In the wake of the announcement made about two civilizations being added in the future, I want to make this discussion because Horse Archer should be given to other civilizations and not just the Rus since other civilizations the Ottomans, one of two new civilizations being added in the future, also used horse archer. Perhaps as the Horse Archer would become a shared unit instead of a unique unit, the upgrade on the Horse Archer would become the Heavy Horse Archer instead of being the Elite Horse Archer. Other civilizations that can be using the Horse Archer besides just the Ottomans and Rus are the Chinese.
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I legit don’t understand what their plan is for civ design. Giving launch civs fairly generic units (horse archer, war elephants, camels, etc) and labeling them as unique to that civ seems super likely to paint future civ design into a corner. Can no future civs have horse archers or war elephants? Holy moly.
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I’m not sure the horse archer was actually stated to be a Rus unique unit, I think it was simply that they were really the only appropriate civ to give them to,
(I can’t comment on China as I don’t know alot about them) the mongols have the mangudai, and the Ottomans are getting their own unique horse archer as well. I think other civs in the future will get them as well, potentially the same with units like elephants or camels.
I believe the horse archers have the unique unit insignia.
It does. It didn’t at first, leading to all kinds of speculation, but then that was updated.
They could always change it back though. Or maybe every future version of horse archer will just be unique somehow ha.
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I like aoe4 diversity and I don’t want it to be aoe2 where all civilizations were the same
I do also expect future civs to have elephant and camel units to be shared units as well for the same reason why I expect the Horse Archer to be a shared unit which is the fact that many civs used camels and elephants in their military.
And add elephants of Rus, you can woolen - mammoths 
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also, all horse archers are light ones. (even camel archers)
They all feel weak and cost too much to invest.
I think the Mongols and Ottomans should have a wide variety of horse archers compared to the Rus and Chinese.
In AOE2, most of the civilizations have horse archers, but only very few do not have them, because the devs would look for historical facts, etc. But Mongols would have the unique Mangudai, in addition to the “Heavy horse archer” that the most civs share.
AOE4 simply lacks unit varieties, and it is not a secret. AOE2 has more varieties and that is what makes it fun to counter the enemy units effectively. I do understand almost all units are the same or generic but unit variety is crucial and it is one of the reasons why it is so successful.
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Why? Other civs can have any unit they want, with their own twist on it. It makes no sense in an semi-asymmetric game to give everyone all the same units.
Maybe a new civ has Elephants with springalds, making them play a totally different role, while still being an Elephant. Mangudai are horse archers that specialize in hit-and-run type plays instead of being in an army maneuvering around the fight like Rus.
Civs identies are mixture if their eco, units, and tech. If you remove unit uniqueness then you are left with each civ having a few techs to make some unit “their unit” and some build order/resource focus changes.
Sure it’s technically still different, but having units that are synergistic with the eco and techs further makes each civ more unique and adds to the variety of play between each of them.
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I dont think Rus having horse archers locks out any other civ from having them. Is it confirmed the Ottomans don’t have them?
After working on the southeast asian civ concepts. I went for the AOE4 unite naming mentality as well.
Unique units are unique. and should stay civ specific in line with the civ identity.
This gave me a massive nightmare trying to add new “elephants” units for each of the SEA civs. as Elephants were to widely used by all the civs, things started becoming silly.
I don’t mind unique “horse archer” unit. But they shouldnt use the Horse-Archer name, as it is very generic and should be reserved to a “universal” unit.
Same could be said about War-elephants. Because right now, War elephants being locked to Dheli, would make adding any other Indian or South east asian Civs, even some african Civs in a odd position.
Especially if their War elepehants don’t bring anything new to the table, and are generally the same.
It would be better to just give them common name: War Elephants.
Than making each uniquely:
Dheli War Elephant, Burmese Battle Elephants, Abyssinia Frontline Elephant, Khmer Royal Elephant, etc.
Things start turning silly.
If a one of those elephant units had its own unique role, example the Khmer Twin-Ballista Elephant, then that is fine.
Same way Mongols have Mangudai being unique from other horse archers.
The Rus Horse Archers could still be unique and be called “Heavy-Horse Archers” As the rus horse archers were more armored than generic horse archers of other nations. Or rename them to more Local name such a Druzhina Horse Archers. Or just Druzhina
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It’s not about making all Civ’s the same.
Its about unlocking oppertunity of being able to add more Civs.
Rus horse archers can still be unique to Rus, by the fact that they are armored (or should be armored at least)
Then you have a generic-horse archer unit.
Its the same thing you see with other units.
English have Longbowmen Unique unit instead of Archers.
French have Royal Knights instead of Knights.
Chinese have Palace Guards instead of Man at Arms.
You could still roll that formula.
Some nations will have +/- some generic units.
we see this with Upcoming Malians, as they lack Lancers and Man at Arms.
But isntead get other more unique units added to them.
Horse archers, as well as War Elephants should be generic units, that can be more available to other civs.
Some African Civs, as well as Many Asian Civs and Empires used War Elephants predominantly.
Horse Archers were quite commonly used in Asia, Eastern Europe and the Middle East.
You’re far from making everyone the same as in AoE2.
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I keep seeing “should be” when I don’t see why that’s the case. There are countless ways to make unique elephant, horse archer, etc. type units. Make them eco, make them support, give them civ specific names, not just civ + elephant naming scheme.
Sure, other real civs could use them IRL, but that doesn’t HAVE to be the case, and it still could be the case with the way things are now. Relic could also just make future adjustments to accommodate future civ crossover issues. It’s just a non-issue aside from this ethereal “oughtness” you all feel about specific unit types.
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The Camel Rider is also a unit that should become a regional one as well as it is to be given to the future Persian civilization.
Just so you know, it just happens to be so weird that some units with a generic name are unique units when they should be common units.
you should also tell people that english,french or hre will not be gonna get this generic unit people getting confused by every civ gonna get it
Who currently gets horse archers?
Rus, Mongols, Abbasid (well it’s a camel but the idea is the same)
Delhi has an elephant with archers, I believe the idea should be similar too 