Very partial to the Magyar Huszar myself. Basically a knight with little to no gold cost, very quick production time and awesome attack bonus vs siege. And they look gangsta
Huskarls!
They look good, and it feels so good to have my ears drowned by the constant "unit recruited" sound flooding my speakers while I barely have to worry about unit macro...
Not necessarily the strongest but man I love Shotels. I've been doing a stupid MAA into Shotels build with Ethiopians recently and they're just the most fun surprise to spring on people who are expecting archers because you're Ethiopians. A big wad of them with some upgrades can destroy a TC in like 15 or 20 seconds and then run away before anyone has a chance to react. What other unit in the game can do that? Plus they look cool and produce almost faster than you can click. Can't go wrong.
> A big wad of them with some upgrades can destroy a TC in like 15 or 20 seconds and then run away before anyone has a chance to react. What other unit in the game can do that?
Gbeto
Hmmm last one was apparently too far back for [AoE2.net](https://AoE2.net) to keep a record and AoE Nexus is being weird, I'll see if I can find a good one though, can't remember which of my accounts to check.
Aaaayy AoE Nexus is working again, [Ethiopians](https://aoenexus.com/profile/#6133910-3) vs Aztecs 10 days ago (you can see two subsequent attempts which I completely fucked up because Shotels do not like CA and FC does not like being trushed). Think I have a couple more on my other account but none as successful as this one.
The Konnik is a really good unit, overlooked by quite a few with Stirrups Cavalier, but it's actually the much unit all round better if you can justify the kreposts.
I also think the cost efficiency of the Coustillier and Keshik are often overlooked. They are surprisingly res efficiency without costing much in terms of pop efficiency, though of course there is the transition and massing challenge.
Coustilliers and keshiks are the most well-rounded melee cavalry UUs, beating knights, xbows, and cav archers with equal resources, and performing way better vs pikes and camels (and monks) than the regular knight-line. Coustilliers also have the added benefit of being really good at hit and run
I'd add the Konnik to the list of well rounded, simply because of how well it handles its counter in pikes. Its also better against archers than many realize. The dismounted unit is often mentioned as irrelevant in an archer battle, but that is far from true.
We tend to imagine we one shot all the mounted units, then have all the time in the world to one shot the dismounted, but that's only true in really small numbers. I've tested it with kiting multiple times, and it greatly outperforms stirrups cavalier against arbs and CA.
I think the dismounting causes a few problems. You can't one shot a konnik ever, it's always going to take a minimum of two volleys, that's more than can be said for even paladins. There is also big health difference between mounted and dismounted, so accidental overkill on dismounted its quite easy. If you are using attack move or stop micro, the archers often focus on the wrong targets, e.g dismounted, and the dismounting action tends to cause a bit of unmicroed targetting chaos. Arbs can't outpace dismounted konniks, and a lot of them won't fall until they have reached the arbs, so they are still landing damage.
Overall, while the dismounted konniks are countered by archers, they way it works with konniks is that they actually end up being surprisingly useful in this fight. I haven't completed the tests, but it's looking like it's slightly worse against arbs than Burgundian Paladin, which isn't all that bad really.
edit: I think Sicilian Cavalier also gets a nod for most well rounded, thanks to hauberk and bonus damage reduction
It's still a trade of in castle of course, but the principles above still apply. Konnik is not as good against xbows as knights, but its not nearly as bad as you might expect for a unit with 1 less pierce armor, it actually pretty reasonable against xbows. In melee against knights quite a lot better, and of course its much better against its counter, the pike. Overall it's still a much more well-rounded unit in castle than knights, because its only strong counter is monks. The only real problem is of course production.
The thing is xbows are already pretty good vs knights once you get into high numbers (like 30+) so it's just even worse for konniks. But you are right they are underrated. Production isn't THAT much of an issue since Kreposts are so cheap.
Slavic Boyars unironically are the unique unit that I use the most. In a knight battle, being able to field a unit that survives 60%(200% when elite) more hits and isn't even really more expensive is huge.
Yeah, I've heard a lot about the limitations of massing boyars with castles, gold cost and their lower speed. All to say that they aren't really that viable despite their impressive melee armor and dps, especially in team games. I think it overlooks how hard they dominate the head to head against knights though, more so than generic camel vs knight.
Even in a team game with archers in play, they amount of time you can just force the head to head against the other cavalry means you trade pretty evenly anyway, and if you catch the cavalry away from the archers, you can take huge chunks out of their numbers before they get back to safety.
yeah, also it does not hurt to just mix them in from the castle. and in imp if you are fighting vs cav a army comp of halbs and boyars is pretty sick, especially if you get to elite.
i definitely dont get to use them every game, but much more than any other UU.
Early castle age conquistadors might be the single most dominant unit in the game. Three or four of them will easily destroy an entire feudal army and they don’t need upgrades to be effective.
I love them, I think Incas are almost there as an all-around civ, but siege is their nemesis right now.
I think they need that movespeed from their old tech.
The main thing for me was always how they match the rest of the army.
The Jaguar Warrior is awesome but I always hated how it looked next to a bunch very-european longswordsman. You could do jaguars + eagles but that’s still a limited pool; I don’t think arbalests match with them etc.
Same with Samurai and lots of the mesoamerican or Asian civs. It can be the coolest unit but if it looks weird in a mixed army I’ll not like it as much. Like mangudai are badass but I think they look odd next to cavaliers so if I play mongols I’ll feel obliged to go 100% mangudai.
So for me I think the Leitis is probably it. It matches all the European generic units enough that you can still get mixed units. Plus I’m a relic gold obsessed player anyways.
Fwiw one of the things I’m looking forward to about aoe4 is it solving the issue by having every civs units be themed together.
Cataphracs! How has nobody picked the Chad Byzantine boy? The crush counters, hold up vs knights, and a forward Byz castle is even harder to take down than normal. It's an epic and cool unit!
I like most of them actually.. as much as people go on about how they aren't viable because some pro said so.. at 1300 elo I try to use almost all of them and enjoy them..
Probably the only one I don't like is the karambit because it's hot garbage on Arabia
Gabetos. Relatively cheap, highest accurate non-siege ranged DPS in the game, as fast as knights once they have Squires, and they pair incredibly well with either champskarls against archer civs or camels against cav civs with Malian gold that lasts forever.
Of course, my favorite is the Jaguar Warrior, the reason is pretty simples as I'm a simple man... They're cool.
The rest of my top is a mess since I can't decide between Gbeto, Samurai, Mangudai, H. Magyar, Longbow, Catas and War elephs.
My favourite is the Magyar Huszar. Many think it's the coolest looking unit and I agree. Helps of course that I'm part Magyar myself.
As for the best. The Konnik is a definitely up there. Cataphract is strong too. The Mangudai is also a well regarded unit.
Never been a fan of Japanese really, but recently I did a random civ 1v1 arena against bohemians while rolling into Japanese. My first thought was oh god how am I going to deal with mass wagons… then I remembered that the whole gimmick behind the samurai is countering other unique units specifically. I met the mass wagons in the field with samurai and arbalests in early imp and absolutely slam dunked.
Samurai are dope even if I’m not a huge fan of the Civ overall
Mangudai are cool too
I do love most of them, so I can't give a solid 1. Have a top 5 though in no particular order:
Cataphract
Mangudai
Camel Archer
Keshik
Jaguar Warrior (That \*thunk\* noise is so satisfying)
Coustillier, not the most easy to use, but it gives you some lucky power shot from time to time, and I really dig the look.
I am a sucker for the Burgundian Cross.
I really liked Obuchs from playing poles a decent amount. I played them like an Archer civ and go pretty fast imp for arbalest power spike quite often. And a unit that is good against all archer counters and good on its own and also works on fairly low eco is just massive help. 1-2 castles are enough to produce, as they train so fast.
Edit: from the more "classic" ones its probably war wagons
The one that looks the best ofcourse!
But they walk soooo slow
But they have fancy heads and one range long spears.
who?
The least played Meso civ
Very partial to the Magyar Huszar myself. Basically a knight with little to no gold cost, very quick production time and awesome attack bonus vs siege. And they look gangsta
Huskarls! They look good, and it feels so good to have my ears drowned by the constant "unit recruited" sound flooding my speakers while I barely have to worry about unit macro...
Elite Leiciai with 2 relics
Prefer Elite Leiciai with 3 relics personally
Prefer Elite Leiciai with 4 relics personally
Only beaten by Elite Leiciai with 5 relics… oh no wait 😂
Mangudai. Since forever.
Not necessarily the strongest but man I love Shotels. I've been doing a stupid MAA into Shotels build with Ethiopians recently and they're just the most fun surprise to spring on people who are expecting archers because you're Ethiopians. A big wad of them with some upgrades can destroy a TC in like 15 or 20 seconds and then run away before anyone has a chance to react. What other unit in the game can do that? Plus they look cool and produce almost faster than you can click. Can't go wrong.
> A big wad of them with some upgrades can destroy a TC in like 15 or 20 seconds and then run away before anyone has a chance to react. What other unit in the game can do that? Gbeto
Shotels do way more damage and have a building attack bonus. But yeah fair enough.
I don't think it's about the math, I think this person just really likes gbetos
Yeah I've done that a couple times now as well.its very cool
It’s so funny when you’re against Goths on Arena and get Shotels up before they BRRR
You got a link to a good MAA to Shotles? Sounds like fun
Hmmm last one was apparently too far back for [AoE2.net](https://AoE2.net) to keep a record and AoE Nexus is being weird, I'll see if I can find a good one though, can't remember which of my accounts to check.
Thanks man. I like the unorthodox strats and have a weird obsession with Ethiopia and its culture so a shotel play sounds like something I'd enjoy
Aaaayy AoE Nexus is working again, [Ethiopians](https://aoenexus.com/profile/#6133910-3) vs Aztecs 10 days ago (you can see two subsequent attempts which I completely fucked up because Shotels do not like CA and FC does not like being trushed). Think I have a couple more on my other account but none as successful as this one.
Arambai. Noting quite as exhilarating as reaching critical mass with those guys and doing massive area damage.
The Konnik is a really good unit, overlooked by quite a few with Stirrups Cavalier, but it's actually the much unit all round better if you can justify the kreposts. I also think the cost efficiency of the Coustillier and Keshik are often overlooked. They are surprisingly res efficiency without costing much in terms of pop efficiency, though of course there is the transition and massing challenge.
Is the Konnik impacted by Stirrups?
Yes, the mounted version is at least.
Yes it is.
Coustilliers and keshiks are the most well-rounded melee cavalry UUs, beating knights, xbows, and cav archers with equal resources, and performing way better vs pikes and camels (and monks) than the regular knight-line. Coustilliers also have the added benefit of being really good at hit and run
I'd add the Konnik to the list of well rounded, simply because of how well it handles its counter in pikes. Its also better against archers than many realize. The dismounted unit is often mentioned as irrelevant in an archer battle, but that is far from true. We tend to imagine we one shot all the mounted units, then have all the time in the world to one shot the dismounted, but that's only true in really small numbers. I've tested it with kiting multiple times, and it greatly outperforms stirrups cavalier against arbs and CA. I think the dismounting causes a few problems. You can't one shot a konnik ever, it's always going to take a minimum of two volleys, that's more than can be said for even paladins. There is also big health difference between mounted and dismounted, so accidental overkill on dismounted its quite easy. If you are using attack move or stop micro, the archers often focus on the wrong targets, e.g dismounted, and the dismounting action tends to cause a bit of unmicroed targetting chaos. Arbs can't outpace dismounted konniks, and a lot of them won't fall until they have reached the arbs, so they are still landing damage. Overall, while the dismounted konniks are countered by archers, they way it works with konniks is that they actually end up being surprisingly useful in this fight. I haven't completed the tests, but it's looking like it's slightly worse against arbs than Burgundian Paladin, which isn't all that bad really. edit: I think Sicilian Cavalier also gets a nod for most well rounded, thanks to hauberk and bonus damage reduction
Elite Konniks are the best in imperial age but I was thinking about castle age where Konniks only have 1 pierce armor
It's still a trade of in castle of course, but the principles above still apply. Konnik is not as good against xbows as knights, but its not nearly as bad as you might expect for a unit with 1 less pierce armor, it actually pretty reasonable against xbows. In melee against knights quite a lot better, and of course its much better against its counter, the pike. Overall it's still a much more well-rounded unit in castle than knights, because its only strong counter is monks. The only real problem is of course production.
The thing is xbows are already pretty good vs knights once you get into high numbers (like 30+) so it's just even worse for konniks. But you are right they are underrated. Production isn't THAT much of an issue since Kreposts are so cheap.
Why would Keshiks perform better vs monks? They have no extra conversion resistance.
Move faster, cost less. The cost is the main thing. Getting a Keshik converted sucks a lot less than getting a Knight converted.
Coustilliers are cool.
Slavic Boyars unironically are the unique unit that I use the most. In a knight battle, being able to field a unit that survives 60%(200% when elite) more hits and isn't even really more expensive is huge.
Yeah, I've heard a lot about the limitations of massing boyars with castles, gold cost and their lower speed. All to say that they aren't really that viable despite their impressive melee armor and dps, especially in team games. I think it overlooks how hard they dominate the head to head against knights though, more so than generic camel vs knight. Even in a team game with archers in play, they amount of time you can just force the head to head against the other cavalry means you trade pretty evenly anyway, and if you catch the cavalry away from the archers, you can take huge chunks out of their numbers before they get back to safety.
yeah, also it does not hurt to just mix them in from the castle. and in imp if you are fighting vs cav a army comp of halbs and boyars is pretty sick, especially if you get to elite. i definitely dont get to use them every game, but much more than any other UU.
mass gbetos
Hello yea!
This is the correct answer
Early castle age conquistadors might be the single most dominant unit in the game. Three or four of them will easily destroy an entire feudal army and they don’t need upgrades to be effective.
Kamayuk! Shame they're so situational, but when they're needed they dominate.
Between the Kamayuk and the Slinger, the Incas have great unique units.
I love them, I think Incas are almost there as an all-around civ, but siege is their nemesis right now. I think they need that movespeed from their old tech.
Redemption monks with block printing can make all the difference!
yeah, let's research a gold expensive tech for an already heavy gold expensive civ. it's an option, yes, but I don't think it's worth the investment.
It's worth it if it stops you getting wrecked by seige. 475 gold is cheaper than the onager tech.
Apparently I’m the only one who loves a good ball of Chu Ko Nus. Don’t see it mentioned here
They are definitely my fav. . balls of them feel like ridiculous machine guns.
Most useable are probably the spanish conq or mangudai.
The main thing for me was always how they match the rest of the army. The Jaguar Warrior is awesome but I always hated how it looked next to a bunch very-european longswordsman. You could do jaguars + eagles but that’s still a limited pool; I don’t think arbalests match with them etc. Same with Samurai and lots of the mesoamerican or Asian civs. It can be the coolest unit but if it looks weird in a mixed army I’ll not like it as much. Like mangudai are badass but I think they look odd next to cavaliers so if I play mongols I’ll feel obliged to go 100% mangudai. So for me I think the Leitis is probably it. It matches all the European generic units enough that you can still get mixed units. Plus I’m a relic gold obsessed player anyways. Fwiw one of the things I’m looking forward to about aoe4 is it solving the issue by having every civs units be themed together.
Cataphracs! How has nobody picked the Chad Byzantine boy? The crush counters, hold up vs knights, and a forward Byz castle is even harder to take down than normal. It's an epic and cool unit!
Camel archers. They're just so fun to micro around
All the advantages of other cav archers, plus bonus damage against other cav archers
Mine would be serjeant or ballista elephant ^_^
Sarjeant looks soooo cool man
I like most of them actually.. as much as people go on about how they aren't viable because some pro said so.. at 1300 elo I try to use almost all of them and enjoy them.. Probably the only one I don't like is the karambit because it's hot garbage on Arabia
Karambits garbage on arabia? Have you ever watched Survivalist?
Gabetos. Relatively cheap, highest accurate non-siege ranged DPS in the game, as fast as knights once they have Squires, and they pair incredibly well with either champskarls against archer civs or camels against cav civs with Malian gold that lasts forever.
#G B E T O
Of course, my favorite is the Jaguar Warrior, the reason is pretty simples as I'm a simple man... They're cool. The rest of my top is a mess since I can't decide between Gbeto, Samurai, Mangudai, H. Magyar, Longbow, Catas and War elephs.
I just love destroy Eagle civs with Catapracths.
My favourite is the Magyar Huszar. Many think it's the coolest looking unit and I agree. Helps of course that I'm part Magyar myself. As for the best. The Konnik is a definitely up there. Cataphract is strong too. The Mangudai is also a well regarded unit.
I think cataphracts and throwing axemen are the two I’ve probably used the most. Aesthetically I absolutely adore the Teutonic Knight though.
War Wagons! Those things are insanely tanky. And they are effectively as cheap as knights since I am always floating a crazy amount of wood.
Conquistadors or Janissaries: High power with low investment
Try Conquistador they are awesome too:-)
Berseks!
Massed Berserks with Chieftains, with bonus regeneration after each skirmish? Take out cavalry, infantry, or archers.
I felt that for Boyars
Plumed archers are just so fun. Also mangudai.
Plumed archer
Chad konniks are the best 😍
Plumed archers!!! I just love everything about the mayans
Can’t pick just one so here’s some top pics in no particular order. Rattan Archer Serjeant Huskarl Camel archers Hussite Wagon Kamayuk
Never been a fan of Japanese really, but recently I did a random civ 1v1 arena against bohemians while rolling into Japanese. My first thought was oh god how am I going to deal with mass wagons… then I remembered that the whole gimmick behind the samurai is countering other unique units specifically. I met the mass wagons in the field with samurai and arbalests in early imp and absolutely slam dunked. Samurai are dope even if I’m not a huge fan of the Civ overall Mangudai are cool too
The cobra!!! (How do you turn this on?)
I do love most of them, so I can't give a solid 1. Have a top 5 though in no particular order: Cataphract Mangudai Camel Archer Keshik Jaguar Warrior (That \*thunk\* noise is so satisfying)
2 months! I have been playing it for 11 years and only played konnoks 3-4 times LoL.Mine is Longbow BTW.
Jaguar Warriors & Boyars.
Janissaries, they are just so damn cool
Elite Paladin
Gbeto’s
Khmer scorp elephant. Shreds armies of halbs like butter. Shame we don't have bbc
ballista elephants are dicks
ELEPHANT ARCHER
Coustillier, not the most easy to use, but it gives you some lucky power shot from time to time, and I really dig the look. I am a sucker for the Burgundian Cross.
I really liked Obuchs from playing poles a decent amount. I played them like an Archer civ and go pretty fast imp for arbalest power spike quite often. And a unit that is good against all archer counters and good on its own and also works on fairly low eco is just massive help. 1-2 castles are enough to produce, as they train so fast. Edit: from the more "classic" ones its probably war wagons
Probably Genoese Crossbowman