Vet Hussar or Cuirassier

[Ashvin]

Playing against brits earlier in the day I found that cuirs are actaully taking a lot of time to train and die very fast to lb+cav+musk composition against my skirm+goon+falc+cuirs. So I was wondering if vet hussar should be used in early fortress since they cost a lot less and train faster. Also huss fight other cav cost effectively, I don't know if cuirs area damage helps by any marginal difference. So should cuirassier work all fine in early fortress (fight and eco-wise) or I just played it badly?

[Challenger_Marco]

You just played it badly.Goons+cuir >vet huss, idk how many cuirs u trained like 5-8 wont do that much vs huge mass of lb musk & cav.You would have lacked in the positioning in units ,u had falcs skrims n cuirs so if u run ur cav first and rest ur army behind bad engagement.

[duckzilla]

I would recommend to use hussars at least until you send cav combat cards. Since hussars stats are based on age II levels while cuir stats are based on age III levels, cuirs get relatively better compared to hussars with every cav improvement you send or research in arsenal. You could arguable keep doing hussars until age IV.

Let's do a comparison of vet stats:
Vet. Hussar (without upgrades through cards etc.): 384 hp, 36 dmg, 120F 80C
Vet. Cuir (without upgrades): 500 hp, 30dmg, 150F 150C
--> Cuirs are ~60% more expensive, have 30% more HP, but do 16% less dmg (though area dmg).

With all upgrade cards + arsenal techs:
Vet. Hussar: 528 hp, 45dmg, 120F 80C
Vet. Cuir: 725 hp, 39 dmg, 150F 150C
--> Cuirs are still ~60% more expensive, have 37% more hp and do 13% less dmg (though area dmg).

Cuirs are expensive business for fortress age. This changes only in industrial with the completely overpowered -15% cost card and the guard upgrade.


edit: one more thing about the area dmg. Area dmg does have some effect in cav to cav combat, but it scales with the quantities on both sides. That means you need to have a high number of cuirs to really have a significant effect. In my opinion that would be too costly for age III fights. Finally, it depends on your enemy whether cuirs are useful. If he fields large quantities of skirms/lb's/strelets, then building some cuirs is surely a good option. But the more muskets/goons/hussars he has, the less cuirs are a viable option to me (in fortress age).

[dietschlander]

Huss ftw, even they a light cav.

[Guigs]

I would recommend to use hussars at least until you send cav combat cards. Since hussars stats are based on age II levels while cuir stats are based on age III levels, cuirs get relatively better compared to hussars with every cav improvement you send or research in arsenal. You could arguable keep doing hussars until age IV.

Let's do a comparison of vet stats:
Vet. Hussar (without upgrades through cards etc.): 384 hp, 36 dmg, 120F 80C
Vet. Cuir (without upgrades): 500 hp, 30dmg, 150F 150C
--> Cuirs are ~60% more expensive, have 30% more HP, but do 16% less dmg (though area dmg).

With all upgrade cards + arsenal techs:
Vet. Hussar: 528 hp, 45dmg, 120F 80C
Vet. Cuir: 725 hp, 39 dmg, 150F 150C
--> Cuirs are still ~60% more expensive, have 37% more hp and do 13% less dmg (though area dmg).

Cuirs are expensive business for fortress age. This changes only in industrial with the completely overpowered -15% cost card and the guard upgrade.


edit: one more thing about the area dmg. Area dmg does have some effect in cav to cav combat, but it scales with the quantities on both sides. That means you need to have a high number of cuirs to really have a significant effect. In my opinion that would be too costly for age III fights. Finally, it depends on your enemy whether cuirs are useful. If he fields large quantities of skirms/lb's/strelets, then building some cuirs is surely a good option. But the more muskets/goons/hussars he has, the less cuirs are a viable option to me (in fortress age).

Cuirs are better than vet huss 90% of the time, especially vs civs like brits or russia having low hp light infantry, also you need to invest 400 ress for vet huss which is not something you want when you unlock freely a better cav in age 3. moreover cuirs tank a lot and do area damage which is what you want in age 3. i guess you could commit to vet huss in you have 10-15 huss + you made in colonial but that's the only reason i would do that

[duckzilla]

Cuirs are better than vet huss 90% of the time, especially vs civs like brits or russia having low hp light infantry, also you need to invest 400 ress for vet huss which is not something you want when you unlock freely a better cav in age 3. moreover cuirs tank a lot and do area damage which is what you want in age 3. i guess you could commit to vet huss in you have 10-15 huss + you made in colonial but that's the only reason i would do that

Thanks for repeating my argument that masses of low hp light infantry are a nice opponent army composition when you have cuirs. Now, who on earth would spam this kind of light infantry, knowing that you produce cuirs?

What is your insight "Cuirs are better than vet huss 90% of the time" based on? As I already showed, using clear numbers and evidence instead of an arbitrary high percentage of "being better", Hussars are just better in any other situation, since they are both (a) more cost efficient and (b) more pop efficient. Your argument that cuirs are better cav, unlocked freely in age 3, is not supported by anything.

Of course in the end it comes down to who you are facing. On PR 10, you might succeed with rushing in Discovery Age with your CDB's meleeing his vills to death, since the opponent cannot cope with the situation (I tried it, it works in 2 out of 3 cases...). But the opponents inability to counter your plans is not a valid argument in favor of cuirs in Fortress Age.

[Challenger_Marco]

I agree with Lecastete.Theoritically duckzilla is correct but practically Lecastete is.Soo.....i would do cuirs rather than vet huss if i dont have have any huss left or few of them.And 200w can be invested in many ways ,can be for houses for future mass, 2nd gold upgrade , a tp or to upgrade stagecoach .I would like to see opinion from a higher player.

[Gendarme]

I suspect that even though the damage and HP per cost is in the favor of veteran hussars, cuirassiers turn out to preferrable in more situations than you seem to think. In early fortress, you may be able to catch a group of 13 gurkhas with your 5 cuirs and get a great trade and snowball from there. In the mid- and lategame you will have far less pathing issues with cuirassiers than hussars (since you have fewer units) and thus actually higher dps despite your numbers saying otherwise—even without cav combat.

And sometimes you just do not know if there will be a battle in early fortress, so you might just end up forced into the midgame.

[duckzilla]

In early fortress, you may be able to catch a group of 13 gurkhas with your 5 cuirs and get a great trade and snowball from there.

Sorry, but this is still no argument. I could as well have 8 hussars instead of these 5 cuirs and the damage done to the 13 ghurkas would be identical - total annihilation. The hussars are even (slightly) faster than cuirs!

In the mid- and lategame you will have far less pathing issues with cuirassiers than hussars (since you have fewer units) and thus actually higher dps despite your numbers saying otherwise—even without cav combat.

As I already said, late-game is something entirely different. That does not change the weakness of cuirs in early fortress age.


I can understand that some people get the impression of cuirs being a very strong unit. But this is only driven by the observation of their late-game behavior, not of empirical evidence from early age III. The analysis above clearly shows that cuirs start to outperfom hussars over time as upgrades are accumulated. But even with all upgrades sent, in fortress age cuirs can only break even with hussars - at best! And that is precisely the topic of this thread.

[flontier]

Cuirs > huss 100% even theoritically, why youre not taking into account the area damage ? Its like i would compare a dopp without area damage and a pik and show the pik is better.
The area damage is huge and keep in mind that more you have cuirs more this area damage is big and do more damage, its expensive. More you have cuirs more the difference with huss is good.
Anyway early age 3 you want skirm goon most of the time and the moment where you want to do a hand cav switch your huss from age2 are probably already dead so upgrading huss is useless everygame.

[duckzilla]

Cuirs > huss 100% even theoritically, why youre not taking into account the area damage ? Its like i would compare a dopp without area damage and a pik and show the pik is better.
The area damage is huge and keep in mind that more you have cuirs more this area damage is big and do more damage, its expensive. More you have cuirs more the difference with huss is good.
Anyway early age 3 you want skirm goon most of the time and the moment where you want to do a hand cav switch your huss from age2 are probably already dead so upgrading huss is useless everygame.

Still, you do not take the ressource cost into account. Of course 1 cuir is better than 1 hussar. But that is not the question. And your area damage is only strong when many units are affected, which is not necessarily the case in early fortress.

The comparison to doppelsoldners is especially weird, since this unit is entirely crap in age II. Pikes are better, as they are cheaper and faster. Doppels get sniped and are simply dead.

[Gendarme]

You would have to train a second batch of hussars in that case, and then it may be too late. And by lategame I meant late fortress, my bad.

[Gendarme]

Dops are crap in Age 2, @Kaiserklein. Now you know.

[duckzilla]

You would have to train a second batch of hussars in that case, and then it may be too late. And by lategame I meant late fortress, my bad.

That's a point. But on the other hand, my first 5 hussars are completed 20 seconds before your cuirs and a further 20 seconds later I will have my next batch. So, speaking in terms of raw power projection, the hussars are infinitely better for the first 20 seconds, but some percentage worse in the 20 seconds afterwards, from then on hussars will be better due to faster production and better ressource efficiency.

[flontier]

My bad, area damage isnt expensive,i mean exponential ^^.
I think youre underestimate really too much the area damage effect which was my point, not that 1 cuirs stronger than 1 huss..

[Gendarme]

You would also have to spend time getting the veterancy upgrade and that completely reks you, and it is also rather awkward unless you already have a lot of hussars since colonial or have two stables so you can train hussars at the same time.

[Challenger_Marco]

You would also have to spend time getting the veterancy upgrade and that completely reks you, and it is also rather awkward unless you already have a lot of hussars since colonial or have two stables so you can train hussars at the same time.

Yeah which is uncommon in 1v1 and common in team games , where u have huss left in age 2 whereas in 1v1 u rather loose all huss or left with few.So cuirs r simply better coz they do area damage which means units die quickly by taking less damage for cuirs and u have time to escape before the reinforcements come from the player.

[Guigs]

Cuirs are better than vet huss 90% of the time, especially vs civs like brits or russia having low hp light infantry, also you need to invest 400 ress for vet huss which is not something you want when you unlock freely a better cav in age 3. moreover cuirs tank a lot and do area damage which is what you want in age 3. i guess you could commit to vet huss in you have 10-15 huss + you made in colonial but that's the only reason i would do that

Thanks for repeating my argument that masses of low hp light infantry are a nice opponent army composition when you have cuirs. Now, who on earth would spam this kind of light infantry, knowing that you produce cuirs?

What is your insight "Cuirs are better than vet huss 90% of the time" based on? As I already showed, using clear numbers and evidence instead of an arbitrary high percentage of "being better", Hussars are just better in any other situation, since they are both (a) more cost efficient and (b) more pop efficient. Your argument that cuirs are better cav, unlocked freely in age 3, is not supported by anything.

Of course in the end it comes down to who you are facing. On PR 10, you might succeed with rushing in Discovery Age with your CDB's meleeing his vills to death, since the opponent cannot cope with the situation (I tried it, it works in 2 out of 3 cases...). But the opponents inability to counter your plans is not a valid argument in favor of cuirs in Fortress Age.

Ok maybe i didn't explain my pov correctly, why are cuirs better ?
they tank much better than huss, which means that in an even fight you'll simply win because your cuirs will stand while opponent huss will just die.

" who on earth would spam this kind of light infantry, knowing that you produce cuirs? " Well for several reason : brits would do that because lbs beat skirms and it's easy to mass with food/wood macro. Also as brits you might get stucked in age 2, which means you need a lot of lbs to compete with french skirms. Moreover, cuirs do a much better job at killing vills in group, you can clean a 10v gold mine twice or 3 times faster with 5 cuirs compare to 5 huss.
Same problem with russia, to compete with skirms you need a lot of strelets.
You're arguing saying that huss are more cost efficient eco wise and in population space, you're right. Although in a battle, cuirs would do as well as huss even if you're opponent get 1.5x your cuirs mass with huss. thing is cuirs tank, and have area damage. Cuirs do the role of support unit, which is exactly what you want when you have goons and skirms shooting in the back. cuirs are also a great tank when you have falcs.

[Gendarme]

Cuirs don't tank better though; they cost 60% more resources, take 50% more pop, but have only 30% more HP. Resists were not mentioned so I assume they have the same. My devastating trample attack is what is so special about me.

[Guigs]

Oh and cuirs are just a much better unit to engage a fight too, running into a 50 units mass won't have the same effect with 15 cuirs and 25 huss. cuirs are just a pain for your opponent to kill compare to huss. I mean, i played a lot of france vs brits game where both are in age 3 but brits have a better eco, the only advantage france has is cuirs, you'll never beat brits with skirm huss goons since lbs huss goon is better.

[Guigs]

You would also have to spend time getting the veterancy upgrade and that completely reks you, and it is also rather awkward unless you already have a lot of hussars since colonial or have two stables so you can train hussars at the same time.

Yeah which is uncommon in 1v1 and common in team games , where u have huss left in age 2 whereas in 1v1 u rather loose all huss or left with few.So cuirs r simply better coz they do area damage which means units die quickly by taking less damage for cuirs and u have time to escape before the reinforcements come from the player.

Using the remaining huss to raid or just to tank in main battle without upgrading them is just much better. although vet huss are such not common that u could potentially surprise your opponent with heavy vet huss compo in early age 3 in some specific match ups.

[Gendarme]

The MU vs Brit is somewhat special since they will have a shit-fucking-ton of hussars to protect the longbowpersons since they can't kite, and you need a shit-fuck-ton of hand cavalry to tank the rain of arrows. Hand cavalry is utterly useless for both players in that MU in early fortress if I am not mistaken, so you rarely get to empirically compare hussars and cuirassiers other than when in huge masses.

[Kaiserklein]

Having to spend 200w 200g and to idle your stable while researching the veterancy for huss is the first reason why going huss is awkward.

Plus cuirs are just better overall. They do very well against "small" units. By that, I'm referring to the obstruction radius of units; for example, infantry and other cheap units (like ruyters or cossacks) are usually really close to each other (low obstruction radius). Obviously then, cuirs do a lot of damage, just like falcs would, because of the area of effect.
On the other hand, cuirs don't perform that well against huss for example, because of their big obstruction radius. But if you have goons in the back, most of the dps is gonna come from them anyway, and your cuirs will still tank and block, so it's alright. Cuirs also suck at sniping falcs, but that's not really relevant most of the time.

So yeah overall it's just more interesting to go cuirs, especially once you get cav upgrades in, since cuirs scale off fortress stats.


I'd advise going vet huss as France only in one specific case: in early fortress, when you have a lot of huss left from colo (like 10+, and with mostly high HP). You should anyway get the veterancy because it's just worth it, and then you might as well add a batch of huss or 2 because they indeed train faster and are easier to mass early on.
Then it's clearly better to have like 20 vet huss instead of 10 colo huss + 8 cuirs or something, and it's faster which matters a lot in early fights (having your reinforcement batch out 20s earlier can make a huge difference then, even if the batch is a bit weaker).

[momuuu]

Cuirs are better than vet huss 90% of the time, especially vs civs like brits or russia having low hp light infantry, also you need to invest 400 ress for vet huss which is not something you want when you unlock freely a better cav in age 3. moreover cuirs tank a lot and do area damage which is what you want in age 3. i guess you could commit to vet huss in you have 10-15 huss + you made in colonial but that's the only reason i would do that

Thanks for repeating my argument that masses of low hp light infantry are a nice opponent army composition when you have cuirs. Now, who on earth would spam this kind of light infantry, knowing that you produce cuirs?

Anybody that wants to win the game would. Here is where your entire case hopelessly falls apart when looked at with actual understanding of aoe3. Almost every civ would make infantry against france because infantry is the most crucial aspect of both age 2 and age 3 compositions. If you had simply watched or played any amount of competitive games, you would know this. There is no reasonable age 2 composition that doesnt involve infantry, save for sioux bow rider/axe rider. There is no truly great composition in age 3 that doesnt feature skirm type units - probably the best unit type in the game.

Whenever you would want to make hussars, cuirs are superior: against age 2 you want hussars to snare, raid and fight infantry. Against other cav you just make goons and annihilate them, so you dont actually make hand cav against other hand cav once you're age 3. Your cav will be fighting mostly infantry to snare them or will be used to tank. Granted that you generally dont even consider hand cav against an age 2 player unless the opponent has access to a unit like longbows or skirms. In which case cuirasiers are obviously better.

Against age 3 you only make cuirs to fight skirmishers. You dont really care for anything else. In cav vs cav the dps comes from the goons anyways, so you actually want to have more tanking capabilities like the cuirs have, so that near the end of the fight you still have a few cuirs left to clean up the skirms. You dont care as much for their dps (which still is great due to area damage).

So in fact against the vast majority of army compositions where you would consider hand cav, cuirs are there to tank and fight groups of infantry. You even acknowledge that cuirs then are superior.

[Gendarme]

But hussars are tankier than cuirassiers per cost and per pop (but not per frontline in case that significantly matters), so you mostly care for their dps and not their tankiness, n'est-ce pas ?