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Pikeman are old, archaic units but Halberdiers are tough and very strong. I have trouble in the fortress age when deciding what to make as dutch. At my level there are a lot of "Gendarme Spammers" so I need some decent anti-cav. What should I make? What is your vote on which is the superior unit.

Your anticav is of course Ruyters, with them you can hit and run without getting hit, and they cost mainly gold which is comfortable with the fact you have banks. I you didn't have those I think Pikemen would be better than halberdiers, even though you have to upgrade them. The only thing halbs have more per cost is attack vs other units than cav, and I don't think they can use it.

Indeed, Ruyters seem to have the best shot due to their mass, mobility and kiting ability, but sometimes you need to tank the damage.

Generally, in the Fortress Age, Halberdiers start with an advantage of being shadow-upgraded, which is something not to ignore. Their other pros are no wood cost, more HP, a bit more siege and more attack vs non-cavalry units, whereas the Pikemen are relatively cheaper, faster to train and faster in general (5 speed), which is a hugely important factor when it comes to heavy infantry. Just because of the first asset, I'd always go for the Halberdiers, especially that as Dutch you won't run out of coin — something other European nations have to deal with.

On top of that, if we take the Gendarme spam into account, it's safe to assume it's already late-game, which in turn means that the former not only get a guard upgrade, but it's also royal guard — additional boost to their stats.

@Googol is an expert in this field. His input is invaluable.

Halberd/swiss pikemen are quite helpful to dutch. Ruyters are good, but when you can't outskirm your opponent/your opponent have strong melee cav (cuir, uhlan, forbidden army), you'll need vet hussars. And halberd+hussar can deal mass damage to cav, while tank tons of damage at the same time.

I just want to add an observation, that halberdiers cost basically the same as skirmishers + 5 gold each.

They must have been originally thought as a unit tailored for the Dutch. When your opponent's army is in your base, you can cancel just queued skirmishers and pop halberdiers instead right between his/her units. Few seconds of cancelled training are more than enought for your banks to gather additional coin.

It is therefore much easier to train halberdiers than pikemen.

Pikes have additional speed because they were thought as a field unit, to actually run after cavalry and, foremost, siege buildings around the map.
In age III running and sieging does not matter that much anymore, so don't worry about such petty deficiency of the halbs.

in short: halbs cost good, halbs kill strong, running is obsolete

Gendarmes can snare, so if you aren't very careful with ruyters, they can hurt you a lot. In team games, or laggy games in general, just switch to halbs. Pikes have few hp and the gendarmes' splash damage can make them useless. The halbs are inferior to ruyters only in mobility, as an anticav, but they have siege.

Ruyters. Halbs are awful in cost effectivity. Pikes are bad too.
Just think about it. You cant really do anything with halbs. They die vs skirms and goons also. Opponent wont run into them with melee cav either. Melee cav tanking damage better.
They only effective in all in situation. For example if you know will get an all in attack vs chinas lot of melee cav. I dont think there are any other scenarios they are useful.

Dsy wrote:Ruyters. Halbs are awful in cost effectivity. Pikes are bad too.
Just think about it. You cant really do anything with halbs. They die vs skirms and goons also. Opponent wont run into them with melee cav either. Melee cav tanking damage better.
They only effective in all in situation. For example if you know will get an all in attack vs chinas lot of melee cav. I dont think there are any other scenarios they are useful.

They can make for a great surprise pop - if your opponent is packed into your base, a 10 halb pop can be game-changing. But yeah, they obviously aren't optimal in most situations for the reasons you already mentioned.

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@EAGLEMUT

pecelot wrote:[spoiler=video]

phpBB [video]

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@EAGLEMUT

red micro 2 gud

*macro, he was already going Industrial

pecelot wrote:[spoiler=video]

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@EAGLEMUT

What a great game, had to watch it till the end again.

make ruyters, halbs are bs

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