: I prefer the simpler Cavalry and Pikemen myself, but the
: flyers are fun as well and the seige weaponry adds a
: nice touch to larger battles. Anyway, I'm making up a
: list of possible units for the next batch and I would
: love some suggestions.
Two suggestions, which I came up with while working with someone else on a possible TC (which never got started). Mounted archers, and deflective pikemen.
The basic units we had come up with for the TC were:
Knights (basically Warriors)
Longbowmen (like normal Bowmen, but they have a "retreat" feature which is a brief run at just-over-Warrior speed have a much longer range, but absolutely HORRIBLE aim, and are cheap. You would buy a bunch of them and send a hail of arrows down on a distant enemy, hoping a few of them would hit them. They could just barely outrun Knights, but only for a moment, and only when you hit the "retreat" key. Yes, this is doable, with mesh scripting).
Cavalry (Knights on horses; very fast units and slightly tougher than Knights, but not that strong on the attack).
Pikemen (slow, and with a minimum range - that is, they can't attack people right next to them - even though they are melee units; but they are fairly tough, and have a long-range and rather strong melee attack).
So the ro-sham-bo of it all went thus: Longbowmen beat Knights and Pikemen, Cavalry beat Longbowmen and Knights, Pikemen beat Cavalry, and Knights beat Pikemen. Nice and balanced, yah?
But one of the big forces in this historical TC was to be the Mongols, who we all know were famed for their mounted bowmen. Mounted Bowmen would beat Longbowmen because they are fast, Knights and Pikemen because they are ranged, and Cavalry because they are both fast and ranged.
This was fine for the solos, because the Mongols DID dominate everyone with their mounted bowmen. But for net games, I had to think up a counter-unit. And I figured it out: the Deflective Pikeman.
The Deflective Pikeman is a Pikeman carrying a big, relatively lightweight wood-and-metal 'V'-shaped shield. I borrowed a principle from TaeKwonDo; you don't try to stop an incoming blow, you just move it out of the way. Arrows hit normal shields and the shields absorb the blows, eventually failing. But arrows would hit this shield and not stop; they would simply be redirected to the side a bit, just enough to miss the pikeman (this could be done with an effect like my AN unit's forcefield). Since they are carring such a big shield, they would be much slower than normal Pikemen, but they would have near-perfect defenses against Mounted Bowmen, Longbowmen, and Cavalry. But Knights would still whoop them, easily.
So the new ro-sham-bo goes: Longbowmen beat Knights and Pikemen, Cavalry beat Longbowmen and Knights, Pikemen beat Cavalry, Mounted Bowmen beat Pikemen, Longbowmen, Knights, and Cavalry, Deflective Pikemen beat Mounted Bowmen, Cavalry, and Longbowmen, but Knights beat Deflective Pikemen and Pikemen.
