I thought about a unique unit for a potential Polynesians civ: the Koa.
It’s an axe-wielding, loincloth-wearing infantry dude with a coconut helmet. He’s relatively quick (slightly faster than a Jaguar Warrior), has slight melee and pierce armor, and has moderate attack. His main gimmick, though, is that he has a charge bar similar to the Shrivamsha Rider that, once full, allows him to dodge one melee attack before it has to recharge again. The recharge takes 20 seconds for the normal Koa and 15 seconds for the Elite Koa; unlike the Rider’s dodge mechanic, the Koa does not start with it fully charged and must wait for the effect to kick in. The dodge itself is signified by a dirt splash like when a Trebuchet projectile hits the ground (like the opponent’s weapon is missing the Koa and hitting the ground instead). This dodge mechanic would make the Koa more resilient to melee damage, but isn’t overbearing like the SVR’s dodge mechanic and would require actual skill and precision to use correctly.
Idk. If a unit shall have a gimmick, that gimmick should have a feelable impact.
The issue with charges as they are currently implemented is how snowbally they usually are. We’ve seen this with the coustilliers who are still one of the best if not the best UU in the game cause once you have enough of them, there is basically nothing to make which can stop them. Ofc if the opponent already has a seitzable mass of the counters it will work, but if he hasn’t, spamming them won’t cut the deal anymore.
Instead of charges I am much more a fan of activated abilties, cause they require skill to use effectively. Especially for slow melee units like infantry which otherwise have nothing to offer for micromanagement.
Like the mentioned Field Fortifictions.
The beauty of this charge is that it is simply a dodge of one melee attack before it has to recharge. If you don’t use it properly, you can squander it before a major fight and have problems as a result. But if you use it right, even late-game power units like Paladins won’t be as effective. It has a big impact, but only if used correctly, which I feel makes it balanced.
An idea would be an infantry that when on stand ground can tank arrow and gunpowder fire, but get damaged more by cavalry, specially elephants and when in movement get bonus vs archers, skirmishers, cammels, lightcav and steppe lancers and no longer take bonus damage from cavalry. Counter, mangonel, heavy cavalry, making them moove. Costs: 5 gold, 30 wood, 40 food. stated base damage non upgraded: 9, upgraded:11. HP: 60>75, armor 2/1> 4/2 bonus vs archer and skyrm:10>15, Bonus vs non heavy calvary units 15>20. movement speed = a lil bit less than an eagle but faster than a champ.
One Thing the Youpudding strat showed is that the Serjeant design has a lot of Potential.
The main reason I see for that is their Rading potential. Once they are in the eco they can really damage it.
It’s actually fine, they die to Knights as it looks. And I also think it would be fine when Archers would deal more Damage to them. Cause it’s still a numbers game: When you make enough of them Archers will still have a hard time even when they did a bit more Damage.
The issue I see with the current implementation of the different unit types.
Archers and Defensive structures deal the same type of damage. That means when you give a unit a lot of pierce armor it becomes good against both. To break that connection you would need to add some Bonus Damage.
Also the way Cavalry is Designed with high HP for the cost and high Pierce Armor makes them immediately Super strong Raiding units. Plus the speed that allows to get in way easier and even also take less damage due to missing shots.
I feel like there would be the potential utility nieche for a Power Infantry unit, when Cavalry wouldn’t be so absurdly strong when Raiding under defensive fire. Imo Cavalry should die more easily under defensive fire than Infnatry. And that relation is currently inversed. Cavalry would still be amazing Raiding units, especially for raiding somewhat exposed eco. But I think a power Infantry should be better suited for Raiding whilst being shot by defences than the Cavalry counterparts.
Serjeants are a good example, Huskarls are probably a bit too much.
But the main issue for me is that Cavalry is actually dominating that Spot which it shouldn’t for my taste. Cavalry has so many situations it is good - I don’t see why it should be better in this specific one than a power Infantry unit. And Youpudding showcased that when you actually give an Infantry a stat boost they can do it even better, they can become attractive to play with.
One idea to solve the connectivity issue with defenses and archery could still be a ranged Infantry counter as mentioned several times here already. But I feel if it’s supposed to be general, we need to make at least some defences (EG Towers) Specifically better in defending against Cavalry. Cause as long as the Cavalry is staying so good in raiding under defensive fire there is very low encouragement to chose Infantry over it even when it’s slighty better in these situations. Cause that Infantry would almost only be useful for that utility opposed to the general usefulness of the more mobile Cavalry alternative.
Royal Heirs makes Shotel Warriors and Camel riders receive -3 damage from Mounted Units.
Why shouldn’t the same thing work for defensive buildings?
Milita takes -2 damage from defensive buildings sounds like a reasonably good technology.
Or you know what, make it a secondary effect of Arson.
Towers already do bonus damage against Spearman, if necessary that could be increased to balance this out.
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Could be interesting yeah.
I think in many cases taking less damage from defensive buildings strategically outshines bonus damage vs buildings which usually only makes sense to get when you’re already swarming the opponent with infantry - and basically only increases the snowball but doesn’t adds a lot when you’re not already ahead.
It’s especailly interesting as Goths don’t get Arson.
Techtrees would need to be changed since the new Arson would be pretty powerful, not something every civilisation should have.
The only reason the Goths don’t have it is because it’s already covered by their civilisation bonus.
That bonus used to be +1 before Arson existed.
Edit:
I thought about the concepts I posted last year and I think they might need to be simplified.
Mode Switch Infantry
The idea is to have a unit that can be good against Crossbow and good against Knights but not at the same time.
The concept I posted before was a little too complex including things like auras and stuff.
The simple idea would be an Infantry with a Shield and a Spear but it can put the Shield away to two-hand the Spear giving it a stronger attack, especially against cavalry.
Shield Mode
- Base attack similar to Long Swordsman
- Small bonus vs. Cavalry similar to Eagle Warrior
- 1 meele armour
- 3 or even 4 Pierce armour
Two Handed Mode
- Same base attack or slightly higher base attack
- Noticeably increased attack bonus vs. cavalry
- 1/0 armour
- Comparable to Flemish Milita
Differences to Eagle Warrior
- Normal infantry speed
- No conversion resistance and no bonus against monks
Anti Infantry Infantry
The main reason why Infantry can’t be buffed is because not every civilisation has a direct Infantry counter, especially in Castle Age.
A stronger Long Swordsman with civilisation bonuses could become unstoppable relatively quickly.
Traits
- High Gold to Food cost ratio (similar to Eagle Warrior)
- Be cost effective against the best Infantry but not necessarily population efficient
- Not useless against other units (like Skirmishers and Scout Line)
- Not good against Crossbows and Knights
- Available from Feudal Age, requires to be upgrade in Castle Age
General thoughts
The Archery Range has 4 generic units and the Stable as 3 (including Camel Rider) with one Regional Unit being available to 6 civilisations (Battle Elephant) while the Barracks only has 2 and even only 1 Regional Unit (Eagle Warrior).
If any building has the potential to get another generic unit or wide spread regional unit it’s the Barracks.
The combination of spear and shield is the most common weaponry of soldiers of almost every army before the invention of gunpoweder almost everywhere in the world yet barely any unit has those weapons in AoE2.
The Eagle Warrior is an amazing and civilisation defining unit. The civs that can train it are often simply being called Eagle civilisations because it’s that central of a unit.
This unit proves that an Infantry unit can be very strong while at the same hand giving reasons for the enemy to build infantry too because that’s their main counter.
Also all Infantry units that do well against cavalry but don’t take bonus damage through the Spearman armour class are also pretty strong units.
Kamayuk and Flemish Militia for example.
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