Actually, we really don’t. The current Britons pretty much only represent Norman England. The Saxons would represent the pre-Norman era of Britain.
Ok well if that’s the case then just change the name to The English. Its a bit confusing like this. Then maybe we can introduce a whole other civ named The Britons, and they can kind of morph into The Welsh or something… I dunno my knowledge of Medieval English history isn’t without holes.
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Yes
I think this has been pointed out more than once, but it probably falls under the logic of “historical names do not change”.
Saxons, Vandals and Goths should share the Huskarl as a regional units. It’s already moved to the barracks anyway.
Their high base cost won’t make them OP in the hands of other civs.
Goths can get a new UU that can replace their gunpowder units to make the historically accurate (and no they do not represent the Spanish! The Spanish have been in the game as their own civ for 25 years!)
The current Britons are good at representing the Welsh and the Norman English but they are bad at representing the Anglo Saxons, which is why the Goths were used to represent them in the Hastings scenario.
The Longbow is a Welsh invention but it was adopted by the Norman English.
These are some good ideas for sure.
For gameplay reasons I would prefer another infantry unit with bonus damage against infantry as a regional unit:
- Huns have always suffered from Huskarl+Alabardiers spam.
- Vandals will be a cavalry civilisation and will need something to handle the Huskarl+Alabardiers too.
- Besides, as you said, the Goths need such a unit anyway.
I wouldn’t say they’re especially Norman. They’re primarily based on the period from the reign of Edward Longshanks onwards, which is all post-Norman. (I’d say the Norman period ends at the latest when the English kings were no longer Dukes of Normandy, 1204 I think.)
They have a couple of bonuses that aren’t specific to that period: the shepherd bonus (English wool trade) and the town centre bonus (presumably based on burhs, so pre-Norman), but nothing specifically Norman.
For gameplay reasons I’d prefer that unit to be a generic unit being available to civs all over the world.
The thing that is holding Infantry back the most is that there is no generic counter so they can’t buff Infantry to so much it overpowers Crossbows and Knights.
I think there are potential ways to design Vandals that make Huskarls make sense. For example make their cavalry weak against Archers (missing the last armour upgrade) but strong in other ways.
I’d still consider the English Norman to this day.
They lost Normandy yes but the majority of nobility is still descendants of the former Norman conquerors.
But there is a reason why they used Sicilians in the Longshanks campaign to represent the Normans and I think they should probably do so in the Hastings scenario.
I’ll say this as many times as I need: The Huskarl shouldn’t be available to Goths or at the very least it should be renamed. “Huskarl” isn’t a Goth term. It’d especially need a rename if it became a generic/regional unit.
Goths originated from scandanavia so this unit is fine for them and lets not forget they are the stand in for saxons.
Which they shouldn’t be
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There are a few unit names that are not fitting for the context they have been used in but I don’t think an iconic AoK unit can be changed without making the nostalgia people extremely angry.
Basically everything Ensamble Studios has made can’t be removed, only new stuff can be added.
Also the Unit name appears in AoM too where the unit has the same role so the problem is not isolated to AoE2 alone.
Personnaly I like how the crusader states are handled in campaigns as different cities of different european civilizations. It means crusade missions have many different civilizations and we see a variety of units on the field. I think these missions would become worse if sicilians, franks, teutons and britons were all replaced by a single “latins states” civilization.
The teutons already represent the idea of christian crusaders, they don’t specifically represent the latins states with a naval focus or the adoption of middle east techs, but they have the good monks, the resistance to enemy monks, the exceptional melee strength and the strong fortifications like the krak des chevaliers.
If they ever get the crusader knight as a skin/upgrade instead of paladins, I think they would represent crusaders well enough.
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You’d be wrong. Huscarls were a common thing for all germanic peoples unitl they diverged into their own ways.
Germanic tribes that existed in the same time and similar location as the goths; franks, teutons, jutes, angles and a whole bunch others.
Unless you can give substantial proof that this term has been used for that long, I’m not buying it.
Otherwise this just show that the old devs wanted Goths to cover Anglo-Saxons for no good reason.