How much stronger are Cataphracts (Post IMP, all other upgrades done as well) become if they have Bloodlines and Blast Furnace in 1v1 fights? Can they now beat a Paladin 1v1 for example? This can be done in the scenario editor/or mods.
How much stronger do they become in large fights when massed?
I have a feeling, Cataphracts alone would become crazy OP if they had Blast Furnace and Bloodlines.
I am not going to test it because I have no time nor motivation to do so… but I think they would became op, indeed. Also, remember that blast furnace would affect byzantine halberdiers and camels, and bloodlines would affect camels, so no cavalry civ would have a chance against byzantines in imperial age.
Why are you asking this? Are you thinking about a hypothetical byzantine buff or something?
Besides, you dont need to test it in the editor, since you are asking for 1v1 fights (so no trample damage). Just compare the stats of your buffed cataphract and the stats of a FU paladin, and see who wins. This way, you could post a thread about a hypothetical buff instead of posting a thread about a question that you could answer with enough time.
You can test it by using the All Techs option.
But wouldn’t that mean they’d lose Logistica?
This question is very easy to answer: No
Hitpoints:
Attack:
Armour is the same.
Paladins have both more Hitpoints and more Attack.
Cataphracts have reduced damage from anti Cavalry attack and bonus damage against Infantry what makes them very hard to counter. With those upgrades the only counter would be Paladins but only by a small margin.
Their main counter, Halberdiers would barely counter them if even and they are slow.
Cataphracts mixed with Camels would be OP.
Their main counter would be arbalest. Same as now, with them having only 1 base pierce armor, vs the 3 armor of the paladin.
Logistica doesnt affect cataphract against paladin in 1v1
By a nose
This question is not as easy as you think to answer with straight math. In reality, a Cataphract will win 1v1 against a Paladin with every upgrade except bloodlines. It’s extremely close.
Damage happens in chunks, not as a linear progression. That fact, and the fact the cataphract attacks faster means that Paladins survive with just 15 hp in a 1v1. That’d make mass Paladin vs Cata heavily in favor of the Cataphract as it’d only take three instances of trample to kill an adjacent Paladin.
every 10th attack, with the extra attack speed, the Cataphract will be an extra hit ahead, and it’s damage is always counted first, so the damage dealt looks like this (Cata numbers will be in bold)
Rounds:
There’s the chart showing how the numbers are applied in practice.
FU Cataphracts are hard to get(yes, they both are, but still)and even then, Paladin’s cost 10 less food, hence easier to mass, and they only need stables.