let’s look at the comparison. for this i’ll be using strictly the knight and steppe lancer as he set them up.
Knight has higher attack (10 vs 9)
Knight therefore has better DPS (5.55 (10/1.8) vs 3.91 (9/2.3)) (6.67 with upgrades vs 4.78 with upgrades) (so the SL is doing 70% of the dps of a knight, or 71.6% with upgrades)
Knight has faster attack speed (1.8 vs 2.3)
Knight has better HP (100 vs 80)
Knight has better overall armor (2/2 vs 1/1)
Knight has better food cost (60 vs 70)
Steppe Lancer has better mobility (1.45 vs 1.35)
Steppe Lancer has better range (2 vs 1)
Steppe Lancer has better Line of Sight (5 vs 4)
Steppe Lancer has better creation time (24 vs 30)
Steppe Lancer has better Gold Cost (45 vs 75)
Steppe Lancers stack better as well
Here’s the thing though. as you go up to Elite and Imperial Lancer, those things the knight are better at?
get better and better for the Steppe Lancer, except the health
the 1/1 armor difference becomes a paltry 0/1.
the 1 attack difference remains the same, but 1 from 9 to 10 is a 11% difference. 1 from 13 to 14 is less then a 8% difference. not only that, but the attack speed of the paladin gets worse (goes up to 1.9) while the lancer stays the same. DPS? Paladin w/o upgrades (7.36 vs 5.65 or SL doing 77% of the paladins DPS) with upgrades? (9.5 dps vs 7.4 dps, or the SL doing 78% of the paladins DPS)
and that food cost? a little prohibitive in the Castle age. but 70 food in the imperial age? non issue.
but what really kicks it into higher gear is the comparisons based on what he wants further.
Parthnan wants this to replace the Knight Line, a Heavy Cavalry unit. yet despite replacing the Heavy Cavalry, and gaining Heavy cavalry benefits (Higher attack, health, armor) he’s still retaining the benefits of the Light Cavalry (training speed, cost, Speed).
on top of this. well let me just put it in perspective in the Imp Age.
Compare a Mongol Cavalier to his buffed Mongol Elite Steppe Lancer
Cavalier has 12 attack, 1.8 attack speed, 2/2 base armor, 1.35 movement and 140 HP
his steppe lancer has 11 attack, 2.3 attack speed, 2/1 base armor, 1.45 movement speed, and between 144 health and 150 health depending on how the math works, and 1 range. it costs 10 more food and 30 less gold, and trains 6 seconds faster.
I don’t feel this is okay at all.
Tatars?
115 health vs 140 health, and no loss in armor. this i’m fine with.
Cumans? well the big red flag for the cumans is he wants them to retain the faster training speed bonus from the Cumans unique Tech. you think Goth Spam is bad? wait till you have a cumans player spamming out 1.67 speed, 17 attack, 1 range, 5/6 armor, 140 health, units that only cost 45 gold in 9 seconds each. you can’t even spam halbs fast enough to keep up with that.