Their eco bonus (cheap vills ) clearly is one of the best in the game, it’s usefull in every situation, it allows to smoothly boom on 4 TC instead of 3 and helps u age up faster
They obviously are one of he best counter to cav, and very often u encounter cav.
Their strong units (camels, canoneers and Elephant archers ) complement each other perfectly, it’s not like some civ where u have bonusses that over lap, like vietnameese, u get extra armor on range units but then if u want ratan archer this doesnt apply.
the castle age tech is absolutely amazing, usefull in every situation (10% faster gold income )
And last but not least ! the elephant archers arent bad AT ALL, they are amzing to help u get momentum, they’re the first stone to building up the number and we all know getting the number is one of the most important thing in the battle. They help holding a spot while you bring up some more mil their.
they have bombard canon that get very affordable since u get all the wood updrage plus that gold bonusfrom the castle.
I had 4 wins out of 4 on arena and forteress but i think that’s because they’re particularly suited for those maps
they might struggle against good archer civ but i havent played any recently so can’t really tell u
Having an economic bonus that grants you an advantage over all random maps, with a great tec tree puts indians into one of the strongest civs, good players know that, there are players that simply can’t understand how tremendous is the impact of cheap villagers, if a civ like vikings that lacks halb, cavalry, gunpowder options and monks is one of the strongest civs at archs+ram without having a single military/unit bonus, a civ with bbc and both counters to heavy cavalry line would be immediately the top 1 civ at any random map.
They don’t struggle vs archer civs, they have full skim line, lc with +5pa in castle age and free+6 by hitting imperial, their UU with 9 PA, full HCA, bbc and onagers.
Those who keep pushing arbs for indians just want another viking civ that gives you an insane economy lead with a simple build order to success just making one unit, indians are an artillery and camel civ, so far since release they have only been used for their OP camel line, any other change to the civ should be only focused to fix their UT for HC line, same like the one for portuguese(arquebus), but in general indians are one of the strongest civs just by their vill discount and wide tec tree.
While I agree that Indians can be amazing, the Pros and casters speaked out, Indians are in a really bad position now.
A bizarre pseudo cavalry camel civ, with a unusable UU in most cases due to their cost and castle needing, Gunpowder with nothing more but a debuff IMP UT that makes them worse at greater range, as well poor vs mesos and heavy archer civs.
I do agree that they don’t need arbalest because is risky, but in general most people agree that this civ need a small buff for 1v1, in team games yes they were too supreme, but that is gone.
Yes, cheaper Vills is, by far, the strongest economic bonus in the game.
It saves you so much Food, down the line, and allows you to spam Vills so efficiently, that Indians can Boom even under pressure.
EAs are great if you know how to use them, they have Hussars and HCA for fast Cavalry, and the Imp Camel trumps Paladin hard.
I really wish that the devs change their name, because the devs introduced the Mughals empire as Indians which it is wrong of course, they should rename the civ to “Mughals Empire”
Imp camel only comes in very late, so up until that point there are a number of civs better at this, if anything they’re actually one of the worst camel civ for fighting cav until imp cam hits because they lack the last armour upgrade, on top of other civs getting their advantages sooner… Berber Saracen mali etc
What does this even mean? They’re one of the worst /slowest to mass slowest to move UU in the game. What does stone to building even mean
They’re not useless but they have their flaws.
I know its picky but it’s not +5 PA. Its 5PA or +3PA. Knights are still missing, so india still lack a meta unit which counters a lot of the counters you mentioned before onagers and bbc kick in (bbc comes in sooo late)
There’s a reason why vikings, celts, britons and even Ethiopians sometimes train knights.
Example :a camel (3PA) still dies a Heck faster than a knight (4PA) while trying to kill the mangonel that is wiping your skirms that is countering the opposing archers. And then when the camel actually reaches the mango it takes a lot longer to kill it. Or you’re using LC to kill magos, which are insanely food intensive in castle age.
Im not saying they don’t need a buff but…
This is simply wrong. It gives them more range. It doesn’t make them worse than other HC in the same conditions. They aren’t suddenly worse at range 7, even if the Indian one sucks at that greater range. And even then if you’re fighting larger groups it’s not as much of a train smash you still get the option to kite sooner.
And on top of all of that since the gunpowder fix is this even still true? Conqs are definitely performing vastly better. Aren’t Indian HC similar?
Maybe Shatagni should give HC +5% accuracy boost as well (from 65 to 70) so that they don’t feel terrible to use at 8 range. This isn’t a game breaking change too.
Well, as with other Gunpowder civs, the Gunpowder comes in quite late. Except the Spanish, which do not have any good Castle Age unit (every unit except Crossbowmen is fully upgradeable without bonuses), I don’t see any civ using Gunpowder is Castle Age. Even Turks, who basically have Indian HC without the anti-infantry bonus, in the Castle Age.
With the Indians, it is about finding the meta rather than adopting a pre-existing one. One option you always have is to boom because of the villager discount. The food bonus also helps in scrushes. But that’s what everyone knows. What next?
After the scouts, switch to [archers to Crossbowmen to] Cavalry Archers to Heavy Cavalry Archers. Cavalry Archers are slightly better in the new patch. The archer-crossbowman is to provide as a filler and maybe ignored. Obviously they do not have any bonus to cavalry archers, but if you get Sultans, it helps. The fact is they are one of the 7/37 civs to have fully upgradeable cavalry archers.
After the scrush, add in some scouts or Skirmishers to avoid pressure. Click upto castle age. Except 2 or 3 gold miners, get other gold miners to do wood/food. Start producing 2 stable Light Cavalry. You need gold only to get the castle age techs - Light Cavalry, Iron Casting and Chain Barding. It sounds food intensive and yes it is, but unlike Knights you do not need 13 gold miners. Castle Age light Cavalry are a weird choice but man, they are strong. With +2 attack, they trade against villagers as if they were Knights without attack upgrades.
What are the counters of Knights?
Camels - Light Cavalry can outpace them
Monks - Light Cavalry hard counter monks
Other heavy Cavalry - Light Cavalry outrun them even if they have husbandry
Pikemen - Light Cavalry outrun them
Massed archer units - the extra pierce armor and lower HP for Indian light Cavalry are balanced, but since Light Cavalry run even faster than Knights, they have fewer problems in closing the distance and running away
Light Cavalry in Castle Age have 8 LOS which is 2 more than Frank Knights. So definitely the potential is there. Just watch out for your housing space.
In most matchups, you will feel the purpose of Light Cavalry - a population inefficient but fastest land unit in the game, having the greatest LOS amonst melee units.
I don’t agree. There seems to be major problems with every tech and bonus of the Indian civilization except the villager eco thingy.
The fishing bonus is not great - a very situational bonus. The unique tech Shatagni does nothing major to HCs. The Elite Elephant is an underwhelming unique unit. Also historically, they are not a Camel Civ and are more of an Elephant civ. I feel the entire Civ needs to be redeveloped.
Here are some (radical?) ideas
Change the name of the civilization to ‘Mughals’. Although the Mughal empire in India started in the 1500s, i guess it is fine as we have Spanish and their conquistadors. Historically the Mughals, like many Central Asian armies, were horse-oriented. Also give them gun powder bonuses - as Mughal India was one of the three Islamic gunpowder empires, along with the Ottoman Empire and Safavid Persia. And yes, include Battle Elephants.
Regarding the Unique unit - Maybe we could have a horse based unit.The Mughal warhorse was a key unit which resulted in a lot of Mughal victories. It was a kind of Cavalry Archer. Or maybe have an upgraded hand canoneer with a rapid-firing gun which may have multiple gun barrels which fired hand cannons loaded with gunpowder. Such a weapon was used during the times of Akbar at the zenith of the Mughal empire. And of-course the Mughals will use the South Asian Architecture set.
Then create a new civ - Cholas - which are more of a South Indian civ which will share the South Asian Architecture set and will be a Naval civ - as they were a thalassocratic empire.
These two major changes in a DLC may work well compared to the current “Indian” civilization.
Am sure this post is not detailed enough, but experts here might expand on the ideas here. I would look forward to reading them!
Mughals would be too late for this game, even the campaign is not about a Mughal ruler (Prithviraj is from the Chauhamana dynasty, almost 400 years before the Mughals).
Indians are a composite of all Northern India, throughout the period.
But I want to point out that at least Hera changed his mind. He said Indians change in the anniversary patch was technically buff in regards of 1v1 in his twitch (give them something other than camels in Castle age, and give instant +2 PA in imp).
I used to think that they are bad civ… but still their eco bonus is probably the best eco bonus in the game after Aztecs nerf.
I don’t like their change in anniversary patch to give bonus overlap with Tatars, Turks, but now they are in a good spot in 1v1 and still very strong in Team game.
This mean that elephant archers are good to get hold of a spot until you bring some more army. I think this is what most people don’t understand. And as I said, getting the military number up is very important and sometime difficult to do, well elephant archers make it a lot easier to mass up your army and get a snow ball effect going
That makes no sense at all… why on earth would an expensive, slow to train, weak unit that requires a castle to train be better at “getting the number up” and “get hold of a spot” than literally any other unit? Units that are stronger, cheaper, easier to mass, more mobile…
well mobility isnt a problem if u want to hold a spot, then if u want to grab hold of some spot on the map, ull probably drop a castle => guess where EA come from
Every bonus for the civ and their units tell us that the devs make them include the Mughals empire. Mughals were a gun powder/CA/Camel civ, which is completely the same for Indians in aoe2 with their UT and bonuses, especially the Mughals were the only people who take the control for all India regardless the campaign they have in the game
If you use them right, they’re actually quite good. Compare them to siege rams, used to absorb enemy archer fire in big archer fights.
A siege ram costs 235 resources and has 270 hp. It dies in 270 shots from archers, or 14 hits from a paladin. A FU Elite Elephant Archer costs 170 resources and has 350 hp. It dies in 350 shots from archers, or 27 hits from a paladin. Per cost, it provides almost double the durability of a ram.
On top of that, rather than automatically running away from enemy fire, it sits just inside your archer range to shoot enemies, something siege rams can’t do.
Sure, it has some weakness to halbs, but how often do you send halbs into archers to kill rams? You don’t, they’ll NEVER make it that far. You might send cavalry, but even they die quickly in those circumstances. Sure, it has some weakness to skirms, but even that weakness is mild compared to the weakness of other archers, simply due to its massive health pool. Meanwhile, Indian Hand Cannons can shred elite skirms, dealing 9 damage per shot rather than 2.
The problem people have is they seem to think they need to build an army PURELY of Elephant Archers, which is a terrible idea. They’re big tanks that happen to be able to deal damage, they’re not meant to be the primary force of your army.
Mix in one EA for 10 other archers and you’ll have a force that costs about 5% more per unit but has 200% the hp.
Well the Mughals ruled most of India din’t they?
Do we have any other Empire between 500 and 1600 that controled most of India? If yes, they can also be a potential option. Maybe the Delhi Sultanate’s Tuglaq Dynasty who controlled most of India.
For those people who say - Mughals would be too late for this game - we have the Spanish and their gun wielding conquistadores or the Azteck campaign which was set in the 1500s.
On the other side of spectrum we have Huns and Goths who were pre 500 AD. If that is the case even get back Western Roman Empire with those awesome Legionary units. Anyway i side track.
The map is of Tughlaq dynasty. Though the region covered is big, the administration was a total failure. The dynasty collapsed within 50 years. Tughlaqs were Turks.
