Best Treaty Mecenaries

So treaty is a magical place where you actually get imp units, get mercenary contractors, and make mortars of all things. Being probably the only place where its practical to both get access to the unique mercs and boost them via politicians, I wanna see which civs actually field merc comparable to imperial units. Specifically mercs, not native allies.

To my knowledge, the best civs for treay merc shanagins are Dutch, Swedes, British and Ottomans (descending).

A quick explanation:

Dutch - Huge gold income potential and a lot of extra popspace so mercs are convenient. Get access to Fusiliers and Elmetto which are good on their own but pair up even better. Elmetti give the same hp/pop as maxed Lifeguards, have more resistance and fight infantry better. Fusiliers have less durability per pop compared to most musk but the ranged damage is above average and vs cav they hit like Ashigaru’s. Bonus for filling in a musk role for a civ that has none (reliably)

Swedes - They get reliable access to Black Riders and Jeagers. Swedish jeagers and lands do fall off a bit compared to imp standard skirms and melee inf, but Black Riders end up stronger than most ranged goons. Not sure if there’s ever a need to go that route with Swedes given their basic roster, but it stands that they do a light cav merc thats stronger than most of its post imp counter parts.

British - So Harquebusiers and Jaegers again. Jeagers dont really matter since rangers are prolly the most dominant skirm and harqs are made of paper besides, but it stands out that they can stack 3 cav cards on any and all units on a horse. They end up with something like super Uhlans, and while thats not better than Lifegaurds/goons/Redcoats its still potentially more dps per pop than most british imp units

Ottomans - So Barbary Corsairs are almost never relevant in treaty with Ottos given that Mamelukes exist. Speaking of Otto mams dont have any extra cards like British mams can stack, but they still end up with more hp/pop than iirc any hussar and have huge ranged resist. Bonus, Ottos can give them +10% melee resist with Team Kapikulu. Not sure how big a deal the resistance is, but the durabilty alone offers alot mixed in with Deli.

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Interesting, I don’t play treaty but why is it you say rangers are good skirms? They are quite bad in 1v1. From the little treaty I’ve seen I think the africans are quite good as well particularly ethiopia, seen the gatling camel spam a few times.

Jeagers are better in supermacy since mercs start strong, but in treaty where you have the time to stack up any and every tech you got, they get outscaled by the average skirmisher over a lack of unit upgrades - even with the politician.

Brits have alot for cav/musk/grens but only one combat card for rangers so jeagers have nothing boosting them aside the arsenal and politicians. On the other end, rangers are the only skirm for euro civs that can out dps abus guns on even pop to my knowledge and hit huss way harder given the base damage.

In reality, you still want longbows and artillery over rangers but I was going for comparbles.

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Only Swedes, newer Germans and ethiopian gatling camels. Also Hatamotos from japan consulate.

They arent viable since are created from just a single building slowly while cost a lot of pop.

Asian civs crying in a corner waiting for imperial mercs and infinite merc shipments in IV :sob:

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I always saw the consulate as a glorified tavern alternative tbh.

Germans have a really strong potential for a treaty Merc strategy. You get 4 production buildings and a strong roster of Mercs. Giant Grenadiers wreck everything they touch with their ridiculous 2.5 AOE and strong siege attack, Black Riders are as tanky as a war wagon while still being mobile and versatile, Jeagers can make up for the weak needle gunners while fully upgraded and Pandours trash any other skirm the enemy can throw at you. Combine that with your settler wagons on gold and you’ve got yourself a solid army.

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My understanding is that jeagers are the equivalent of imperial skirmishers

Using that as a measurement unless your final age up is with the mercenary contractor or possibly new york/arabs it’s probably a bad idea to make mercenaries in the imperial age.

Swedes and germans have improved mercenaries/german contracts card but otherwise…skip mercs.

Jeagers have exactly twice the ranged dps of skirms and bit more than twice the hp and melee attack so they’re a net gain on a pop basis. Trouble is, Germans can at most upgrade their stats by x1.7 via the mercery contractor/cards for age 4. Meanwhile skirms get anywhere from x2 - x2.3 depending on the civ.

German imp skirms have 34 base damage while maxed out jeagers have 56 - or 28 at even pop. Even with the extra card/politician boost, jeagers cant displace skirms since they give less stats per pop on top of gold being an annoying res to gather.

Even with the +50/35 % from the second mercenary contractor, its hard to find alot of mercs that are a valid replacement to basic imp units.

I’ve been going so hard on natives with the Germans I forgot all about the mercenary camps. Line and mounted infantry go hard yo.

While their giant grens aren’t as scary as the brits’(when they get it) they dont need rng to get it as Germany. Personally, I find that the pandour/Ggren kinda lose to ranged cav or even musk/gren, but there IS alot of potential. Adding to the list, Germans royal horsemen are pretty hardcore.

That’s right, Imperial contractor helps, But mercenaries fall behind imperial standard units.
Unless you can card them! Germans and Swedes have all merc boosting cards, but cards like cavalry combat (not german version) and applicable TEAM cards are good too due to their high base stats and not targeting specific units.

Cards and arsenal techs - things like fusiliers, jaegers, giant grens, etc benefit from arsenal upgrades. It was considering all that that I began thinking what civ that has merc contractor has the best merc setup; Germans/Russians dont count since they dont have that politician so from the remaining I’d say are Ports and Ottos just cuz how relevant it is to have mamlukes and lil’bombards reliably.

Yeah it is Asian version of European tavern. Just trickle Xp instead of coin.

I mostly play Asian civs but I don’t mind that, mercenaries are pretty bad compared to Asian units. Worse than Chinese units for cost effectiveness and worse than Japanese units for raw power

I agree, I am not suggesting a buff, just a diversification of playstyle which is what this game is all about.

Atonement is kinda like a mercenary contractor for asian civs, but they still dont get that +50% merc outlaw boost.

That aside, id say the Japanese have it the best for making treaty mercs because of the yojimbo and Indian have it the worst cuz of the jat lancer.

Interesting points

I don’t think it’s the same, it is more like the equivalent of the European card ‘‘Dance Halls’’. It only assures you access to one mercenary and also diminishes outlaw population. It could be interesting to add to those effects access to 50% boost in imperial.

It would be pretty cool to see Japan with imperial Yojimbo for sure, I’m sure it would make treaty more spicy. Jat lancers should be cheaper and cost 3 pop.

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No. It behaves more like an alternative metropolis. In the treaty it loses some relevance.


Maybe privateers should have bonuses against heavy infantry. Or give them tolerance for the projectile.