Hi everyone, some day ago I couldn’t remember what was the Berbers team bonus, so I had to check to “discover” once more the existance of the Genitour.
And this prompted me a question: what is the purpose of a TRASH team unit?
I’ve never trained a Genitour (as a Berber ally) in over a thousand games, and same goes for Vietnamese Imperial Skirmisher upgrade.
I’ve used multiple times the Condottieri instead, as ally of course. Usually in team games you should avoid using trash, so what is the purpose of these units, is it me or I can’t find a use for them? Heck, I’m not even using them in 1v1 most of the times.
What do you think of these units as team bonus? Wasted? Useful? If so, how?
3 Likes
Trade means they are typically irrelevant. Better to make them regular units of the civ, and change the team bonuses. Vietnamese for example, should have the Imp Skirm become one of their civ bonuses, and have enemy positions revealed as a team bonus. Imp Skirm isn’t really used by anyone in the team I don’t think, and having the position reveal as a team bonus prevents those situations where you play with randoms, but they never communicate where the enemy is, even though they know from the get go. With Berbers, I like the idea that Kasbah becomes a team bonus, they get a new UT, and the Genitour actually becomes a regional unit of the Spanish and Portuguese, who would likely benefit from it more, and it is more historically accurate.
6 Likes
Once in a blue moon if you lose a flank fight big time but ur enemy doesn’t coordinate with their pocket genitours can save you since they don’t need to have an upgrade (unlike elite skirms) and you can have a sufficient number of them faster than just rebuilding your archer mass (since your enemy is ahead in archer numbers anyway). And you kinda need bloodlines (which implies you’re not playing the best flank civs available)
So yes they kinda require everything to go suboptimal to start making sense, and none of this is enough to justify them being a team bonus, but at least I tried 11
2 Likes
Genitours as a TB are useless, but I have seen a few uses of the Viet Imp skirms in 4v4, especially on closed maps. Aztec Imp skirms deal 9 damage, which is pretty sweet.
Genitours, I think, exist solely because Berbers would be too susceptible to Hussars and Halbs once the gold runs out, hence a unit that deals 2 damage to hussars while having a bonus vs skirms is included, and also keeping their cavalry theme.
Genitours should be a UU for the Berbers and buffed, Kasbah should be the TB, and a new Castle age UT can be included.
2 Likes
Uh I don’t think they thought of it this way, this is true for others no-halb civs as well and trying to counter cav with a skirm unit that only has +1 attack to offer is a bad idea. And genitours are actually bad against skirm because while they have more HP they have the cav archer armour class so they take more bonus damage from skirms anyway. It’s probs only for the cavalry theme.
1 Like
Genitours also have the problem that they are countered by the natural unit addition to cav archers, the scout line. They are clearly designed to counter cav archers but fail because of that.
Besides I think that Ports and Spanish could use the genitours, these civs will most likely also suffer from that easy counter mechanic. Probably genitours also need some kind of mini bonus damage against cavalry, higher speed or armor to be useful in the situations they are designed for.
Another Idea I just got from this: What if heavy cavalry would get a small amount of cavalry armor? This way we could make more destinctions from the scout to the heavy cavs. There could be some units like the militia line with only a little bit of bonus damage vs cavalry that would be (almost) completely negated by the heavy cav cavalry armor.
Even small amounts of armour can matter, like a no blast furnace halbs needs 1 more hit to kill a a paladin. So the natural consequence would be to buff camels and halbs, but then every non-heavy mounted unit just gets nerfed, not just light cav.
2 Likes
But we could give every cav unit different amount of cav armour, depending on the unit. Like boyars could receive more and leitis less or whatever.
A lot of players asking Genitours be a regional unit for Berbers, Spanish and Portuguese. I think that will be better than making it an UU.
2 Likes
My experience backs the observation that Imperial Skirmishers are indeed used in team games, particularly on maps like Black Forest.
I think that part of the reasoning behind Genitours as a team unit is that they can help deal with Mangudai, and other raiding CA, without disrupting primary unit production. They are an alternative way to guard trade, if you want to, or have to use them.
I haven’t tried that one, but I’ve made Lithuanian Imperial Skirmishers with 11 Pierce Armor and +10% movement speed 
I love Playing as the Byzantines, having Berber Allies, I use my Genitours to protect my Catephracts from a flood of archers, since the Catephracts are more subseptable to arrow fire.
Historically and game play wise , it works beautifully to use the Genitours either as a Christian ally to the Berbers (Byzantines,Franks,Cisillians, Italians, Spanish, Ethiopians) or as a ME/African ally (Saracens,Persians,Turks,Malians) .
I’ve seen them used by AI, obviously, but never from humans.
Why would you use them on Black Forest? Honestly the only trash I’d use in team games are Hussars probably, and only if I have an excess of food of some sort.
I think Genitour should be made a regional unit. And maybe make it a gold unit replacing the conventional CA?
1 Like
No, but imo the thing with genitour good against ca + also considerable damage output vs light cav can work (no bonus vs spears then). Then it had a clearly destinct role to the skirm line.
Also would be much more historically accurate, as it was indeed used against the berber light cavalry.
The best solution for that I found was to give the genitour (very low) ranged melee attack, this way it could deal good damage vs light cav but not against heavy cav.
This would clearly separate the genitour from the skirm, giving it a destinct role.
They work against a number of pushes quite well, and can complement other pushes. It is true that Skirmishers are never quite impressive, but neither are the Halberdiers used to compliment a number of other types of pushes, such as SO. I oft play the Vietnamese, and remind allies of the option in game. When I play Vietnamese, I often end up going Elephants (Team positions matter), but personally prefer Rattans. Rattan/Elephant is a thing, but Elephant/Skirmisher is less demanding, and easier to mass, to give one example. The units complement each other frightfully well in either case, and the elephants need what support they can get against Halb/Siege. Allied archers can get tied down, and if they lack cannons, you might have to cover that also. Micro wars on Black Forest turn very real in such battles, as they are in villager fights.
Why only CA though? Also hard to implement as you’re giving them melee attack.
If they have melee attack, they will also be good against spears and honestly against other infantries too.
I’d personally like to make skirmishers melee attack barracks units as well as to give them an imperial age upgrade.
Genitours would be a stable unit rather than an archery range unit.
Skirms would become effected by melee attack and defense infantry upgrades, and genitours would be effected by regular melee type cavalry upgrades.
They would be unaffected by the cavalry archer class.
(Genitours would no longer be part of the cavalry archer class.)
I believe the shared units can be useful, but such civs should have two team bonuses.
For instance:
Vietnamese - Imperial Skirmisher upgrade available in the Imperial Age and gain +2/2 armor. something along those lines, or something to make the team units more efficient without making them overpowered in 1 vs 1.
That’s my proposal. This way it wold deal 4 damage per shot vs light cav, 3 vs spears and 2 vs champs + heavy cav.
It would also be ok against archers, but not as good as regular skirms.