Give me a break!!!!

[Blademun]

just a quick FYI, Properly chipped obsidian produces one of the sharpest edges known to man. However, it does not keep that edge for more then a couple blows against anything harder then flesh.

[Musashi]

Without smallpox Cortez would have been massacred. The one pitched battle he actually fought he lost and badly.

[Varyar]

Without smallpox Cortez would have been massacred. The one pitched battle he actually fought he lost and badly.

While true, it might have less to do with comparable quality of arms rather than number of troops.

[Booga]

I think in the largest field battle Cortez fought, at Otumba, he mainly won through the power of his cavalry. The Aztecs had never seen a good ol' fashioned cavalry charge at full tilt before and when Cortez went gunning for the Aztec leaders the entire native army began to rout - all ten thousands of them. I believe Pizarro pulled something similar in the same battle where he captured the Sapa Inca.

[Ulstan]

Aztecs have incredible morale.

Aztecs own in melee. To beat them you need gunpowder. That how it happened in real life.

What happened in real life was an extremely complicated affair, and we can be 100% positive that it is not in anyway accurately modelled in MTW. Therefore, I see no real reason in complaining about the unit balance.

You are not going to see a field battle in MTW where 300 spaniards route tens of thousands of Aztecs who run away mostly unscathed into the jungle.

One other possibility is that 'civilized' Europeans are actually pretty formidable warriors themselves, especially mercenaries and professionals like Cortez and his drinking buddies.

Europeans are probably the most murderously effective and utterly brutal warriors history has seen. There is almost no other comparison to how tiny bands of European mercenaries and professional soldiers would just go out into Africa, South America, the middle east, etc, and just annhilate entire cultures, all while being horrendously outnumbered. The breathtaking arrogance of such enterprises is only matched by how often they succeeded. It's really truly amazing, and makes for far more interesting reading than most Fantasy Series :)

[dismal]

What happened in real life was an extremely complicated affair, and we can be 100% positive that it is not in anyway accurately modelled in MTW. Therefore, I see no real reason in complaining about the unit balance.

I agree with that.

The new world is basically a fantasy scenario in the game -- and perhaps more importantly one that is almost guaranteed to never make much of a difference in terms of the outcome of a campaign.

The concept that the Aztec had enormous morale seems a bit inconsistent with the fact they lost some of their largest cities to remarkably few men.

[Booga]

The Aztecs Empire was based on fear, spread partially through human sacrifice, and attrition through constant low-intensity warfare. In that sort of situation you find many people willing to switch sides for the promise of protection from the authorities.

As for remarkably few men - the Spanish usually had plenty of men, but the vast majority were native auxiliaries. They often could field as many soldiers as the Aztecs could while only having several hundred actual conquistadores.

[pike master]

give it up guys they were cannon fodder ive used pikes on em and if you get them to work right they do a good job but i also used forlorn hope, two handers and some swiss guard i created to see how they worked. they all did all right but the fun i really had was that the whole army was bunched up in a little ball in a city street so im looking at it and my soldiers are just a short distance away and they aint attacking me so i wheeled a grand bombard up set it on solid shot and ripped loose on em several times at point blank.lol

i also had some created elephants and sent them in from another direction and man i really think that they started from scratch on these elephants as far as mechanics. in rome they had to tusk you up in the air to kill you but now all they have to do is step on you lol.

[IrishArmenian]

But I do have a problem with their obsidian weapons. How are they better than steel?

[Empirate]

Their weapons are not better than steel. But for a few blows, they're also not much worse than steel. Jaguar Guards are not "practically naked", but wearing very sophisticated armor that protects well against all edged and blunt weapons. JHI are a specialist unit in that they're not as heavily armored as some others. Both units have superior training, but Jaguars fight as if on psychoactive substances... which they may well have been. They weren't expected to reach old age, after all. Also, pitting JHI against Jaguars is one ahistorical battle to start with, so don't worry about this too much, OK?

[MilesGregarius]

But I do have a problem with their obsidian weapons. How are they better than steel?

As Empirate said, not better, but not altogether worse. Obsidian holds one off the sharpest edges imaginable (think broken glass) and is therefore devestating against bare flesh. Even though the obsidian edges would shatter against any hardened armor, the underlying wood club would remain an effective concussive weapon. With heavy armor, it's concussion, not cutting that is your best chance to inflict damage. Even Europeans used mauls and maces to crack heavy plate, not bladed weapons - steel, stone, or otherwise.

[Orda Khan]

I suspect the test was done unit v unit and not unit v heavily outnumbered unit. In a situation like that any Aztec unit should suffer badly

.......Orda

[Rollon]

As someone already mentioned before, current engine just cannot handle tens or even hundreds of thousands warriors Aztec empire could deploy at the time. So even if they are overpowered it should be ok, that's just to simulate their numbers.
BTW, Aztec were keen to capture their foes alive (clubs are a good choice for that) so they could be sacrificed later. Nice moral boost for them.

[Stlaind]

So give them low(er) stats and multiple hitpoints.

[dopp]

Aztecs I think were deliberately made quite tough to increase the challenge for the player and also to emphasize that people who can carve out an empire of 20 million people through conquest are usually pretty good fighters.

Jaguar warriors can take on and defeat 'fixed' pikemen if they kill enough in the initial charge. They will destroy the first rank or two of any unit they charge instantly. JHI don't even stand a chance against them.

There are various explanations as to why the Spaniards could beat them even when outnumbered (of course, the Spaniards had lots of native allies themselves). Steel armor, swords, pikes, horses, guns, discipline, better commanders, better military tradition. One other possibility is that 'civilized' Europeans are actually pretty formidable warriors themselves, especially mercenaries and professionals like Cortez and his drinking buddies.