As far as I understand, because Age of Empires 2 prioritizes the names of “ethnicities” or demonyms instead of the names of the empires they want to represent, we’re dealing with civilizations that represent two, three, or even four kingdoms at once.
When they released Vikings in 1999, they wanted to represent all Vikings, including Sweden, Denmark, and Norway.
Now, with this new 2026 split, there are at least three types of Vikings:
Vikings, to represent “Norwegian Vikings.”
Danes, to represent “Danish Vikings.”
Varangians, to represent “Swedish Vikings.”
Saxons, I suppose, are to represent the English kingdoms before the Norman Conquest, like “Anglo-Saxons,” or I suppose for the Saxons of northern Germany.
I see what you mean, but it’s not justifiable. 45G/50G of gold for an infantry unit is the absolute limit, any more than that is unmanageable. To do what you’re suggesting, they’d have to cost a lot more gold, but at that point they’d be rubbish.
Here we have a unit that fulfills its role as heavy shock infantry, and lose to Champion in cost. A Champion will deal 19 damage towards it, killing it in 6 hits. It will deal 17 damage to a Champion, killing it in 5 hits at a 0.1 faster speed.
On average a Champion will get off 4 hits before dying, and so you need 1.5 Champions to kill one Varangian Guard. 1.5 Champions cost 75F 30G, and 1 Varangian Guard cost 80F 45G, giving the Champion a net win.
So what? it is not like norsemen didn’t use 2 handed axes as shock infantry… Or would you rather all have a different name but very similar stats? In my opinion, it is not a perfect name but it is ok.. there are worse unit representation that we did accept.. like mamlukes throwing scimitars or throwing axemen without shields, condotieros as a foot unit only.. a halberd that does less damage than a small sword and has no extra range, heavy cavs without charge mechanics…
if we are going to start naming all the little inconsistencies in the game we will never end, is not supposed to be perfect, it is supossed to be fun
Fair points. The Corvid Army solves a problem, so integrating it into the unit would be a nerf.
Anarchy and Marauders (i guess) are a tricky case. I’m not a big fan, but including them in the civilisation bonus would probably be excessive.
Am I the only one who thinks the Varangians should also be available to the Slavs? Historically speaking, most members of the Varangian Guard were of Slavic origin. Not to mention that Varangians (i.e., Swedish Vikings) and Slavs are inextricably linked.
I mean, it doesn’t really bother me personally. Since I only play my own custom scenarios anyway, I simply enable them in my Slav scenario. But in principle, it would have made perfect sense. Given the historical context, the Slavs are definitely one of the civilizations that should have received them.
But it’s a problem that if it just existed as the unit itself was wouldn’t be a problem. I dunno. Let it also reduce cost of something else because it feels like if the unit had a more reasonable food/gold ratio it probably wouldn’t be that in need of a gold/food swap especially when most Cav are way more expensive
I think celts should get it too as some gallowglass reference, vikings had a lot of influence in the british isles… that includes ireland and scothland too…
one could argue that with that logic britons should get varangians too.. but I rather if both britons and sicilians shared a unique norman knights line that replace the normal knights from both civs
I don’t think so… vikings have extra hp and a UT that gives them extra dmg to cavalry… if they had gameson would had been almost unstopable… celts would be as fast as the danes varangians but without the extra damage from the danes UT
nah, that’s alright… I don’t think necessary to have another similar unit with a very small difference, also gallowglasses are descendent of norse invaders in the british isles…
If we are going to be more strict about not allowing referenciation for units we have to remove Paladins from any civ but Franks and Burgundians… Paladins were frankish elite officers that did administrative and martial duties. Spanish, Lithuanians or Huns should not have them… Teuton should have their own
They were a part of the carolingian empire so teutons having them is ok in my view.French knights did serve in spain I think so they too are passable.Other two without a doubt should not get them same with magyars and cumans.
Huns Cumans Magyars should/could get a regional paladin as all three overlap the same area.
