A Quick Observation About Armor Upgrades | AoE2

[@Henkersman1]

This is one the reasons why atlatl and imperial skirms are so strong. Unless you have Turk hussar or Paladin they are twice as effective. Knowing what to upgrade when, is something I obsess over.

[@Igor369]

"Your archers are trash Aztecs!" "Hold my atlatl fellow Vietnamese ally" - "It is over champion! I have the high ground!" - Aztec Imperial skirmisher with Tatars ally "You underestimate my HP" - low ground champion

[@holyn8]

skirm is the best unit in the game.

[@justincronkright5025]

@@Igor369 Tanky Vietnamese Imperial Skirmishers in the front line with Powerhouse Aztec Imperial Skirmishers in the back!

[@TheKobasen]

Which is why Turks armor bonus is so good despite only give you +1 piece armor because you can survive more often against archers or TC attack.

[@valger3652]

@ПИПУПА 24 Generic TC have 5 attack with max 10 arrows per attack (only teuton TC have 15 arrows). Max damage per shot is 30hp to generic scout and 20hp to turks scout. So turk scout can survive 2 direct hits from TC.

[@richardbos4696]

How much hitpoints equal +1 armor?

[@TheKobasen]

@@richardbos4696 it's quite hard to explained it mathematically. 50HP with 0 armor, against 5 attack 5x10=50 You need 10 shot to kill it. 50HP with 1 armor, against 5 attack 4x13=52 You need 13 shot to kill it. 50HP with 2 armor, against 5 attack 3x17=51 You need 17 shot to kill it. 0 armor = 5x10=50 (+0HP) 1 armor = 5x13=65 (+15HP) 2 armor = 5x17=85 (+20HP)

[@richardbos4696]

@@TheKobasen Nice explanation

[@jefffinkbonner9551]

Given all the buffs to infantry lately, especially long swords, I think the easiest way to buff infantry without breaking them is to quicken their armor upgrade times to be what fletching, bodkin, and bracer currently are and lengthen the upgrade times for those 3 upgrades. That way, infantry armor is always a little bit ahead of archer attack upgrades.

[@lolmaster3200]

Hello Hera, very interesting as usual. In some cases, perhaps armor is also not as useful? E.g. a camel has 0 base pierce armor. If you add 1 armor to it, the 4 damage archer does 3 damage to it (25% reduction), which is less than the 50% reduction that a knight with 2 base armor gets from +1 armor. It's still very valuable to get the armor on your camels, but the marginal benefit of +1 more armor is not as high as with knights. It seems to me that the closer your unit's armor is to the attack, the more valuable adding +1 armor is. In an extreme case, if you had a 6+4 arb against a 0 base pierce armor camel for some reason, adding +1 pierce armor on the camel would only lead to 10% reduction of damage, or a 10% increase in necessary units to one-shot the camel.

[@lotfj]

If I'm not mistaken Hera made the video to hightlight the cases in which armor is massively effective to have. What you're saying is true. It is how people most commonly think of armor. The video is more of a 'hey look at these specific cases where uograding armor is huge' I think.

[@The_Stray_King]

Nice, never thought about it that way. So, it's basically +1 armor against every shot instead of +1 against total shots. When you visualize it in this way, you can really see how much damage armor reduces. Thanks for the video!

[@allanasher1790]

Hera; Always humbly trying to improve and teach others what he learns. Deep respect for your craft and work.

[@LokirofRoriksted]

Also worth mentioning that this mostly applies to similar damage vs armor units. Conquistador dealing 16 damage per shot on a knight with 2 or 4 pierce armor doesnt change all that much in a battle. It would change from 9 to 10 conquistadors required to 1shot a knight. A single armor upgrade for the knight already jumps from 9 to 10 conquistadors required

[@Beetil]

I'm glad you explained it this way. It's a great way to look at it. Many beginner players will always go for damage bonuses first without realising the armour bonus is going to make a massive difference in situations such as what you explained.

[@Lightning_Lance]

The term for this is incremental advantage: the more armor you have, the better every additional point is. Another good example of this is resistances in RPG games, especially arpgs. If you go from 0 resistance to 1 resistance, that's just a 1% difference in how much damage you take from that damage type. But if you go from 98 resistance to 99, now you are taking half the damage you were before. So it's actually a 50% difference. And if you go from 99 to 100, it's an infinite difference because you go from taking some damage to not taking damage at all. And that's why most games make it so you can't get 100% resistance.

[@nilayvyas668]

Thank you for all of the great content!! You have really been killing it lately. My guess is that you know, but if you have any doubt, you are providing the best content for Aoe2 right now. Please keep it up!

[@AGoodLittleSub]

Interesting, I had the habit to sometimes even overinvest too early into upgrades when numbers should have been the priority and switching should have been kept as options, as I always heard Vipy, T90, Dave and Nili talk so much about armour upgrades. That just lead me to often invest a huge amount of res into armour upgrades in faulty read situations. General rules of thumbs I feel like are somewhat confirmed by my outsiders view on your and other Pros games and commentary, could be: If you are going for Melee v. Range, armour is typically preferable. If you go melee v melee w/o bonus dmg armour or attack are mostly interchangeable (tactical decision of "do I want to kill potential counter units more quickly or survive longer under tc fire whilst raiding or such). When going melee vs melee with bonus damage, most of the time attack will be preferable. When going melee with bonus damage vs melee, often armour will be preferable if e.g. your unit can give of one more hit with massive bonus damage. With ranged units, attack upgrades almost always are to be preferred, as your collective damage output outweighs individual survivability, increasingly so due to your range increasing with fletching, bodkin and bracer. Only exception for this I can think of is in combination with the rule before with castle age elite skirms, but still, only very situationally. And then, unit combinations and detailed situations, where you will just mostly not do the math on the fly can fuck all that up (e.g. you have pikes vs. knights, where depending on the knights upgrades, getting your armour upgrades can be completely ineffective due to the numbers or make you survive another hit), then either you just now the calculations on the fly, or have to hope you intuit the situation correctly. 11 Edit: Aaand I just remembered you did a video on "when to get which upgrade" and my small rule of thumb essay was probably fully wasted here 11

[@Fitzibutzi]

I think you are right. For example it makes just a huge differents if you have +2 armor or +1 armor on your kts, when you fight against xbows or dive into the tc.

[@carlpult5235]

It's a very good point, I'd say it boils down to how many hits unit A needs to kill unit B(or rather how quick it is dispatched or can retaliate). If your attack oneshots an enemy that enemy seldom has the chance to strike back at all, so your side ideally stays fully intact and instead of trading they just wasted the unit(unless there was some tactical/positioning advantage to be bought from that). While armour upgrades only contribute a few points compared to the healthpool, attack values are in the same ballpark, so they influence how many hits a unit can sustain and consequently survive to hit themselves. We like to think in Hitpoints but tactically the important metric is how many hits a unit can take. Still that does not keep me from forgetting my upgrades X(

[@Spink_Prime]

I like how this video is about armor, so he uses a knight and an acher, but he still has a random ass scout in the video. Hera and his SC, classic.

[@dearestcomrade8638]

Stop providing such easy, informative content! You are educating my enemies! 1k elo is already so hard, stooooop!

[@dougler500]

Something else that might help drive this home for some people, especially when thinking about the effectiveness of certain blacksmith upgrades and how to value them in a given situation: Consider the relative increase in attack or defense, but this applies especially with armor because the values are generally low. If your unit has 0 melee armor and you get +1/+1 then you've just given them a massive increase to their defenses whereas getting the attack upgrade on a unit with 6 attack is about a +15% increase in attack. One of these may give you a better deal and in feudal age when money is tight and you can only pick one upgrade thinking about this might help you decide whats worth it.

[@IndexInvestingWithCole]

That’s an ok way to think about it but doesn’t really make sense. You would think about the % increase based on what you’re fighting against. If you’re fighting something with 5 melee armor, the attack upgrade would double your damage.

[@gletscherminze9372]

Damn! I did expect this to be common knowledge. I thought these powerspikes are the major reason to get armor over attack upgrades. Some of them are very relevant: Tc fire with no fletching (pretty common in a cav vs cav game) do 1 dmg per shot to +2 Knights or light cav. And castle age crossbows do 1 dmg if you get +4 on knights or light cav. Skirms with armor also take only 1 dmg from archers with fletching in feudal and same goes for elite skirm with +2 armor vs crossbow with bodkin arrow. Scorpions have also one P-Armor more than the mangonel, which lets them hit that sweet spot vs cav archers in castle age. And there are a lot more of these interactions...

[@Freeman-bt9od]

Thanks bro for this! As a newish player I've always wondered exactly how much difference armour is!

[@arcan762]

Best player in the world realising basic math about the game...

[@benmcm77]

This is why I love any unit that can reach 8/9 pierce armor. Tatars genitours with silk armor (9 pierce armor) take 1 dmg instead of 2 from arbalest. One of my favourite team game dreams.

[@danielwynalda6700]

11. Hera discovering the power of math

[@davidmolina-lx6zf]

awesome videos man! you improve with every video you make! arena tierlist was amazing! luckily you stick to aoe2, hope you are enjoying Argentina.

[@thays182]

Great to be aware of from a practical standpoint.

[@pbsoccer2]

I would almost never voluntary engage with Knights unless I have +2 armor. If you can keep your knights alive until you get +2 you get a lot better value for them.

[@vedocorban]

Funny this video drops just after I managed to make a burmese howdah elephants strategy work aganist ethiopians in Castle Age. Feels good man.

[@alanmillis6998]

Another thing to look at is when armor is not worth it. Skirm v Skirm in fuedal age for example the skirms are already doing 1 damage to eachother. Adding armor does nothing there and just slows down castle

[@ThatGuanfranco]

I have only one news years resolution year: Watch every discussion video by Hera

[@Combinebobnt]

prostagma

[@derikaem8021]

For me armor upgrade is the main incentive to age up when playing against archers. Even swordsmen counter xbow if they get last armor

[@booradley6832]

Synopsis for anyone too lazy to watch 3 minutes of video- Armor techs give a linear gain on the stat card (3+1, 3+2, etc) but give a multiplicative or even a (figuratively) exponential gain on the damage sheet- ex. 5 max ranged damage vs 0 armor goes from 5 all the way down to 1 at level 3 armor, if its physical it still scales from 5 to 2. This makes scenarios where when fighting primarily low base attack enemies (Skirms, Archers, Halberdiers, Chakram throwers) with high base attack ones, (Knights, basically any melee unit that isnt a Halberdier or Karambit Warrior) putting those armor upgrades earlier in your priority list will pay dividends.

[@smashenYT]

Yes armor is important! So full tripple wall it is, on Black Forest and some towers because as we all know a good offensive is also a strong defense 🤡

[@NapKingCole84]

I should really take some time to look at common matchups and study armor (knights vs xbows). I see the numbers and upgrades, but I don't really think about the damage that can be done to my units in battle.

[@SchlomoGoldbergstein]

SotL chads, we had this one on our minds already, didn't we

[@Umdeuter]

Same same but different conclusion: against high attack units like gunpowder or siege, armor upgrades are usually pretty useless And attack upgrades are suuuper key for low attack units (Karambits, Chakrams) but almost useless for high attack units (Elephants, Leitis)

[@fubaohong]

I will upgrade my cavalry armor more early.It just saves my unit efficiently.Especially knights are so expensive in early castle age.I don't want to lost anyone if i can.

[@snack711]

for turk scout line armor is more important than bloodlines when fighting archers.

[@mitochondrium2648]

Hera of the Law

[@IndexInvestingWithCole]

It’s unfortunate that I can’t put your tips into use since I crash in feudal age every single game since the newest patch. 6 crashes out of 6 games, can’t even play.

[@DGrin1]

Tldr: think in percentages when considering how upgrades change unit performance

[@Cacun]

Ok…. Now KZbin do your magic coz this vid at 3am is way too much, gonna re visit with a fresh mind 😅

[@kennygpokerstrategy4917]

Oh wow man, 100k soon. LFG

[@FlymanMS]

Armor is important but have you heard of that funny looking guy called Obuch?

[@bizzhat]

would you happen to have an observation on the speed of various units?

[@navaro5265]

how to control blue and red units? for example if I want to play for fun in editor?

[@hikatoyshi]

I understood that thanks to Spirit of the Law.

[@IndexInvestingWithCole]

I always felt like commentators underplayed the importance of this. Armor upgrade generally means doubling your HP

[@superstar5042]

It doesn't doubles you hp. It depends a lot what unit are you facing. If you are fighting as knights vs camels armor do almost nothing. And commentators always saying that upgrades are huge.

[@AGoodLittleSub]

In Castle Age, it almost never means double HP as long as your opponents have their upgrades in significant fights. Knights, LC, or others with 2 base PA will receive 5 dmg without armour from Xbows with bodkin arrow, 4 with the firdt armour, 3 with second. That's significant, but this sentiment - that these upgrades basically double your HP and are to be preferred over everything else - or comparable lead to me heavily overinvesting into upgrades at too early - as such too low eco - stages several times at moments in which numbers would have been more important in hindsight. In my case that was actually pushed by T90 and Dave as well as Vipy since they, as I experienced it, almost every second game someone went for cav pointed out missing armour upgrades and in many cases said, that the belated timing was the reason for a game win or loss. But I guess those differing experiences can come down to a mixture of confirmation and selection bias (for both of us, as in, I overestimate the importance they give it as my impression is that they talk often and extensively about armour and also now think of all casts they went on and on about those whilst unintentionally ignoring those in which that didn't happen where it should. And vice versa ofc) As always with AOE, it's highly situational and about timing, even in situations which feel like they have a super easy rule to follow. Bc that's mostly just wrong. Having rules of thumb helps ofc, and having "I'm playing Scout v. Archer or Knight v. X-Bow, I should get armour sooner than later.", is absolutely a good base thought to always have in mind of course (as long as they aren't Genoese, no armour will ever save you then).

[@richardbos4696]

What about hitpoint upgrades like bloodlines?

[@justxavier9999]

No amount of archer upgrades will save the Celtic archers against my army of heavy Aztec cavalry

[@irvindalacourt7178]

nice video but i am still sad we dont actually se the units fighting 11

[@edman3d593]

an interesting consequence of the low value numbers

[@nelsonmejiaslozada9362]

armor upgrades are key when u are pike vs camel.

[@GoldenArcher823]

swag

[@richardbos4696]

How much hitpoints upgrades equal +1 armor?

[@crownofglory1264]

Imagine a new civ where archers ignore armor 😮

[@SufferToResist]

Hera, can i contact you somehow?

[@Ratciclefan]

Good knowledge

[@dovecar6605]

if i have knights and opponent has knights, should i upgrade armor or attack 1st?

[@IndexInvestingWithCole]

Armor

[@nachoantunez]

Usually, in melee combats is said that att up is better. If you are kt vs kt and your enemy doesnt have full upgrades is better in terms of cost to upgrade +1 att and +1 armor. The effect is the same than upgrading +2 armor with no att, but its cheaper and needs no gold

[@foxnyl4141]

If you sense the opportunity to raid some vills with them, then the +1 attack can be a big game changer, otherwise going for armour first is the more standard approach. Though if you truely would only fight knights, one could argue that it doesn't really make that much of a difference, unless you have different amount of knights. If you have less then your opponent, then getting the armour first is even more important, as you benefit every time you get hit, but if you have more knights than your opponent and want to take a fight, then attack upgrade can again be the better priority, as you benefit everytime one of your unit attacks. There are more things to consider, but "it depends" is probably the best answer and - if in doubt - going for armour first with cav seems to be a good decision.

[@danielwynalda6700]

The answer as always is it depends. Depends on both what you and your opponent already have and who has more numbers. But the short answer is probably to just get whatever is cheaper.

[@TheRomanAoE]

If you have an opportunity to kill villagers, forging will make your knights strong enough to kill them in 4 hits instead of 5. That could mean the difference between an unsuccessful raid and a very good raid. If the villagers are protected by Town Centers, however, getting the +2 pierce armor is advisable as TCs won't to as much damage to your raiding knights. Obviously, having +2 armor and +1 attack is optimal but not easily achievable.

[@Diego0wnz]

Foot Archers need a buff

[@TheRomanAoE]

No they're strong enough at the moment.

[@brucedavidson3881]

Knock off spirt of the law

[@dabbott1502]

"Mom, can we get some _Spirit of the Law_ ?" "We have _Spirit of the Law_ at home" -Spirit of the Law at home-

[@lewisjones4610]

Wtf…