So… let’s come to the Shieldman.
The Shieldman was even more complicated than the Genitour cause the intended design just didn’t work. Cause the melee unit target selection is too good. Meaning the units are too clever to make it work, sadly.
The Idea was to make the Shieldman an high HP damage soaker mostly, but if you do it so it will basically not be targeted by the enemy units, meaning it’s just meat hanging around and nobody cares about it.
The only viable solution I came up with that is “justificable” is to make it a super cheap low HP unit like the other infantry units. That way it becomes targeted more often. But it also makes it essential that it has a) half the collision size (so you can fit more in a line) and also b) just half the pop space like karambit. There were a lot of different other Ideas I had but ruled out as it would require to implement new mechanics which I think would be better suited for some UUs in the future:
A) Actively “Shield” nearby units by increasing their stats
B) Take part of the damage dealt to nearby units instead of them
C) Attract enemy units to attack it
D) Go always in front of a formation
… and some other I already forgot.
With the new design there came some difficulties as it is potetially also better for a “semi-goth” flood cause it’s just better spammable and cause of the lower pop efficieny I was forced to increase the HP/cost which also plays in favor of that utility.
(Heavy) Shieldman - Very cheap Infantry unit. Very low and slow attack, but comparably high pierce armor for an infantry. Good against Skirmishers
Occupies only half a population space and can be packed twice as dense in a line as regular infantry.
Infantry
15 F, 10 W
50 (60) HP
1 Atk (+2 vs Archers), Melee
4 Rof
2 Pierce Armor
0 Melee Armor
Speed 0.9
The unit on it’s own is kinda useless (except against skirms) it only gets it’s strength when used together with other units like the militia or archer line by just soaking damage.
The extremely low damage output is necessary otherwise it would counter halbs/pikes which would lead to shieldman + halb dominating full trash wars with these civs. The way proposed it’s softcountered by halbs which makes it an interestig addition to trash wars but you still need the other trash units.