yeah, or train them in the basilica could work.
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That works with malta and hospitallers really well but it’s not the same when those units must be shipped as with italy.
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So you are basically asking for a new civilization 
But jokes aside:
I agree on the necessity of the guard and imp upgrades, although that alone will be a lot, I don’t see Italy get out of the european norm and get extra arsenal upgrades.
Also, those 2 cards aren’t really critical if you get the 2 upgrades. Right now Italy and Malta have them because they lack an age 3 skirms, but if the pavisiers are just a temporary unit that you use until you switch into something else, and in any case they still work as xbows and can be effective for a small time even without them. The main problem is in early age 4, when you still don’t have bersaglieri, and have only age 3 units, this is were they are weak.
Also, I would prefer to see their animation fixed instead of having 2 HC cards become techs, which highly unlikely.
By my count it needs just 3 cards, but anyway if you get the pavisier buffed you might want to keep the bersaglieri cards only for FI or FF strategies, or just get 1 of them.
Also, they might have just 20% resistance, but you can add basically what it is another 25% resistance if they have any papal units close nearby.
Ok, I’ll admit that the 170 gold cost bugs me a lot and it should be 150 gold… but maybe that’s just a the obsessive-compulsive disorder inside me 
Apart form that, the architect is probably the best bonus for Italy, it’s basically a free building just for the age 1, either be a lombard, a house, an outpost or a TP, and that on top of another house and a market. The architects of well micromanaged gives back an incredible value. That of course doesn’t mean that you don’t need to build with your vills or to pay for any building, but even if you get to build half houses for free that’s a lot.
So no, I believe that they are more than fine… with the exception for that 20 gold…
I get that the ability of the PB is a bit counterintuitive… it was probably thought to be a unit that helps in artillery fights, especially with culvs and their extra health, but for that you need to keep the PB packed behind, otherwise it get just out-ranged and sniped.
Still, the unit is still a buffed heavy cannon, with more attack and way more HP, and you can ship a ton of them through the HC, so it’s a units that doesn’t need buff in my opinion, and it also have a special attack after 1 HC shipment.
Way to go if you want to nerf Italy even more… they already get just 1 factory, and yes they compensate a bit with the lombards and their strong eco, but removing both is killing the civ…
I would like to see some adjustments to the usury card, but in general for buffs I would wait and see how the most recent changes will impact the civ.
It’s not a bad building at all, those units are good and they are supposed to be shipped in small numbers for balance reasons, they are support units, not your main ones. Buff the baseline units like the pavisiers and you won’t have to rely exclusively on papal units.
The only problem in my opinion is with the shipments of papal guards and schiavoni in age 2, but only in that age, since it’s hard to squeeze them in, but again if you buff the pavisiers you would need them less.
You need to not rely on specific units to win, but rather a combination of them. What people often miss is that Italy can train Mounted Riflemen via an ageup option which is absurd in late game treaty matches and easy to mass up, adding on top of it the age 5 politician for better mercs.
Lombards can train mercs, and if you aren’t taking advantage of it, you’re crippling yourself.
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It can work… I usually don’t use them if not in small numbers since it takes too much micro, but they can be used to constantly heal the papal units.
But you don’t need a good mass of them, you need just 1 or 2 shipments along with baseline units to do their jobs. Zouaves can absorb a ton of damage and deal even more, and they don’t even have to be on the frontline to do it, so your bersaglieri basically have 45% resistance.
And if Zouaves are too few, you can use papal guards or lancers, to have units that counter cavalry or artillery and still do the job, Papal guards are even in the front and have a pistol attack too. Papal bombards does the job too.
And again, I’m not an expert of treaty, but don’t tell me that you can’t squeeze in a couple of shipments from the basilica in age 4, or to have some papal bombards.
Mercs are situational, depend a lof of the map or the match. Mounted Riflemen is a situational unit.
basically u are suggesting to micro priest to heal papal units, sacrificing army population to make priests, not using infinite sends to make papal units and letting them destroy artillery to micro the priests?
Zouaves are 3 pop units that not counter anything. Literally, u can’t use infinite shipment because u are training the papal units. I’m not saying that using papal units as shields doesn’t work, the problem is that each papal shipment is unprofitable takes 40 secs, and requires 7 or 9 pop space of army while it is being sent. Literally the 3 Zouaves you sent you already lost them when the other 3 arrive.
Well, first zouaves are shipped in batches of 4, not 3. Second as I said you don’t need ti send just papal shipments, you can alternate them with standard infinite shipments and send the papal units when you don’t have shipments.
No, I said that it’s possible to do that in small numbers fights, and that it’s probably not worth in treaty.
For Italy and its generic upgrades, you can make the argument for padding an army with mercs that your comp needs. Especially since Lombards train them.