At the request of Legend5000, I am opening this thread to discuss the most cost-effective unit. Legend5000 writes:

Quote Originally Posted by Legend5000
Now everyone knows that a 720 Denarii Legionnary Cohort is more powerful than a 180 Denarii unit of Iberian Infantry, but wouldn't four units of Iberian Infantry worth 720 denarii destroy that legionnary cohort? And at the same time, would even 20 units of peasants be able to destroy 2 spartan hoplite units?

So for a unit to be considered the most cost-effective unit, one would have to consider:

- The stats (including stamina and morale)
- The price
- The amount of turns needed to recruit the unit
- The infrastructure needed to recruit the unit (a unit of Town Watch is much easier to recruit than a unit of Cataphracts)
To organise the discussion, it might be best if people distinguish between single player and multiplayer. I suspect the MP patrons will have a pretty good sense of unit capabilities and the cost effectiveness of upgrades against other players. However in the SP game, the price of unit is almost irrelevant (unlike the upkeep) and certain types of unit (maybe weak missiles?) may be better against the AI than against good players. Distinguishing between different units classes (missiles, spears, heavy cav etc) might be required. There might also be some sense in distinguishing between what's good for a particular army and what's good in the early/middle/late game.

Anyway, I'll throw it open to discussion and debate.