An idea for a change to Elephant Archer

Okay this is just an idea for a change to the Elephant Archer since it is little more than meme at this point. So how about it being changed to something in the lines of a reverse Konnik, so when it dies or rather the archer on the elephant dies it turns into a War Elephant. Now right off the bat this may sound like a terrible idea which will perhaps make the Elephant Archer way too OP but with proper adjustments to its HP/Armor of both Elephant Archer before death and the Battle Elephant after I think this could actually work.

But still if you think it’s a bad idea how about something more interesting, where you actually lose control of the Battle Elephant after the death of the Elephant Archer and it auto attacks any target near to it, maybe prioritizing units over buildings or something like that. Now this wouldn’t be too far from reality you know, elephants did have a tendency run amok when terrified or after the death of it’s rider.

So what do you guys think about this? Could this work?

P.S. It’s just an idea so please be nice. :blush:

10 Likes

This sounds really cool. I suspect the actual archer would need to have much less hp than a BE (or -10 pierce armour), and it could be balanced.

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Maybe weaker version of non-elite Battle Elephant can work.

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Or maybe the archer comes back instead of the elephant

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what if an elephant can garrison like a tower? :slight_smile: :blush:

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Elephant archer is fine now.

It doesn’t have the problem with the 2.5 fire rate anymore, it’s the extreme pop efficient unit option for the Indians and it actually serves that purpose okay now instead of what it used to do, which was take up space and 170 resources to do nothing.

As someone who made an exhibition over ragging on the Elephant archer pre-change and how bad it was, I can safely say that everything I said then is no longer applicable besides the incredibly high cost to get to, and mass, the Elephant archer. To that I say, yeah, elephants are expensive, why should these be different.

If anyone cares to see my record on how much I enjoyed tearing at this unit when it deserved it. I’m not just making it up. The unit is vastly improved with the fire rate change.

6 Likes

I can’t believe this unit is still completely useless. They recieved like 6 buffs, but still the worst unit in the game. :confused:

They get destroyed by what? Paladins, Camels, Halberdier, Skirmisher, Siege Ram, Siege Onager, Scorpion, Monks, Lots of UU like Camel Archer, very slow, very expensive, converting them is so effective, a single one costs more than an economy upgrade in Castle Age. They can counter two types of units: CA and Arbalest, but the most harmless full trash destroy them.

Compared to Rattan: No skirmisher weakness, no Camel weakness, less UU weakness, no Monk weakness, no Halberdier weakness, resistant vs Scorpions, much cheaper, fast, viable in Castle Age, created faster, no food cost.

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It’s not a unit for every game, much like the War Elephant. It’s ridiculously expensive, but it’s all about population efficiency. There aren’t a lot of units that are going to be more efficient on the map than the Elephant Archer, and sometimes you need pop efficiency.

Oh, and:

305 more hp, doesn’t tip over against cavalry, survives 58 shots from a E skirm compared to the Rattan’s 12, survives 24 shots from a heavy scorpion instead of the Rattan’s 7, for just under twice the overall cost of one Rattan, the savings weighted entirely on the gold.

And we’re talking about the durable archer UU, so we’re not parsing words about how survivable the Elephant archer is, yeah? Let’s not act like it’s main redeeming feature, of being a mobile tower, isn’t an actual feature of the unit, mmkay? Choose your favorite unit to sandbag from halbs and it seems like you should be okay in most cases. It’s downside is affording it. Affording it is a serious and, in many cases, nigh impossible task. It should be. This is the kind of unit that provides the opponent a civ loss.

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Personally, if the Elephant Archer really needs to be buffed, just give it more HP and armor, or even lower the cost to train it.

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Do not listen necessarily to what others on the forums say…there are people who can greatly exaggerate something as “bad” or “terrible”.

It is better to go into Scenario Editor and find out the information about how “bad” (or “good”) the Indian Elephant Archer is, like what @WoeIsToWho did (check his comment above). Or just play some casual games in the Lobby against human players or Single Player Skirmish against the AI and try out Elephant Archers for yourself, fencing off against various other civilizations.

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Elephant Archers are never seen in the actual game and get destroyed by the cheapest army composition.

While Rattans are one of the best UU in the game. Only Paladins and 20 Siege Onagers can stop them.

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At least EA are useful in battle royal…

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It’s the least used UU in the game. Even pros like Viper make fun of it. Yes maybe the last patch improved it slightly but still it’s far from being anything viable in any situation, I mean honestly, name a situation where you’d actually use EA?

Also, even though I usually refrain from this historical accuracy thing because I believe gameplay balance and fun are more important but Indians were never actually a camel civilization. Camels were only an elite scouting unit since they can outperform horses over long distances in a desert and India is less than 5% desert so camel is more befitting for civs that occupied landmasses which were more than 90% desert like Saracens, Berbers etc.

Elephants were the backbone of the medieval Indian army, most of the Asian Elephants are found in India and even the elephants used by Burmese, Khmer, Maylay and Vietnamese are Indian elephants which is the most prominent subspecies of Asian Elephants. The tides of many historic battles were turned due to the presence of elephants in the battlefield like the end of Alexander’s conquest of India and his eventual retreat. The Indian civ in this game should’ve been entirely an elephant civ and build around it. Even Horses were more extensively used in Indian army than Camels, about 9 indigenous horse breeds are found here just so you know.

Persians on the other hand were never an elephant civilization, even the elephants used in the ancient Persian army were Indian elephants both bred and trained in India. It was fun back in days of AOE2 CD games because Persians were the only civ with elephants, now that we have so many they should’ve entirely removed elephants from Persians and added horses which formed the backbone of ancient Persian army. I mean really, at this rate they could’ve also added Prince of Persia a hero unit to Persians, a swordsman on a flying carpet.

But jokes apart, the Indian civ deserves a better elephant unit, maybe even the best elephant unit in the game.

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Thats more due to cost. And given how many spears and skirms your opponent would have to dedicate to taking down eea you should be able to wreck them with the rest of your army

After the last patch for ea viper said it has a real place in Indians late game. He said it would be too expensive for pro level play but outside of that? Solid unit

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They are more than fine cause all fo you have no clue how to use them: That’s exactly why Indians have +1 Range on their Hand Cannoneers.
Elephant Archer: Tanky, 7 Range, long living also in close combat, weak vs mass halb.
Hand Cannoneer: Not Tanky, 7+1 Range, good vs halbs, massive damage on close range
You all don’t seem to grasp that while you need something in front of your Hand Canoneers to make em worth (Champions, Cavalry or whatever) and even then on that range they miss like 50% of the shots. Thats why YOU GET a literal TANK. Any melee unit needs to fight the Elephant Archers first, AND the HC have 100% accuracy on such a close Range. By the time anything Half life the Elephant Archers they Unit dead 3 times already by HC.

Elephant Archer + HC combo is literally unstoppable, that’s what the idea was behind this UU, try it, its unstoppable except vs mass Onager but even then I am not sure + you can get Bombard Cannons aswell.

You don’t even need to micro, due to the 1 Range different Elephant archers automatically move in front

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It really isnt that bad

They are not just pop efficient, but when fighting knights in castle age even they are cost efficient compared to crossbows(considering ressources to be of equal value, EA are more food costly but less gold costly), and are actually pretty close to being training time efficient comparing 1 castle to 3 ranges.
If anything I would give them the +2 bonus damage against helbs. Because without a meatshield they die to them quite easily. As their damage output of course is not cost efficient. Just their overall fighting power.

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Hand cannons are abad unit though, and that +1 range on a unit with only 65% accuracy is pretty damn useless. I think Shartagni should also increase the accuracy by 10 or 15%, then it would be a worthwile tech, while hand cannons still wouldnt be very strong…

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Did you even read my post?

Yes, and it was extremely difficult to follow your line of thought, because of your grammar.
I still think I got most of it, but that does not change the fact that elephant archer + handcannons is not a worthwhile combo. Yes, hand cannons are better when paired with EAs, but they are still pretty useless.

Either you mass EAs, or you mass Hand cannons. You cant possibly mass both.
So if you mass Hand Cannons, why would the enemy go for Helbs? They have no reason to. They can just go skirms and arbs, and they will still wreck you, unless they completely ignore their army and cant be bothered with micro. If they go Knights even better, even easier to micro. Hand cannons alone don’t pose a thread because their damage output is so much worse than that of archers. Elephant archers only help their survivability, but that isnt even their main issue.

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