posted 03-17-19 01:13 PM
CT (US)
1 / 3
I will assume you are talking about late imperial age. Feudal and castle age will usually see scouts or archers followed by knights or crossbowmen, with a few variances here and there (Cavalry archers for Huns, plumed archers for Mayans, etc.)
I will also assume you are focusing mostly on gold units. Furthermore, rather than list civilizations alphabetically, I will go by build set or expansion in which they were introduced.
Aztecs get good infantry and siege onagers. Otherwise, they don't have any super powerful units in imperial age.
Mayans get the best elite eagle warriors, and their plumed archers are awesome. Otherwise, they don't get much beyond siege ram and trebuchet.
Incas are super at countering. Kamayuks hard counter cavalry, 10 pierce armor eagles hard counter archers, and slingers hard counter infantry. Add in decent siege, and they can be tough customers all around as long as they have gold.
Britons will do great with longbows, halberdiers, and trebuchets, perhaps mixing in champions or scorpions depending on the enemy units.
Celts get super siege to go along with woad raiders and halberdiers.
Franks get the best paladins in the game, gunpowder, and elite throwing axemen. That's a hard (if expensive) combination to counter.
Spanish get paladins, gunpowder, bombard towers, and elite conquistadors. They also get perfect trash, along with super villagers, in case you want to go for that.
Vikings are weak in late imperial. Their best options are infantry, archers, and siege.
Huns are also weak in late imperial, relying solely on mounted armies for their imperial strength.
Teutons get great siege options with ironclad, paladins, bombard towers, Elite Teutonic Knights, and bombard towers. They are the only civilization to get siege onager, bombard tower, and paladin.
Goths get infantry and more infantry. They also get infantry. (And gunpowder.) And more infantry.
Persians get war elephants, awesome stable options, and gunpowder.
Saracens get elite mamelukes, excellent archery range options, and a wide variety of siege.
Byzantines can do just about any strategy with just about any unit combination. They even get bombard tower. They just don't usually get all the upgrades for every unit.
Turks get super gunpowder. Wow, do they ever have good gunpowder. It's SUPER gunpowder! Also they get camels and hussars, and 100 HP cavalry archers. And gunpowder.
Portuguese also get nice gunpowder. Not quite as powerful as the Turks, but more accurate. Their unique unit is also nice, and is gunpowder. They don't get anything else particularly powerful, but really, do you need to when you have nice gunpowder? They can do anything else moderately well.
Berbers get cheap cavalry, though they miss paladins. They also get a super unique unit and decent siege. And gunpowder.
Malians are like Byzantines: a wide variety of options, with few standout units. Siege onagers, with no siege engineers. Farimba for cavalry, with no blast furnace. High pierce armor champions, with no blast furnace. High power gbetos, which die easily. Arbalests, without bracer.
Ethiopians are the only civilization in the game to get all siege units, and they get torsion engines to boot. Their shotel warriors can be used situationally, and their arbalests fire faster.
Mongols get super siege and a great unique unit. Also, their hussars have 117 HP.
Chinese get bombard towers, elite chu ko nu, powerful scorpions, and are another all around strong civilization, without specializing in much.
Japanese get super trebuchets, decent other siege, and super infantry.
Koreans have awesome siege onagers, gunpowder, bombard towers, and war wagons. Seriously, their siege onagers are scary.
Malay get bombard tower and cannon, but not hand cannon. Karambit warriors can be massed like nothing else, but are individually weak. They get cheap battle elephants, but miss armor and bloodlines.
Khmers have awesome scorpions, gunpowder, fast battle elephants, and ballista elephants.
Burmese have high attacking infantry, arambai, high pierce armor battle elephants, and decent siege.
Vietnamese have high HP archery range units and high HP elephants. Their rattan archers are also excellent at killing all other archers.
Slavs get cheap versatile siege, excellent infantry, and boyars.
Magyars get great cavalry archers, paladins, and okay siege.
Italians get cheap gunpowder, condotierri, and their Genoese Crossbows kill all mounted units well. Bombard towers too.
Indians get great gunpowder, imperial camels, and elephant archers.
This is by no means an exhaustive list of possibilities. For the most part, for example, I didn't mention champions or trash, as the former isn't seen much outside a few civilizations, (Aztecs, Goths, Burmese, Vikings,) and halberdiers and elite skirmishers are obvious counters to cavalry and archers, respectively. The only civilization to miss elite skirmisher is the Turks. The only civilizations to miss halberdier are the Aztecs, Vikings, Turks, Indians Malians, Saracens, Mongols, and Italians. Aztecs and Vikings get bonuses on infantry, Turks, Malians, Indians Mongols, and Saracens get camels, and Italians get Genoese crossbows.
The game is about much more than late imperial, though. I didn't even mention monks, which are used a lot in castle age on some maps. Furthermore, units that are less powerful late imperial, such as the archer line, can be super good right up through early to mid imperial.
I also have not touched water, or mentioned how economic bonuses figure into strategy throughout the game.
The game is deep! Tower rushes don't even involve many military units. Byzantine heavy trash pushes, or Viking fast imperial arbalests + siege rams, or Saracen Monk Rushes are just a few of the many slightly less than ordinary ideas used in this game.