Ok, that’s what I found out so far about the Italians:
The crossbows are probably pavisan crossbowmen, or genoese crossbowmen.
I suspect that they’ll have an ability similar to the arbaletrier of the aoe4 French, where they deploy the shield for extra ranged resistance.
Historically speaking, the crossbow was always a weapon of choice for the Italian states, and the xbows of Genoa, Pisa and Venice were well renowned soldiers.
The unit below instead might look like a UU that replace the halberdier. It makes, sense, the Italians always have preferred shorter but more powerful polearms. It also nice that they try to make an UU out of an underused unit.
The soldier might be a papal guard, but the arsenalotti of Venice too used similar weapons and armor.
Here we have more units.
Quite simply there is a pike high in the top left, probably Italians will have generic pikes, with at best an age up or HC shipment to get them to veteran or give them some buffed stats.
The other 2 are swiss pikes instead. Again, they probably just have shipment for them, but with the generic unit and some buffed stats at best.
In the middle there is probably an emeto. Now that doesn’t seem too different from the unit that we have in the game, so maybe they’ll just have a ton of HC shipment for them, but it’s not an UU… or maybe yes? Hard to tell, the unit seems just a tiny little bit different, they might just give it a reskin…
Lastly, they have a dragoon, again, nothing too special here…
Now here in the lower side we probably have what it seems to be their explorer, you know that it’s him from the pose and the rifle, and it’s hat resemble that of various Italians leaders of the renaissance.
In the middle there seems to be a special economic unit, difficult to tell. It might be a merchant, or an architect, both were units for the Italians on old mods. Or it might be just an eye candy…
Lastly in the top left, we have what it seems a plague doctor, with its famous venetian mask. Now I don’t know if that’s what they are going for, but I made a design for such unit some time ago for a potential venetians civ for aoe4.
If they make it like I designed it, then prepare to poison your enemies… you can read it here.
This one seems quite simple, probably the Italian militia will use xbows instead of rifles, which was quite common for the maritime republics, were all citizens must be trained in the use of the xbow.
This one is instead harder, both because it seems quite generic and because the image isn’t clear. It might be a rifleman from the later kingdom of Italy, an alpine, or a bersagliere, or maybe red coat, not the English ones, but the ones of the Garibaldi expedition.
It’s also difficult to determine if it’s a regular units, and if it’s a musket or a skirm, but I think that it’s the later.
This too its quite hard…
The lower bombard seems a reskin of the Lil bombard, so I’m not convinced that it’ll an UU, probably the Italians simply have HC shipments for them.
The 2 units on the top are quite difficult… the one with the torch might seem like a spy-kind of units, or a version of the arsonist, anyway a sabotage unit, or maybe a vill with a torch… so just an eye candy.
The heavy armored unit instead is even more complicated. It might be a man at arms, or a condottiero, but there is no weapon visible. Maybe it’s a special unit like the doctor, it’s hard to tell its role.
So on water, there is a caravel (not in the picture) and a galley, which is quite odd, since the galley is a unit that should replace the caravel. It fits the maritime republics theme better for sure, so it’s possible that either the Italians get access to both, or that the caravel can be shipped through the HC.
The big warships instead is a galeass, a huge heavy warship that the venetians used. It will probably replace the galeon or the frigate, most likely the latter since it was a ship with a huge amount of cannons, cannons that had high calibers and could scare off even the British navy before the fall of the republic of Venice.
The tower it’s a bit difficult. It seems like an unique building, but it could also be an eye candy or something for some scenarios. If it’s an in-game building though, it’s plausible that it can be built only through a HC shipment or through an architect.
It seems like a coastal defense structure, so it’s probably inspired by the huge amount of defensive buildings that the venetians had on the Mediterranean and on several Greek islands. It could be also inspired by the fact that the Italians in general were pioneers on developing the star fortress cities, that were also called Italians fortresses.
Then there are the other unique buildings:
Now the big one is the “Duomo”, a cathedral, in particular the one of Florence. Considering that aoe3 doesn’t have wonders (not like other aoe) and seeing how big it is, it’s probably either a late game building or a core building, maybe used for unique upgrades or for aging up, similarly for how the hausa have the university. Either way it most likely substitute the church.
The other one is more of a mistery, it seems like a bank, the fact that it’s called “monte” might seem like it act as a bank. In particular, the monte di pietà was a religion credit institute for giving small loans ad advantageous rates. Near it there is also a particular cart, so it make me think that’s mostly likely an HC shipment only, or that it can at least be shipped through the HC.
It might have a meccanic to generate gold, maybe with vills around, or it might be an unique trade posts, not unlikely too.
Last but not least, there is the Da Vinci tank. I think that will be a cool and fun cheat unit, or a nice HC niche unit. It shouldn’t be something that it’s just too spammable though, since while it did design it, the tank never actually made it to any battlefield.
That summarize pretty much everything that I could find on the picture, let me know what you think and if I left something out.
PS: there also a hidden bandit-like unit behind a building, but I don’t think that it’ll be a unique unit, it’s probably more of an eye candy, something from other civs.