Rattan are actually quite good, more PA, more speed, more attack, good both for raiding in small groups and for a massed archers army.
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I know that they are a solid UU, but the fact that I barely see them in some pro games tells me that they arenāt that requested while in every Chinese game I see Chu Ko Nu
Chukos are simply ridiculously powerful, that why you see them in every game at every elo (I mean, they take only 8 seconds to trainā¦).
Rattan are rarely see only because xbows (and knights for other civs) are THE meta (the more consolidate one at least), especially in tournaments, but when they goof around, pros sometimes use them, plus itās a fine unit for all other elo players.
The unit is simply balanced and not a must like the chukos.
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Eh, looks like they did just fine against the Tarkans, a cavalry unit made to soft counter pierce attacks. And they held out for a very long time against the Hussar spam. Camping behind Fortified Walls helped a lot with the super-duper hard thing of massing them up too. The only weakness I see has more to do with the Viper over committing on one unit type, getting locked into his base by the counter unit, and then dying to Hussar spam as a result. But that can happen with Arbalester and other UU foot archers too, and plenty of people are fine with that. Sorry, but the only thing convincing me from that game is the weakness of the GC has more to do with players misusing them, rather than the unit being that inherently weak.
Thatās because the bonus damage bypass the armor, but Iām not complaining about their mediocre vs tarkans, that yes was fine.
That what Iām referring about, they held out and nothing else, even not considering that a lot of hussars time to time were able to sneak into the eco, with the hussars mobility they werenāt able to do anything else.
Not gaining some map control, not pushing into the enemy base, just trying to run behind the hussars, and while viper spent a lot of gold on them, yo simply spammed food.
The GC really didnāt give back much value for their price, considering how costly is both the unit and its upgradesā¦
He actually trained the best units that he can, GC to counter hussars and tarkans and hussar for ESkirms, he didnāt have any other choice without halbs or camels.
Yeah no, I think that longbows and halbs would have shred the enemy hussars, and that chukos would actually inflict more damage vs tarkans.
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That is part of the point of the UT. (remember it already has higher hp and MA than an arb, which could be attributed to that shield )
Its like the Cataphract and itās UTā¦ Or the berserkerā¦
Arbalest also get bonus from pavise so they still have same pierce armor. Also in real life pavise is not a shield you would like to use in melee combat, its more likely that Genoese Crossbowmen being highly professional soldiers had better equipment such as armor than your usual crossbowmen in medieval army.
Thatās not actually true, pavise were used for covering while reloading the xbow as much as used with a pike when necessary.
There were various versions of the pavise shield, from the smaller 1-man that you see in the game, to huge shields manned by 2 or 3 soldiers, an xbow, and one with pike and shield, or one with pike and another one with shield.
However you are right, they were highly professional and organized teams.
Well, one major weakness is pretty obvious in that game. Itās not inherent to GC but about Italianās civ design that GC are their anti cav unit. Since they lack halbs and in imp your base is usually spreat out across half the map, you canāt really defend your base unless you stone wall which isnāt a great thing on arabia. In castle age you can defend with archers but then you usually donāt have enough castles to get GC rolling. Thatās why I think the best way to make GC work on open maps would be to just give them halbs so you can use your GC offensively.
I am not against granting Italians halberdier. I think there are 2 reasons that Italians misses halberdier upgrade.
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Devs do not want another civs to have FU upgraded trash. There is only 1 out of 35 civ has FU trash. That is Spanish. If Italians (which has FULL blacksmith tech) gain access to halberdier, they are the 2nd civ to have FU trash beside Spanish.
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For civs miss halberdier upgrade, they have better alternatives or mere strength.
Aztec pikes have fierce base atk with Garland War. Vikings swordsman can counter cavalry well with Chieftain and this UT makes their pikes better to counter Cavalry in Castle age.
Saracens camels have +30HP with Zealotry. Berbers camels can regenerate. Malians camels have +5 atk.
Mongols miss halberdier for balance as they have good archers, cavalry and siege. Turks do not have pike upgradeā¦
Saracens UU mamelukes and Italians UU GC counter cavalry.
I am not against Italians accessing halberdier upgrades because it wonāt make Italians OP and Italians military is not that great.
Missing halberdier upgrade makes a big hole in infantry branch. Even Condos cannot cover this up. Their infantry is below average.
Archers is good for sure given full access to arbalest, HC, GC, full archer techs and Pavise.
Cavalry is average as they have FU Hussar and cavalier but nothing stands out. SotL even gives a lower grade on Italians cavalry than Japanese cavalry. (Perhaps Japanese have FU HCA and CA provides better ranged support for cavalry?)
Siege is really bad. No siege engineer, no full upgrade on any line of siege. Italians siege heavily rely on cheaper BBC and thatās all about the good things of siege.
Giving halberdier to Italians makes their infantry a bit above average yet still close to average. Condos cannot create powerspike as before.
But if GC are fixed and they can properly counter cavalry, they donāt need halbs, they got FU hussars as a meatshield and that enough.
Onestly, that probably a bias (we all know that SotL loves japs) or simply hussars gained became more important since he made the videos.
Having a complete trash tec tree isnāt to underestimate.
Well, yes itās probably the reason why they miss halbs but it also makes it a rather bad civ on maps like arabia.
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True, Iām just asking myself if itās really worth it to have this signature argument just to maintain there is only one civ in that respect. Besides, Lithuanians also have kind of FU trash (tower shields makes up for the halbsā pierce armor so itās just one melee armor they are missing).
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Which? genovese xbows donāt really make up for it because cav can just spread out which makes it super difficult to defend with archers so you basically need to use your own cav. Italians is the only archer civ without halbs and only civ in general without usable replacement to defend from raiding.
They already can properly counter cav if the cav stays in one spot which wonāt happen with a player that pays attention. And hussars to defend from cavalier/hussar isnāt really the best option. Ofc, stuff like reducing their TT will help a bit and early game bonuses would help them getting a better position in general but both wouldnāt really solve that issue. If your GC are staying at your base all the time trying to catch cavalry itās really hard to pressure your opponent.
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I meant fix as they fix their training time, their major problems is how long it take to mass them and then how much it takes to upgrade them.