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here in this video we're going to be taking an in-depth look at the gurjaras
going purely by online win rate gurjaras have been either the best or second best open map
civilization for most of 2022 though they have been recently nerfed in a couple of ways since
then with an admittedly small sample size they fall into a more balanced 9th on open maps and
13th on closed Maps out of 42 civilizations while they're still clearly a very strong
civilization I personally find them to be also quite interesting to play in part for their
strange early game bonuses which we'll look at in depth but also for their three unique units
likely because of those factors and complexity they've always performed progressively better at
higher ELO ratings than for casual players as they can be a little tricky to learn at
first hopefully this overview will help with that process though so let's check them out
To start off with their team
bonus their allies and gurjaras themselves have their camels and elephants created 25% faster of
the two I would say camels are the big one here gurjaras are missing the knight line
entirely and while they don't have access to the battle elephant as a team bonus you still have six
different Ally civs that could benefit from that on top of any others that use elephant archers
or camels even just as a bonus in 1v1 games it's pretty solid given camels are often a big part of
a gurjaras core Army it allows them to be trained significantly faster than a knight which takes 30
seconds for a generic civilization in comparison their next two bonuses come as a pair and are
worth spending a bit of time on not only do you start with two Forge bushes under your town center
but you can also Garrison Mills with herdables to produce a passive trickle of food this is probably
the trickiest part of picking up the civilization for the first time but if you handle it right and
know the steps to follow this bonus can give you a very nice lead heading into feudal age to give
you a sense of the numbers with all eight sheep garrisoned the mill generates between 200 and 250
food in a typical fuel age Advance time adding up to around 500 food by 21 or 22 minutes and returns
all 800 food by 34 minutes The way gurjaras are typically played by experienced players as with
a very early Mill right after first two houses are up and then putting all sheep into the mill
as soon as possible because berries collect so slowly and you want to keep up villager production
constantly you'll then want to lure abort or start pushing deer a bit earlier than usual remember as
long as you're bringing in enough food to keep your villagers busy you're essentially playing
up one villager in Dark Age thanks to the passive food income unfortunately building an early Mill
means that you're out of wood to afford a lumber Camp so the first wood villagers go on straggler
trees then build a lumber Camp after your third house you can see why high level players typically
do better with gurjaras than casual players especially if they get them on random as it's
a lot of little things to manage including deer pushing to make things run more smoothly
eventually you are going to run out of free food sources though and at that point you have to make
the call between and garrisoning sheep a couple at a time or putting down some early Farms there's an
argument for both sides here and ungarrisoning sheep means you can usually delay making any
farms until after horse collar which is nice from a wood savings point of view though from what I've
seen generally high level players just leave them Garrison for the passive trickle and make
the early Farms as needed one word of caution is if you are leaving the sheep in be careful
of men at Arms or other units destroying your Mill especially if it's in an exposed position
all in all though for gurjaras the slightly more complicated start does seem to compensate players
and adds a bit of variety for anyone who's maybe bored of the standard Dark Age their next bonus
is their mounted units deal a staggered amount of extra bonus damage maybe surprisingly the elephant
Archer has no bonus damage whatsoever meaning we can just ignore that unit and you also don't
have Cavalry archers so this doesn't actually help at the archery range at all at the stable though
this gives some extra help for these out Cavalry line against monks as one side effect in Castle
age There's no practical impact against Monks at full health but it can be situationally helpful
on Arena with the right combination of blacksmith and monk upgrades the main benefit though is for
camels especially against other mounted units the extra 30 bonus damage means they actually
take out knights in eight instead of the typical 10 attacks for most camels like hindustanis this
means gurjaras aren't just beating Knights cost effectively but even with population efficiency
with equal numbers in Castle age once you reach Imperial age as well the bonus increases to plus
40 percent leading to another plus one attack against Cavalry another less obvious benefit
is for the armored elephant which is the Indian civilization's replacement for the battering ram
it counts as a mounted unit despite not having a rider meeting its bonus damage against buildings
is increased 30 percent in Castle age given almost all of its damage is from anti-building
bonuses that ends up meaning that they do almost as much as a Siege Ram but available 1 age earlier
if that's not enough the Imperial age upgrade to Siege elephant effectively gives you another plus
40 damage meaning they more than match a fully upgraded Ram with Siege Engineers despite not
having that technology this is on top of armored and Siege elephants being faster than ramps and
having a bit more combat ability against villagers so overall with this bonus it's a surprisingly
potent weapon for guitars especially their final bonus is for water maps and is that they
can Garrison docks with up to 10 fishing ships obviously this is useful to save them during
raids though note it doesn't work on fishermen or any other Naval unit this bonus doesn't seem to do
a lot in practice as the garage win rate on water Maps is actually below average but situationally
this could help you out in a pinch so that's their sip bonuses and so far you might feel pushed
toward camels with faster creation and more bonus damage though with the added unusual start to
navigate when it comes to their economy now let's move on and take a look if they're not one not two
but record setting three unique units the first is the Chuck run thrower from the castle this
is a ranged melee unit similar to the gbeto and throwing axemen though side by side notice they
have much lower attack than those two in Castle age which becomes even more noticeable in Imperial
age ending with just four base attack though that can be improved to six with blacksmith attacks
what's more is their cost compared to these other units isn't particularly cheap so at first they
might seem a bit underpowered that is until you consider their special ability to deal full damage
to anything their attack passes through even if it is just two or three damage getting through their
targets melee armor that adds up fast in large groups they're of course upgraded by anything
infantry related including infantry attack and arson which are both a good idea to pick up and
they also have a unique Tech to reduce their food cost as well in terms of how to actually use them
they're decent but not necessarily cost effective against archers in a fair fight and they're also
outranged by two in that matchup while that's a bit of a dubious situation they are very good
against skirmishers though as chakram arranged infantry and not archers so they don't take bonus
damage from skirmishers and likewise have a melee attack that bypasses their High Pierce armor their
main specialty though is infantry which they have a plus one attack bonus against and who generally
have low melee armor though of course there's exceptions having access to an anti-infantry
specialist is quite useful considering garage stable units are otherwise weak against Mass
Pikeman where this unit is very much focused on being anti-infantry though their second
unique unit complements it by being specialized as anti-archer and that's the shrivamsha rider from
the stable again comparing their stats and costs side by side with light Cavalry and a knight they
don't immediately jump out as looking particularly special in fact they're quite comparable to the
light Cavalry stats while having an extra gold cost thrown in one hidden advantage that have in
their favor is they're actually the fastest out of this group which immediately implies they're
going to be pretty good at rating of course anyone familiar with the unit knows their main advantage
is they're regenerating Halo style Shield against projectiles for lack of a better description here
you can see them against a single crossbow where despite having quite poor stats on paper they end
up with the same resilience as a knight since a lot of the early attacks are completely negated
The Shield can also regenerate mid-battle so it even helps in prolonged fights in other cases the
Dodge Shield mechanic can be even more dramatic like against a mangonel shot where the entire
first hit is completely absorbed the only way to beat them easily is either with melee units or
with large amount of focus firing to essentially overwhelm The Shield generally unless they're
massively outnumbered they're a great choice against crossbows even handling Town Center
fire as well though they are beaten by Knights and most melee units cost effectively since remember
its base stats are quite poor their most common use is against either Archer civilizations or
mangonels and they make for a great pairing with camels whose low pure summer makes them otherwise
vulnerable to even generic crossbows now so far we have a unique unit to deal with infantry and
other fur archers which leaves the third unique unit as your response to Cavalry in the form of
the camel line with the unique camel Scout this is the garage replacement for the Scout Cavalry and
has a few advantages and disadvantages initially they have no bonus damage in Dark Age against
Cavalry and in terms of scouting it's basically just a reskin of the normal Scout with the same
speed and line of sight with that said the way the numbers work out with their attack and higher HP
they're in fact guaranteed to win a one-on-one fight against the scale Cavalry with one HP left
even if the Scout attacks first following that in feudal age they gain an automatic plus 6 hidden
attack bonus against Cavalry though with the trade-off of being slower than the typical Scout
remember they cost the regular camels 55 food and 60 Gold compared to the Scout cavalry's 80
food so overall it is a big investment in feudal of course any you managed to create in feudal age
or on the way up to Castle automatically upgrade to camels once you reach Castle age giving them
more HP attack and a big drop in training time to just 18 seconds so that's their three unique
units which together really seem to handle just about every type of unit you can come across on
land Maps now let's move on and check out their unique tags the first is pretty straightforward
and gives a food discount on all of your military units this is useful for camels hazards elephant
archers shrivamsha Riders chakrams and even armored elephants which cost food so there's
really no shortage of uses for this Tech and it's also reasonably cheap in contrast they're Imperial
age unique Tech is a bit more situational and gives camel Riders an elephant archers plus four
melee armor which on the surface does synergize with your faster creation team bonus keep in mind
that neither has melee armor by default so this actually adds more melee armor than all of the
blacksmith armor upgrades combined that said it doesn't really help a lot against halberdiers for
example as bonus damage ignores armor completely and even against Champions it basically only makes
them for your lack of blast furnace instead I see this being most useful against the Paladin where
the plus 40 bonus damage comes into play and having both effects stacking really makes him
quite a strong counter to that unit it it's the same idea for the elephant Archer where against
halberdiers it's just a drop in the bucket but against more General melee units it's more than
doubling their usual armor given the Tech's high cost and the fact it doesn't help at all against
anything doing Pierce damage I see this as being more situational for when you're making a lot of
camels against Cavalry or other melee units so that's their unique units and text which is really
where a lot of the guitar's strength lies as we've seen they pretty much have a specialist counter
unit for just about any situation though to get a full view of their options let's take a quick look
at the tech tree starting with the archers here they're missing arbalester the final armor upgrade
and have elephant archers instead of Cavalry archers basically you're fine and feudal in Castle
age even getting fully upgraded crossbows though Things fall off quite a bit in Imperial except
for the elephant Archer you do pick up the hand Cannon ear but I see the arching range as really
a secondary Focus mainly just to provide support units or counters overall I'd say it's a B minus
for their archers next step for infantry it's not a great look they're missing champion pikemen
Squires and blast furnace which all together is pretty brutal opening men at arms would be
completely fine but after that it's basically all downhill and to quite possibly the worst Barracks
options of any civilization as you really push toward using camels over the spear line I suppose
situationally against pure Eagle Warriors you might go two-handed swordsman but I have to
give the barracks here an f and if you're making a lot of Barracks as gurjaras it feels like you're
probably in a difficult position if we factor in the chalk room thrower is an infantry unit though
you can maybe argue that brings things up to a b as it's widely considered a pretty strong unit in
the right situation especially against Pikes and skirmishers moving on to Cavalry initially things
don't look very good with no knight line or Blast Furnace of course the extra mounted attack bonus
and creation speed bonus make your camel Riders top tier and their hussar spam is pretty amazing
with 25 reduced cost after their Castle age unique Tech they can also pull off a pretty decent Scout
Rush as a combination of the extra forged bushes and their Mill bonus personally I think the
servant writer is their biggest weapon though as they do so well against archers defenses and even
mangonels it's hard to compare gurjaras to other Stables as they're so unique but I'd say it's
an a for me even with the missing attack upgrade and lack of the knight line next up for Siege of
course the armored elephant replaces the ram light and does significantly more damage to buildings
than it probably should thanks to a sip bonus they are missing Siege onager and Siege Engineers
but bombard Cannon is a nice option to counter enemy onagers you could even argue heavy scorpion
probably isn't needed on account of having the chakram thrower so I think while you are held
back by missing Siege Engineers on their onagers I consider them a solid a minus with some pretty
scary potential in Castle age to raise buildings surprisingly quickly with their elephants next
up for the Navy they get out to a nice start with their extra Forge bushes and passive food income
and they also have their dog's ability to protect their fishing ships while their online performance
on maps like Islands hasn't been great I think they have some decent potential worth at least
a B in the early game in the late game though they're missing out on Fast Fire Ship and Dry
Dock without an obvious bonus helping them out though they at least have galleons with bracer at
this point it falls to a C+ for me for an overall B- on the water taking a quick look now at monks
overall they have some good options just missing block printing though with no direct monk bonuses
I could definitely see a situational amongst Siege push with their early good economy on Arena but
admittedly it's not really their specialty access to block printing is also pretty important against
onagers as well so I'd say it's a serviceable B for the monastery moving on to defenses they
have lots of the core University techs as well as very good counter units against both Cavalry
and archers which I think contributes a bit to this category I don't really think of them as
a tower civilization but I'd still say they're a B+ for defenses with the caveat that your Mill is
a pretty easy Target in the early game and I've definitely seen that bonus backfire in the past
wrapping up with their trash units that is units that don't cost any gold they're missing quite a
few texts here most notably Pikeman which in the late game is a pretty glaring gap of course both
your hussar and your skirmishers are not fully upgraded but I still think it's a b basically
carried on the back of Cheaper hussar so to put it all together admittedly they have a bit of an
unusual start that can take a little bit practice to get a handle on assuming you're able to take
advantage of your passive income though they have a great Scout Rush with the option of playing for
an early archery range as well or even going for a completely unique camel Scout rush I'd argue
though it's in Castle age where they really Blossom with their great camels to deal with
knights shrivamsha Rider against crossbows or chakram throwers against Mass Pikeman all three
upgrade nicely in Imperial age and of course they can also close out games with their discounted
Hazard spam or very powerful Siege elephant there really isn't a moment where they feel
weak or behind most civilizations and they don't even really have a terrible match-up especially
in team games having a civilization like this able to counter both Knights and crossbows so
well makes them really hard to deal with and as of the most recent data that I've seen they
actually had the best win rate on Team game open maps but speaking of powerful and flexible options
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so hopefully this video gave you a few ideas to try with the gurjaras and how
to handle this very unique civilization thanks for watching and I'll see you next time [Music]