Most Under/Over Rated RTW unit?

I confess gladly i don't play vanilla or anyvanilla promoting mods; I play the Dominus Mod for RTR. But i can still give my opinion.

Overrated:

Horse Archers:

They are good units yes but players talkf of using 100% HA armies. HA's, like msot light cavalry, cna be owned by heavy archer fire in return or even Legion Pila. The fact is HA's are pwoerful supplements but they are not the sturdy structure to build an army off of. Even if you do exploit the stupid AI with them its still no fun at all.

Underrated:

Falxmen. They have massive atatck and are extremely tough troops to go head t o head with. When i amde a brief foray into the good ol' Balkans Barbarians, the Flaxmen dominated the hard-hitting section of my army.

Overrated: Praetorian/Urban Cohorts

I'm not saying these guys aren't good; I'm saying that in many cases they're just overkill. Early and regular Legionary Cohorts can do all the things they can, can be present in greater numbers because they come earlier and they're vastly cheaper, and take less time to make (2 turns as opposed to 1). They're nice if you can recruit and financially support them in bulk, but I'll take a full stack of Legionary's plus supporting troops instead of having a half-stack of Urbans plus supporting troops.

Underrated: Eastern Infantry and Gothic Cavalry

I'll admit that I'm partial to the way these units simply look. However, Eastern Infantry make superb garrison units because of their cheap cost and great numbers when you stack them in your square, where they won't rout. Routing is why most people don't, or even can't, use them, but the "Poor Morale" trait is not only unfair, but hardly accurate historically. Remove them, and suddenly they actually have value on the field (so long as used en masse, which is something I think most people don't understand about them). As for Gothic Cavalry - I never, ever see anyone talk about them in any context, which I find bizarre because they're simply awesome heavy cavalry. During my Germania campaign, I never bothered with Berserkers or Nightraiders (or whatever those things are called) when I was fighting Rome - give me some Chosen Archer Warbands and Gothic Cavalry over those guys any day.

Extremely valid point about those Eastern Infantry. In RTR as Mercs their mental stats are:

stat_mental 20, disciplined, highly_trained

And are steadfast troops. Great garrisons especially for infantry poor people like Parthia.

Overrated? Pretorian Cohorts.

Underrated? Numidian Cavalry.

Unlike with MTW, I can't really think of any units in RTW that are under- or overrated. Units in RTW usually are often either uber, total crap and are universally recognised as such. There's also units that are average like hastati or plain hoplites, but RTW sadly strikes me as a game that favours armies composed entirely out of elite units.

Over rated: Spartan Hoplites

Under Rated: Peasents

Overated: Beserkers

Underated: Hastai

Urbans arent overated, they are one of if not the best unit in the game. Eastern infantry are archer fodder at best in RTW. Gothic cav cannot stand up to praetorian cav.

Over rated: Triarii
Under rated: Eastern Spearmen (those phalanx soldeirs that Hayk gets)

Over-rated: Chariots. Just a waste of space IMHO.

Under-rated: Onagers. These bad boys are absolutely critical in my high-tech armies when attacking, defending, or taking a city.

Well onagers are good in single battles, but they can be pretty tough in campaign. They have an extremely limited movement range that can slow up armies greatly.

Overrated: None. (Talking MP)

Downrated: None. (Talking MP)

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Overrated:

Horse Archers:

They are good units yes but players talkf of using 100% HA armies. HA's, like msot light cavalry, cna be owned by heavy archer fire in return or even Legion Pila. The fact is HA's are pwoerful supplements but they are not the sturdy structure to build an army off of. Even if you do exploit the stupid AI with them its still no fun at all.

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Get out of here.. HA is the most powerful unit in RTW/BI.

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Underrated:

Falxmen. They have massive atatck and are extremely tough troops to go head t o head with. When i amde a brief foray into the good ol' Balkans Barbarians, the Flaxmen dominated the hard-hitting section of my army.

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Have you tried some Urbans mixed with cav charges?

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Overrated: Praetorian/Urban Cohorts

I'm not saying these guys aren't good; I'm saying that in many cases they're just overkill. Early and regular Legionary Cohorts can do all the things they can, can be present in greater numbers because they come earlier and they're vastly cheaper, and take less time to make (2 turns as opposed to 1). They're nice if you can recruit and financially support them in bulk, but I'll take a full stack of Legionary's plus supporting troops instead of having a half-stack of Urbans plus supporting troops.

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I think you mean 'un-needed' rather than overrated.. But yea, you can be right in SP.

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Underrated: Eastern Infantry and Gothic Cavalry

I'll admit that I'm partial to the way these units simply look. However, Eastern Infantry make superb garrison units because of their cheap cost and great numbers when you stack them in your square, where they won't rout. Routing is why most people don't, or even can't, use them, but the "Poor Morale" trait is not only unfair, but hardly accurate historically. Remove them, and suddenly they actually have value on the field (so long as used en masse, which is something I think most people don't understand about them). As for Gothic Cavalry - I never, ever see anyone talk about them in any context, which I find bizarre because they're simply awesome heavy cavalry. During my Germania campaign, I never bothered with Berserkers or Nightraiders (or whatever those things are called) when I was fighting Rome - give me some Chosen Archer Warbands and Gothic Cavalry over those guys any day.

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Eastern Infantry are useless IMO, though Gothic Cav is awesome.

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Originally Posted by Tyranus

Well onagers are good in single battles, but they can be pretty tough in campaign. They have an extremely limited movement range that can slow up armies greatly.

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I find that by the time enough can be produced to make a difference, the campaign has progressed enough that you're fighting in densly populated areas where movement points mean little.

Example: In the Civil War you usually target Italy and Greece (if not Brutii)- usually these two places are already upgraded to Highways, not to mention the already small distance between cities.

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Originally Posted by IrishArmenian

Over rated: Triarii
Under rated: Eastern Spearmen (those phalanx soldeirs that Hayk gets)

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under rated: triarii
under rated 2:eastern infantry
under rated 3:royal pikemen
over rated: urban cohort
ha!

I did not mean Eastern Infantry, I meant the Phalanx soldiers that Armenia gets, damm those guys along with horse archers was almost my whole army*.
*Of course add a few cataphracts and mercanaries just for good measure.

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Originally Posted by IrishArmenian

I did not mean Eastern Infantry, I meant the Phalanx soldiers that Armenia gets, damm those guys along with horse archers was almost my whole army*.
*Of course add a few cataphracts and mercanaries just for good measure.

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oh. their underated too then.

Underated: Anything that is Roman

Overated: Anything that is not Roman.

It is vitually impossible to beat Rome in multiplayer if you are not Rome. They are just the best and that is all there is too it.

Overrated: Berserkers/Hounds of Culunn also pharaohs archers
Underrated: Eastern Inf. i never got why they are so weak...

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Originally Posted by IrishArmenian

I meant the Phalanx soldiers that Armenia gets,

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Do you mean Heavy Spearmen? I cant remember what else Armenia gets from the Phalanx style troops... Pikemen?

don't know really which units are overrated, but Numidian cavalry is vastly underrated

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Originally Posted by gmjapan

Do you mean Heavy Spearmen? I cant remember what else Armenia gets from the Phalanx style troops... Pikemen?

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That is it. I don't know why I did not know that. I must have recruited dozens of them.

most under rated unit in RTW is eastern infantry (the only native melee infatry available for Parthians, and you can't take settlements with them cuz their are too weak and the best Parthian units can't dismount for siege)

most over rated are British chariots (sometimes too uber powerful)

I suspect that a lot of the problems with Eastern Infantry is that CA lumped together too much in acategory for simplicity's sake.

Historically, their would have been a lot of troops that really were crap. Too many rulers of that area wanted numbers and lots of their infantry was nothing more than jumped up peasants tricked out as spearmen or javeliners. Those troops, on the rare occasions that they stood to against a disciplined opponent (rather than running), they mostly made the veteran unit wear out their arm muscles stabbing them.

However, and CA doesn't reflect this enough, there were a number of sub-groups whose morale and training were substantially better than the hastily assembled levies. Vanilla RTW only shows us the Judean zealots, but there were other examples. Take the same equippage and add 4 morale points and you have a different unit. I wish they'd added more of the variants for the other factions.

Another overated unit that I forgot is Scythed Chariots. Two or three volleys of fire arrows from a few units of archers makes these guys completely usless.

under rated: Slingers, Bastarnae, Falxmen, Bronze/silver shield pikemen

over rated: Romans....(the entire army lol)

Overrated - elephants. Expensive, can slow to produce, hard to control and they go mental

Underrated - the 'umble levy spearman, or perhaps barbarian stlye sword/axeman e.g. Falx? Yes rubbish at pinning troops for a long period but good morale and warcry can make the enemy wet their knickers and run after the first blow of a weapon.

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Originally Posted by GeneralHankerchief

Over-rated: Chariots. Just a waste of space IMHO.

Under-rated: Onagers. These bad boys are absolutely critical in my high-tech armies when attacking, defending, or taking a city.

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Egyptian Heavy Chariots? Overrated? ...how on earth did you ever draw that conclusion?

I never knew Numidian Cavalry were so underrated. I know whenever I play as Carthage I buy as many of them as possible. Fighting the Romans without them is darn near impossible, fighting Numidia without them is impossible, and fighting anyone else without them just isn't a good idea.

TM

Fighting Numidia isnt impossible without them, almost all numidian units get torched by archers. I think they are decent, but by no means a necessity.

Underrated: any type of slinger(awesome at city defense)
Overrated: all Egyptian chariots, hastati(you can almost hear them saying "kill me")

Over rated : German Spearmen, seriously who needs chosen axemen when you have German Spearmen ?

Under Rated : I'll go with Eastern Infantry.

:balloon2: