I feel that not may people are aware of stat changes this tech provides. Nizams are fun and all, but a huge bonus of this tech are it’s passive boosts. Heavy infantry get a bonus to multipliers vs cavalry and shock infantry, +0.5 and +0.3, respectively, and also -20% train time. This is to ALL heavy infantry, including mercenaries and natives.
Say I role giant grenadiers or askaris in the tavern - throw in 1000 wood for a tech and I have prolly the best versions of said units. Giant grenadiers especially, since they can function as a viable cannon replacement (as actual grens were intended) and allow whole new army comps.
This is really huge for minor civs in particular. Native heavy infantry units tend to have mediocre base damage and small multipliers compared to their design counterparts. All civs boost native via home city cards for infantry/cavalry related cards, but that usually amounts to a 15% hp/attack boost - not all that meaningful when the base stats are low. I mathed it out for native american minor civs, and most of he melee infantry comes alot closer to its design counterpart with the increased multipliers.
Thought I’d put that out there. Dont see nearly enough builds that leverage the heavy infantry boosts.