What's your favorite Total War unit of all-time?

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I started thinking about this, and it's hard to say (especially since my memory is a bit gone from the older ones).

I think first I have to narrow it down to my choice for the best unit in each game (I'm going to include expansions with the mother game for the sake of simplicity).

• Shogun: Kensei

Probably the most ridiculous unit in TW history but still awesome and really fun. I loved making custom battles of big armies vs. just a few vetted Kensei.

Runner up: Battlefield Ninja. They're ninjas. They threw ninja stars and shredded in melee. Awesome.

• Medieval: Viking Berserkers

Viking Beserkers dude...they're Viking Beserkers! What else is there to discuss?

Runner up:Varangian Guard. Incredible melee unit that I recall being unmatched in the early period of the game.

• Rome: Spartan Hoplites

This is an extremely easy choice. I don't recall anything even coming close to them in the game. They seemed almost invincible. It's too bad their uniforms sucked in the game.

Runner up: Legionary Cohort. Probably my favorite "standard" unit of any TW game. The awesome uniforms, the javelins, testudo ability. They're the iconic Roman infantry and they captured that perfectly in RTW.

• Medieval II: Ritterbruder

Coolest knight unit of either Medievals. And there are a lot of armored horsemen between those two games, so that's saying a lot.

Runner up: Reiters. I'll never forget how deadly these things were in my HRE campaign. More than that they were just really cool and very fun to watch. It felt like something out of the 17th centiry had crept its way into a Medieval game.

• Empire: Walloon Guards

Most of the guards have comparable stats but the Walloons are the ones I did the most fighting with and I've seen kick the most ass, so I'll give it to them.

Runner up(s): Native American unique units from Warpath. I can't pick just one. They were all really, really cool looking and detailed and were an absolute blast to use. I didn't exactly play the crap out of Warpath but the awesome units gave me my money's worth for sure.

• Napoleon: Old Guard

While not as ridiculously godlike as the Spartans in Rome, this is definitely the first time since Rome where there's a unit in the game which is unarguably superior to everything else. It puts other guard units to shame and can rout entire lines just by running across them from left to right. Also they have big fuzzy hats and snazzy uniforms.

Runner up: Cuirassiers. I like any unit in NTW that wears the Alexander-style helmet so I just sort of picked this one out of a hat. Heavy cavalry seems to have had a great sense of style in that period.

Right now I'd have to say Old Guard. But while I'm very aware it just might be the newness of NTW making me say that, I'll settle on a tie between Old Guard and Ritterbruder.

How about you?