not break
• 1:24:13
  the meta and start a tower rush with a trash rush against your
• 1:24:16
  opponent? That'll make things extremely
• 1:24:19
  messy and put a calf player under an immense amount of
• 1:24:22
  pressure, especially if he's trying to play the meta.
• 1:24:26
  This of course depends a lot on the map.
• 1:24:29
  The Inca are arguably at their peak on open maps.
• 1:24:34
  This is where they can flex their early game advantages,
• 1:24:37
  that extra starting food and aggressive openings with their
• 1:24:40
  rushes and spam of food units. Their aggressive openings and
• 1:24:44
  sheer flexibility are devastating here because the
• 1:24:47
  enemy either needs to match your unit strength and therefore
• 1:24:50
  invests more resources since they don't have that heavy
• 1:24:54
  discount, or they invest into early walls to stop your
• 1:24:57
  aggression by sacrificing their economy on an open map.
• 1:25:01
  The game is usually decided before the lack of late game
• 1:25:05
  economic bonuses or power units even becomes an issue for the
• 1:25:09
  Inca. If you can keep the pressure
• 1:25:11
  high, you won't even need a post imperial economy.
• 1:25:15
  In this spirit, and this is going to sound quite random, I
• 1:25:18
  personally have but one map where Inca are my go to
• 1:25:22
  civilization and that's enclosed.
• 1:25:25
  Because you need to expand to the outside of your little
• 1:25:28
  starting base and you can't really wall yourself, you'll
• 1:25:32
  almost always find damage when playing aggressive, whether it's
• 1:25:35
  a tower rush, a trash rush, or nowadays A champi into Archers
• 1:25:40
  built order. On the flip side, these same
• 1:25:43
  traits make them a tough sell for closed maps like Arena or
• 1:25:47
  Black Forest. Without long term economic bonus
• 1:25:50
  they tend to fall behind. Plus they lack a definitive
• 1:25:54
  death ball that can go toe to toe with the massive late game
• 1:25:58
  compositions. You usually see an arena.
• 1:26:00
  Of course you can contest relics with your slingers, but if your
• 1:26:05
  enemy is going for light calf they will counter your slingers.
• 1:26:09
  So you'll have to add some Spears to that mix.
• 1:26:11
  But that is actually quite common.
• 1:26:13
  You usually play light calf and some Spears, so I think you
• 1:26:17
  should match quite well when you're contesting relics.
• 1:26:20
  Water is another struggle for the Incas in the late game.
• 1:26:23
  With the water rework they're getting access to the catapult
• 1:26:26
  galleon, which is a huge improvement because before they
• 1:26:29
  had neither Canon galleons nor dromats.
• 1:26:31
  However, they still not really good at water just because any
• 1:26:35
  good water civilization needs bonuses that help them in the
• 1:26:39
  water. Inca are made for land and land
• 1:26:42
  only. However, hybrid maps are a
• 1:26:45
  completely different story. Those are still land maps,
• 1:26:49
  right? On those maps, long term naval
• 1:26:52
  dominance often takes a back seat to early game control.
• 1:26:57
  This is where the Inca house bonus and settlement bonus
• 1:26:59
  giving you double the population per house and settlement really
• 1:27:03
  shines. The wood you save on housing and
• 1:27:05
  buildings translates into a significant early eco lead,
• 1:27:09
  allowing you to dominate the water early, build earlier
• 1:27:12
  fishing ships, and pivot to the land quickly.
• 1:27:16
  Finally, on maps where controlling the center is
• 1:27:18
  everything, the Incas are a powerhouse.
• 1:27:21
  They have incredible power spikes in the early ages thanks
• 1:27:24
  to their food discounts, which allows them to seize the middle
• 1:27:27
  of the map faster than most. All of this is valid for the
• 1:27:31
  Inca as they are today, but I've mentioned before that the Inca
• 1:27:35
  have received a notable amount of changes that have brought a
• 1:27:39
  couple of changes to as to how they might play out, especially
• 1:27:44
  with the Slingers and the Champion Warriors, but I still
• 1:27:47
  believe that at the core, the Inca are staying the same.
• 1:27:51
  To maybe get a clearer picture on how the Inca came to be the
• 1:27:54
  civilization they are today, I want to spend a few minutes
• 1:27:58
  talking about where they come from and how they've been
• 1:28:01
  changed over time. When the Inca were released in
• 1:28:05
  2013, it was commonly said that they were the worst out of the
• 1:28:09
  three American civilizations. Aztecs were considered one of
• 1:28:12
  the best, if not the best civilization in the game.
• 1:28:16
  They had an incredible economy with their farms and unbeatable
• 1:28:19
  monks. Maya had their strong Archer
• 1:28:22
  place and long lasting resources and Inca.
• 1:28:26
  They had a free llama and they saved some wood on houses.
• 1:28:30
  They couldn't even build slingers without a castle.
• 1:28:33
  They weren't a bad sieve because eagles were busted back then,
• 1:28:37
  but there were enough better civilizations for them to be not
• 1:28:41
  picked as much in tournaments for a long time.
• 1:28:44
  The Incas were infamous for one thing, the Inca Tower rush with
• 1:28:49
  armoured villagers, what later became known as the Nobu Rush.
• 1:28:53
  You would send 10 villagers forward and because they had
• 1:28:56
  blacksmith armor and attack, they were basically military
• 1:29:00
  units. You could run under enemy TCS,
• 1:29:02
  build towers in their face, and there was almost nothing the
• 1:29:05
  opponent could do to kill your villagers.
• 1:29:07
  It was fun to watch, but it was broken for E Sports, my episode
• 1:29:12
  about the Noble Rush. I'm also telling the story of
• 1:29:14
  Mr. Yo using the strategy against the Viper in the
• 1:29:17
  semifinals of Neely's Apartment Cup 3.
• 1:29:20
  Eventually, the developers nerfed the rush by having
• 1:29:23
  blacksmiths upgrades only affecting villagers starting in
• 1:29:25
  the Castle age, and that proved to be deadly for the Inca.
• 1:29:29
  They were a kind of a meme civilization, and once you took
• 1:29:32
  away their meme, there wasn't much else going for them.
• 1:29:36
  To compensate for losing their super villagers, the developers
• 1:29:40
  shifted the Inca identity towards logistical efficiency.
• 1:29:44
  This is when we saw the introduction of the food
• 1:29:47
  discount for military units. This change was massive for the
• 1:29:51
  E sport. It took the Inca from being
• 1:29:54
  hardly ever considered and turned them into a formidable
• 1:29:57
  and dangerous, very aggressive civilization that doesn't rely
• 1:30:02
  on tower rushes anymore. Suddenly pro players were
• 1:30:05
  picking Incas on Arabia to exploit their incredible trash
• 1:30:09
  spam and their ability to flood the map with slingers and eagles
• 1:30:13
  later on. It also felt like the Inca got
• 1:30:15
  stronger and stronger over time as the players figured out just
• 1:30:19
  how aggressive they can be and still get to the later stages
• 1:30:23
  with competitive timings. Most pros would rate Inca as an
• 1:30:28
  A tier or mid tier civilization. At that time they were a safe
• 1:30:33
  pick in tournaments like King of the Desert because they don't
• 1:30:36
  have many hard counters, and that is actually true even
• 1:30:40
  today. I would argue that this was the
• 1:30:43
  time when the Incas have finally turned it around and went from
• 1:30:47
  the worst American civilization to maybe the best one.
• 1:30:50
  However, the next turning point was the infantry rework early
• 1:30:55
  2025, when infantry was buffed by increasing their movement
• 1:30:59
  speed. And that was also at the same
• 1:31:02
  time indirect consequence nerve to all eager civilizations
• 1:31:07
  because infantry was much more viable, more worth taking into,
• 1:31:11
  and naturally eagles would be countered a lot harder.
• 1:31:15
  With that the Inca slowly decreased in popularity and some
• 1:31:19
  pros would rank them lower. In my opinion the Inca are in a
• 1:31:23
  good place. They are situational yes, and
• 1:31:27
  have unique strengths with their food discount and an identity as
• 1:31:31
  a counter civilization. But instead of being defensive
• 1:31:34
  like the Byzantines, they like to go on the offensive.
• 1:31:38
  It's too early to say what the newest rework changes, but it is
• 1:31:42
  going to be important for them that the Champion Warrior is
• 1:31:45
  strong enough to carry them. Eagles have been widely
• 1:31:49
  considered their only power unit, and if the Champion
• 1:31:52
  Warrior cannot replace them well enough, think I will at best be
• 1:31:55
  a generic Archer civilization. I've been testing the Champion
• 1:31:59
  Warriors for two days now and to me they feel like a little bit
• 1:32:04
  of a weaker version of the Eagles in the late game, but
• 1:32:08
  much stronger in the early game. So if I had to make a
• 1:32:11
  prediction, the Inca will be even more of an early game rush
• 1:32:15
  civilization than they have already been.
• 1:32:19
  The moon had risen, but sleep was far from my mind.
• 1:32:23
  I hung on the words of the old man, who did not seem the least
• 1:32:27
  bit tired. It was as if the more he talked
• 1:32:30
  about Bachakuti, the livelier he became.
• 1:32:33
  I told you about the great battle of Cusco, he continued.
• 1:32:37
  But you must know that this glorious victory did not bring
• 1:32:40
  peace to the Inca. On the contrary, a civil war
• 1:32:44
  broke out for the success of his son filled Bachakruti.
• 1:32:48
  'S father. As is tradition for these
• 1:32:50
  Civilization episodes, I want to talk about campaigns.
• 1:32:54
  The Inca campaign is especially interesting because it has been
• 1:32:57
  overhauled not once, but twice. When the Inca came out, their
• 1:33:02
  campaign was originally called El Dorado.
• 1:33:05
  The reason El Dorado was removed for the Definitive Edition was
• 1:33:08
  because it was more of a second Spanish campaign rather than a
• 1:33:12
  proper Inca campaign. It's depicted the quest of
• 1:33:16
  Francisco de Orellada in search of a rumoured golden city known
• 1:33:21
  as El Dorado, the namesake of this campaign.
• 1:33:25
  In the first mission, you were playing as a Spanish and as the
• 1:33:28
  Inca for the other 3. Since El Dorado is only a myth
• 1:33:32
  and has nothing to do with Inca history, it felt a little out of
• 1:33:35
  place. So it does make sense that Dev's
• 1:33:38
  exchanged this campaign for a new one called Pachakuti with a
• 1:33:42
  definitive edition. If you're curious though, you
• 1:33:45
  can still play the old campaign just by browsing for it in the
• 1:33:48
  mod section. Look for a mod called The
• 1:33:51
  Forgotten HD Campaigns by the author Bellum Zelda DS and
• 1:33:56
  you'll find all the old campaigns, one of which is El
• 1:33:59
  Dorado. Open up the campaigns then and
• 1:34:01
  go to custom campaigns and there you go, you're back in 2013 with
• 1:34:06
  better graphics and no voice overs.
• 1:34:08
  But enough of the old times. I took this opportunity to play
• 1:34:13
  the new and polished campaign entirely.
• 1:34:15
  It focuses on Pachakuti Inka Yupanki, who lived from 1418 to
• 1:34:20
  1471 or 1472. That much is a bit unclear.
• 1:34:26
  Pachakuti was the 9th Sapa Inca of the Kingdom of Cusco.
• 1:34:31
  During his reign, Pachakuti turned Cusco from a small hamlet
• 1:34:35
  to a large Kingdom, which puts them around the same level with
• 1:34:39
  the Chimo, and later initiated an era of conquest that expanded
• 1:34:43
  the Cusco dominion to nearly the entire length of western South
• 1:34:48
  America within 3 generations. The campaign is narrated by a
• 1:34:53
  second hand narrator, a passing merchant telling the words of an
• 1:34:57
  old hermit living in the mountains, and at the end of the
• 1:35:01
  campaign the hermit implies that he is Appu Maita, one of the
• 1:35:05
  generals serving Pachakuti. The campaign consists of five
• 1:35:09
  missions. Mission 1 takes you to the time
• 1:35:12
  before Pachakuti was even born and depicts the rising of
• 1:35:16
  Virakotka as the 8th Inca King. He was actually called Hatun
• 1:35:22
  Tupac and effectively the true founder of the Great Inca
• 1:35:26
  Empire. He led massive military
• 1:35:29
  campaigns through the Urubamba Valley and down to Lake
• 1:35:32
  Titicaca, conquering regions like Kalka and Pisak.
• 1:35:37
  He was a deeply spiritual leader too.
• 1:35:39
  He attributed all his military success to the Andean creator
• 1:35:43
  God Pilakoka and eventually took the name Biakoka Inca for
• 1:35:48
  himself, which is the name used in this first mission.
• 1:35:52
  This mission introduces you to the Inca world and shows how the
• 1:35:55
  Inca formed according to legend, which is why you're overpowering
• 1:36:00
  tribes in the region to establish rule over them.
• 1:36:03
  This is done by capturing 3 artifacts from the three
• 1:36:06
  different tribes called the Chanca, Chuyu and Tambo, who are
• 1:36:10
  represented by the Tupian Mapuche.
• 1:36:12
  So you get to play against two of the three new civilizations.
• 1:36:16
  Right at the start you can tell that the campaign has been
• 1:36:19
  reworked because you're starting with Champi scouts and one of
• 1:36:23
  your advisors explains to you how the new settlements work.
• 1:36:27
  In theory you are surrounded by three enemies who will
• 1:36:30
  constantly attack you, but I moved out early enough to
• 1:36:34
  actually get the Quechua in the east to surrender and then it's
• 1:36:38
  became A2V3. Unlike in other campaigns, your
• 1:36:42
  newly won ally is quite useful and attacks a lot.
• 1:36:47
  Since every faction is playing as a South American
• 1:36:50
  civilization, you're kind of on even grounds when it comes to
• 1:36:54
  fights. So at first I boomed a little,
• 1:36:57
  went to the Castle Age, and then fully committed to Champions and
• 1:37:00
  Slingers, a combination that proved to be unbeatable.
• 1:37:04
  Destroying trade workshops is also worth it because you get
• 1:37:07
  Imperial Age upgrades like Bracer armor and Cap Rams, even
• 1:37:11
  though you're capped at the Castle Age.
• 1:37:13
  All in all, it's not exactly a challenging scenario, but I
• 1:37:16
  admire the fact that there were llamas to be found pretty much
• 1:37:20
  everywhere, and that some of the resources have been arranged so
• 1:37:23
  that you can nicely fit a settlement in between them.
• 1:37:27
  Maybe this has always been the case, but it sure felt nice.
• 1:37:31
  Also, while I was scouting the map, I've encountered Guanacos,
• 1:37:36
  Black Panthers, and Tapia, which by the way, are a little out of
• 1:37:41
  proportion because they are much bigger than llamas.
• 1:37:45
  I've seen a few top peers in my life and I know they're big, but
• 1:37:49
  they're not that big. Anyway, I didn't need to defeat
• 1:37:53
  any opponents to win the scenario, I just had to get
• 1:37:55
  those sacred artifacts. But what fun is that?
• 1:37:59
  So I took some extra time to at least cause a few fights and
• 1:38:02
  destroy the very cool looking Tupee castle in the north.
• 1:38:06
  Mira Kocha's luck didn't last forever though.
• 1:38:09
  His greatest rivals, the Chunka people, eventually came for the
• 1:38:12
  crown. In 1438, the Chunka leader Anku
• 1:38:16
  Valuk marched on the capital city of Kusku with a massive
• 1:38:20
  army, supposedly 40,000 men. Anku Valuk will turn out to be
• 1:38:24
  your main antagonist in this campaign.
• 1:38:27
  Feeling the pressure, Viracoca actually abandoned the capital.
• 1:38:32
  He fled to the fortress of Calca with his chosen heir Urko,
• 1:38:36
  leaving the city to its fate. But Viracoca had another son,
• 1:38:42
  Kusi Yupanki, who refused to run.
• 1:38:45
  He stayed behind, rallied the defenders, and dealt the chunka
• 1:38:49
  A crushing legendary defeat. This is also the framework of
• 1:38:54
  the second scenario. As Cusi Upanki, you need to
• 1:38:58
  defend the city of Cusco, which is located in the Highlands.
• 1:39:02
  After the shameful departure of your father and you get control
• 1:39:06
  over the city and start booming. Cusco villages are starting to
• 1:39:09
  build a wander, the Sun Temple in the centre of Cusco, and you
• 1:39:14
  need to make sure that the construction workers survive in
• 1:39:17
  order to complete the wander. You can't do it with your own
• 1:39:20
  villages. Once the wander completes, you
• 1:39:23
  need to defend for 200 years. It's true that the enemies are
• 1:39:26
  constantly sending their forces to try and take down that
• 1:39:29
  wonder, but the defence is not that hard.
• 1:39:33
  All I had to do was to play some castles along the city edges,
• 1:39:38
  which is a long river, and snipe the siege with my super strong
• 1:39:41
  champion warriors and that's basically all.
• 1:39:45
  The enemies did a good job of keeping me busy during the 200
• 1:39:49
  years though. To my surprise, I even got an
• 1:39:51
  achievement for not building a single piece of Stonewall or
• 1:39:54
  Stonegate. After the battle, Kusi seized
• 1:39:57
  power from his father and brother.
• 1:39:59
  He took on a new name that every Age of Empires player will
• 1:40:02
  recognize, Pachakuti, which literally means the Earth Shaker
• 1:40:06
  or World Transformer. He turned a small regional
• 1:40:10
  Kingdom into a massive empire we know today, and that is the
• 1:40:14
  hero. You're leading to victory in the
• 1:40:15
  next scenario when he is at war with his brother Urku, who had
• 1:40:20
  entrenched himself in Colors, a mountain fortress.
• 1:40:23
  And proclaimed himself Sapa Inca.
• 1:40:25
  The supreme ruler Pachakuti had no intention of bowing to his
• 1:40:29
  brother, so he went to kill him. On your way to your brother,
• 1:40:33
  leaderless Inca soldiers will join your army if they get to
• 1:40:36
  see Pachakuti, and so will Inca of civilians.
• 1:40:40
  He can also loot chunka buildings and tends to obtain
• 1:40:43
  additional resources and destroy the chunka siege workshop.
• 1:40:47
  Since you're on a military campaign, you're starting off in
• 1:40:49
  a little camp at the edge of the map with some skirmishes,
• 1:40:52
  slingers and crossbows, as well as kamauks and lots of champion
• 1:40:56
  runners, but you have no villages.
• 1:40:58
  There's also three hero units, Pachakuti of course, and two of
• 1:41:02
  his generals, one of which is the guy from the narration.
• 1:41:06
  This mission is very slow paced as you make your way through the
• 1:41:09
  narrow paths of the mountains and slowly increase your army
• 1:41:12
  size. You'll have to watch your units
• 1:41:15
  initially so that you don't run into a manganel shot, but after
• 1:41:19
  a while your army is big enough to just patrol into anything.
• 1:41:22
  Taking out your brother is also not too hard, especially once
• 1:41:26
  you get some siege units and petards in the final fight.
• 1:41:30
  You need to be careful not to lose too many units though,
• 1:41:33
  since the city is well fortified, but I've supported my
• 1:41:37
  push with some towers and that did the trick.
• 1:41:41
  OOC is dead and Pachakuti, the undisputed ruler of the Inca
• 1:41:46
  Empire. To ensure long lasting peace,
• 1:41:49
  Pachakuti now had to send his troops to his arch enemy, the
• 1:41:53
  Chunka. So he wants to occupy Vaman
• 1:41:57
  Karpa, the Falcon's Tent, which is the capital of Chunka.
• 1:42:02
  In order to conquer the capital, we need to destroy the four
• 1:42:05
  castles of the city and one of their two allies.
• 1:42:09
  Luckily, this mission has been slightly adjusted and we get to
• 1:42:13
  start with some buildings to speed up the initial part.
• 1:42:16
  Relics will be contested, so it's worth collecting those
• 1:42:19
  early on. And by killing Uncle Hua Lok,
• 1:42:22
  who we can damage the morale and discipline of the capital's
• 1:42:25
  defenders, he has his fortified base in the middle of the map.
• 1:42:29
  And there's even more incentive to get rid of him because our
• 1:42:33
  army is actually split into two unconnected groups in the South
• 1:42:37
  and the east, and the only way to get these armies together is
• 1:42:41
  by defeating Uncle Whoalok. Until then, it's actually quite
• 1:42:44
  the stressful scenario because each side is constantly being
• 1:42:48
  attacked and you're playing A2 TC.
• 1:42:50
  Start on completely opposite sides.
• 1:42:53
  If you boom too long, the enemy will overpower you.
• 1:42:57
  But thankfully we have an ally that's sending a huge army to
• 1:43:00
  help down our opponent. What's fun about this map is
• 1:43:04
  that there are lots of rivers and the enemies are going for
• 1:43:07
  water as well, so it gets chaotic pretty quickly.
• 1:43:11
  Once you defeat 1 of Chunka's allies and the forecasters of
• 1:43:15
  the capital, you're rewarded by seeing the wonder of the Tupi
• 1:43:19
  who are the sift behind your enemy crumble to pieces.
• 1:43:23
  The final mission is called Like Father, Like Son.
• 1:43:27
  Pachakuti is now growing old and needs an heir.
• 1:43:30
  His son is the perfect candidate.
• 1:43:32
  He's already the commander of the imperial troops, but he
• 1:43:36
  needs one final Test. So Pachakuti gave his son the
• 1:43:39
  command of the campaign against the Kimu Empire and its capital,
• 1:43:44
  Kankan. In order to accomplish this
• 1:43:46
  mission, we first need to kill the four chieftains of a nearby
• 1:43:50
  village and then conquer the capital by bringing at least 15
• 1:43:55
  military units to the city's main pyramid.
• 1:43:58
  Pachakuti's son is our hero unit and I made sure to charge him
• 1:44:03
  into battle whenever possible to prove his worth.
• 1:44:07
  The capital is a huge city that's well fortified by
• 1:44:10
  countless castles, stone walls and towers.
• 1:44:13
  In the West lies the ocean, and they have a Navy that we need to
• 1:44:17
  beat in order to destroy their harbour market.
• 1:44:20
  In the mountains. They have many strongholds that
• 1:44:22
  are hard to get to and even harder to take out, but it's
• 1:44:26
  well worth the effort. Each of these 3 strongholds have
• 1:44:29
  a cistern, and if we take control of them, the capital
• 1:44:33
  will lose its water supply and thus be weakened.
• 1:44:36
  There's hardly any place on the map that's easy to hold, and
• 1:44:39
  you're fighting for every single tile.
• 1:44:42
  To me, it was a slow and steady creep towards the capital.
• 1:44:46
  Once again, it's not particularly challenging, but
• 1:44:50
  it's fun to play because there's no moment without some action
• 1:44:53
  going on. So what's the final verdict on
• 1:44:56
  the campaign? It's nothing special to be
• 1:44:59
  honest. If you've never played it, this
• 1:45:02
  might be a great way of familiarizing yourself with the
• 1:45:05
  new Inca. And it's not as slow paced as
• 1:45:07
  some of the older campaigns, which is probably because of
• 1:45:10
  some of the recent changes they have made for these scenarios.
• 1:45:14
  It has two swords so it's considered to be medium
• 1:45:16
  difficulty, and it's definitely harder than the Aztec campaign,
• 1:45:20
  but it's also much more modernized so they are hard to
• 1:45:24
  compare. Pachakuti himself and the Inca
• 1:45:27
  history feels a bit underwhelming.
• 1:45:29
  The campaign fails to make the protagonist as interesting as he
• 1:45:32
  probably was in real life. Other than being patriotic and
• 1:45:35
  smart, he really doesn't have any traits.
• 1:45:39
  There's also no antagonist that's worth mentioning who
• 1:45:42
  could bring out some other side of Pachakuti.
• 1:45:45
  He's just an all around good guy who came to save the day and
• 1:45:49
  then decided to be even better and turn the Inca Empire into
• 1:45:53
  the cultural centre of the region.
• 1:45:55
  This is where I believe the asset campaign is superior in my
• 1:45:59
  opinion, at least from a storytelling point of view
• 1:46:03
  because you have Alan Cortez as the ultimate villain and
• 1:46:06
  Moctezuma himself was also kind of a difficult character.
• 1:46:10
  I've told you about the Aztec campaign in length and how many
• 1:46:14
  mistakes there have been, but still I feel like the Pachakuti
• 1:46:18
  campaign felt just much more light hearted.
• 1:46:23
  If you don't mind this, it'll be a fun campaign to play.
• 1:46:26
  However, there's one major criticism I have and that's the
• 1:46:30
  maps. They don't showcase the vast
• 1:46:33
  network of roads and the difficult terrain of the
• 1:46:36
  mountains well enough in my opinion.
• 1:46:38
  I felt like there wasn't enough elevation and everything takes
• 1:46:42
  place in the coastal regions, whereas I personally would have
• 1:46:45
  liked to experience a different kind of terrain.
• 1:46:47
  I remember at least one mission from the Tamerlane campaign that
• 1:46:51
  did a better job at this. But then again, it also does
• 1:46:55
  make sense that the Inca armies didn't clash at high altitudes.
• 1:46:59
  I can assure you that this new version of the Pachakuti
• 1:47:03
  campaign is better than the old one.
• 1:47:05
  And the main reason is that this campaign used to be only Inca
• 1:47:09
  versus Inca for all 5 scenarios. But now that you have new
• 1:47:13
  civilizations, you can also fight against the Tupi, the
• 1:47:16
  Mapuche, and the Muiska as well as the Inca.
• 1:47:20
  So that's just a hell of a lot more variety.
• 1:47:23
  Well, this episode got a little long.
• 1:47:25
  I'm afraid so I'm going to call it a day.
• 1:47:28
  Feels like the Inca rework has delivered and I enjoy their
• 1:47:32
  design A lot. They still feel the same way
• 1:47:35
  they did before the change but with a little twist.
• 1:47:38
  I usually only talk about civilizations that are kind of
• 1:47:41
  figured out, which is why I chose Inca over the three new
• 1:47:44
  civilizations. But there's a chance that in the
• 1:47:47
  next weeks and months, we'll realize that some of my analysis
• 1:47:50
  is just not up to date anymore. I hope that's not going to
• 1:47:53
  happen. And after playing with them for
• 1:47:55
  more than two days, I'm quite confident that the Inca are just
• 1:47:59
  as strong as they were before, maybe even a little stronger.
• 1:48:04
  I want to thank you, dear listener, for sticking around
• 1:48:07
  until the very end of this episode and would like to remind
• 1:48:10
  you that there are lots of other episodes on different
• 1:48:13
  civilizations and strategies and of course, the E Sport magazines
• 1:48:17
  that you can listen to for free and anytime.
• 1:48:21
  So make sure to follow the podcast on Spotify and maybe
• 1:48:25
  leave a comment for this episode if you feel inspired.
• 1:48:28
  You can also write in with some questions or feedback.
• 1:48:31
  If you write an e-mail to ageofcast@gmail.com.
• 1:48:35
  That's ageofcast@gmail.com because I'm curious what you
• 1:48:39
  guys think of the new Inca. You can, of course, also join
• 1:48:43
  this podcast's community Discord and write me there and discuss
• 1:48:47
  the episode. Oh, and if you haven't already,
• 1:48:50
  please rate this podcast on Spotify.
• 1:48:53
  That's actually a great help. But that's going to do it for
• 1:48:56
  the show. I'm actually feeling a little
• 1:48:58
  peckish now, but I'm not really sure what to eat.
• 1:49:02
  I kind of want to try llama now but that seems hard to get, so
• 1:49:07
  maybe potato can't go wrong with that.
• 1:49:11
  I am German after all.