I am not sure if this is a good idea as spearman also have infantry armor class. Knight+ new trash can be reasonably good comp and meta favors knight play more. Pikes+ archers can be dead
Do we need more trash units?
How often does one actually run out of gold?
Most 1v1 games end before players run out of gold and gold is not a rare resource in team games.
The main type of map that will see a lot of trash units is probably closed maps in 1v1 or FFA (which not that many people play).
So if there was a new trash unit it should exist to end stalemates on closed maps since you will not really have that issue on Arabia.
But is that something a trash unit can do without being too good in other situations too?
Wouldnât that be essentially a trash siege unit? Makes little sense.
There are a lot of ways to maintain this.
- Add heavy infantry armor class.
- Since Spearman Eagle have their own armor class, we can just remove them from âInfantryâ.
THen you should add bonus vs spearman to Jaguar Warrior, Cataphracts, HC, Legionary, etc.
2nd solution will be more feasible. Remove infantry armor class from spearman and add anti-spear bonus to all anti-infantry unit. But infantry UU and swords-line have to be buff first.
Trash castles. 500 wood for wooden castles or 300 wood for barrack forts.
I am more fond of trash petards.
For Trash Petards we would need to redesign the unit entirely.
Which I would be all for cause I find it silly that there are these bombing hings you canât react to that can target any of your vulnerable points in the defense with no warning and no time to react to.
At least atm their Gold cost and the Castle requirement makes them very situational, but when they become trash⊠oh man that will become a nightmare to deal with. Basically impossible for any human when used well.
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ok, here we go againâŠ
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How about a small âScout Shipâ? It would have a weak attack and only cost wood.
American civs could have the Canoe as a regional replacement.
Actually⊠this might be a good time to talk about the current state of trash units in the game and discuss wether we want them to play a different role.
Fact is, atm many players donât like trash units, especially not trash wars - the âpower unitsâ have a way better standing and players prefer using them during the whole game. Itâs kinda rare to get full trash wars in the current Arabia meta. Games are most often decided before it gets to this state.
I personally like long games, but I have to admit that the current trash wars leave something to be desired. They are grindy, you need to considerably invest in good Backline units (CA / HC) and therefore have almost nothing over for Siege. A player who has spent less Gold or has access to more has a huge advantage - this is especially reflected in unit type matchups aswell with CA usually the ones that can be kept up produced the longest followed by archers and then finally Knights. Itâs not massive, especially as Knight civs often have very good powerspikes (Paladin!) to work with, but itâs there.
But the biggest thing is the discrepancy in utility between the trash units. Especially the Hussars are just super powerful with their raiding threat - whilst the other 2 trash units basically threaten nothing on their own, just potentially open up map control for your siege push. Sometimes skirms can be useful in denying the last remaining ressources and halbs can be annoying when they somehow get in the back of the enemy base to âraidâ. But itâs nothing compared to the immediate game winning threat of wiping out the entire food eco of the hussars.
Maybe we could have a look on TGs, especially how skirms could be tweaked to be of any use there and derive from that a profile what trash units should be good at and what they shouldnât be, so they are useful and interesting at all stages and settings of the game?
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Maybe some sort of siege unit. Nothing too powerful though, because youâll still want to defend your base somehow.
I think theres little to no way to adress trash directly in TGs without completely reworking them or making them too strong in 1v1s
The 1v1 game balance simply breaks when you can mass so many diferent gold power units, research so many expensive upgrades and not run out of gold instantly. Arbs die to skirms and paladins die to hañbs, but arbs + paladin easily defeats skirms + halbs
Imo to make trash units viable in TGs, the problem is that theres too much gold in the map and thay trade is too powerful (although it may need to become cheaper or faster to get going if you nerf the ammount of gold it generates since its a pretty big investment rn)
I agree that itâs difficult for trash to shine in TGs.
Yet alone through the fact that there is the archer / knight civ specialisation. Which ofc has the benefit that you donât need to tech into a composition partner. And the team which is foced to is most likely in a way worse spot already.
But we actually see Spears and Scouts in TGs. And successfully. As trade needs time and sometimes you have to add units to serve certain purposes, they can actually provide just what you need at that moment.
Skirms are very rarely seen and also most often only in desperation situations where they also canât really help much.
For me the big difference here is the comparably low damage output against the intended to counter units. Whilst skirms would trade well against archers when they would be on their own, knights just decimate skirms so well they canât really.
But Iâm deviating. I think when we get the trash units to get consitant value in TGs they will also become more of a âacceptable developmentâ in 1v1s, when the gold start to run out. Meaning they would be generally more attractive to use - even when they canât reach the sheer prowess of the âpower unitsâ, it wouldnât feel like the best part of the game is missing.
Trash eagle is necessary. Because native american civs has no hussar equivalent so in late game they only have skirm and halb, eagle is also very gold heavy that they tend to drain gold very fast.
Give them something like elite eagle scout, an upgraded version of eagle scout, like having some more hp than standard eagle scout, but still weaker than eagle warriors, just like hussar has more hp than light cav, but still weaker than the knight line.
American civs have strong early and mid game. It makes sense that their late game to be weak. Besides, games often end before gold running out.
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Donât you see how often games go to trash war, even at high levels ? And the native civs are not any stronger in early and mid game.
ehm? nope?
The vast majority of games donât go into trash wars.
But ofc for the american civs not having light cav is an issue. They all have amazing skirms to partially compensate for that, but itâs ofc not the same.
I personally would have given them light cav from castle age and therefore allowing monks to be a solid eagle counter. But ofc there would be the option to make trash eagles.
But we need to be very careful with that. Trash eagles would need to have noticable downsides and terrible lategame scaling whilst still be decent in the midgame. With currently missing a trash infantry counter this is a very tough task to accomplish.
Funnily, given the current meta. The lack of light cav isnât even the worst for the mesos. Even worse is the lack of CA and HC as high damage backline units. Yes, they have good archers (and ##### ########## but they fall short in impact compared to CA and HC. So mesos are hurt twiceâŠ
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Obviously you can give halberdier a bonus damage vs trash eagles, so they fill the same role as hussars in trash unit counter system. Obviously trash eagles will be different unit line as gold eagles, just like knight vs hussar
Aoe3 did that, they make their âeaglesâ or shock infantry take take bonus damage from pikes just like cavs. It works well in the counter system