Just me forgetting an S 11
Wait â â â â â isnât censored lol (well apparently for me it is)
Well, Teutons and Vikings are also labeled as âunberittenâ, yet have no hunting bonus. I think itâs just a more freely chosen translation of infantry civ that was done by ES in 1998. Anyways, interesting insights nontheless.
Did you read through the historical references? Goths are pretty much focused on heavy troops, and earlier the mass of their army consisted of heavy infantry, but in later stages they relied a lot on mounted warriors, even cavalry archers (which is why they have access to heavy cav archers, which wouldnât make any sense otherwise. Ofc theyâre useless without thumb ring, but at least ES did their homework in terms of history 11). Goths used to have their heavy infantry accompanied by heavy cavalry, similar to how Norse used Jarls, noble tribal leaders. Goth ânoblesâ had a similar role. Those mounted warriors should replace the role of gunpowder units and give Goths a reason to fight and raid in Castle Age. The timespan covers ~500-1200 A.D, and there was no gunpowder present at that time. Gunpowder only exists because their champions need anti infantry support against certain factions and ES seemed to be unable to come up with something more original back then.
The way theyâre potrayed in this game is wrong in many areas and causes lots of issues for players and their enemies, as you well know.
The hunting bonus actually is decent as it effects in +20% meat from huntables due to carry bonus. Itâs just that Goths have a very standard start in the default game and do not profit from early boar luring as much. If you add the 10% bonus pop from the start you can lure boars at 2:00 and ~3:30 mins into the game, and afterwards proceed with a 2x3 villager hunting party to get your more risky food sources.
Platemail contradicts their time frame and butchers their identity way more than anything else. Especially Plate Barding for their Knights/Hussars is herecy. See this post regarding the historical reference:
Not sure, theyâre still a risky one trick pony, and Iâm pretty sure that Champions with +2 additional pierce armour along with their 200% total production speed bonus is pretty close to lunatic.
The issue with Plate isnât really the +1 melee armour, itâs the +2 pierce armour that will break them.
Lulz, some civ boners are definately worth it 
EDITED: Since the link doesnât work Iâll just copy the reasoning behind the Goths here:
click me
Goths are sort of the predecessors of a lot of central, western and even eastern european civilizations. Portugese, Spanish and Italians are their âlate Middle Ageâ successors. You could even argue that Goths were predecessors of Magyars and Bulgarians, too.
Anyways, in terms of combat Goths used a variety of heavy infantry along with heavy cavalry units. They didnât use plate armour, simply because it didnât exist back then. Plate became standard in the late 14th century when the âclassicâ Goths already were massively on the decline. The timeframe the ingame Goths cover is from ~500 - 1200 AD (last references loosely in the Barbarossa/Dschingis Khan campaigns which play in the 13th century). Also itâs very far fetched that they had access to gunpowder. Earliest reports are around 1350, so roughly 150 years later than the Goth timeframe spans.
About their characteristics:
Goth blacksmiths were known to be very advanved for their time and their armies in general were well equipped with lances, axes and weapons that are sort of earlier versions of longswords. They had massive shields and the more wealthy soldiers also had helmets and very effective armour.
Overall Goths were feared for their combat power, which ultimately brought down the Roman Empire.
I included this by giving them a discount on their infantry related blacksmith techs.
And while weâre at it, about the historic relevance of their unique techs:
Anarchy
The term Anarchy refers to absence of rulership. Pretty much Each village/tribe had their own leaders, and in general these were called âHuskarlsâ among other names.
Huskarls (from hus = âhouseâ, karl sort of means âlordâ) were goth chieftains and so the local rulers of Goth Warbands. Thatâs the historical reason behind training Huskarls in barracks. Gameplay wise this is ofc course to support Goth infantry against archers.
However, not only the Goths had Huskarls, they also had ânoblesâ who were engaged in heavy cavalry, similar to Norse Jarls. My concepts further establishes âAnarchyâ theme by giving Goth ânoblesâ Knights a boost to reflect their important role in the Anarchy. Them coming out of Stables fit the peripheral theme of Anarchy.
gameplay wise they help in late Castle Age against melee units which are the most potent counters to Huskarls. This is to make their Castle Age more viable and improves their raiding and give them options for taking the initiative in the late midgame.
Perfusion
The 2nd tech perfusion is reasoned by the fact that Goths used to show up, raze or raid a town and then disappear from one moment to the other. Also they were known to conscript people on their raids, similar to the Vikings. This is meant to be reflected by the faster creation time for barracks units.
However, this isnât really a good way to portrait that trait, nor is it fun to play against. Goths are one dimensional and boring enemies because of that. Either you crush them early on, or they flood you, and if you survive it you win again.
Until that point gameplay wise itâs knight + xbow combo even though itâs dead weight for Goths since there are no bonuses or imperial upgrades for them available at the moment.
Thatâs why âmyâ perfusion allows building of heavy siege in early imp from Workshops (Goth Castles can be placed defensively instead of at the front) and their siege is faster and cheaper to put pressure on the enemy. Cheaper siege means more damage for less resources afterall.
The faster training from stables and Archery ranges like Skirms and Cavalry stabilizes their army in longer fights a lot more than a pure champion flood and makes up for missing plate armour.
Iâm not exactly sure where you take the âlack of focusâ from.
The theme of Goths is âearly middle ageâ heavy infantry faction with lots of raid potential. In THEORY. However, they canât raid properly in Castle Age - Huskarls are too slow and too vulnerable to Knights/infantry to do. Although they would have the potential, itâs way too risky. Longswords without proper support are bad aswell, just like with all factions. Their upgrades are too expensive and come too late, and theyâre too easily countered by defenses and archers because of that. Additionally, each resource point that a Goth player spends on Castle Age raiding is a delay of his Imperial flood, which ultimately can cost him the game. That prevents Goths from actually playing their faction is supposed to be played. In a lot games players just use Knight + Xbow + mangonel combo in competitive, since these units are overall reliable and can deal with most threats and allows them to get into Imperial Age. Still this is not good at all, since other civs also allow this cookie cutter strat with a more reliable Castle and late Imperial techtree, which makes Goths obsolete for the most part.
My design actually improves their identity of a brute force, straightforward infantry civ:
- Infantry cost discount and cheaper infantry upgrades allow them to equip âheavy armourâ earlier than others in Feudal and Castle Age (but no plate because goths timeframe ends in 1200 AD, see historical chapter)
- Cheaper military buildings help to get early blacksmiths and fields as eco bonus
- Boost to Knights in late Castle age to help with raiding. Huskarls and knights go in, destroy defenses and then the heavy infantry comes and razes the buildings.
- anti infantry knights are much more in line with history. Gunpowder for gameplay reasons only is whacky, and itâs widely seen as unjustified
- cheaper, faster moving Trebuchets from siege workshops: replace the hole left by the bombards and allows Goths to get a large amount of trebuchets in early imp, which fits their âsimple yet effectiveâ brute force style without fancy stuff. Trebuchets were a lot more common in the 11th-13th century than cannons.
For Bombard cannons you need to get a university + chemistry. If you tech perfusion upon hitting Imp youâll also have Trebuchets faster than you could get Bombards before.
Each one costs 225w/225g and they actually can be converted. For 2 bombards Goths can get 3 trebuchets in a shorter time (+25% creation speed) that cannot be converted. - the Scorpions are sort of a small goodie, idk if theyâre useful at all, would have to be tested. edit: the historical reasoning behind the bonus on Scorpions is that Goths used scorpion/ballistae type weapons in combat after the Romans used their Scorpios against them in the field. They were used as a predecessor of the more common crossbows that came up later from the 9th-10th century onwards.
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Iâm aware that Goths did have some elite mounted warriors, as did most Eurasian peoples, but they were more known for their infantry. The thing is, while some people will look at historical references for this or any other civ and conclude that Goths or some other civ âneedâ either another cavalry UU or a buff to their existing cavalry on that basis, I see those references merely as justification for the cavalry units and upgrades that Goths already have (Cavalier, Hussar, Heavy Cav Archer). Knights, and especially Cavaliers, already represent an elite/noble cavalry unit, but the fact that nearly everyone gets them waters down the feeling of exclusivity. But thatâs okay. Within the game, some historical realities do not dominate balance considerations, and for the same reason that Vikings donât need Jarls as another UU, I donât know that Goths need any kind of cavalry buff.
Most of the time itâs much less than that, and itâs usefulness is hyper-situational. Itâs basically irrelevant on boars due to luring, and nearly irrelevant on standard maps since other civs can push deer, build a mill, or simply add one more villager on deer (and since other villagers eat deer at the same rate as Goths, the Goths wonât even save vill time from that). Just the hunting portion of the Mayansâ 15% resource bonus is better than the Gothsâ âbonusâ 100% of the time.
You can find a tech/unit availability that this is true of with just about any civ. No need to be hyper-realistic with Goths when Aztecs, Mayans and Incas shouldnât even get Forging, Xbows, or Siege Workshops. Besides, although the Goths were mainly a force to be reckoned with in the early to mid centuries A.D, at least one group of them maintained their identity well past the medieval period, so I wouldnât disqualify any particular Imperial technology on that basis:
But as for butchering their in-game identity as an infantry civ? On the contrary, it reinforces it.
Maybe. At least 1/1 is necessary, but might not be sufficient. As far as Iâm concerned, the devs have taken bigger risks, many of which seemed stupidly and obviously overpowered at the time, and it hasnât broken the game. See: Kamandaran, Keshik, Lithuanian +4 Paladins, Castle Age Capped Rams, Burmese 13 AT halbs, Champskarls, etc. You name it, it can probably be balanced.
Regarding your post and ideas, I have to give you points for creativity for your suggestions, but I have to agree with @DemiserofD that we donât need to entirely retool the civ for the sake of historical accuracy. Your suggestions, like many interesting ideas I come across here, would likely be great in a mod or scenario, but I donât see them happening in the game proper, and to apply the same logic to every civ would involve a dramatic restructuring of the game that would be more appropriate for a mod.
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Goths donât really need another unique unit, I agree to that, and I do not plan to add a unique unit. Instead it would be more suitable to fit the anti infantry role, which currently is covered by gunpowder units to the knight line, and tie it to the Anarchy tech. By adding the effects of +melee armour and + damage against infantry to the Goth knight line you get a pretty potent champion killers which is also are useful against enemy knight line units, and complement Goths late Castle Age very well. With stronger knights thereâs actually an incentive to stay in Castle Age for an extended period of time to profit from their cost discount on infantry and raid. Since they have the same armour/attack upgrades the other civs have, thus their units are stronger since less expensive.
If the enemy builds a mill near his deer he wastes 100 wood that could be spend otherwise - this is another hidden bonus for Goths as they save around 250 villager seconds chopping wood. Deer pushing is a thing, but itâs micro intensive, canât be done in every game (sometimes the deer are way too far away to be effective) and the player who does it sacrifices scouting capacities, so itâs also situational.
While youâre right that Meso civs share a lot of historical inaccuracies, they were made to be different from the base game factions and sort of have to âworkâ. I think ES did a decent job at that. But letâs not derail.
Back to the Goths: the Goths ingame represent the Western Goths (which covered parts of France and Spain) and the Eastern Goths (which were later conquered by the Byzantines), in general the Goths that conquered Rome. With a bit of good will you can trace their history to the 13th century, after that itâs getting pretty whacky.
The Crimean Goths are sort of independant, and itâs more reasonable to put them in relation to Bulgarians/Magyars/Slavs. Also, itâs debateable whether the Crimean Goths actually engaged in larger conflicts. But they somewhat existed up until the Renaissance - youâre right about that.
Gameplay wise the plate armor would benefit them alot, I give you that. But it still contradicts their timeframe, just like their access to gunpowder. Both are bad design flaws and I actually wonder why ES didnât bother fixing this.
The Forgotten Empires team takes more risks with the expansions, thatâs true. And itâs not a bad thing, I like most of the stuff they did. But still, some âoldâ civs simply outlived themselves and should be adressed properly.
Adding Plate WILL create even more problems with Goths and will force them to stay the âhigh risk mediocre rewardâ faction that they currently are. If they can reach their Imp on a regular base, they need to be toned down. Ultimately itâs a dilemma that can only be fixed by reworking them in parts.
Thanks. But to be honest, I donât think this is really such a dramatic overhaul. I did the research, worked a couple of hours with the genie editor and merely changed numbers around and copied the files from the Trebuchet to add it to the workshop.
The historical accuracy is predefined by ES, they worked in a lot of the Goth history afterall. Itâs only that they do not fit the game in its current form anymore, and as a result require a rework to actually become a fully competitive faction. Without that they will remain in the âweird factionâ niche forever, or as Hera would call it: F-Tier.
I approve of this word.
You really do want gunpowder instead of cavalry countering the enemy infantry, since knights are taking room from your own infantry to engage in battles. Infantry screen supported by gunpowder is pretty good, while mixing vulnerable knights instead of the gunpowder means your army is more prone to the infantry you are trying to counter, cause of halbs. Their focus from infantry would be shifting towards cavalry more, since cavalry has speed, gunpowder does not shift their focus from infantry cause they are only effective against infantry. This is in my mind another good example why gunpowder was given to them, to keep their mainly infantry focus. The point is that for the actual situation where goths need anti infantry right now, gunpowder will arguably be better. But for other situations, cavalry would begin to be used over their infantry, they would now be op raiders that can kill isolated pikes much easier. I donât see how this would be a good idea.
Hand Cannoneers take the same 2 resources that Champions, Cavaliers and Huskarls do: Food and Gold.
They are already taking room from your Infantry.
What Iâm saying is that ranged units behind melee units is a better combination than even more melee units, some of which cannot engage.
They are, but that does not help Goths much. They are still too easily countered by Skirm-Hussar combo, or just Scorpions and Mangonels.
The problem with Goths is not their Infantry, but that Infantry is not sufficient, and will not ever be again, due to how the game has changed.
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Halbs die to heavy Scorpions, which are discounted and move faster. Goths even already have them in their normal techtree. At first I was sceptical since they lack +1 range from SE, but due to their area damage, fast deployment speed and higher movementspeed theyâre pretty good.
Well, Hand Cannoneers are classified as archers and not as infantry, so this is not correct to call them infantry. If this would be the case Mayas Halbs + Arbalests or Plumes would be considered as âinfantry onlyâ aswell. Same with Incas - Halbs + slingersâŠ
Gunpowder is thematically unfitting to them. Itâs fine to have gunpowder for their âsuccessor-civsâ(Spanish, Portugese, Italians, Byz) because they all existed well into the 15th and 16th century. Goths were obsolete past 13th century.
Goths actually even have weapons to be used against other champions/infantry:
Heavy Scorpions.
I know, theyâre seen as slow and clumsy. But, they work against infantry, and only cost food + wood to upgrade. I buffed them with a civ bonus (-25%g/w) and Perfusion gives them speed to match regular infantry movementspeed). I did a couple of more tests and they perform reasonably well to my own surprise.
Sidenote: the + damage bonus on Knights only affects regular infantry, not spearmen. I considered giving them half the bonus against spears but decided against that.
Anyways, what do you think will happen if you add plate barding to Goths like a lot of people demand? It will shift them towards Knight/Hussars which is bad for faction identity.
And this is exactly the reason why I propose to NOT give them plate armour (along with it being historically nonsense)
.
Stats comparison:
FU Paladin: 180 Hp, 2+4/3+4 melee/pierce armour, 14+4 attack
Goth Chevalier with Anarchy: 160 Hp, 2+5/2+2 armour 12+4 attack + 5 vs. infantry
Goth Chevalier with plate: 160 Hp, 2+3/2+4 12+4 attack
Giving Goths Plate Barding actually does the opposite of helping. Instead it makes their cavalry rival with Huskarls in their anti archer and raiding role.
The Goth Cavalry needs to stay support units for their infantry, I agree to that. Maybe itâs enough to give Knights/Chevaliers +3 melee armour upon researching Anarchy. They would end up with 2+5 melee armour in Imperial but still only have 2+2 ranged armour. Need to be tested.
The same can be achieved with scorpions, which counter Champions and halbs alike.
I disagree. Goths have Gunpowder because of their successor civs, so the thematic argument is moot.
While it is true that they already are in the game, taking Gunpwder from Goths would incur the need for MASSIVE buffs in other areas, not a redesign.
Goths lack Siege Engineers, and that is only compensated by them having Bombard Cannons. They also lose to vanilla enemy Champions, and that is compensated by Hand Cannoneers.
They would need a buff to Heavy scorpions, if they were expected to use those against Infantry, and it would have to be a buff comparable to the Celt and Teuton UTs, as those have already have better Champions than Goths to begin with.
Making Goths an âeverything is cheap or produces fastâ civ is also not the answer, and would likely make them very abusable, perhaps even broken.
It will absolutely not, as they lack Paladins and bonii to Cavalry in general. At most, it would give them a follow up to Castle Age Knights, which they seem to go with anyway, as Longswords are underwhelming at that stage.
It would also give them a counter unit to Hussar + Skirmishers, a unit combo that actually gives them a lot of trouble.
Well, disagree as much as you want, Goths were released with AoK. And back then nobody would have considered that there will be any sort of âsuccessor civsâ.
Spain came later in The Conquerors. Italians and Portuguese are essentially mod factions and came 15 years after Conquerors release. The only civ from original are Byzantines, but they assimmilated the Goths into their realm well before the 9th century, so I wouldnât call them successors.
Goths still cover a time frame until 1200 A.D. and should not have gunpowder. The first reports from gunpowder in europe were 150 years later. And even in 1200 itâs questionable how much of the âtrueâ Goths were still alive, since the bigger Goth kingdoms in central Europe were conquered between 500-800 AD.
Which shouldnât be the case either. Same reason as with Hand Cannons.
[quote]They also lose to vanilla enemy Champions, and that is compensated by Hand Cannoneers.
They would need a buff to Heavy scorpions, if they were expected to use those against Infantry, and it would have to be a buff comparable to the Celt and Teuton UTs, as those have already have better Champions than Goths to begin with.
[/quote]
My proposed buffs were following:
- Scorpion/Heavy scorpions 25% cheaper (56w/56g)
- Perfusion gives them movementspeed to match infantry with squires
This is more than enough. Iâd even argue that they donât even need the cost discount. But I think it doesnât hurt to save gold for 1 champion for each scorpion built.
If you give them perfusion like production speed bonuses Iâd certainly agree.
They should have a hard hitting flush with a decent uptime on land maps, they also should have decent Castle Age and early Imp and then fade off in strength. Sort of similar to Meso civs, but less gold dependant.
The production speed bonuses should only be strong enough to compensate for the missing unit efficiency.
Edit:
Paladins are roughly 20% more effective than Chevaliers, you need to spend <3.000g on your cav line to actually get a benefit for getting Paladins over Chevaliers.
Iâd rather stick with pure melee armour on Chevaliers though. And what about Huskarls? They should be decent against both types of units, at least when mixed with halbsâŠ
Byzantines are not a Goth successor civ, they are romanized Greeks.
Meso civs never fade in stength. The UTs they get to comopenste for the lack of Cavalry, and the low Food cost of Eagles, makes sure they are alway strong, specially in lategame.
They arenât, however, since they cost Gold and lose to Hussars, which means that you are always losing value fighting Trash units. Viper already proved that even Turk Hussar + Skirms overpower Goths Halbs + Huskarls, as missing Platemail Armour is a huge crippling inefficiency, that makes Goth Infantry essentially obsolete in late Imperial.
Infantry is already the worst type of unit to invest in, no matter how many bonii you stack on them.
What? Iâm confused, how are goth scorps faster and discounted?
I did not mean hand cannoneers are infantry, but that they are mostly useless unless you are countering infantry. So you donât spam them instead of infantry so it doesnât move their focus from infantry to ranged, but making knights too viable could mean goths might spam them.
Yeaaaap⊠this is why Iâm still personally not siding with it.
Why would goths suddenly get a siege buff? Is that a thematical thing then?
Basically a boyar.
Thing about scorps is they are good against groups that come towards it vertically, less so when they come horizontally and staggered. You need a proper unit for that.
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Itâs because he modded his game to test his buff ideas.
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Yeah I realised that later and forgot to remove it from the front. Oh well.
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In Short summary Goths get
- Infantry costs -30% starting in Feudal age, and deal +3 damage to buildings
- Military buildings 25% cheaper
- 33% cheaper infantry blacksmith techs (Scale mail + forging paths)
- Scorpions and Trebuchets cost 25% less wood/gold
- +10% bonus population and start with +10 free pop in Dark Age
- hunters deal +5 damage to boars and carry +15 meat (equals to +20% more meat from deer)
- UT Anarchy: Huskarls in barracks + Knights get +2 (or +3) melee armour and (+5 damage to swordsmen units - debatable if necessary)
- UT Perfusion: Military Structures 25% faster. Trebuchets can be built in Siege Workshops. Trebuchets and Scorpions move 25% faster (0.8-> 1.0, same speed as infantry)
Regarding tech tree changes:
- gun powder removed for [reasons]
- Iâve been experimenting with addition of Guard Towers + Arrowslits to accompany their defensive Castles. Reason : lower raid vulnerability, although 2-3 defensive Castles are pretty good nontheless.
Le Goth Historié - click here to view
Goths are sort of the predecessors of a lot of central, western and even eastern european civilizations. Portugese, Spanish and Italians are their âlate Middle Ageâ successors. You could even argue that Goths were predecessors of Magyars and Bulgarians, too.
Anyways, in terms of combat Goths used a variety of heavy infantry along with heavy cavalry units. They didnât use plate armour, simply because it didnât exist back then. Plate became standard in the late 14th century when the âclassicâ Goths already were massively on the decline. The timeframe the ingame Goths cover is from ~500 - 1200 AD (last references loosely in the Barbarossa/Dschingis Khan campaigns which play in the 13th century). Also itâs very far fetched that they had access to gunpowder. Earliest reports are around 1350, so roughly 150 years later than the Goth timeframe spans.
About their characteristics:
Goth blacksmiths were known to be very advanved for their time and their armies in general were well equipped with lances, axes and weapons that are sort of earlier versions of longswords. They had massive shields and the more wealthy soldiers also had helmets and very effective armour.
Overall Goths were feared for their combat power, which ultimately brought down the Roman Empire.
I included this by giving them a discount on their infantry related blacksmith techs.
And while weâre at it, about the historic relevance of their unique techs:
Anarchy
The term Anarchy refers to absence of rulership. Pretty much Each village/tribe had their own leaders, and in general these were called âHuskarlsâ among other names.
Huskarls (from hus = âhouseâ, karl sort of means âlordâ) were goth chieftains and so the local rulers of Goth Warbands. Thatâs the historical reason behind training Huskarls in barracks. Gameplay wise this is ofc course to support Goth infantry against archers.
However, not only the Goths had Huskarls, they also had ânoblesâ who were engaged in heavy cavalry, similar to Norse Jarls. My concepts further establishes âAnarchyâ theme by giving Goth ânoblesâ Knights a boost to reflect their important role in the Anarchy. Them coming out of Stables fit the peripheral theme of Anarchy.
gameplay wise they help in late Castle Age against melee units which are the most potent counters to Huskarls. This is to make their Castle Age more viable and improves their raiding and give them options for taking the initiative in the late midgame.
Perfusion
The 2nd tech perfusion is reasoned by the fact that Goths used to show up, raze or raid a town and then disappear from one moment to the other. Also they were known to conscript people on their raids, similar to the Vikings. This is meant to be reflected by the faster creation time for barracks units.
However, this isnât really a good way to portrait that trait, nor is it fun to play against. Goths are one dimensional and boring enemies because of that. Either you crush them early on, or they flood you, and if you survive it you win again.
Until that point gameplay wise itâs knight + xbow combo even though itâs dead weight for Goths since there are no bonuses or imperial upgrades for them available at the moment.
Thatâs why âmyâ perfusion allows building of heavy siege in early imp from Workshops (Goth Castles can be placed defensively instead of at the front) and their siege is faster and cheaper to put pressure on the enemy. Cheaper siege means more damage for less resources afterall.
The faster training from stables and Archery ranges like Skirms and Cavalry stabilizes their army in longer fights a lot more than a pure champion flood and makes up for missing plate armour.
Iâm not exactly sure where you take the âlack of focusâ from.
The theme of Goths is âearly middle ageâ heavy infantry faction with lots of raid potential. In THEORY. However, they canât raid properly in Castle Age - Huskarls are too slow and too vulnerable to Knights/infantry to do. Although they would have the potential, itâs way too risky. Longswords without proper support are bad aswell, just like with all factions. Their upgrades are too expensive and come too late, and theyâre too easily countered by defenses and archers because of that. Additionally, each resource point that a Goth player spends on Castle Age raiding is a delay of his Imperial flood, which ultimately can cost him the game. That prevents Goths from actually playing their faction is supposed to be played. In a lot games players just use Knight + Xbow + mangonel combo in competitive, since these units are overall reliable and can deal with most threats and allows them to get into Imperial Age. Still this is not good at all, since other civs also allow this cookie cutter strat with a more reliable Castle and late Imperial techtree, which makes Goths obsolete for the most part.
My design actually improves their identity of a brute force, straightforward infantry civ:
- Infantry cost discount and cheaper infantry upgrades allow them to equip âheavy armourâ earlier than others in Feudal and Castle Age (but no plate because goths timeframe ends in 1200 AD, see historical chapter)
- Cheaper military buildings help to get early blacksmiths and fields as eco bonus
- Boost to Knights in late Castle age to help with raiding. Huskarls and knights go in, destroy defenses and then the heavy infantry comes and razes the buildings.
- anti infantry knights are much more in line with history. Gunpowder for gameplay reasons only is whacky, and itâs widely seen as unjustified
- cheaper, faster moving Trebuchets from siege workshops: replace the hole left by the bombards and allows Goths to get a large amount of trebuchets in early imp, which fits their âsimple yet effectiveâ brute force style without fancy stuff. Trebuchets were a lot more common in the 11th-13th century than cannons.
For Bombard cannons you need to get a university + chemistry. If you tech perfusion upon hitting Imp youâll also have Trebuchets faster than you could get Bombards before.
Each one costs 225w/225g and they actually can be converted. For 2 bombards Goths can get 3 trebuchets in a shorter time (+25% creation speed) that cannot be converted. - the Scorpions are sort of a small goodie, idk if theyâre useful at all, would have to be tested. edit: the historical reasoning behind the bonus on Scorpions is that Goths used scorpion/ballistae type weapons in combat after the Romans used their Scorpios against them in the field. They were used as a predecessor of the more common crossbows that came up later from the 9th-10th century onwards.
About the âbasically a Boyarâ: well, sort of. But itâs still the regular Knight/Chevalier instead of another unique unit that can trade with Champions. Not really my fault that the Boyar is a pretty uninspired UU 
.
About the Scorpions: well yes, they are less effective on open field than hand cannons.
Edit: actually⊠Iâmn not too sure about that. Hand cannoneers are pretty inaccurate at long range and have a low rate of fire. Issue with scorpions usually is that theyâre too clumsy and slow to retreat, while normal units can turn and move easier.
Still this should be addressed with slightly improved movementspeed, so scorpions should work fine for Goths.
Well yes, I just named them for the fact that Byzantium was partly the Eastern Roman empire. So at least a small fraction was influenced by the Goths. But like I said, the large Goth Kingdoms were conquered well before the 9th century.
in team games youâre probably right, but in 1v1 their dependency on gold makes them less efficient in late Imperial. Although Aztecs remain alot stronger than Mayas and Incas tho.
Gotta check that, I never wouldâve expected Elit Huskarls to loose to Hussars. I woulâdve expectet that Goths are more vulnerable to LCav raids than other civs due to having no walls in the lategame⊠I honestly canât imagine how regular skirms can overpower huskarls with 10 pierce armour and +22 attack against achers along with Halbs that are produced in less than 10 seconds⊠I can only imagine some shenanigans that cripple Goths in early imperial or very bad unit management which can actually be likely. Microing such a flood of units is a pain, another problem that Goths have.
But yea, Goths lack strength in late castle and rely on early imperial to win. Turks get a huge power spike upon hitting imperial with free Hussar and free chemistry and better gunpowder units⊠Probably this does not favor Goth infantry spam either.
While itâs true I found that if you invest in armour upgrades early on theyâre pretty good even in Castle Age. But you cannot use them alone. You need support for them, which you cannot do as Goth unless commiting into a very risky Castle warfare that does not benefit Goths much, because you waste your preparation time for the Perfusion Deathball. Also infantry techs in Castle Age are too expensive and too inefficient in the base game.
Move faster than siege and have no minimum range and attack bonus on infantry.
Since these civs have a very strong early game which leads to strong midgame itâs just right that they should fall of at later stages. And aztecs is just one of the best civs sadly.
Edit: and I still donât understand how the scorpion is justified thematically.
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In his modded version, he made scorpions fast as infantry with perfusion 11
But I feel 20-30 heavy scorpions deal with infantry swarms better than similiar hand cannoneer numbers