I wouldn’t even consider all of them even a counter, and only a few are real hard-counters.
Most of them are also UUs, not basic units.
The list is actually very short considering the amount of units in the game and considering that most of the mentioned units aren’t hard counters. Some of them are even oblitterated by mames if you know hot to micro the mames. 11
I’m sorry I wanted to say around pro players**
i want the game balanced around pro players. and it absolutely should. doesn’t mean i think individual units need to be balanced.
Yes absolutely, but facts are facts, I never see prop player use them and even normal players on ladder. I think the first setp is getting rid of the archer armor class because like the throwing axeman who has 1 more range, cost 25 gold and gets created 35% faster has no archer armor class . You would never, ever want to engage mameloukes vs throwing axeman.
yeah, make TA against saracens…I think yo never played the game really, I’m out of this nonsense.
Your changes would make mameluke borderline the most OP unit ever existed in AOE2. Either you want to break the game or you are just a Troll.
I dont need someone to tell me what I am or what I am not, I wish you good luck and appreciate you opinion and inputs.
AND btw for the guy putting ur videos look at this one before saying its nonesense :
Mameloukes vs throwing are actually in D tier. So yeah.
I think You are wrong, pro players are just todo few and most of us will never be as good or dedícated to the Game. You can make thing very useless for most of us if You Don’t have superior skills.
I’m not saying it should be balanced around 500elo, but maybe something like 1500 to 1800 instead of 2400+
Use the term “hard counter” carefully.
None of these things even remotely count as a hard counter. A hard counter is an option that completely nullifies another (Rams vs Bombard Tower is a cold-case hard counter with no debate) and none of these options are even close.
Skirms get blown up by Mamelukes even with the bonus archer damage. Cost-effectively, they win, but Mamelukes win actual fights against skirms unless tremendously outnumbered (like 4-1 or higher). Ditto for literally any archer unit in the game except the Genoese, which is one of the rarest UU’s in the entire game to see.
Halbs get beat by Mameluke hard with any micro considerations (and if you aren’t considering micro there’s literally no discussion here for at least half of your listed options here because they are almost all micro dependent) and that’s end of story. It’s infinitely pop-inefficient alone.
Kipchaks and Mangudai have the same nonsense about them. When micro is involved both fights are excruciatingly close and the matchup is not clear cut in either case, but the micro advantage is with the Mangudai/Kipchak. Ohnoes, a unit that kills the Mameluke? Must be a bad unit, not that you’re comparing a powerful niche option to one of the best units in the entire game and it’s estranged cousin.
Huskarls have the same thing going as the Halb. Mamelukes with micro are infinitely efficient against pure huskarl. Nope. Not even close to being a counter let alone a hard counter
Scorps have the archer thing, except scorps cannot micro. Set your mamelukes to staggered formation and you’ll utterly massacre scorpions.
Camel archers are not as fast as Kipchak or Mangudai, meaning they can’t escape the Mameluke. With equal numbers, micro included, Mamelukes win against Camel archers in spite of no bonus damage (neither side gets it and the mameluke has better overall damage and durability) cleanly, consistently.
Throwing Axemen do well against Mamelukes, but again, this is an example of calling a good matchup a “hard counter” making your position look extremely foolish. Cost efficient, yes. Pop efficient? Absolutely not.
I think it’s funny that you put “11” before you listed “Massed Ballista Elephants.” No other comment. Fight’s very nearly perfectly even in both cost and outcome unless “massed” means “100” and then this really does deserve an 11. Not a hard counter.
Eagle warriors? what? Mamelukes massacre eagles for the same reason they nuke Halbs and Huskarls. The only difference is that the Eagles are going to be hemorrhaging gold way faster than the other two. If you’re looking for an answer to Mamelukes, Eagles might be the worst option against mass mamelukes for meso civs. They have archers.
Also , why the hell would you want to go mamelukes against a meso civ anyway? You know that specific bonus that Mameluke carries against Cavalry? Meso civs don’t have Cavalry. Any unit you say “counters” the mameluke from a Meso civ shouldn’t be relevant, because you’d only ever see such a matchup if you had no idea what you were doing whatsoever which has no implications towards balance. Therefore:
Is both misspelled and totally irrelevant. Anyway, where was I? Right.
Onagers. Micro. Micro favors the Mameluke. Gonna have to come up with a complement unit to keep em safe. Halbs? We’ve been over this. Micro. Massed Onager doesn’t work because even if you could mass onagers, you can’t keep them safe against the faster composition. Not a hard counter. A micro-intensive matchup but far from a hard counter.
“Massed longbowmen” Again, why in the world would you make Mamelukes against a civ that doesn’t use Cavalry? Whether or not it is, it is totally irrelevant because you’d never even think to use the Mameluke against the Britons. It’s like making Slingers against the Tatars. Yes, Slingers lose pretty horrifically to the Cavalry and CA lines that the Tatars produce but why in the world would you ever consider this to be a good idea? Further, why then would you seriously make an argument that a unit is bad because you used it in a terrible matchup which made no sense in the first place?
Massed archers (just another longbow thing) doesn’t counter Mamelukes. Take whatever proportions you want. 100 v 100 archers (excepting Genoese) will lose against Mamelukes. Doesn’t matter that the Archers have critical firing advantage, once the Mamelukes actually engage the Mamelukes have higher damage, better overall durability, and the Archers cannot disengage. Cost efficient for the archers? Generally true. A “Hard counter”? You have to be playing extremely fast and lose with the definitions to make such an argument.
Skipping every infantry unit otherwise to say “without micro, maybe” and leaving them at that. None of those melee units I’ve skipped can actually force a fight against the Mameluke or deal with it kiting, so they’re all irrelevant to actual balance considerations. Mameluke will win every fight with micro. The only unit I’m not counting here is the ETK, simply because the Teutons do have good cavalry you’d want to deal with and kiting ETK’s can only work until they’re on your production.
So yeah. 90% of what you’ve said is utter nonsense, and at least a quarter of it requires you to ignore basic logic to come to the conclusion that it’s even remotely relevant. The Mamelukes are not in crisis. The real crisis is players who don’t like one of the best unit in the entire game making complaint threads about it because it rustles their jimmies that it isn’t a mono-composition unit given its entirely justified, very high gold cost.
except the Genoese, which is one of the rarest UU’s in the entire game to see.
no, I see way more genosee than mameloukes.
Kipchaks and Mangudai have the same nonsense about them.
Mameloukes WITHOUT micro is a B tier ( not the best B tier vs a unit that t should counter which is cavalry) and Mangudai outmicro mameloukes so easily they never miss any shot have are faster and have longer range.
Huskarls have the same thing going as the Halb. Mamelukes with micro are infinitely efficient against pure huskarl. Nope. Not even close to being a counter let alone a hard counter
The map is not infinitely big, you cant jsut hit and run and what about trying to attack and not defend? Let say you want to attck a castle and he has 50 huskarlks how would in your mind even consider miicroin. Mass huskarls beat mameloukes with ease and are easy to mass.
Scorps have the archer thing, except scorps cannot micro. Set your mamelukes to staggered formation and you’ll utterly massacre scorpions.
No civ will ever give only scropions. they go scorps and halbs which would be he same gold cost as a mamelouke. Mameloukes cant beat that.
Camel archers are not as fast as Kipchak or Mangudai, meaning they can’t escape the Mameluke. With equal numbers, micro included, Mamelukes win against Camel archers in spite of no bonus damage (neither side gets it and the mameluke has better overall damage and durability) cleanly, consistently.
I will never tell you you are saying nonsense as I respect everyone opinion but mamelouks are D tier vs camel archer wiothout any micro and camel archers outmicro mameloukes with ease.
Throwing Axemen do well against Mamelukes, but again, this is an example of calling a good matchup a “hard counter” making your position look extremely foolish. Cost efficient, yes. Pop efficient? Absolutely not.
Here is the video again, with EQUAL resources, throwing axeman has 47% HP LEFT how would you even call mameloukes pop efficient in this stage.
Eagle warriors? what ? Mamelukes massacre eagles for the same reason they nuke Halbs and Huskarls. The only difference is that the Eagles are going to be hemorrhaging gold way faster than the other two. If you’re looking for an answer to Mamelukes, Eagles might be the worst option against mass mamelukes for meso civs. They have archers.
Look at this vid mameloukes are Lowest B /C tier vs a super fast infantry. mameloukes are already average speed mounted units so microsing against eagle is not possible especially when u need to be the attacker.
Also , why the hell would you want to go mamelukes against a meso civ anyway?
As I have said going mamelukes is never a good idea which is my whole point
Massed longbowmen” Again, why in the world would you make Mamelukes against a civ that doesn’t use Cavalry? Whether or not it is, it is totally irrelevant because you’d never even think to use the Mameluke against the Britons. It’s like making Slingers against the Tatars. Yes, Slingers lose pretty horrifically to the Cavalry and CA lines that the Tatars produce but why in the world would you ever consider this to be a good idea? Further, why then would you seriously make an argument that a unit is bad because you used it in a terrible matchup which made no sense in the first place?
Massed archers (just another longbow thing) doesn’t counter Mamelukes. Take whatever proportions you want. 100 v 100 archers (excepting Genoese) will lose against Mamelukes. Doesn’t matter that the Archers have critical firing advantage, once the Mamelukes actually engage the Mamelukes have higher damage, better overall durability, and the Archers cannot disengage. Cost efficient for the archers? Generally true. A “Hard counter”? You have to be playing extremely fast and lose with the definitions to make such an argument.
Skipping every infantry unit otherwise to say “without micro, maybe” and leaving them at that. None of those melee units I’ve skipped can actually force a fight against the Mameluke or deal with it kiting, so they’re all irrelevant to actual balance considerations. Mameluke will win every fight with micro. The only unit I’m not counting here is the ETK, simply because the Teutons do have good cavalry you’d want to deal with and kiting ETK’s can only work until they’re on your production.
So yeah. 90% of what you’ve said is utter nonsense, and at least a quarter of it requires you to ignore basic logic to come to the conclusion that it’s even remotely relevant. The Mamelukes are not in crisis. The real crisis is players who don’t like one of the best unit in the entire game making complaint threads about it because it rustles their jimmies that it isn’t a mono-composition unit given its entirely justified, very high gold cost.
Again, you need :
So by the time the enemy has masssed mameloukes, Its easy to create more archer and just beat the hell out of him. And for your own interest, mameloukes are D tier vs arbalsters. Thats not even taking into account its basic arbalsters not ethiopian ones nor brits ones.
Wrong!
You balance around the community, pro player are only part of the community. 1500 elo for example are also part of the community because they play this game everyday. That is why Arambai got nerfed though pro play was not necessarily needed.
If the community cry for buff Mamelukes they will be buff sooner or later even if pro player does not care about them.
Good lord.
You’ve got no point if you think Mamelukes are never a good idea. It’s a hard counter to the Paladin in every respect. If you can’t find a good reason to use Mamelukes you must be trying very hard to be wrong.
I’ll send you my steam invite code if you want to try outmicroing Mamelukes with Mangudai. I come from experience, and I’m telling you, flat out, that what you are claiming should be easy is not easy and you will struggle to make it look easy.
This is a hard matchup to play as either side and with equal numbers it is extremely close. If you’d like to test it out, I’ve got the scenario built for it. Otherwise, you’ll have to take my word for it. Ditto the Kipchak.
It doesn’t need to be infinitely big. I’ll create a new scenario where the space I have to work with is less than 50 x 50 and I’ll very gladly micro down Huskarls outnumbering me 2-to-1 because it’s that easy. Again, if you’d like to test these things out I am glad to send you my invite code so we can stop talking and start proving what’s being said with micro involved. It’s going to be more efficient that I show you rather than have you take me at my word (especially since you disagree with my word)
No civ will ever go only Mamelukes. They can go into Hussar (or Skirmisher), which would be no greater a gold investment than just pure Mameluke. Scorpion + Halb cannot beat that. Especially given that the cavalry civ has the mobility. Push out with Halb + Scorpion and I’ll just raid your base and TC snipe. The more mobile unit composition has all the advantages.
Same offer as before, I can drop you my steam code, you may attempt to outmicro my Mamelukes with Camel archers for as long as you’d like. In this case (as opposed to Mangudai or Kipchak) I will guarantee, unilaterally, right now, that I will win every single time. The Camel archer has absolutely nothing on the Mameluke. You are just wrong.
37 v 21
yes
What? Do you know what “Pop efficient” means? It means "Assuming you have a limit of population (which you do in any game of AOE 2) what gives you the most value for the population space. Not for resources. That’s a polar opposite comparison to a cost efficient unit (which is efficient based off the cost of getting it and not the actual strength you’ve provided for the slot of population) and these two things are not associated. An Elite Battle elephant is Pop Efficient. A Malay two-handed trashman is cost efficient.
Mamelukes are pop efficient against Throwing Axes. Throwing Axes are cost efficient against Mamelukes. And yes, there are gamestates where population efficiency matters just as much as cost efficiency.
Okay, first off. That Video shows the Mameluke winning the fight against an equal cost of Eagles (which actually costs more gold than the Mameluke mass does) and you honestly think I can’t make it worse for you with Micro? Alright then.
I’ll give you my steam friend code, I’ll make the scenario, and we’ll play it out. I promise you I’ll be able to change your mind on every single item you’ve listed, because you are so far off from reality, even my average level of micro will be sufficient. No animosity, just testing for testing’s sake (words do nothing when someone’s stuck in an argument and are convinced of their position) and to clean up the discussion.
Beyond that. You called this a hard counter. The problem with that is… It isn’t. It’s the furthest thing from a hard counter. It’s just a micro-dependent MU common to 95% of the matchups in the game. very few things are hard counters in the game, in general, and even fewer of these things exist to the mameluke. Genoese, Camels, that’s literally the list.
Yes, yes, they’d win with all those factors in because the mameluke is more expensive and takes more time to train. But if a number of those hurdles would be cleared (say, a clean trade line, in post imp) and the Mamelukes got to a mass, the Archers would die with equal numbers. The advantage with the archer comes from the fact that the archers will almost always have greater numbers and that much is true. That doesn’t make it a hard counter.
In reality, Archers are very good against Mamelukes and that’s why they’re the go-to option against Mamelukes when Camels aren’t an option (and based on the civ, sometimes even when camels are an option) and that’s fine. They need some effective counters given how they utterly massacre cavalry in general whilst having the mobility of being cavalry. That’s an extremely dangerous compliation of factors to just be buffing willy-nilly and they are expensive for a good reason. That reason.
you can select the text you want, and then click quote, not sure what you are doing, maybe copy/paste, but if you use the quote option you wont end up with the ambiguous posts you have made, where it looks like you literally correct yourself…
on the actual topic, i agree memelukes need a buff, but not sure by how much, so far this thread just looks like everyone arguing over what the memeluke is the best or worst at, and not actually really discussing what does or doesnt need to be buffed…
gotta agree with the other guys here though, some of your examples are just weird… why would you end up with memelukes vs vikings? if he made some fragile kts? then your memelukes would be over kill and you wouldnt need many, and then you can raid with them, but how would zerks even counter them? zerks should hardly catch em if you used them properly…
either way… i say reduce the cost of the memeluke slightly… maybe 10g?
I will be mre than happy you throw me your steam invite 
I think a cost discussion on the Mameluke is reasonable. I understand the concept, castle plus a high gold cost is quite prohibitive towards use (especially with camels that are already an alternative that works in a similar role) but I simply don’t think the unit’s cost is unwarranted. I think the cost is totally justified.
This is not a cost discussion. This is a “The Mameluke is bad against everything” thread and that’s just not a position I can allow. It’s unreasonable.
Not all civs get good archers or want to tech into them
Mamelukes are in the game to completely annihilate Paladin civs.
Paladin civs usually do not have Arbalests or Camels, so they cannot catch the Mamelukes and actually deal with them effectively.
Spearmen line units and Kamayuks cannot kill Mamelukes, and actually die to them, with very little micro needed. If you cannot micro Mamelukes and your economy at the same time, that is your own issue, not an issue with the Mamelukes.
Franks and Teutons auto-lose once Saracens gets a decent mass of Mamelukes with a few Archery Range units for support. Mamelukes + Heavy cav Archers melt through most Paladin civs like a hot knife through butter, and because both units are fast Cavalry, Skirmishers are not a good option to stop them from raiding.
Because Mamelukes trade so cost-effectively with Knight and Scout line units (even with Battle Elephants, Camels and Steppe Lancers), if they were easily spammable, all Cavalry civs would stand the same chance against them, that Mayans has against Goths.
This would make Saracens one of the top Meta civs, and you would be here complaining that all you see is Saracens, in less than a month.
Franks doesnt need archers, they just go throwing axeman it will eat thru the mameloukes with 50% cost efficiency.
Throwing axemen cannot catch up to Mamelukes, and will die to Saracens Arbalests or HCA, by the dozens.
Franks have no counter to a good mass of Mamelukes + Heavy Cav Archers or Arbalests, it is a civ loss at that point.
Ehhhhh That’s really expensive though. If we agree that it’s only supposed to be a deathball unit (I mean, the Saracens do have camels already as a cheaper anti-cav specialist) then it’s fine, but otherwise relying on your HCA transition seems a bit rough as a justification against the Taxe.
I make the case that you should plan for HCA/arbalest with whatever archer pressure you get early onward and plan for Camel/Mameluke/Hussar to deal with whatever’s served.
And for the record, I don’t see why it has the Archer armor class. It’s not really threatened by Huskarls in general, even with it, Skirms are much better as a result but Saracen Hussar should have absolutely no problem handling skirms in general. Unless I’m missing something, it seems like it’s giving it a weakness to skirms that really shouldn’t matter that much.