Can someone explain why sepoy so op

[deleted_user0]

Musketeer-type units are overrated!

I have found attack moving sex sepoy very effective tactic

[Darwin_]

Sepoy have insane, what you would call, break stats. This means that they trade very well with other types of units. A sepoy kills a musk in 6 shots with no overkill, while a musk takes 9 with tons of overkill. Same goes with them against other types of units. I think someone made a spreadsheet with these kinds of stats but I don't know where it is.

They also take 3 shots to die from a tc, instead of a musketeer's 2.

[howlingwolfpaw]

ERK get up to 16 range with card. But im not configuring range into account because thats primarily for group of unit scenarios. If you walk 1 musket up to a skirm and fire the skrim gets off the first 1-2 hits then musket attacks, same for the ERK. after so many hits each would theoretically die even though the muskets will always die first. So basically because a skirm has like 100 less HP than a ERK it dies quicker than a ERk, even to musket fire.

Skirms can kite ERK dont. Skirms deal way better with HI than ERK.

Yes I have said and agree skirms are better as a hard counter to Muskets. But effectively they are similar in how much damage they can do to muskets. Skirms just do that damage faster but have shorter life spans. Skirms do have the added bonus of more range. I am not talking about kiting I am talking about a heads up fight, ERK have a very short if any load animation. ERK are also considerably faster than skirms. ERK can fulfill that role in a sense that they so remarkably well vs HI for being a light inf unit.

Anyway this is pointless. It was just a mute argument about how inf like jans get ragged on for having a weaker melee attack vs cav, yet also survive longer to deal out more hits.

[deleted_user]

I am not talking about kiting I am talking about a heads up fight

y tho

[momuuu]

Honestly though, while sepoy are indeed very strong I think they fail to combat skirms properly just like any musk unit does. In the end they are still just musketeers but a tiny bit better.

[forgrin]

ERK get up to 16 range with card. But im not configuring range into account because thats primarily for group of unit scenarios. If you walk 1 musket up to a skirm and fire the skrim gets off the first 1-2 hits then musket attacks, same for the ERK. after so many hits each would theoretically die even though the muskets will always die first. So basically because a skirm has like 100 less HP than a ERK it dies quicker than a ERk, even to musket fire.

Skirms can kite ERK dont. Skirms deal way better with HI than ERK.

Yes I have said and agree skirms are better as a hard counter to Muskets. But effectively they are similar in how much damage they can do to muskets. Skirms just do that damage faster but have shorter life spans. Skirms do have the added bonus of more range. I am not talking about kiting I am talking about a heads up fight, ERK have a very short if any load animation. ERK are also considerably faster than skirms. ERK can fulfill that role in a sense that they so remarkably well vs HI for being a light inf unit.

Anyway this is pointless. It was just a mute argument about how inf like jans get ragged on for having a weaker melee attack vs cav, yet also survive longer to deal out more hits.

About jan vs sepoy in dealing with cav, sepoy are considered better because killing the cav faster (therefore preventing damage to your LI) is their goal, not 1v1'ing the cav units.

[howlingwolfpaw]

@deleted_user4 why not? it removes the hypothetical constructs created from micro skills and multitudes of circumstantial situations. Not all battles are taken in micro some you get caught in and can't run from.

@forgrin as I stated earlier killing things faster is better because of the unit drop off. If jans had similar attacks to a musket their value would be far greater than a musket or sepoy due to HP tankiness. Skirms are not light inf they are just infantry. put HI in melee and drop infantry back and they make a shield or seek out the cav is one of the best ways to handle cav spam.

[Mitoe]

I'll say it again: musketeer-type units are overrated.

They appear strong because they have reasonably high base stats for their cost, while also doing relatively well in fights vs all other unit types with minimal micro—which therein lies the problem. Musketeers have high stats but low speed and low range, which—when compared to other units—gives them a very low capacity to be controlled to any greater effect than simply attack moving. Other units, dragoons, heavy cavalry, skirmishers, etc. have far more micro potential and become exponentially stronger as the player's skill increases. Musketeer-type units, then, appear strong because they are so easy to use to their full potential. That's not to say that they have no micro potential, only that the difference between an uncontrolled musketeer and a controlled musketeer is a lot lower than, say, an uncontrolled skirmisher vs a controlled skirmisher.

Musketeer-type units are strongest when micro either becomes impossible—like when kiting into the edge of the map, a building, or a similar obstacle—or when micro will hurt the opposing army more than it will to stand and fight—like when attempting to defend a critical part of the map like a hunt or mine with 15-20 villagers on it, or when fighting longbows or some other unit with a long setup animation—or when they have something to engage and snare the opposing army for them, like cavalry.

For these reasons, musketeer-type units like Sepoy are strongest in the early game when army sizes are relatively small and musketeers innate tanky-ness makes it difficult to 1 shot them or more than 1 of them, and most civs don't have access to long-range infantry like skirmishers or good ways to keep cavalry off of them like dragoons (because hand infantry is also quite bad for similar reasons to musketeers), but they get increasingly weaker as the players' skill increases and the longer the game goes as they get out-teched and outplayed by other, more advanced and more controllable, unit types, excepting specific cases like I mentioned earlier where micro becomes a non-factor. If someone wants to use musketeers effectively beyond the Colonial age, they have to do their best to create these situations, but the majority of the time skirmishers or dragoons will be the superior units to make at this stage of the game.

TL;DR

To conclude: contrary to popular belief, musketeer-type units like Sepoy are not all-purpose units; however, due to how easy they are to control to their full potential compared to other unit-types they often appear to be just that. The better the players' get, and the more able they are to control other unit-types to their full potential, the more situational musketeers become.

[Darwin_]

meh

Musketeers are shit in fortress and mid-game most of the time because the standard age 3 skirm/goon hard counters them with micro. However in age 2, musks are probably the best unit-type. This is also true in lategame situations, especially so if you can upgrade them a little bit. Musks really only weakness is micro. They do have a lot of "hard" counter units, but if the musks can force a static engagement (which albeit is quite hard/rare in a fortress setting) they are so versatile and cost-effective that they don't do that poorly versus really anything.

And to your last point, if you say that musks are used mainly because they don't take much micro, then why don't we see high-level players going xbow/pike or xbow/huss?

[howlingwolfpaw]

mmm I dunno... Sepoy are a great back bone for an indian army. I Think it comes down to play styles but I have great success mixing them with about 15 gurka+ mansabar, 3 siege eles, 3 mahout and rest sepoy+ mansabar and tigers. Its so much pushing power the gurkas pick off goons trying to kite and then they are pushed back to their base (in scenario like you described) and have no where to go there is just so much that can be done from there. I try to make as few howdas as possible except for certain civ matches or to counter extreme cannon and cav spam. I feel like they give you control and steady footing in a battle to protect your more micro intensive units.

[JakeyBoyTH]

They are strong in early/mid colonial and in some other niche situations, but overall they're still a musk unit. Something to consider is that ashi, tomo, jan, and musk (for several civs) have upgrade cards in colonial for these units, while India only has Brit Consulate HP, meaning that most other musks catch up in cost effectiveness.

So yeah, they are the strongest base musket unit, but with upgrade cards less so and their unit typing makes them less relevant as the game goes on (especially in age 3+, where skirms destroy them).

The unit hand attack also affects them, esp in this situation when comparing anti-cav attack, however you are right there are no specific up cards.

[howlingwolfpaw]

if you have to train mahouts you should, out of age 2 would never make camels. yes they are expensive but worth it if they are too skirm heavy. luckily though whenever I use a rush deck in FFA when i use the mahout cards the 5 is about all I need unless I am vs japan or a few other civs i might make more as they die. But usually I mass my army and force them to fight and use tower of vic to decimate their forces. in those cases its the players that make a good mix of muskets with their army that do the best. As they will kill the mahouts pretty fast, causing me to have to kite them back and let the sepoys/gurka do more work. goons allow them to inflict too much damage while the infantry comes in to kill everything else.

[Mitoe]

meh

Musketeers are shit in fortress and mid-game most of the time because the standard age 3 skirm/goon hard counters them with micro. However in age 2, musks are probably the best unit-type. This is also true in lategame situations, especially so if you can upgrade them a little bit. Musks really only weakness is micro. They do have a lot of "hard" counter units, but if the musks can force a static engagement (which albeit is quite hard/rare in a fortress setting) they are so versatile and cost-effective that they don't do that poorly versus really anything.

Yep, except I disagree about the versatile and cost effective part. It's situational.

And to your last point, if you say that musks are used mainly because they don't take much micro, then why don't we see high-level players going xbow/pike or xbow/huss?

I alluded to this in my post already, but pikes are a bit like musketeers in that they don't really have a lot of micro potential. They have no range, they're barely any faster than ranged infantry so they aren't very useful for snaring—nor do they do enough damage to be relevant in melee with units other than cavalry usually. They just drop like flies to ranged units (partially because of melee units) and can't engage onto ranged units on their own at all, either. Cavalry can easily bait them forward and retreat, allowing them to be easily picked off. Bow/pike compositions usually don't work for this reason.

Xbow/huss would be more prevalent if it wasn't so easily countered by pure cav. It is useful against civs that can't mass cavalry very easily though, or have cavalry that doesn't do so well vs other cavalry, like Aztec or Japan, for example.

[SoldieR]

British East India Company Sepoys, Gurkhas, and Sowars get +10% Hit Points and Damage. Ships one Villager.
+ brit cons + melee card

[deleted_user0]

ERK get up to 16 range with card. But im not configuring range into account because thats primarily for group of unit scenarios. If you walk 1 musket up to a skirm and fire the skrim gets off the first 1-2 hits then musket attacks, same for the ERK. after so many hits each would theoretically die even though the muskets will always die first. So basically because a skirm has like 100 less HP than a ERK it dies quicker than a ERk, even to musket fire.

You cant just ignore range, its a dominating factor. Only speed is more dominating.

[Hazza54321]

because sepoy are the most broken age 2 unit after abus

maybe so but abus are most broken age2 unit only after bow riders, yumi and 3 hussar first.

At least u have to kite with abus and yumi though : D

[Hazza54321]

Musketeer-type units are overrated!

i remember you saying when kiting jans it only works up to a certain point because then theyre just be ontop of ur hunts and that jans dont die, sepoy have a similar role but they have way more attack and 2 elis that are annoying, iirc u lost to sepoy in the tourney also

[Darwin_]

CHUNFIRMED

[lemmings121]

sepoy good unit, ask tit.

For real, mitoe's argument is right, in fortress they are hard to use because people can kite until half the sepoys are dead, and only be forced to engage when the numbers are lower.. BUT, in early-mid game, its still viable to throw sowar huss on top of anything and attack move your sepoys, and if skirm/bow/mace/whatever cant kite, sepoys do very decent against them. (while 10 sowars melt against 2 pik, godamm bad unit)

[Garja]

The problem with such high stats musk units is that - even in fortress, you need quite an amount of skirms that sometimes can't produce because you don't have two raxes. So often enough after a couple of free shots you get engaged and get outmassed (1 sepoy vs 1 vet skirm break even more or less).
Also usually you end up with skirm+goon vs gurka+sepoy and the latter is superior in straight up fights (atleast with vet units), simply because goons are overpriced for their stats vs non cav units.

[Goodspeed]

Musketeer-type units are overrated!

Courtesy of the semi-FF meta. Remember ASFP?

[howlingwolfpaw]

ERK get up to 16 range with card. But im not configuring range into account because thats primarily for group of unit scenarios. If you walk 1 musket up to a skirm and fire the skrim gets off the first 1-2 hits then musket attacks, same for the ERK. after so many hits each would theoretically die even though the muskets will always die first. So basically because a skirm has like 100 less HP than a ERK it dies quicker than a ERk, even to musket fire.

You cant just ignore range, its a dominating factor. Only speed is more dominating.

sure I can.... I am comparing how many hits a unit can take vs how much damage it can do to other units. I am not comparing how the units are used in groups or anything else.

[Dsy]

They are not op statwise. Actually they are worse a bit than muskets. I guess they seems op cause of the big early mass india can make.

[Garja]

They are far better than muskets objectively. 40hp for 15f and 2 attack for 5g is a good deal. Also it is a disruptive advantage because of break points (e.g. TC needs 3 shots as someone pointed out) and because upgrades stack up on high base stats.
Sepoy are very much like old ashigaru except for speed.

[lemmings121]

They are far better than muskets objectively. 40hp for 15f and 2 attack for 5g is a good deal. Also it is a disruptive advantage because of break points (e.g. TC needs 3 shots as someone pointed out) and because upgrades stack up on high base stats.
Sepoy are very much like old ashigaru except for speed.

except for speed, the thing that still makes them the best musk by far