Elephants: Balanced or not?

**Steppe Merc** · 01-28-2006, 03:17

Originally Posted by Danest

I'm trying to remember, weren't elephants eventually considered almost obsolete in history, once the Romans or whoever figured out how to fight them?

Not really. I mean when the Romans fought the Sassanians, they were scared of the Elephants, mainly because the Romans had a few hundred years to forget about them.

But elephants need heavy protection. Horse archers or horse javilen men can destroy them, like they did in history. You just shoot the elepants till there dead, and there really too slow to catch up.

**QwertyMIDX** · 01-28-2006, 07:26

You don't even usally have to kill them, just hurt them enough that they stop letting their manhout order them around.

Anyway, they have a ton of attack power, and they scare enemy units. In the next build they'll be a bit hardier too, but they're not tanks.

**GMT** · 01-28-2006, 08:54

Originally Posted by QwertyMIDX

You don't even usally have to kill them, just hurt them enough that they stop letting their manhout order them around.

Anyway, they have a ton of attack power, and they scare enemy units. In the next build they'll be a bit hardier too, but they're not tanks.

I usually try to rout them so they wreak havoc on the enemy's lines

I noticed some kind of bug though.. I think.

According to my in game experience there doesn't seem to be much (if any) difference between war elephants and armored elephants.

They die just as easily but they cost a shitload more. They also look identical on the battlemap I think.

GMT

**LorDBulA** · 01-28-2006, 09:00

Elephants are worth they weight in gold.
I would give kingdom for one unit of this beasts in my Gatai campaigne.
Just keep them away from skirmishers and watch havoc they cause in enemy ranks.
Non the less they should be a bit more resistent to javelin fire, but only a small bit.

**Megalos** · 01-28-2006, 11:37

Having read what you gentlemen have wrote, I have reached this conclusion:

Normal Elephants (unarmoured)- Have the correct stats, however their upkeep cost seems to be a bit exaggerated, as the cost of housing and feeding them would not be that great (how much did a bale of hay cost in ancient times?), and only their handlers would require any pay from the army.
Their recruitment cost seems to be right though, I can't imagine they were all that common.

Armoured Elephants- Stats seem to indicate they are not correct, as it would be almost impossible to penetrate the armour even with a well aimed javelin (in my opinion. look at well armoured troops ingame). Upkeep and recruitment costs could do with a little rise (cost of armour etc etc), to balance things out should the EB team decide to implement these suggestions in game.

Just my thoughts

Please discuss some more

**Geoffrey S** · 01-28-2006, 12:05

As said, keep them away from skirmishers. When possible, charge the line with elephants and send in heavy infantry or some form of cavalry to follow up and exploit the temporary chaos. As always using various types of units in support of each other vastly increases their usefulness.

Hannibal's elephants were reportedly very useful when crossing the Alps; they may have held up the line, but they did dissuade the tribes from attacking the army column wherever the elephants were located due to their unfamiliarity with such creatures.

Besides, elephants did need to be well-trained for battle. See what happened when Hannibal took to the field with a large force of newly trained elephants at Zama, and that then they were more of a liability than a boon.

**tk-421** · 01-28-2006, 15:19

Elephants were really overpowered in RTW and RTR, but now I think that are underpowered. Keeping them away from skirmishers is good against some armies, but when fighting Romans they can't be used at all. They get shot up too easily by the legionaries. I really think they should be a little tougher to kill, not a lot, but a little.

**BigTex** · 01-29-2006, 03:10

Maybe a bit off topic but, a question. In my Carthage campaign i am unable to recruit anything but forest elephants

, and only those in a few provinces. It's 242 bc and i have lvl 5 baracks in most of my African provinces. Is there some type of reform that needs to happen to get them (I've seen something called a nietos reform in the barracks description window) or has the ability to recruit them not been implimented yet.

Btw great mod, finally nice to see Carthiginian cavalry that is better then Roman.