I would like to take this opportunity to state: After further plaiyng the game, I eventually decided that the Teutons, not the Byzantines, are my new favourite civilization. However, most people would not give two shits if I were to make a whole thread just to say that, so I have decided I will instead make a long review that most people also wont give two shits about.

Infantry: A-( Teutonic infantry is pretty standart up until they begin making their unique unit, the Teutonic Knight. ... A unit which I have been liking more and more the more I learn how to play the game. Personally, I tend to have then as my "main" infantry unit, actually, but it might be my bias for "Expensive, slow, but powerfull" units speaking here.

The Teutonic Knight can easily defeat almost any meele unit, both on 1v1 and cost effectivelly, with a handfull of exceptions. Samurai and Jaguar Warriors, though they tend to lose in a battle of equal numbers, are cost effective against the Teutonic Knight, though barely. Harder meele counters for the Teutonic Knight are the Cataphract and the War Elephant, who beat then by a much wilder margin. Of course, the real counters to the Teutonic Knight are archers, Hand Cannoneers, and siege units.

One of the primary use for the Teutonic Knight is defending siege units( Which the Teutons conveniently have great samples of ). TK and Siege Onagers, in particular, are really good at screening eachother weaknesses, for as long as you can keep the Teutonic Knights outside of their line of fire. Another, more gimmicky tactic is to use the Teutonic Knights as Ram filling, as they can give a unfortunate surprise to anyone that tries to charge at the Ram with infantry or cavalry, and the TK are free to retreat to the Ram if archer fire ever becomes a problem.

In my personal opinion, a better question then "When should I use Teutonic Knigths" is "When shouldnt I use Teutonic Knights"? Well...

-Fighting cavalry, at least in low gold situations: While Teutonic Knights can take on Paladins on one-versus-one, they arent as cost effective as the Halberdiers. Most importantly, they cost a lot of gold. So you shouldnt see then as a flat-out replacement to the Halberdier.

-Raiding: Teutonic Knights are amazingly bad raiders on virtue of their very slow speed, preventing then from catching up to Villagers properly. The Paladin, or even the-Champion( Due to its very low gold cost meaning you have little to lose even if it dies ) is better then the Teutonic Knight at this role.

-Really, just low gold scenarions in general: While The Teutonic Knight is a effective counter to trash units, even Skirmishers( It has 1 more Pierce Armor then the champion. You would think it doesnt matter much, but against Skirmishers they go from doing 2 damage per hit, to 1. ), it does costs twice as much gold as a Champion to make. )

Cavalry: B+( While they are the only non-Mesoamerican civilization to lack the Light Cavalry upgrade, if you are anything like me, you may find yourself not particularly caring about that. The only real use light cavalry usually sees on the Castle Age is killing monks... Which, thanks to the Teutons team bonus of all their units being more resistent then conversion, their Knights often dont have to worry about as much anyway. They will be in a pinch if gold ever starts running out, though. )

Archery Range: B-( Where their archery range is concerned, I slowly found out the Teutons are on a intersting spot. While they technically have bad lategame archers, it is often recommendable for then to make a lot of archers on the early game, both to fully take advantage of their garrisson bonuses, and because those cheaper farms really add up in terms of wood savings.

The fact Teutons get Hand Cannoneers means that, on the very late game, their weak Archer-line wont bother then too much. Weaker Skirmishers are slightly more of a problem, though. In fact, Teutons have bad trash units in general, though the fact a single Teutonic Knight can cut through hordes upon hordes of Halberdiers, Hussars or Skirmishers can make up for it. )

Siege: B+( I would like to take this moment to say I personally believe Ironclad is borderline useless: If your siege units are taking meele damage, they are probably for all relevant effects already dead .

Still, Teutonic siege is pretty great despite their lackluster unique technology, and the fact it supports their unique unit so well is only another reason why you should use it as your primary source of ranged support. )

Monks: B+( People that like using monks for healing purposes may rank then higher because of their ability to heal from farther away, but I personally find it that, again, it is a somewhat useless bonus, made up for the fact the actual tech tree for monks is good. )

Navy: B-( The Teutons lack a lot of naval techs, perhaps the two most important ones being Shipwright and Bracer. Bracer means their Galleons will be outgunned and-Even worse- Outranged by enemy Galleons. Never a situation you want to be in on water maps. Bracer also affects other areas of their tech tree, of course, but for the most part they have their ways to make up for it. Shipwright also makes it much easier for they to be outnumbered too. One can argue that their farming bonus kind of makes up for it, as it saves more wood for their ships, but... For me, it doesnt even come close from making up for it. )

Defenses: A-( It took me a while to learn to properly appreciate the Teutonic defensive bonuses. They are a bit less straighforward then the Byzantine bonuses, take more pratice to take advantage of. However, over time, I grew to learn that harder-hitting defensive buildings is actually often more important then bulkier defensive buildings, as counter-intuitive as it may seem. After all, say, more hitpoints in your walls only means that your opponent may need a additional shot from their Trebuchet to knock then down: But more firepower to your Towers means they are more likely to actually kill that which is triyng to kill your villagers.

The only catches of sorts are two: First: Early game, in order to take full advantage of the Teutonic defensive bonuses, you will be forced to make a lot of archers. This is as in opposed to, say, the Byzantine bonus, which is guaranteed to always help you. Late game, Crennelations means you have the option of garrissoning your buildings with infantry instead of archers, though. Other then not forcing you to make archers which you will no longer want to be using by the time you research Crennelation, the other advantage of this is that it helps you against Rams, as against these you can just un-garrisson your infantry and have then kill Rams with their meele attacks. The secound is that the Teutons lack a few defensive technologies, namely Architecture and Bracer. Crennelations makes up for Bracer where their castles range is concerned, though, and they will still be hitting harder then normal towers, for as long as they are fully garrissoned with Hand Cannoneers( As infantry doesnt provide as many arrows and Crossbows arent much better. ).

All of this "fully garrissoned" talk obviously has a catch: This is not as usefull of a bonus for tower rushes as you would think, because, if you are going to make ten archers... You are probably going to want to do a Archer rush instead . )

Ecnomy: A-( Though only particularly helpfull for your Wood economy, the Teutonic farming bonus is much more powerfull then it appears at a first glance. In fact, much like the Celtic bonus, it is part of what lets the Teutons have a decent Archer rush despite having lousy lategame Archers. )

[This message has been edited by Draco_Wolfgand (edited 10-13-2019 @ 09:16 AM).]