Mahouts in AoE3 suck because they take 7 pop slots while being weaker than 7 sowars (ie.Indian camel rider in AoE3, oh the irony) They can at best be used for a short power spike if you ship them from the home city because at least then you will waste less ressources on them. Otherwise the howdah (ranged ele) is much better, but it’s not the most common play either. I’m not sure if the DE changes made flail elephants viable, in the end the most used ele units from the Indian would be the artillery elephant because it’s your best way to deal with buildings. In the end Indians players in AoE3 mostly focus on cipayes.
We already have situations like Goths/Spanish or Slavs/Bulgarian, I think this is fine.
One of the purposes of the november change is to allow players to counter Imp camels with arbs in team games.
Mahout Lancers in AOE3 are actually beasts if used properly, yes they cost too much pop and I think FE should reduce their pop by 1, but 2 of them kill a large group of ranged infantry much faster than even cuirassiers while also being dangerous to melee cavalry (Sowars do poorly vs anything than artillery and skirmisher.)
