If it was historically used all over the world as you say then I have nothing against making it generally available.
I just know about the northern european utilization of shield wall tactics, so that’s why designed the unit after that example.
shielwalls are something more from total war, where there is actual formations matter, where they also have way more generic unit types without equivalent in aoe, as it has more battle deepness, aoe is pretty simplified because most real world battle tactics doesn’t make sense in this game
in total war they have as different unit roles separate archer/crossbows, separate spearman/pikeman/halberds, infantry and cavalry can have one weapon (spear, axe,sword,mace) and shield (better pierce armor) or be two handed (better attack), skirmishers counter cavalry and high armor units instead of archer, there are there are more different gunpowder units and cavalry actually have to charge instead of maintain combat.
But the usefulness of the roles of many of the different units types can’t be replicated in the more simple battles of aoe2.
2 Likes
well, I used the mechanics of aoe2 that they actually can be useful here.
Target selection is the keyword here, the crucial part is that the unit only takes half a pop space, so it’s much more likely that it will be randomly targeted by the ranged units.
BTW this is also what makes Huskalrs so abnoxious to deal with, so it’s not even something new - and i actually prefer it to the combat system of total war.
I think with a speed of 0.96 and low dps, the issue is 2), that they will be ignored by skirms (wont help that melee pathing is very bugged and they will likely bump each other for melee units)
Thinking about it again, it may work, but I am not sure if it shut down skirm play too much
Also will likely have weird effects on skirm maps, e.g. socortra or border dispute
Don’t you see a lot of militia play on those anyways? So the counter units are already there. Though ofc it can make sense to add sheildmen there against the ranged units, but I think on these maps it’s actually not a main strategy option because of the swordsman heavy meta.
btw here is an updated unit design:
| Name | Shieldman (F) | Elite Shieldman ( C ) |
|---|---|---|
| Armor Class | Infantry (+4) | Infantry (+6) |
| Armor Class | Shock Infantry | Shock Infantry |
| Produced at | Barracks | Barracks |
| Production Time | 10 s | 10 s |
| Production Cost | 15 F, 10 W | 15 F, 10 W |
| HP | 45 | 55 |
| Speed | 0,96 | 0,96 |
| ROF | 4 | 4 |
| Attack | 1 | 1 |
| Atk Bonus | 2 vs Archers | 2 vs Archers |
| Atk Bonus | 1 vs Skirmisher | 2 vs Skirmisher |
| Atk Bonus | 2 vs Standard Building | 2 vs Standard Building |
| Atk Bonus | 1 vs Gunpowder | 2 vs Gunpowder |
| Range | - | - |
| Accuracy | - | - |
| Melee Armor | -2 | -2 |
| Pierce Armor | 2 | 2 |
| Benefits from | Infantry Upgrades | Infantry Upgrades |
| Upgrade Cost | 100 s | 300 G, 500 F |
| Special | Consumes only half | Population space |
| and stacks twice as | dense as other infantry |
Not really, or rather depends on map (militias are real bad on maps without good food source e.g. socortra)
1+1 Attack is definitely very little tho*, so dont see it being a threat to skirms (if you really need some counter, feels like spear skirm destroys shieldman since they have negative armor!!)
(*Also because of melee bumping issues. Karambits suffer the same problem but they move at 1.2 speed so you can do a surround more easily)
it’s actually 1+2+1 (as skirms count as archers aswell) . And the unit is super cheap, 25 res a piece. Ok they also attack twice as slow as normal, but you can’t jsut let them run into your skirms, even if it takes them some time, the skirms actually stand no chance here. (skirms deal 1 damage per 3 s whilst 2 shieldmen do 8 per 4 s and also have at least triple the HP. It’s like a factor 20 in relative damage output per investment. Thats even better than Knigths do. (Don’t forget you can make 5.4 of these for the same cost as a Knight and these would already even the dps against skirms, whilst having much more HP).
It is based on the assumption that skirms have to fight shieldmen
Imo the most natural way would just be run away from them, then add a few spears/MAAs - in this case those shieldmen feel exactly like scouts.
(In castle age scrops / mango would be a better answer than knights imo)
The Militia line should originally represent shielded infantry. If we are going to have new shieldman units, I would prefer them to be upgrades within this line, for example replacing the Two-handed Sword for certain civs.
The real problem is that skirmishers dominate Age II. I raised this point a long time ago (in this topic: Add something new to the current tech tree), even suggesting introducing a new technology called “Javelins” at the Archery Range in Age II. Have this technology unlock the bonus of skirmisher units against spearman units to slightly slowed down or delay the heavy use of Skirmishers at the time.
There, I also suggested spliting the Bloodlines and let the first +10 HP can be researched in Age II. I hope that can help the scout gameplay especailly for the non-cavalry civs.
3 Likes
I do like the idea of a Militia Line Split like it was originally intended.
You can still see that the MMA looks like a Knight and the Long Swordsman looks like a Cavalier since those units were intended to be Castle and Imperial Age units.
So I suggest:
- Militia → New Unit → Man at Arms → Long Swordsman
- Two Handed Swordsman → Champion
The Milita Line gets higher Pierce armour while the Two Handed Swordsman Line gets a small AoE attack and bad pierce armour.
So the Two Handed Swordsman counters the Milita Line while the Milita Line is very good against Skirmishers and ok vs. Archers.
So the Milita Line would be mostly unchanged. Just like +1 Pierce armour as a base stat.
The Two Handed Swordsman Line would have 0 or 1 base Pierce but 2 base Melee armour and deal 25% AoE damage in a 1 Tile Radius. Maybe also move a little faster.
2 Likes
My original intention was simpler: some civs can upgrade their swordsmen to shielded infantry, such as the Aztecs, Spanish, Portuguese, Vikings, etc. Other civs have their swordsmen retain the use of two-handed swords, such as the Celts, Chinese, Japanese, Teutons, etc.
2 Likes
Not sure if a split line is “simpler” then 2 lines.
There are probably some civs that would benefit from having both. Not sure which.
Milita → Man at Arms → Long Swordsman → Heavy Swordsman
Milita → Man at Arms → Two Handed Swordsman → Champion
Making it only 4 units for all.
1 Like
Take this with a grain of salt because ultimately I’m rather hesitant towards such radical changes – what if the Militia line remained as it is point-wise but was equipped with axes instead of swords, while a new Swordsman line would get lower damage but higher HP to better act as tanks? Having one line using axe and the other sword would help differentiate between the two visually.
(Note again that this is a wild idea I’m not sold on myself.)
You can’t bring the Swordsman line there. That line is just a Glass Cannon by design.
And that’s fine, it’s anyway better if that role was filled by a specialised unit.
If you make Skirms worse against cavalry you’ll break the game because then Crossbow players can just add 1-2 Knights (without upgrades) as they hit Castle Age and take out all the enemy’s Skirms.
If you’re going to do anything at all then slightly nerfing their movement speed (from 0.96 to 0.94) or increasing their cost by like +5 wood would be more suitable.
1 Like
Generally something to think about is also to change the cost of Skirms AND spearmen, so one of them (probably skirms) is more wood heavy and the other more food heavy. This would probably need some other adjustments to, like different total costs or other adjustments,
I talked about that issue a long time ago already, but currently it’s way too easy to just add a few spears to your skirm mass when needed because it’s basically the same eco needed for both.
There should be more commitment needed to at least skirms. Also btw something sitaux picked up on in his video aswell.
What is also problematic to some degree is that the spearman line can be added very easily when you open skirms as the barracks is already up.
The question would be if there would be some adjustments possible that reduce the synergy or make that transition less smooth. One idea could be to make Spearmen need one tech to become “good”, possibly something similar to bloodlines for infantry. Then it would possibly hard to afford that tech when you already are on a food unit like Skirms, whilst when you open spears or archers you would already plan getting that tech at a good timing.
Or ofc if there WAS a unit that would be super strong against skirms whilst not dieing to the spearman line (like shieldmen) this issue could be circumvended.
Just give -1 melee armor all across instead to skirms???
The issue isn’t really that melee units wouldn’t kll Skirms when they engage them.
The issue is that it’s really hard to get these engagements with non-cavalry units and even cavalry can’t do that effectively when spearmen or walls are involved. Or in low numbers without upgrades sometimes the skirms can even kill them.
Shieldmen take a bit of a different path by just being able to take absurd amounts of javelines for their cost even if they can’t find a good engagement.
edit: btw it would make more sense to reduce the PIERCE armor of Skirms actually, increase their DPS against Archers instead. Then it would be way more tricky to keep the Skirms alive when the opponent also has ranged units.
1 Like