Most Ridiculous/Hated unit

[vastator]

Chariots were outdated by 300 B.C., and for a reason. All you had to do was kill/maim ONE of the horses (a big target for archers, javelineers and spearmen alike) or put a stick through one of the spokes of the chariot cart wheels, and chariots would wreck all over the place. Ever seen "Ben Hur"? Plus, chariots were virtually useless on anything but flat, open ground.

The Gauls fielded chariots at the battle of Telamon in 225 BC. Mithridates VI of Pontus used scythed chariots in his wars against Rome (1st century BC). Julius Caesar was impressed by the Britons' use of chariots a few years later. Just for the record, the Assyrians kept a "spare" horse loosely tethered to the left of the team puuling the chariot. As the chariot turned after an attack this animal was used to draw enemy fire. If it was hit, the charioteer simply cut it loose and made his getaway. Here endeth the lesson...

My problem with chariots is that (a) the Eastern chariot archers should have a range of 170 as they used powerful composite bows, (b) scythes were never used on Egyptian chariots (except perhaps by the Ptolemies), and (c) British chariots should be armed with javelins rather than bows.

[Count Belisarius]

The Gauls fielded chariots at the battle of Telamon in 225 BC. Mithridates VI of Pontus used scythed chariots in his wars against Rome (1st century BC). Julius Caesar was impressed by the Britons' use of chariots a few years later. Just for the record, the Assyrians kept a "spare" horse loosely tethered to the left of the team puuling the chariot. As the chariot turned after an attack this animal was used to draw enemy fire. If it was hit, the charioteer simply cut it loose and made his getaway. Here endeth the lesson...

Yes, I realize that chariots were used in battle after 300 B.C. The point I was trying to make was that chariots had fallen out of favor with the most militarily-advanced civilizations of the day, because even then most people had recognized the chariot's limitations on the battlefield. Mithridates Eupator may have fielded chariots, but I'm sure you will note that - despite his long career and undoubted resiliency - he repeatedly lost major battles against the Romans : Charonea, Orchomenos, etc. Sulla, Lucullus and Pompey were great generals, granted, but the Pontic chariots were easy meat for "modern" armies. Too, the Gauls lost Telamon on crushing fashion.

[Arrowhead]

Elephants I hate when I come up against them. I have to use about 3-5 units of upgraded foresters on flaming arrows to kill them or make them run amok.

Arcani are just stupid.

[The Stranger]

i just needed to light Auxilia, to run the eles in amok and let the eles kill their general and some other soldiers

[Rodion Romanovich]

than mod roman cavalry size down or mod their stats. your complaining but it's easy to fix

For singleplayer it's easy to fix. If I play an opponent to Rome I don't see why I should bother because it only increases the challenge. But for multiplayer it's impossible to mod myself, because that would result in incompatible game data. All I can do is hope that any mod which addresses these issues becomes so popular that there are enough people interested in playing multiplayer with that mod. RTR, SPQR and EB are possibilities... It would also help to have some IRL friends who play tw games so the time zone problem among others could be sorted out, but most people I meet IRL don't know much about ancient/medieval tactics and aren't the least interested in it. So - no matter how easy to mod, it won't solve the multiplayer issue.

[Rodion Romanovich]

Edit in my post above: I meant it is a greater challenge to keep the overpowered units of your opponents, not the opposite.

[The Stranger]

oh oke

[ludicus]

i hate the immortal egyptian generals
i charged my general + 5 units of praetorian cav. into him, he killes the general on impact and routs the praetorians, loosing only 3 chariots

he was a noob general, mine was 10 star and had on of them traits that gave him more hitpoints.

[imdWALRU5]

Chariots and archer chariots

[Quietus]

Wardogs are a pain. Fighting elephants and chariots are fun (even if it is tough), but wardogs, they simply chew your units and there's nothing you can do about it.

What I do, if feasible for the occassion, is lure them with cavalry, then I withdraw the the cavalry. The dogs will chase them through the red-line.

[avesta]

Another hated unit is the praetorian cavalry - very unrealistc with roman cavalry that can easily beat cathapracts.

Actually, if you Alt-double right click on the enemy praetorian cavalry while commanding cataphracts, they will eat up their opponent. Reasing being is they switch to their lances when engaged in melee if u hold down the alt button before u attack. Im not sure if cappadocian cavalry do the same but parthian cataphracts will eat praetorians for breakfast. Cataphracts become so powerful they can even take a full unit of urban cohort 1v1 this way. Try it out in custom battle.

[pezhetairoi]

nevertheless, I hate cataphracts when the AI controls them. I was playing a custom battle against a parthian army, and a) the cataphracts kept charging into my deepened royal phalanx, and getting killed (though they did take out quite a few of my men) and b) a flank attack into the the cataphracts by companion cavalry is all it takes to crush them. Yuks. In a human opponent's hands, I have no doubt the cataphracts will be more potent.

[Productivity]

Hated unit: At the moment, Macedonian Light Lancers. I don't mind them, they're fine. Except when the AI uses stacks of 12+ of these units. And never seems to run out of them. Where the hell do they come from???

[HarunTaiwan]

No one is saying Horse Archers.

If the AI used Armeniia and Parthia to only field HA, they would be very scary indeed.

Imagine the AI masterfully weaving armies of HA, scattering your forces and killing you slowly.

I'm glad to bitch about chariots, because I'm playing Armenia now, and the plain vanilla HA (upkeep 110) can kill off major infantry based armies without breaking a sweat.

[Barbarossa82]

So is it that HA have just been legitimately toned down in 1.2, rather than it being a bug? I tried playing a custom battle as Parthia the other day and my army of HAs and Persian Cavalry caused about 5 casualties!

As for the most hated unit it has to be the Desert Axemen and their ability to sprint through the desert wearing invidible armour (they still have some, don't they, even post-patch?)

[HarunTaiwan]

Horse Archers in my current experience can wipe out any infantry based army.

Waiting to fight Romans to confirm this.

Not only by arrows only (though this is enough) you can scatter the enemy as they chase you around then gang up in charges that shatter the individual units. I had ot do this against Cataphracts, but it worked very well - especially when you realize how cheap HA are.

The only real problem is an archer heavy enemy army with enough spears to keep you away.

[lars573]

I really hate pharaohs bowmen. Chariots and Egyptian generals I can deal with axemen too, but those goddamn Pharaohs bowmen piss me off.

[The Stranger]

harun, no one says HA because the total idiot AI can't handle HA they just trow them away.

[The Stranger]

Actually, if you Alt-double right click on the enemy praetorian cavalry while commanding cataphracts, they will eat up their opponent. Reasing being is they switch to their lances when engaged in melee if u hold down the alt button before u attack. Im not sure if cappadocian cavalry do the same but parthian cataphracts will eat praetorians for breakfast. Cataphracts become so powerful they can even take a full unit of urban cohort 1v1 this way. Try it out in custom battle.

duh they switch to maces and maces are armour piercing. cappa's have swords swords are not armour piercing

[Vlad Tzepes]

Hated: eggy chariot archers. Learned to dread them when playing greek-style factions.

Ridiculous: flaming pigs, nothing beats flaming pigs (but screeching women tailgate hard )

[Titus Livius]

I really hate pharaohs bowmen. Chariots and Egyptian generals I can deal with axemen too, but those goddamn Pharaohs bowmen piss me off.

Amen. In my current war with the Ptolemaids as the Greek Cities I sent 4 platoons of Spartans with some Arab Cavalry to take down a single unit of Pharoah's bowmen. My mistake was that I was tired of fighting battles and hit the auto-battle button.

My Spartans only killed about 40 of the PB's, with 224 of their own casualties.

I really don't see how that's even physically possible.

[Craterus]

The whole Desert Axemen invisible armour thing? Check out Gallic/Briton Swordsmen!!!
They do not wear armour on their torso yet they have an armour defence bonus so I wish people would shut up about axemen, its so boring now.