Berserk is faster, has slightly more HP and (I think?) maybe more armor, and possibility to get an anti-cavalry bonus. They also have a bonus vs building which is also very useful for slow-moving infantry and quite crucial very often.
You are right on Lithuanians.
Huns UU is similar to Huskarl/Eagle Warrior in that it’s annoying to get rid of them raiding your eco. Paladin is not a substitute because although it has similar levels of pierce armor, it’s hard to tech into and mass.
War Elephants are nearly impossible to mass in 1v1 games.
Elite Berserks are statistically superior to Champions. With 18, they have +1 attack. Also, they have +1 armor, +0.15 speed, and the regeneration ability at the cost of 5 food and 5 gold each. The Champion has +9 HP. Overall, the Berserk is the better unit, first of all because of its speed. The only advantage the Champion holds (next to the HP) is their attack bonus against Eagle Warriors. Champions get +8 attack, Elite Berserks only +3.
because anytime a civ has archers, or cav archers, you’re better off going cavalier/paladin.
so team games are eliminated, using them against archer civs and meso civs are eliminated. you more then likely won’t use them against cav archer civs or any of the civs that have archers as a good/great option (japanese, vikings, saracens, khmer, etc).
so basically you’re left with using them against civs like Teutons, Franks, Bulgarians, etc.
so like i said - niche. they don’t see much use at the pro level at all anymore.
add to that, it’s just not an easy unit to mass up in castle age.
so basically the time you are going to use them would be imperial age, against civs with bad archers, and you’re left with not a lot of situations where you can feasibly use it.
yeah maybe at lower levels they will see a lot of use, but at lower levels cav already dominate as is.
Is your tier list more focused on arabia, arena or is general?
I think D tier for organ guns is undeserved, they’re very strong in some situations (such as in castle age on arena).
And S tier for janissaries is too much, they’re amazing in castle age on arena for aggressive strategies, nearly uncounterable if the castle is dropped offensively, but they struggle to have an impact on open maps.
well first of all, the Champ is made from the barracks, and the leitis from a castle, so it would be very easy to have a numbers advantage.
and yeah in some situations what you say is true, but again - in most situations the leitis is going to be not useful.
team games are out because archers are everywhere.
archer civs are out because archers wreck leitis.
cav archer civs are out because the same reason.
so basically you’re limited to cav and infantry civs without good archer options, and only in imperial age.
you can only realistically get 1 maybe 2 castles up during castle age, and those don’t normally come until late, and its just not really feasibly to mass them up the same way you can mass up knights or archers. not to mention they are a bigger strain on your food eco then knights are, and food is king in castle age.
then you’re doing something wrong - food is precious in castle age, especially for cav civs, i’ve frequently seen games where people are buying food at 120-130 gold for 100 food.
adjust your build. remember you need 6 workers on farms per tc your pumping villagers from.
and that’s just for villager production. throw in knights and you need more villagers on food on top of that.
that eats up a lot of wood on farms.
that’s also why you frequently don’t see castles until mid castle age as well, you go up to castle age, throw down 2 tcs, and so by maintaining 3 tc, 2 stable knight production you are eating up a good amount of villager production right there. throwing workers on stone to mine for a castle will just slow your eco down.
for what? for a unit that is better against melee units, but has slower production, and is worse against archers?
Yeah it should be 5 champions vs 2 leitis for the same gold cost, champion and halbs are the most common infantry thats why I use them as examples.
Sure you can use it in castle age but you cannot really drop 2 castles in early castle age as Lith. You are gonna build knights first anyway so basically this discussion is nothing about leitis
Gold isn’t that limited that you will end up having to be that ountumbered when fighting champs with leitis wtf. Also elite leitis is among the cheapest elite upgrades so you will have elite leitis before they get champions.