They didn’t even mention anything about Vikings. But they didn’t say anything about Chinese or Koreans on DLC teaser either. Only Inca was mentioned during TLC announcement for getting Champi and Settlement.
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Yes, those units should also be more generic… the Varangian Guard was used by the Byzantines, but due to proximity, they could also be used by Sicilians, Armenians, and Georgians… and the Mounted Crossbowman should be a unique upgrade of the Cavalry Archer for European civilizations starting with Castle Age (just as the Crossbowman is for the common Archer)…
Yes, that’s why I think the Saxons are based on the Anglo-Saxons (because if it were based on the continental Saxons they would have Central European architecture like the Teutons or the Vikings up to now)…
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my point exactly. if they shove these changes down our throats, they should at least announce them properly
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There’s no “proximity” arguement here, the Varangian Guard were specifically A Byzantine elite unit, not for anybody else in the Mediterranean
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Normans fought against the varangian guards and annihilated them,why should they get them as a unit?
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Varangian deserters?..I don’t think all the Varangians returned to Byzantium after the Norman conquest of Sicily…
No im referring to this.
This 100%. It’s quite shocking how neglected are the Byzantines.
They could easily have a few three campaign DLCs focused on them entirely.
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It would not be the first time that promotional material is not accurate.
As Akleoni says:
Though the Saxons did use long, narrow, rowing ships for raids and migrations. I would not be surprised if they did get these Longships.
But I would be unpleasantly surprised if they restrict these regional units to the new civs alone. Mounted Crossbowmen are strongly associated with late Medieval Germany, France, and Italy, Varangian Guards not being added to the Byzantines would be the new Khitanguts mishap.
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Why did they even introduced mounted arbalesters in this DLC ?
It should be an upgrade for heavy cavalry archer for Italians, Teutons, Franks and Burgundians, under the name cranequiniers for the two latter.
Yes, that too, in fact that is the third Sicilian mission…
Yes, it must be because they included the Cranequiniers in the Baltic DLC for AoE 3 as mercenaries, but it’s still a strange decision…
Many years ago I posted a hypothetical Swedish/Varangian civ idea on a forum with the Varangian Guard as a UU. I wonder if ChatGPT was trained on that data and then fed that info to the devs as a recommendation. Or maybe they actually read the post. Or not at all. Cool either way!
Anyway, there I designed it as a very strong melee unit that got extra buffs when fighting near own or allied castles (to reflect that they were guardians of the emperor, kings or nobility). So they’d be good generalist melee units, but when fighting within 8-12 tiles under a castle, they’d be very strong units in almost any matchup. Gold cost would be high for balance reasons. They’d be great offensive units to produce out of forward castle drops, or defensive units from castles at home. But not the best generalist unit to leave exposed in the middle of the map with no castles nearby (just too costly for what they’d provide in those situations).
Unfortunately the Celts got this castle-aura as a civ bonus recently, so this ability probably won’t be given to the Varangian Guards now. How do you think they will be designed? What will be their stats and what will be their use case?
The Varangian Guard is described as a Sock Infantry that is good in Melee but there is no bonus mentioned for them fighting close to Castles or other buildings.
Shock Infantry that is strong in melee sounds a little strange because Infantry have bonus damage against Shock Infantry. So are they only strong against Cavalry?
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To me that sounds like they’ll be good against other shock infantry and cavalry, and still decent against non-shock infantry (like Champs, Huskarls), but due to taking bonus damage they probably won’t trade effectively in those matchups even if they won’t get dominated.
I guess that works but if that’s all then it’s a missed opportunity, I think. That just sounds like a Temple Guard for all intents and purposes.
Yeah they sound like another Fire Lancer to me.
It took 4 months to add Steppe Lancer to Mongols. So don’t hope that mounted Xbow will be added to other civs on release.
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Didn’t medieval Denmark have best cavalry in Scandinavia?
I think they will be both.
TMR introduced some minor but significant change to Saracens. 3K changed Koreans quite a lot. Though TLC didn’t touch anything other than Inca, I think this DLC will touch both the Vikings and Byzantines.
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