First, I don’t think you read the entire post, as I said , they are no where near cataphract when it comes to anti infantries. they still died hard to halb while cataphacts out performed them like cheat code units. So in the end they do not replace cataphracts.
Second, sending knight line without bloodline (and blast furnace) against archer is not effective, they will die easily. That’s one of the reasons why most people avoid stable that has no bloodline like a plague (except when there are bonuses that compensate bloodline). Like you said, they have cheaper skirm for that one purpose.
Finally, you only get logistica in imperial and its cost, at the moment, is too expensive. So, they still “play a lesser role” in castle age because they have no bloodline. If players want to research paladins and go for logistica, it’s a huge risk that they would have to burden in castle age and early imperial. In 1v1, doing this is like asking to lose, unless you want to do some masterpiece or play in team game as pocket.
Byzantine’s win rate is among the top 5 worst civs at the moment and it’s been like that for a very long time, which is bad for the game. So this is not about “romantic harmony”, it’s about helping them out.
Ok, imo, saying paladins without blood line and blast furnace being not that bad is weird because they really are that bad. How many time do you see anyone goes for knight line as byzantine in castle age and past early imperial age? If someone completely removes knight line out of byzantine, they would be still the same, then why put them in the tech tree in the first place?
let’s us remember that Logistica is only available in imperial age, so their knights cannot compete with anything in castle age. It’s like asking to lose the game if a player goes for knight as byzantine in castle age.
No bloodline means paladins still die fairly fast to arrows even with 3 p armor anyway. And They get destroyed even faster to aniti cav bonus like halb and camel because of that (yes, paladins have actual weakness too). Meanwhile cataphracts is almost immune to this like a cheat code unit.
This would only help them in team game as pocket. In 1v1, it’s not feasible because both paladins and logistica are extremely expensive, and their knight in castle age can’t compete.
Knights are probably there for two reasons. One: So that Byzantines have a couple of cav options, and Two: Because Byzantines were part of Christian Europe, and Knights symbolize that in a way. (Just ignore how almost every other non-Christian civ also has knights though.
Their halbs is actually underwhelming in post-imp. They lacking attack upgrade that FU halbs kill Paladin in 5 hit, and Byzantines halbs 6hit. Discount offset that weakness for sure, but nowhere close to “some of the best halbs”. Their camels is also lacking two upgrade and can’t win 1v1 against Paladin.
First, Cataphract is nowhere close to “1 size fits all” unit. They are weak against other heavy cavarly, Heavy cavarly archer or other good archers.
Second, Trample damage doesn’t mean their Paladin have no counter. It still weak against Halbs and camels. Trample damage just give them similar level of mass fight with Teutons or Franks Paladin. They actually lacking power unit in TG. Cataphract is only useful in very specific matchup such as Goths or Indians in TG.
“infantry civ” or “Cavarly civ” is just arbitrary classification. See indians are gunpowder civilization and Burgundian isn’t. Teutons already have one of the best Paladin even though they are infantry civ. Byzantines have one of the best heavy cavarly aren’t unreasonable for historical sense.
In 1v1, cheaper halbs, blast furnace or not, is better than having blast furnace. Getting 30-40 halbs to counter knights push from early imp saves you some 1000 ish resources and this in 1v1 is quite a lot.
their camels cost nearly as much as an archer while having 3x the HP…
they beat everything with Logistica except Paladin+
Which Byzantines don’t need as they are a civ that already has enough good options, again if they need anything, it should be something like Siege Engineers to make their Imp pushes a bit better (especially with SR and BBC)
again, who cares about TG… the game is not balanced for TG. If you wanna do 4v4 black forest, do your usual Celts vs Celts siege fest, TGs are not balanced and more of a “for fun” thing anyway, the game is balanced mostly for 1v1.
Byzantines already have:
FU Arbalest
very good Halbs
possibility to go Camels
they don’t need to be good at EVERYTHING. Their tech tree is reasonable and, for 1v1, what they have is more than enough. They are already a very good counterpick to some mid-top tier civs like Ethiopians, Mongols, Cumans etc. and if you’ve ever played 1v1 at a remotely good elo, you would know that fighting vs Byzantines (in 1v1) never feels nice, it’s quite tough to kill them and you feel pressured at many stages in the game (early game due to their much cheaper counter units, and late game due to their Imp timing).
Byzantines are already strong with their massive armies of Cheap Counters + FU Arbalesters or Cataphracts. In late game, they are great at building a huge army that basically counters yours. They often have the numbers advantage.
Giving Trample damage to their Knight Line could be OP in tournaments. The worst part is not the cost, but the fact that you would be producing an epic cavalry force from 6 stables with trample damage to raid & clean any pikemen/villagers in the way. Even normal Paladins even often win at overwhelming pikemen and disrupting farming economies, without special bonuses. I think the balance is good as it is.
TBH I think byz could get bloodlines (cataphracts could lose some 10-15 hp in the exchange).
Yes, this would make them extremely flexible civ, but because they have no eco bonus still not a great cavalry civ. I think it would make them more interesting if they had bloodlines.
Besides I admit that this change could possible make them s-tier in pro play, but for all others it would make it much more interesting to play with or against them as they wouldn’t be all around their counters every game.
I think this change would be much better for the civ than logistica affecting the knight line aswell.
And it would make them better in TG were they currently suck.
Edit: forgot about the chep camels - if byz get bloodlines their camel discount needs to be adjusted ofc.
I’d like to give bloodline to Byzantines too.
The camel discount should be removed after getting bloodline in my opinion.
No bloodline, no blast furnace. To be honest, I don’t think that people are willing to pay 1300 food and 750 gold no matter the lame paladin get logistica or not. Similar to Celts, always better strategies are there than using paladins.
Counter units aren’t that great in team games, especially not FU ones like byz.
Giving them a usable late game unit in trample paladins would nkt affect 1v1 at all but boost them were they need a boost. They are on the low side of winrates in teangames.
Even thought byzantine paladins are still better currently thaz cavaliers, getting them is more expensive. With the cost of logistics added, the hold thing stays balanced.
Paladins with trample damage would be massively OP for any civilization. There’s a reason it has never been implemented. They would be spammed from 5 Stables, and they would raid cleaning any halberdiers/villagers and destroy the opponent’s economy in 2 seconds. It’s impossible to recover from a Paladin spam over your farms or gold mines, so it’s an instant GG. The Pikemen line has been carefully balanced to handle this situation. (The game is fine as it is now, or at least, this isn’t the way to buff Byzantines.)
PS. Besides, the fearsome Paladin spam would be backed by waves of cheap counter units.
No bloodlines or blast furnace, the paladins barely wil be even more effective. It would be OP if it was fully upgraded too
Anyway whats up with this concern, Franks are allowed to spam 192HP paladins at a 40% rate for a civ wth many eco advantages, but trample damage paladins without bloodlines and blast furnace is bad
Oh and the super broken sicilian cavaliers lol
Byzantines are currently bad in TG and need a major help here
Sorry but a bit trrample damage on their palas won’t make byz miracoulously a good tg civ. It would hardly change anything about them. Having no bloodlines is just a nono for a pocket civ.
this would be a MASSIVE buff to byzantines. they get cheap camels who would greatly benefit, not to mention cav archers, and all off a sudden their cataphracts are ridiculous, not to mention solid knights.
Ofc. I just wanted to state that if byz should become a even possible pocket civ their knights would need bloodlines. It’s that easy. Just some trample damage on paladins wouldn’t cur the deal for them.
