umm lets start with they are trained faster then most cavalry and have range?
less armor, cheaper, more mobility and range. yes. absolutely yes. built like a unit for raiding or for winning through numbers because they are easier to mass up.
they are still weak to pikes and camels, they are just used differently.
Faster training doesn’t change anything about them since they are weaker per unit than knights.
Melee armor isn’t that impactful, it only makes them less effective against knights. Lower pierce armor means weakness against archer, which is compensated with extra range and speed, so they perform similarly to knights against ranged units. Mobility is better, but not by a great margin. It’s not enough to use the unit in a different way. Cheaper cost, once again, doesn’t change the purpose of the unit, since it’s weaker per pop than most heavy cavalry.
So, their distinct feature is what? One raid in early Castle Age? Yes, they have some difference from knights, like somewhat better powerspike in early imp, somewhat different control, somewhat lower gold cost etc. But it doesn’t feel like a new unit in its use, apart from a few quirks in early Castle Age. I would make them more food heavy, less gold heavy and slightly stronger in Castle Age (to make up for different resource balance), so that they are a more valuable long-term investment.
true but they aren’t supposed to be knights. the fact though is that you can get more of them out.
SL are a Quantity over Quality Unit.
this can’t even be close to serious. assuming bloodlines and +2 defense, SL have 3 PA in castle age, taking 4 damage from each crossbowman. meaning they die in 20 shots.
meanwhile a knight has 120 health and 4 PA, meaning they take 3 damage per shot, and die in 40 shots.
the SL also attacks much slower, so no, they don’t perform “about the same” as knights against archers. not even close.
you guys have fun discussing redesigning a unit that doesn’t need to be redesigned.
You only say that they are half of a knight, build faster, cheaper and weaker (20 shots for SL and 40 for knight) to be half of someone don’t make you someone.
they aren’t supposed to fill the same role as a knight. stop acting like they are supposed to.
his argument was they perform similarly to knights against archers, i pointed out how wrong that was. half the shots to kill, much slower dps, etc.
Wow, I have a 15% cheaper, 25% faster to produce unit that is weaker per unit by roughly the same margins (strongly depends on civs and age though), what an astonishingly huge difference, they are clearly a new unit type.
Sorry, I meant to say something else. I meant that they just about as ineffective against archers as they are against knights. So overall in castle age they are weaker knights except for 3-5 unit raid party, where they are slightly better. Finally, in imp they basically the same unit as cavalier. They have lower hp and lower armor, so they die noticeably faster to any type of unit, and they make up for it by dealing more damage in practice due to range advantage. They are like half-assed shotels, except shotels differentiate themselfes from militia-line by having vastly superior speed and castle-based production.
So what’s their distinct role? If it’s a single-time 3 unit raid in early castle age (which knights are also ok at), then we clearly use different definitions. Having a long stick isn’t a role btw.
I saw this in the last steppe lancer discussion, and I still agree with it
Give them bonus damage against Eagles. That way, the lancer civs have a gold-efficient eagle counter. This is something the Tatars desperately, and specifically need. I think if you give them just a bit of bonus damage against Eagles (maybe +4 at most, probably +3 without elite upgrade) they’ll have a specific role in dealing with eagle rushes, as it can both keep up with, and beat Eagles.
Giving them pierce armor makes them too much like the other cav units, 2 pierce is shared between every castle age cavalry unit besides Camels (even elephants start with +2) and I think it’s lower pierce armor serves a purpose. It’ll be even more important to have low pierce armor on them when they can kill Eagles and the meso civs don’t have Cavalry.
That seems to be the same idea the devs had about the milita line when they created AoC. We have a unit without purpose, so let’s give them bonus damage against eagles. It worked to give the militia line some situational use and would surely do the same to the steppe lancers. The problem could be though that steppe lancers are much faster than eagles, while militias are much slower, so steppe lancers could force a fight. A counter unit is usually not (much) faster than the unit it counters, because it would make it completely impossible to effectively use that unit.
If steppe lancers had an attack bonus against eagles, what unit composition should meso civs go for? Steppe lancers + skirmishers would counter everything they have, wouldn’t it? Even if they go for eagles + arbalesters (a very expensive combination!), the eagles would always have to be near the arbs to not be catched by the steppe lancers, so it would completely negate the eagles’ speed advantage that they usually have.
Not at all. Skirms do nothing against eagles.
In the eagle + Arb combo, you have two units that both damage the Steppe lancer, which has incredibly low HP and practically no armor. Which means it’s in the favor of the Steppe lancer to take quick fights where it can avoid taking extra damage from the Archers. As long as the army is together, the Steppe lancer is going to die way faster, long before the Eagles do since the Skirmisher doesn’t contribute to killing them.
Further, you say this army is expensive. In the latter stages of the game, you’re right. In castle age, and early Imperial, the Steppe Lancer + Skirm composition is way more expensive as food is very limited. You can much more easily supply the gold for both Eagles and Archers than you can supply the food for both Skirms and Steppes.
Lastly, giving the Steppe Lancer this change wouldn’t make them any better (or worse) at raiding, or not really in a pitched battle. Fully upgraded, they already beat eagles 1v1. If they were uniquely capable of handling Eagles, that’s not going to be the secret puzzle piece that makes them a meta unit. Let’s say they were really good at countering eagles and it was shown to be a deadly matchup for the eagle units. That’s three civs that have a special answer to a unit three other civs have. It’s not like they don’t all have units that, aside from the Eagle, can absolutely handle a Steppe lancer mass. It’s just another option they can use to proactively handle eagle raiding potential, which is a big problem against Eagle civs.
“Attack in large numbers” supposedly, lol
Give SL a charge bonus like the coustellier, it doesn’t need to be much, +15 or +20 would be more than enough
Bonus against siege would be enough IMO
I know its mind bending but what if each civ had a unique attack bonus for their SL… Tatars is an easy one but the rest.
Tatar had attack bonus vs eagles. Since that is one of their worst matchups
Cumans attack bonus vs vils. Maybe as some kind of compensation if they don’t go double tc? Not sure.
And mongols attack bonus vs siege? Fits their theme? And doesn’t necessarily bring anything new?
they all already have bonuses for steppe lancers as is, and do tatars and mongols really need buffs?
would probably require a change in training time because they are so easy to mass up.
Steppe lancer needs only to reduce their cost. I think it should be 60f, 35 gold.
Mongols no. But weirdly im seeing more and more people saying mongols are being less favoured by pros. No idea if it’s true.
Tatars are as weak as they were pre patch if you don’t boom. A meso match up means less likely to boom due their civ pressure on top of tatar having poor counters for eagles.
So maybe if anything only their SL could get the bonus v eagles.
Yeah and with their range it magnifies that bonus(Which imo is way too high) since they can completely avoid getting hit while instagibbing the target unlike Coustilliers.
Which imo is way too high.
Definitely the easiest option.
still among the top civs. especially with other civs getting nerfed left and right.
if they are eagle pressuring while you’re booming you still have longswords which are more then enough. yeah they will be missing an armor upgrade but longswords still do 9 base + 6 bonus damage to eagles.
i’d start with 60 food 40 gold and a massive reduction in ESL upgrade cost.
Agree this will be enough 
Sounds fair, i still think the SL TT should be 1 or 2 seconds lower than paladin TT.
Only reason i could ser a Charge bonus to SL is because they are kind of weak vs archers