Can someone with some insight or someone close to the devs or something actually explain what the functional purpose of Steppe Lancers are? I just can’t figure out what it is that they are supposed to be better at than other units?
In age of empires all units seem to have some sorta specialty where they do something that no other unit does as good, pikes kill cav, Camels kill cav and can chase them down, skirms kill archers, swordman kills other infantry and pikes and skirms, cav is baically like a tank, light cav is a scout which also specialises in killing monks, mangonels flatten groups of units and turn the tide of battle, rams take out buildings, trebs take out castles, cannons take out other siege, hand cannons kill infantry, elephants are a slower and tankier knight basically, all the ships have their own specific purpose as well, but where does the Steppe Lancer fit in all this? I just can’t figure it out.
Their main function was to capture player attention at the realise of DE. Super cool and OP.
After the big nerf they are much worse than knights in fights, and less useful in raiding that scout line because of their gold cost.
There is a topic in which someone proposes a stats buff from them, like more armor, bonus attack vs vills, and extra speed. However, the price would be to remove knight-line from SL civs.
Despite this should not hurt too much Mongols and Tatars, Cumans would need some fix, like the introduction of an imperial upgrade.
Also TG balancing, where knights matter more, would be difficult.
I mean, it may work to add more variety to the game, specializing thermal civs. But it is not trivial to balance everything, especially TG where knights are the way to go…
If you remove knight line of cumans, you should give them something else. Like a further upgrade with respect to the elite upgrade. So SLs may have two variants in imperial age. “Imperial SL” should be a sort of paladin replacement.
Sure, but the problem is that something raiding with no gold units is preferable. So mid-late imp, scout line is less powerful in terms of pure force, but it does not require attention, you can even click the enemy woodlines without micro…
But why removing the knigt line, especially for cumans that have one of the best paladins.
Almost no one goes for ligh cav in castle, either you same some from feudal or you use the hussars in imp, but in castle (when there still is plenty of gold and is acessible) gold units will always be better.
This was a proposal in another topic. I think the main issue is TGs, where the meta is knights from pocket even if it is Malay (at least for pros).
Well, in mid imp 1v1 I do not think that you send an expensive gold army without looking at it. It is less risky to lose 10 hussars to halabs, than 10 palas (assuming you have some in 1v1).
In castle age I agree that raiding is different. It involves more micro, like in the case of plumes or conquistadors…
Sorry friend, but at this point I can’t trust your judgement on any units because even if Viper says they are OK, you are gonna say it was a game against “NOOBS”
I agree that you don’t raid with Paladins that much, but if you manage to keep a solid eco, you send 60 Paladins to his eco and boom, he’s dead
Viper said they are OK but only with respect to casual play (considering he was doing casual play)
NOT serious or competitive play
And the game is supposed to be balanced keeping in ming the COMPETITIVE SCENE.
This is the fact. Period.
Maybe in TGs… but even with Cavaliers you do not risk to loose your gold army… In 1v1 with a SL civ I would spam hussars to raid without micro while using the remaining gold for CAs or Cavaliers for the main fights.
I like the idea of civs having the knight replaced by SL. We have 35 civs, I can play knights with others… but balancing that is difficult
