Italian wars are withing the timeline yes, from 1500 circa to 1560 circa… Oh, i didn’t meant they couldn’t be a UU, they are memey enough that everyone know them which would make a very easy UU… The disbanding (or annihilation if we refer to the sack of rome of 1527) and their reforming is just to state that they aren’t that incredible military unit people think they are…
Yeah, they fought, but we cannot take every single men that fought in that battle and make a unit of them can we?
They stopped fighting as an army unit after the italian wars, did they had their moment of glory? Yes, but those were early in their history and also quite sparse tbh (i can recall only them buying time for the pope to run and hide in castel san’tangelo as moment of glory)…
Regarding crossbowmen and elmeti i have complained a lot on discord about them too… There is no unit that i feel is actually right in the reveal image, all those units stopped being used by the end of the italian wars, which showed the superiority of guns and artillery over crossbows and heavy cav…
We can ask Giovanni delle Bande Nere what he think about it, we just need to be quick, he is dying from a firearm injury…
Rodeleros were used like for 30 years IRC.
They stopped being an independent infantry unit around 1530, they were inglobated in the tercio, but they were still present in 1565 at the siege of malta…
Normal, there is 22 years difference between both games…
Yes, but the doubt will be that they will put in the European dlc? Poles and Danes? Poles and Crimean Tartars?..
The same as those of aoe 2 I guess…In Napoleonic Era,the Universities have this:Each match, the University randomly has 2-4 BONUS upgrades. Bonus upgrades cost nothing, upgrade something, but will make something worse. The Italians can make Basilicas, which act as Universities, but cost 500 wood and 500 coin. The Basilica gives trickles to resources, gives many more unique upgrades and allows church units to be free and Nuncios. A Nuncio has no attack but is resistant to ranged attacks, bonus the stats of nearby units, can only be acquired through the home city or Basilica, and with a church upgrade can use an attack such as the sharpshooter attack…
But the Rangers did form the basis of the British (and American) Light Infantry traditions in those militaries following the French and Indian/Seven Years War, as one of the British Army’s first designated light infantry units. The Rangers were disbanded after the war, but a lot of the traditions and know-how carried over into another contemporary unit, the 60th “Royal American” Regiment. By the Napoleonic Wars, the 60th Regiment was the other British Rifle regiment in service alongside the 95th, and wore a similar green uniform.
During the Napoleonic Wars, the British actually restored the Ranger designation for some designated light infantry and rifle units created outside of the Royal Rifle Corps (the 60th and 95th Regiments). There were the Corsican Rangers, raised during the British occupation of Napoleon’s home island in 1797 and served until 1817. Interesting, the Corsicans were led by Hudson Lowe, whose postwar assignment was to look after on St. Helena the most notorious Corsican himself: Napoleon!
the battle of pavia also…there they captured King Francis I…
Yes the Italian wars were from 1494 to 1559…although you have the previous wars of Lombardy (1425-1454) (which are seen in the campaign of Sforza) that would also enter the timeline of aoe 3 (1421-1876)…
Italians give a lot of room for condottiero battles between italians city-states
Yeah I get that you would have preferred they they depicted a more modern italy, but the game goes form around the 1500 to the late 1800, so the renaissance is in it.
We have crossbowmen and halberdiers both are units that weren’t used extensively during the time periods of Aoe3, but they are there, so of the italian culture have something unique for them it just makes sense that they make a good use of it.
We also know that they would have gone for a renaissance theme for the Italians, since that’s an iconic moment of italian history, and people tend to picture that when thinking about the Italians.
That doesn’t mean that there isn’t room for some more modern italy, since we had some gunpowder units in the background, it just means that it’s not what they are using to marketing the civ… it’s all always about money in the end…
And do get me wrong, I was extremely critical on the past new civs, especially US and Mexico, and about some of their unique features such as flags or lazos, and if with the italians too they’ll go for some meme mechanic or nonsense I’ll be the first to critique it, but for now there isn’t any reason to think so.
Personally, I believe that the Italians will be a strong rush civilization.
Probably, they’ll have access to their unique church, the duomo, through an early shipment in the age 1 or early age 2, or they’ll be able to build it quite fast. This will give them access to strong techs and units like monks and doctors. The latter especially will be used to sabotage enemy cities. In the economy, I believe that we’ll have a berry bonus (since they were hinted through them at first) and some gold generation mechanics, maybe related to the other unique buildings that they have.
Then they’ll have a strong age 2 military, with strong xbows, supported by early mercenary shipments of swiss pikes and elmeti, and some other standard musket unit.
This is to resemble Italy strength during the renaissance, both on economy and military.
Then they’ll fall off quickly in the age 3, so you’ll need to do damage in the age 2 to keep up. This is to mimic the italian decline after the end of the renaissance until the napoleonic wars.
Xbows and dragoons will still be good, but not that much powerful anymore, you’ll get special halbs though, by the unit papal guard upgrade, and you’ll get access to lil bombards. You’ll also have some agriculture bonus maybe, I don’t know, it’s just a hint.
In age 4 and 5 you’ll get back up again with military, probably with the dragoons or the musketeers being the other powerful units, being upgraded to carabiners or bersaglieri, so that a fast age 4 strategy it’s a viable option.
Again, this is to mimic the italian resurgence and unification.
On water maps instead they’ll probably be strong in all ages. A fish bonus wouldn’t be too strange, and the galeass will probably be a strong early water unit, useful for all maps.
To sum up, the Italians will probably be an archaic civilization, with a powerful age 1 and 2, a below average age 3 and early age 4 (with its unique features though) a a good late age 4 to 5.
I would have preferred a post 1815 italy yes, mostly because i love how mexico is, and it is froom 1820…
I slightly disagree with the presence of halberdiers and crossbowmen in AoE 3 too, but that i just my personal opinion…
It is a shame that italy is know only for renaissance, don’t get me wrong, i love it, but i would have preferred a major focus, or the only focus being the post 1815, or maybe just napolenic era time…
I fear that italy will be a meme civ too, mostly because that is what seems most outsiders see italy… But it has an extremely rich history… Like the spanish war of succession, it was fought in italy, and we also got the famous Siege of Turin of 1706…
This doesn’t look good to me, if they are a rush civ, or an extremely archaic civ i have no interest in them
Also, Bersagliei are not muskets WTH?! We also saw that they have no nayonet on their rifle and instead seems to use the skirm stance
Seems like the overall theme is to make the revolution civs more modern with 1800’s theme and Europeans archaic. US and Mexico get steamships and ironclads when the British and French can’t despite owning some of the most famous examples.
To be fair to the Definitive Edition team, the weird state of the European civs was beyond their control and I appriciate they have tryed to improve things somewhat like Rangers for Brits (even though they kept them inferior to longbowmen for some reason)
I’m sorry for you, but that’s just your personal taste… unfortunately with the italians it was quite predictable that they would have gone heavily for the renaissance theme.
The game goes from the 1500 to the 1900, so of course they need to add the more archaic civs and more modern civs.
That doesn’t mean that there isn’t room for a modern italy, it’s not just the main focus for selling the civ.
That’s my fear too… my hope is that they take seriously the renaissance theme, even if they stretch the border of the game timeframe.
We don’t actually know if those are the bersaglieri, and we don’t know if the bersaglieri will be a standard unit…
Bersaglieri were shock troopers, so both the muskets and the skirmishers suits them.
I don’t mind rush civs, but again, it’s just about tastes…
Yes, remember that this is not the wars of liberty mod (1789-1914), the normal aoe 3 requires more civs and units of Renaissance indole, since its initial period is precisely that (1400/1421-1876/1900), so the chronology of the Italians would be from 1423 (when the wars of Lombardy start until 1870 (which gives the final unification of the peninsula) (if aoe 4 had been set in the twentieth century, we would have seen the Regio Esercito fighting in both world wars)…
Yes, let’s say that the civs of aoe 3 tend to be somewhat stereotyped cof cof mexico with their giant hats cof cof…
Yes, it is difficult to update the European armies trying to maintain the spirit that permeated them Ensemble Studios…if Forgotten Empires had the advice of Bruce Shelley and Sandy Peteresen, it would still have a hit…