Top 9 Worst Elite upgrades (AoE2)

[@atoucangirl]

SotL is just a massive advertisement campaign for blacksmith techs

[@250914616672152]

Spirit of The Blacksmithing

[@SvanTowerMan]

Make Army Values Great Again! Vote Blacksmith 2024!

[@Snipergod1024]

Smithing of the Law

[@drdiabeetus4419]

He’s being paid off by big blacksmith it seems.

[@Michael_Brock]

Sotl needs to cover AOE2 mobile game any good? Or waste of time?

[@NestorKYAT]

To be fair, if you're not planning on making like 150 karambit warriors, you might as well not make any

[@sevenpolar3483]

I disagree, in mass, you are almost always better off with trash militia. Karabits are a unit I make in castle age to protect elephants and archers before I get forced levy.

[@informitas0117]

They are the most fun unique unit imo,

[@informitas0117]

They are the most fun unique unit imo,

[@eRic-hr3yl]

@@sevenpolar3483 I see the karambits more as a raiding unit to send into the enemy eco, and trash militia to raze the frontline and slowly push into the enemy forward production

[@NestorKYAT]

@@sevenpolar3483 I mean, maybe, but it's not about effectiveness. It's about the satisfaction of showing to the enemy's base with 200 Zerglings

[@ChargingEve]

1:05 not to mention the zerglings here missing the adrenal glands upgrade

[@MadArcherJr]

Ong, so true

[@Mexican00b]

Also no banneling evolution chamber

[@2MeatyOwlLegs]

And no ling speed

[@farqadmajid]

💯 agreed

[@psssshhh7730]

Just zerg without creep, yo.

[@jacobwood3326]

The upbeat music with the top contender on the list always gets me with these “worst” lists hahaha

[@caccus2639]

technically being strong and having a bad elite upgrade just means that when it hits the field, it is almost FU and your resources can be spent elsewhere early on.

[@ethribin4188]

I like how you hammer in that the "bad" part mostly means "expensive & situational". Many people understand "bad" as "useless". When actually, it means "to situational" or "to high an oppertunity cost". Nothing is actually inherantly bad.

[@No1twelshy]

Idk have you ever had noravirus?

[@biocode4478]

these can be situationally good usually due to opportunity cost. karambit warrior upgrade might take a lot to be worth it but it is researched in enough time to make just 6 of them. it is not unusual for castles to be the limiting factor rather than resources, increasing population efficiency might be worth it. especially magyar hussars that just cost food. you'll be explicitly rate limited by stone while likely floating food

[@saffral]

The only truly useless techs are Coinage and Banking in 1v1s. Though Caravan is exceptionally situational in 1v1s too, only there for maps with a gaia market or if you're planning a gold heist.

[@dembro27]

Heated Shot. On a land map. I guess it’s situational, but if you never play water, it’s not.

[@Michaelonyoutub]

The chu ko nu upgrade comes very close to being actually bad, due to its attack speed reduction. Overall it actually is an upgrade, though only barely in some cases.

[@nicolaaffatati5355]

As italian my self, i should say that genoese crossbowmen should first of all renamed into pavise crossbowmen or in ancient italian language, Palvesari, and they should get more pierce armor and less move speed as default

[@llSuperSnivyll]

Should be renamed and split the Italians into multiple civilizations to represent the major states of the region.

[@nicolaaffatati5355]

@llSuperSnivyll indeed Sir, but you need to add hundreds of new civs in game in order to represent the full and aweome historical cultural differences in the medieval Italia, take a look to a Medieval 2 Total War's Mod called "Spicciolati d'Italia", there you will see a lot of intresting differences in the various Italians Signorie e Comuni!

[@Broken_robot1986]

Then everybody is going to be chiming in, erm actually.

[@godmarilputente7460]

This: - Genoese: similar current Italians civ, focus on ships and crossbows. UU: Genoese Crossbowman (anti-cavalry crossbowman). - Venetians: focus on ships, infantry and light cavalry, very strong trade bonus. UU: Fante da Mar (armour piercing heavy infantry), Galleass (slow, super heavy cannon ship). - Lombards: decent infantry, heavy cavalry and gunpowder, strong blacksmith bonus. UU: Carroccio (support-focused wagon). - Tuscanians: strong university, economy and market. Decent fleet, well rounded late army. UU: Feditore (medium cavalry, middle ground between knights and light cavalry in terms of cost and power). - Pontificians: amazing monastery (no heresy tech, though), strong infantry. UU: Swiss Guard (stronger, gold-costed halberdier).

[@nicolaaffatati5355]

@godmarilputente7460 and as good all non italian peoples, you only consider northen italy, i never understood this kind of discrimination, i.e.,every time a famous vip, or internetional singer makes his/her concert tour in italy they NEVER came in south italy, even if that is the absolute most beauty part of the nation!

[@thepersonwhocomentz]

Heard SotL mention zerglings in his video, saw WinterStarcraft bring up the AoE2 tech tree in a patch notes vid today. Nice to see even 20 years later AoE and Starcraft are still like RTS brothers.

[@kauly91]

Good Weather - ✓ Saturday - ✓ Coffee - ✓ Chocolate - ✓ SOTL new upload - ✓ nice? - ✓

[@Doktersocks]

Don't Malay get infantry armour for free?

[@sanmitranaik]

Hey guys, elite of the law here!

[@tau2791]

Guys Hey, Spirit of the here Elite!

[@troybernier2968]

​@neoplante wow, you're NOT miserable

[@IndexInvestingWithCole]

Is Chu Ko Nu the only one that can even be argued for being worse after the elite upgrade?

[@jiagengliu]

They are more effective against rams which can be quite helpful to protect your castle

[@Snipergod1024]

@@jiagengliu Yeah, but you've got pretty much any melee unit that'll do the job against rams just as well, so even that niche use isn't exactly great. The loss of fire rate due to slower reloads and overall mediocre damage means that you're still gonna lose that castle, unless you magically have a group of them sitting around. So I can't even defend them in that regard, sadly.

[@atoucangirl]

well the graphs still show a damage increase in all cases, plus creation speed is actually useful for a unit that needs to be massed, so they're not worse, just barely better

[@KSriram]

Paladin attacks slower than Cavalier.

[@Snipergod1024]

@@KSriram However the Paladin has noticeably higher stats with 40 extra hp, +2 in attack and +1 pierce armour. So the slower attack is offset by the improvements. Chu ko Nu does not. It gains 5hp, no extra damage and no extra armour. It gets 2 extra arrows that aren't guaranteed to hit, and only deal 1 damage each when they do.

[@DanielWood-v6y]

I noticed the underwhelming Samurai upgrade when I randomed them on Black Forrest the other day. Luckily my opponents were on Gbeto and Mangudai, so the extra anti unique bonus still made a big difference.

[@parthn-musicforwork4789]

You ransomed Samurai??? So modern day Samurai exist!! And you managed to kidnap them while simultaneously fighting modern day Gbeto and Mangudai, and also managed to get money for releasing them into a forest!! Wow!

[@guillemusic7]

I'd like to see that match, can I have your aoe2 user so I can download the replay?

[@DanielWood-v6y]

@@guillemusic7 AmericanDan

[@Dr.Macrophage]

How can Gbeto or Mangudai lose to Samurai 💀

[@tomscorpion6288]

@@Dr.Macrophage Also no idea. Can only see it on no attack stance :))

[@atoucangirl]

i want to see a video looking at units whose castle age versions are still viable in imperial (unique units and generic, like light cav), to see for which of them you can skip the upgrade entirely and still get decent value provided you get the other related techs

[@Vektordeformacio]

Light cav is really good. Crossbows CAN BE servicable, but you will feel the difference. Samurai is pretty good as regular, so is the Genoese and the Composite The Burgundian charge horseman is okay aswell.

[@atoucangirl]

@@Vektordeformacio you don't get it, i want to see NUMBERS and unit testing in the scenario editor. we've seen light cav/hussar several time, and the spearmen/pikes/halbs in the Turk video, and it makes me crave more.

[@jefffinkbonner9551]

@@atoucangirl The answer to all your questions is Teuton scouts in Imperial

[@atoucangirl]

@@jefffinkbonner9551 yes but what about castle Elephants in imperial? or fully upgraded non-heavy cav archers? or non-heavy camels, like Cumans have? or some of the units talked about in this video, which doesn't go into all the meticulous detail, and other unique units for that matter? i need to know

[@Tocaraca]

@@atoucangirl I think MikeEmpires did some videos like that. He showcased Persian longswords against all unique units

[@HiyokoSupiritto]

So the best thing to do is lowering the cost of most of these upgrades

[@pofdsjoijsodfjsoidf]

A key point in favour of elite karambits is that you have nothing else to spend your resources on, with armor being free and attack upgrades being not so expensive. You might be bottlenecked only by number of castles and not resources, so you might not be able to produce the extra 40 karambits. This is why elite is good.

[@Morgan_Black]

This is a very nice list for the devs to look into for future patches, since at least some of these seem to be this bad by accident/leftovers from previous balance changes.

[@CaesarCJ15]

1:53 good consideration but lacking knowledge by including infantry armor as total cost in bs upgrades since the civilization gets these for free, in fact the whole comparison that comes after makes no sense since you will get the upgrade regardless

[@annaairahala9462]

Genoese being the worse elite upgrade is something well recognized when doing 10x shared civ bonus lol. The bonus damage is alright if you're against a cav civ, but it's so little compared to every other civs bonuses that it's just pitiful, and the HP increase feels like a joke

[@MrDibara]

They should buff the Genoese Crossbow's Pierce Armor by +4 and give it a small +2 Bonus Damage against buildings. That ought to give it some more utility, as a siege helper or even a late game raider, sniping not only Villagers, but buildings as well.

[@ralfwolters3843]

​@@MrDibaraI really dont like that idea. +4 pierce amor would make it something like a rattan archer which feels a bit to much. Furthermore their raiding unit is the hussar. The genoese crossbow needs to be a stronger version of the arbalest which can do better against cav then the regular arbalest. Slight increase in attack speed or bonus damage might do that.

[@BouncerMcDayGreen]

@@ralfwolters3843 The +4 pierce might be a bit too much, but it would be in line with their design and historical utility. Pavise crossbowmen were attrition "archers". Amazing for sieging enemy settlements/fortifications, trading with enemy archers, as well as "sniping" enemy knights (full plate armour, infantry or on horse-back) with their very strong crossbows and armour piercing bolt tips. They were more or less the backbone of the army, capable of covering retreats, laying siege effectively (simulated defender's advantage even offensively), good defensive capabilities and overall very easy to train (there's no such thing as crossbowmanship). Keeping their attack as is (maybe only a +1 bonus damage vs buildings) is fine. Giving them more pierce armour is also fine, although +4 might be a bit much. Maintaining their cav damage is also good. Perhaps a smaller cav bonus damage compensated with a 20-25% armour penetration, to make it a bit more of a generalist (as genoese crossbowmen used to be then) would work, without turning it into either a Rattan or a Comp Bow.

[@pabloduarte1722]

5:05 YEEESS!! finally some justice for samurai #buffSamuraiEliteTech

[@gamesandstuff127]

60 Karabit Warriors seems pretty easy to jump into.

[@sonoffenix3399]

Don't ever use Zergling as derogatory, Cracklings have 40% faster attack, and that's on top of Metabolic Boost. They're one of the most costeffective and dangerous units in SC2

[@Ghost-qr6yh]

Hi, spirit of the law. I hope if you can make a video about the new Market update, and especially the Saracens market, since I play them a lot.

[@bwilson774]

I agree with your take on elite camel archers. I'd pickup maghrebi camels before the elite upgrade, as that also affects your melee camel units as well making them a more effective meat shield.

[@Mattroid99]

Elite upgrade gives you 1 more attack and its cost is comparable to the one of regular HCA. If anything is an amazing upgrade and should always be prioritized over Maghrebi Camels (The fact it affects regular camels doesn't matter much as those will usually engage and die, it mostly helps your Camel Archers to stay alive)

[@NivMizzet89]

I kind of reason the opposite way when comparing cost of unit vs upgrade. I tend value the upgrade more for cheaper units, as you're more likely to be able to afford more units to benefit from the upgrade (whereas with the expensive units it's harder to get enough to justify the upgrade).

[@IndexInvestingWithCole]

That’s not really how it works

[@UnDeaDCyBorg]

It's interesting to think that at some point, some of those upgrades gave extreme value, then most of that value was transferred for free to the base version, and now the upgrade sits there orphaned, but it's still the same price because making it cheaper would be a buff to a civ that might not need one at the time.

[@SIGNOR-G]

Once again this is the proof that either you split the italian civ or you buff it.

[@goaldhost]

How so?

[@SIGNOR-G]

@goaldhost they lack just a little punch to make them a deadly civ. Just a little.

[@daniloalves1139]

@@SIGNOR-G damn they are so deadly in my elo in my hands xD but yeah eco sometimes is bad

[@andrewwaldock9585]

Do Camel archer's heal faster in a castle with their elite tech?

[@indnwkybrd]

0:45 "age of vampires" in the captions lol 😆 Next campaign-only DLC predicted?

[@IowaShihTzu00]

Requesting community feedback on this idea: Make wonders more useful in non-wonder victory allowed games by (inspired by AoM:R & Civ. series): 1: give wonders the Feitorias resource trickle. 2: (with or without above #1) Additional powerful unique civ bonus only applied when built. [I suspect such a change would remain mod only or added with a far off 3rd remake like how unique tech's were added in in later remakes] I'm going to reply to this comment with some of the basic ability ideas I had for examples

[@IowaShihTzu00]

Aztecs: when an infantry or Xolotal unit kills an enemy unit they gain +15 current & max HP (up to 4 kills) Myan: Eagles, Xolotal, & Plumed archers move +10% faster & train +40% faster Inca: Land (non siege) units deal +20% bonus damage

[@IowaShihTzu00]

Franks: +1 attack & +1/+1 armor to cavalry units Huns: infantry & cavalry deal +2 to buildings, Tarken gain +4 vs buildings, siege, & monks Vikings: Infantry & Cavalry gain +10 resources for killing enemy land military units (food for infantry, wood for archers, gold for cavalry)

[@gletscherminze9372]

It woulb be a lot of work for a feature that will be rarely seen in standard games. But it sounds fun. Maybe make the wonder cheaper in non-wonder victory and this might work out.

[@HistoricalWeapons]

China should of had a elite single shot crossbow or firelance/grenadiers

[@supatrollinelectro3785]

I was specting conquistador be somewhere around here. Kind of relieved

[@林堅欣]

i somehow think some of the elite upgrades on the list are still worth picking up

[@pedrofelck]

I don't think the Magyar Hussar should be on this list, considering that is a "trash" unique unit, if you compare it to the hussar upgrade (that is a worse upgrade), it costs the same amount of gold and 300 food more.

[@masonfreedman2722]

As Always a great video!

[@Lord_Desert]

@SpiritOfTheLaw This would be the first video where I would have to disagree quite a bit with you in your ranking and reasoning, and I want to share why. But first of: You do fantastic, informative AND entertaining videos, something that is not an easy feat and I bow my hat to you for that! My ranking would be: (Not great, but ok - Tier) - 9. Samurai - 8. Kamayuks - 7. Camel Archer, - 6. Karambit (Meh - Tier) - 5. Maygar Huszar - 4. Ballista Elephant (Did my unit even change?! - Tier) - 3. Genoese Crossbow - 2. Chu Ku Nu - 1. Composite Bowman My reasoning is: "What is the impact of the upgrade and if it didnt get access to it, how bad would the unit be?" - The samurai upgrade gives a total of +4 against UUs, which are very often seen and players generally want to use their UUs. This plus 10hp makes the samurai, as a melee unit, more durable especially vs archers and lets them keep up as a general UU counter unit! They need this upgrade. - Kamayuks is a very special case, its "only" +4 against cavalery, which is already pretty good (50% increase), but their 1 range is the key here. If 20 vs 20 units are fighting, but only 10 of each can fight at a time, it doesnt matter if the 10 backline units have +99999 attack, all upgrades and a nuke. If they dont fight, they dont contribute. But the 20 kamayuks in this scenario can all fight on the frontline because of their range and their stats can contribute! Which is why even a minor increase is much more effective on them, hence why their elite upgrade brings more to the table than you would expected from the pur numbers! - Camal Archers need the +1 Attack because pierce dmg is very tightly balanced, them keeping the +1 over the norm is what makes them strong. They are not thrash without it, but to keep their identity and dmg output, its needed. - Karambit W. are rats, and what is more annoying than a rat that survives 1 hit? One which survives 2... But the +1 Attack is arguably more impactful. But you should have more units in the first place, so the extra hp and attack are not that needed, but still welcomed. - Maygar huzsar is though to rank, in a pur trash fight or as a trash unit, that you can throw at the backline/raiding, its a good upgrade. But as a UU its a bad, minuscule upgrade. - Why balista so low? Because they dont really care for the hp or the +1 attack. Its always nice to have, especially on expensive units, but as a raw improvement its not much! Its still a very expensive upgrade, I would rather have more units to reach a critical mass, which are also pretty expensive to get in the first place, if you had forgotten to get this upgrade, you wouldnt even notice it and nether the hp nor attack value upgrade are critical to the functionality of them. Only after I made like 40 of them, would I even think about upgrading them. - Genoese Crossbow and Chu Ku Nu both get a very good +5Hp to hold up much better against (a single) Onager. But their dmg and general survivablity does not change much. Why put Genoese above Chu Ku Nu? Because Genoese at least become better at killing one of the main threads to archers, cavalry, while elite Chu Ku Nu are not changing very much in that regard. - Without any doubt, the composite bowman upgrade has to be the worst upgrade. The worst upgrade has to be the one that (almost) doesnt do anything (*like fervor once upon a time). If you couldnt research this elite upgrade, would you even be able to notice that something is off? The strength of this unit comes purely from its ability and blacksmith upgrades, not its elite upgrade. Hence why this has to be the worst elite upgrade, maybe even the worst elite upgrade possible of all times, considering its mechanics. This would by my ranking and reasoning for it. Have a nice day^^

[@TheChristOOv]

I think it is interesting that you mention blacksmith upgrades when making comparisons because blacksmith upgrades will usually come in a trickle, whereas the elite stats all come in at once. Which could be important for timing attacks or switches, the same way I'd rather upgrade a unit line than get a blacksmith upgrade if I had to make that choice. (In reality, I'd be getting a unit upgrade and a blacksmith tech simultaneously, but that additionally bring about castle numbers Vs military building numbers) Super interesting video, I hope the unique units who have had part of their elite upgrade shifted to base stats can get another look at!

[@TheOhioNews]

Solid stuff Spirit 😊

[@mightyPants]

I don't even play AOE anymore but I still enjoy all the SOTL videos.

[@dylanfalk3243]

Love the zergling reference 🙂

[@DCdabest]

The other thing is that GenBows are already very good at what they do, despite the nerfs. So if you are going to Elite GenBow it's because you really need to kill cavalry, most likely cavalry archers, faster and going to Elite is to help you put down the enemies army that little bit faster.

[@ashwanikumarsingh3414]

Dont agree with the math here, like Karambits and Mag Huz - you WILL mass that tiny HP or + 1 attack will compund in mass battles ; Ballistas get 30+ HP - which is suppose to and will add extra shots from Melee units again a unit you will mass

[@doppelpunkt]

I just love this channel

[@BillyONeal]

1:10 Glad to see this is sponsored by Karambitcoin

[@Gigas0101]

I like how the number one spot on this list goes to a tech that seems to have been nerfed too hard, which says a lot about the pros and cons of how this game is balanced. It also says a lot about how all of this is just a waste of resources in the knight rush game, just build knights lol.

[@rovsea-3761]

I'm sorry, why aren't composite bowmen not top 2 here? You literally highlighted, when you talked about them, how chemistry + bracer matter so much more than the elite tech.

[@bluequiltedness]

Okay, so I got a question: Doesn't apply to this video (at the time I'm writing this), but can someone explain the youtube tradition of misspelling words in chapter headings? Just watched the "10 Best" Elite upgrades vid and the chapters were named things like "Tonic Knight" and "Hite Wagon." Lots of youtubers do this, but why?

[@SpiritOfTheLaw]

They're probably just auto-generated. The automatic subtitles are pretty hit or miss (it loves spelling arbalesters as "AR Blasters" for example). A lot of unit names don't seem to be in its dictionary.

[@bluequiltedness]

@@SpiritOfTheLaw Ah, so it's jank text to speech, not youtubers trying to be funny. Make sense. Some of them are pretty inadvertently funny though

[@EvilDoresh]

At least with the ones that look "bad" because the non-elite version has been buffed in the past, I'm beginning to see the wisdom of AoM and AoE3 making unit upgrades _percentage-based_

[@MrAnonymous00100]

SotL, have you compare some of those elite upgrade to same main units final upgrade? Like compare between camel archer and cavalry archer? Magyar hussar to normal hussar? Balista elephant to heavy scorpion? Maybe you find that cost and benefits doesn't much different.

[@lathamtk]

Wow, I thought elite conquistadors would be on this list.

[@Nazuiko]

+2 pierce attack, added anti-ram bonus, +15 HP, +0/1 armor is huge. Especially given, as a gunpowder unit, you cant get +2 pierce attack almost any other way

[@christopherdecock703]

Now we need the best and worst upgrades for X10 mod

[@fishcake4473]

Thank god i now know that i should get the infantry armor upgrade for my karambit warriors instead of the elite upgrade

[@Pixelbuddha_]

whats even worse is, if your opponent goes mass paladin against you being italian, they already outplayed themselves on the way there, and you should win before that paladins become an issue

[@JLotusss]

2:00 typo: should be +10hp , nice vid though

[@player_0184]

SOTL make it sound like those elite upgrade are not worth getting it when going imp but we all know that is always good to research them

[@TurboDiego37]

Yeah, but you should always prioritize the blacksmith techs first

[@JacketAndTie]

Composite should be #1, it's a completely worthless upgrade giving stats that an archer should not need. At least the genoese crowssbows gain some offensive power and are incredible for teamgames

[@JacketAndTie]

In addition, italian archers already benefit from extra armour, so the extra hp is more beneficial

[@volk551]

How much more dangerous would the cataphract be if they got blast furnace?

[@Jondiceful]

I would be interested to know why unit creation times didn't factor in. SOTL mentioned that he didn't have a way to factor that in. I'm curious as to what made that so difficult. From the outside looking in, I would have thought something so easily converted into data without the need for subjective interpretation would have been no problem at all. Clearly, something made that more complicated than it appears, or SOTL would have included it as he often does. So what happened?

[@hakonbrre804]

oh no, did you forget that Malay get the infantry armor for free? Elite Karambits without the last armor can't exist. But aliens do

[@micahbonewell5994]

Using number of units to express the value of an elite upgrade seems a poor metric. As it overemphasizes the value of upgrades for expensive units and under values it for cheap units. As I can easily find myself making 60 Karambit warriors. The unit is very cheap and only half a population. I think that metric needs to be scaled differently according to the base cost of the unit

[@SpiritOfTheLaw]

I get what you mean. I think I did take that into account, though, as purely by how many units you're set back by the elite upgrade Karabits take by FAR the longest, at 38 units. 2nd longest is Throwing Axeman with 23, and the median is 16, so Karambits were such an outlier by that metric I thought was worth mentioning to start the list.

[@P1ankt0nb0y]

​@@SpiritOfTheLaw Karambits are by all accounts half a unit, so the number can be thought of as closer to 19. It makes no sense to scale based on the costs, if a unit costs more you'll make fewer and if it costs less you'll make more. The Karambit upgrade is objectively very strong, and I was surprised to see it on this list.

[@micahbonewell5994]

​@@SpiritOfTheLaw Bu that doesn't pass the smell test, if you were to ask Viper or Hera if elite Karambit is a strong upgrade they would both say yes. Think about it this way: Bloodlines is a super strong upgrade, one of the strongest in the game (if not the strongest). If you have 19 knights on the field bloodlines gives you 380 extra HP (20 per knight) On the contrary if you 38 Karambits on the field the elite upgrade also gives you 380 extra hp (10 per karambit). Yet those 19 knights cost 1140f 1425g or 2565 total Res. Whereas those 38 Karambits only cost 950f 570g or 1520 total res. The Knights are also far more gold heavy.

[@micahbonewell5994]

@@SpiritOfTheLaw Another factor meddling with this is that Blacksmith upgrades in AOE2 are far too powerful compared to unit upgrades. That is one thing I strongly prefer about AOE3. Unit upgrades are far more powerful there, and Arsenal Upgrades, although useful are a secondary priority. It's very unintuitive. Which is why you always see low elo players getting unit upgrades, but never blacksmith upgrades. Even though a Knight with all blacksmith upgrades is better than a Paladin with no blacksmith upgrades. All these unit upgrades are going to seem very poor value compared to blacksmith upgrades.

[@micahbonewell5994]

@@SpiritOfTheLaw For example Throwing Axemen get 10 hp for the upgrade, but 38 throwing axemen (for the 380 HP) would cost 2090f and 950g or 3040 total Res

[@killyekfael4909]

I wonder how much of this video will still be true in a few years considering all the balancing that has been done to the game these last few years. :)

[@htjohn8202]

aaaah that's why the samurai shredded through my kamayuks +2 hidden bonus dmgs vs special units

[@Mondreus313]

Poor Cataphracts. Scorpions buff (Ballistics) really makes me wonder how (Heavy) Scorps compare to Crossbow / Arbalests on things like resource efficiency now. Romans are the most obvious, extreme comparison that's probably in favor of Scorps overall, but how are some other civs doing after the change? Slavs get a discount on them (less than Romans, but still a discount), Celts and Teutons have some unique buffs for them, Mongols I suppose as well. I am really scratching the head on Vikings though. Arbalests miss Thumb Ring after 20+ years of apparently being OP, now getting an expensive +1 Atk instead, and I'm really wondering if I'm better off skipping Archer-line upgrades and blacksmith techs for Scorpions in longer matches. Scorpions compared to Arbalests might be a neat video man.

[@JamesEck]

Don't the karambit warriors get the armor upgrade for free anyway?

[@lumanliu8457]

I think Chu Ko Nu upgrade may be better than the stats show. Chu Ko Nu is already among the highest HP foot archer units in the game. Considering the only and biggest counter unit to Chu Ko Nu is Mangonel, be able to have 5 more HP to survive a Mangonel hit is the most important thing you might need. After all, unlike melee unit, ranged unit only need one HP to provide damage output.

[@MrAnonymous00100]

I think Chu Ko Nu designed for add damage by garrison in tower / castle. Those slow reload time would affect attack speed while increase DPS per unit garrison. Historically, Cho Ko Nu designed for defend siege by shoot from wall and garrison.

[@LGM999St]

@SOTL Can you make AOE 2 vs History and its about El Cid? I like your Attila and Montezuma opinions...

[@alex_zetsu]

Ok I personally think you should just toss out cost into consideration when rating technologies since the upgrade will be divided over N units where N is however many you make for the rest of the game, but if you do count cost, 100 food for 50 gold is _not_ the Imperial Age market price.

[@LetsbeHonestOfficial]

Random idea. Say you use a large map, put a production building (be it castle, barracks, stable etc.) on each side of the map. Then put the buildings on constant production where you set the produced units to go to the other side to give us a visual representation of production speed as the lines of units walk across naturally equidistant from each other. Just to measure the effect of production speed over distance with a nice visual. You could pit the opposite sides against each other to see the accumulative effect of out-production. Goths could especially be interesting. The walking speed of the units would ofc come in to play, and the resources needed to keep the stream going etc. Also test the effectiveness of bunching up units vs sending a constant stream.

[@paulmustermann8398]

Hi great Video. Could you do a unique unit counter video for 2024 pls

[@belzebubukas]

Ngl, I don't get the whole "sets you back N units"... You seem to look at upgrades in terms of how much fractionally they improve the units (or at least that makes sense to me), so regardless of whether you make 5 or 500, it's still the same percentage improvement in strength. And the cost in resources is just a number (and recourse type I guess)

[@joedalton155]

Karambitcoin value still pretty low it seems

[@jefffinkbonner9551]

Lol 😆

[@87JJosh]

First time I am not surprise by the No.1

[@inductivegrunt94]

Cataphrats are such a cool unit. It's sad that it costs so much to have it reach its full potential. But the unit is still really good and I go for the Elite upgrade should I have the resources available for it.

[@Berengar92]

This video brought to you by the smithing guild.

[@KSriram]

I don't understand the metric measuring the number of units the upgrade sets you back. All units don't have the same per-unit power level making this not an apples to apples comparison.

[@Marky_Mark__]

1:57 should be +10 hp based on 1:20

[@SpiritOfTheLaw]

lol I somehow found the worst way of combining +10 HP and +33% HP into a single number.

[@daarom3472]

must disagree with many points on this list. +1 attack for camel archers is huge, especially vs their main counter the Paladin it means they do 25% more damage. Elite karambits dont exist without plate mail so its not a valid comparison. The extra hp on them is huge. Magyar Huszar upgrade is only done when you considering spamming them in ultra late game rather than Hussar. It means you wil make a looot of them. Its a bit more expensive than Hussar but gives extra attack on top of extra hp.

[@MegamnZero]

i disagree about elite chukonu, cuz it makes them able to survive a mangonel shot. its so valuable

[@Mattroid99]

Respectfully I think you are undervaluing the impact of an Attack bonus in the Elite Upgrades for ranged units, it's clearly not equal to the other stats and any extra damage you can dish is super important. Camel Archers, for instance, go to 8 attack and the upgrade cost is very comparable to Heavy Cavalry Archer in terms of its cost. Is an amazing upgrade and should absolutely be prioritized before Maghrebi Camels (Which is an "extra" you get to ensure your Camel Archers mass stays healthy in a long game). Same deal for Ballista Elephants, the upgrade is both comparably cheap and adding HP and especially attack is all you can ask for. Sidenote, but I think Elite Karambit is an amazing upgrade, perhaps it got very much penalized by your calculation because it's a swarm unit with low stats, so the Elite can give you a lower value when looked at face level. They also get free armor, so your argument is just very very confusing.

[@rastelmagister]

Spirit of the rage using those techs XD

[@ryanforgo3500]

7:45 i have to disagree with you here COMPLETELY for a logical reason "bear with me i am a nerd like you :p" for starters if we are to talk about the Unique units upgrade value it should be in the context of what are the alternative for those unique units. meaning we have to compared composite bowmen functionality and all else as you did , but then compare them to arbs because arbs are the alternative for the civ. and then decide if it's better go to with arbs for that civ or go with the composite bowmen. based on that comparison we can decide if composite bowmen are better or worse than other unique units. with that in mind, when it comes to magyar huszar, we would be comparing them to generic hussar. and 1:1 magyar hussar upgrade FAR exceed normal hussar upgrade in value precisely because of the 1 extra damage. and the logic behind my argument is that with how low the attack of hussar is, even the lowest armor untis in teh game take out a VERY big part of hussars damage which is primarily why they are weak. so we ccould for example argue that even 3 amor "as the lowest possible FU armor of a unit" will take normal hussar from 11 to 7 and 11 is about 58% higher than 7. so if hussar upgrade added 1 damage it would have been a GREAT DEAL. on that note, a paladin coming with 5 armor will almost cut hussar's damage in half. in case of magyar hussar vs elite magyar hussar "vs what's mentioned above" normal magyar hussar is gonna set at 13 damage, doing 10 damage on targets with 3 armor but 8 damage to paladins and yes there are targets more armoured than generic paladins anyway. so elite magyar hussar will give us 10% dmg boost vs the lowest armor targets and about 13% against a paladin. ofc we could also argue against things like roman infantry with 6 armor and even two handed swordmen for bulgarians and in such situations the elite upgrade will become HUGE VALUE but i won't focus on niche cases like that. but generally speaking the point i am trying to make here is that the stats elite magyar hussar is getting are important because it's a trash unit thaat can put up a fight with gold units. so the elite upgrade chould be taken based on factors but primarily for the purpose of squeezing your opponent out of gold without spending any gold on your own. but again i guess what i am trying to say here, the comparison should be with normal hussar and magyar hussar upgrade commpared to normal hussar is FAR better and if we look at those upgrades values in comparison of what alternative those civs have, then yes elite magyar hussar is insane value compared to hussar.

[@riccardocorradini6713]

Geno xbows should Hey something like +1/+1 armor or +1 Attack, +1 MA

[@NtK0000]

Persians re skinned review next

[@nathanfranks1476]

I though malay got their infantry armor for free? I guess doesn’t include Katambits?

[@SpiritOfTheLaw]

They do, which is why I called the elite karambit warrior without the last armor "theoretical". It was mostly just to point out how the elite upgrade is relatively expensive compared to other imperial age techs with similar net effects, but I probably could have been more clear in retrospect.

[@dhelsel89]

Why talk about Karambit warriors armor upgrade costs when Malay get them for free?

[@MetalKingII]

Wait, elite genoese does no longer give the faster fire rate? Wth?!

[@olorinistar9903]

Secret #0: Elite Xolotl Warrior :P

[@dragovern]

Did SOTL forgot that malay have free armour?

[@Sosuke0727]

I thought I was going to see conquistador here 👀

[@5cmain207]

Your measureing mechanism is off. An upgrade like the karambit upgrade should be one of the most value upgrades not the worst for the reasons you specified. If a unit is very cheap, you can make a ton of it, if you have a lot of units of a certain type, that means that an upgrade gives more value not less. So if the unit is expensive, the upgrade has to be cheap while for a cheap unit the upgrade has to be expensive as you are making more of it. This is why hussar can get away with being so expensive as you make a ton of hussars. This is the reason why we see hussar so much more often than paladin, because you make a lot more hussar. So a unit being cheap should contribute to the upgrade being more effective given that it will effect more units.

[@tilmanr.3299]

Bottom 9 upgrades.

[@DimaErmakov97]

Worst one is cataphract. 1 pierce armor on elite is extremely dissappointing.

[@hoangtrunganh]

Zerglings !!!!!

[@killerchicken750]

Don’t Malay get infantry armour techs for free?

[@griddmeirax]

1:03 starcraft video when

[@jarmoksvk]

I guess composite bowman upgrade is really cheap, but it's that the worst upgrade stat-wise? At least dishonorable mention IMO.

[@matthiasvandekerkhove3594]

Where's the conquistador?

[@borwinschenck8873]

Comparing elite karambits w/o last amor with normal karabits with last amor is funny because malay get amor for free so you can not have elite karambit w/o amor in a normal game.

[@DubStepNMany]

Squarespace?

[@georgeprchal3924]

I'll still never understand why Byzantines have Paladins when Cataphracts are arguably better every way.

[@hylje]

Byzantines: no longer have Cavalier or Paladin. Logistica: in addition to giving trample damage for cataphracts, upgrades knights to (elite) cataphracts. Give more pierce armor to cataphracts to make them even less counterable.

[@EvilDoresh]

Possibly a reference to the Sack of Constantinople