Haeduan suggestions

Hello,

I have noticed that gaul hammers, especially after the implementation of horse drinking through, are quite weak. Siege is ok balanced because the trebuchet is still quite good, even if expensive (particulary in a WW hammer cost shouldn't be an issue). And siege is optional imo, some people just want to have some fun attacking around, not train a WWK.

The problem lies within their heavy cavalry, haeduans, in my oppinion. (If you want to skip my description of haeduans, just go to the red text paragraph)

They are a great unit by itself, but you don't actually get to use them in both of the fields they excel. As defenders against cavalry, they are good but you will rarely see them because of the huge cost. You can get the same amount of anti cav deff points by building a few phalanx, much cheaper. Of course there is the situational case when an ally needs fast help, but let's be honest: how many times they've asked for anti-cav defense? A few spears from a close teuton can do that job much better, even phalanx. I rarely see that happening.
When we take a look at haeduan, it is not:
-spammable. It's very expensive and doesn't train fast either.
- It has the worst attack per crop of all heavy cavalry (considering romans have HDT). Defense per crop is decent, but as I stated earlier, people don't usually build them for defence because of the enourmous costs and even better alternatives (spears win on efficiency).
- They are good in the gaul hammer because they make it nearly immune to ghosting.
- Their speed is ok. Can raid a bit, though vastly overshadowed by TT.

What we end up with is a mediocre unit like the lego, good-at-all but not the best at anything. Well, they are the best gauls have. But here lies the problem. The other heavy cavalry are just way superior.

Some would say versatility is also a factor, but I wouldn't agree. Lego is the most balanced unit in the game, it has both attack and defense in roughly equal amounts, yet almost no one builds it because most people can gather spears or phalanx from other people and do a much better job. Or train imperians and again do a much better job.

Ideas to fix the Haeduans:

1. Give them +5 attack. Maybe even +10, and they would still be behind the teutonic knight in terms of offense/day. this would only benefit hammer builders and nothing else

2. Reduce their training time by a little. this would also only benefit hammer builders, but a larger amount of haeds means also a possible bigger moving defence, if the hammer builder chooses to send them as defense.

3. Make them cheaper. This would allow them to be built more often as defenders, thus making that nice anti-cav deff useful. (and please don't reduce only the wheat cost, we can't all afford to NPC in 3 villages every day :D) This would benefit both attack use and defense use of haeduans. Cheaper means they can be trained earlier in your hammer village. It also means they would become a somewhat viable to be trained defensive unit. It would also make the game a little more fun, who doesn't like to build badass heavy cavalry? If they are cheaper, (noobs like me)/people can train them more often.

Number 1 and 2 should do a pretty good job in closing the gap between gaul hammers and others, while number 3 would make them use their defensive role more often.

Please tell me what do you think about it.

Tineren wrote:

My question is: Do we really want all three tribes to be equal at all aspects of the game?
I would love it if either Praets or Legos could move at speed 7 like the other infantry defenders, or if Romans had a cavalry defense unit. But they don't, and I accept that slow defense is Roman deficiency. Gauls are the best defenders in the game, but the downside is they are the worst attackers. Not that their attack is bad, they can build 90% as much offense as a Roman (at a bit over 90% of the price). I certainly think they can build a viable WWK (the biggest variable in hammer power is the player running the account, not the tribe choice).
While I agree that Haeds shouldn't be considered a defensive unit, don't discount the ghost protection. When I'm looking for a target to ghost, I actively avoid Gauls, especially if they have Haeds. I've also seen Gauls sacrifice most of their hammer to stop a hammer chiefing.
If I were to change the haeds, my suggestion would be to play to the current Gallic strengths: Make them speed 15. They are already the fastest "heavy" cavalry, but the HDP means Romans can make more attack/day with the speed 14 EI, with less total upkeep. With the speed bumped up, they would be a more viable ghosting alternative to the TTs. Though my favorite Gaul offense boost suggestion is not for haeds at all, but rather to make Trebuchets speed 4. That would emphasize the gallic offense standard of "mediocre but quick" (but clearly as compensation Praets should become speed 6 :))

To be honest, I don't see them as the best defenders but rather as the best solo(simmer) defenders. They have defensive units wich are balanced and fairly spammable (imo, the druids are quite cheap for their effectiveness in my oppinon). They are pretty easy to be played defensive but that doesn't always make them the best defenders.
I can always put out more defense points in the end with teutons, because they can always build a couple hundred/thousand clubbies for casual raiding on semi-active farms, without worrying about losses. With gauls, you have TT but if someone decides to put up a hero or some form of defensive, it's going to hurt you. Clubbies carry almost as much as TT at quarter the price. They don't need to be researched, any new village can spam a couple of these and start raiding. With TT, you actually have to invest the raid profits into more TTs instead of boosting your anvil (most of the time, or maybe I'm just a really unlucky guy when it comes to raiding with gauls). Sword is just too slow to be considered a raider. Teuton defense isn't great alone in terms of infantry deff, but it can also be used to raid inactives much better than gaul def. I don't play romans (tried once, I don't like them), but I know these guys hurt your army when they leveled up the wall and have a chunk of praets. Even TT ghosts have a hard time chopping through praets with a lv20 wall. I think each tribe has a capable defensive and they compliment each other really well (the praets could indeed gain a +1 speed boost).

On the other hand, teutons were the only viable option as offensive style before the HDT. Since the introduction of that, the 2 tribes are roughly equal and I often see them both as top attackers. Can't say the same about gauls. Sure they have the ghost hammer, wich is amazing, but these days I often see roman ghost hammers doing a much better job, simply because of the sheer power of imperatoris. And unlike some people say, speed isn't everything. It is great, but what if the dude already has some defence there on his own? At least imperatoris will pack a punch unlike TT who die like flies when some defense shows up. This is just my oppinion though, I'm open to suggestions from the pros. (I play this game for many years but I haven't really spent all my time with it, thus weak results overall on the offensive side. I am pretty happy about my defensive play).

What boosts I'm proposing here won't make gauls the best tribe. Even with +5 attack and a slight reduction in training time for haeduan, they will still be the worst hammer builders. But the gap won't be so big. As far as I've seen, 90% of people who play gauls don't even bother building offense because a roman or teuton can just do it much better. But I see every tribe building defense. I haven't seen anyone yet who refuses to build praets just because their speed sucks. That's what I'm trying to say. Gaul hammers are pretty obsolete right now.