I feel this useless is pointless no matter how you look at them.
They do almost the same dps as toxotes (5.7 vs 5.4), and have no bonus vs infantry while costing amlns taking 50% more res and pop. Thry dont do much damage to buildings (almost 2 times as a toxotes pop wise), at leat not like in the old game with crush damage (which also helped vs myth and siege) and considering greeks have petrobolos, they already have a great option for a ranged unit vs buildings (that’s way they wherent impressing in og game as well).
If we look at AoE2 for unique archers inspiration, we got the following options:
- Longbowman path- remove bonus vs buildings, increase damage to at least match toxotoi pop wise and maybe increase range a bit. So you pay for the extra range.
- Composite bow path- reduce range, remove bonus, and add devine damage. Those crossbow where designed to pierce armor afterall… making them more of a generalist. (Though the similarities woth myrmidons is glaring)
- Cannoneer path- replace building bonus with some bonus vs infantry, or even infantry and archers (like fanatics). Making them more of a specialists, leaving the toxotoi as the more generalist unit.
What do you think? Which of the ideas you like the most? Do you have other ideas?