So, in my two current games, I've had support units. I don't really see their purpose. Can someone clue me in?

Support-class units usually have some ability that buffs allied units. Target a friendly unit in combat to activate.



It also dictates AI behavior. They will generally avoid melee combat.

Propbuddha wrote:
Support-class units usually have some ability that buffs allied units. Target a friendly unit in combat to activate.



It also dictates AI behavior. They will generally avoid melee combat.

Sure, but take the Wild Walkers for example: Their shaman boosts your defense, but is it a worthy trade against an archer or tank? Or does it do other things that I haven't noticed (passive vs active)?

well support units also are able to equip the weapon which gives their target the unsteady buff, lowing it's attack significantly. In the late game this can absolutly cripple a decked out hero or archer unit, so I will always try to have at least 1 in my army purely to apply this debuff to as many enemies as possible

Debuff lasts only for 2 turns I think, so you can keep 2 units debuffed at best with a single debuffer. Also, this is not limited to supports, zealots also have it, but can rain fiery death on everything at the same time. The only decent supports form my experience are proliferators (because of forager spam) and bishops (heal's pretty good). The others can use a major buff.

BTW i like that spider like creatures for Valuters. They miss support units and "stun, give defense and heal own unit"= Cocoon is great skill

Since the buffer support units are practically removed from most of the combat, maybe they should give their buffs more duration when they level up. Since the default level rises with each era it would make them relevant in higher unit count battles in late game, having their buffs last till the end of combat eventually. Same with the debuffs but scaling to weapon quality.

I hope the developers will take a good look at all units of the Support class to see whether they fulfill their intended roles or not. Particularly the Support AI behavior in combat is direly in need of tweaking.

Xandrios wrote:
I hope the developers will take a good look at all units of the Support class to see whether they fulfill their intended roles or not. Particularly the Support AI behavior in combat is direly in need of tweaking.

Yea, or maybe give us more control over the support unit. Let me chose what buff/de-buff the unit casts.

go ask the dust bishop is support units are worth it

As it is most of the support units are next to useless when you consider putting them into your main battle stack (with some exceptions).



Reasons for this that imho are:

1. Short buff/debuff duration. This results in having to keep them on a stand-by near the front the whole battle (which is dangerous considering their average stats). Besides it severely reduces their weight in battle since they only can influence 2 units at a time.

2. Their stats. This is no surprise as they are not meant to be useful as a raw power but considering the present battle system you can say goodbye to your shaman who ventured to near to the front-lines. Better not to bring him to battle at all.



The only way they happen to be useful for me is that I have a main stack (or a group of stacks) and a bunch of supporters nearby. The main stack does the dirty work and the supporters pop out as reinforcements when I consider their chances of survival are non zero or their assistance is necessary for some reason.

ripperr wrote:
As it is most of the support units are next to useless when you consider putting them into your main battle stack (with some exceptions).



Reasons for this that imho are:

1. Short buff/debuff duration. This results in having to keep them on a stand-by near the front the whole battle (which is dangerous considering their average stats). Besides it severely reduces their weight in battle since they only can influence 2 units at a time.

2. Their stats. This is no surprise as they are not meant to be useful as a raw power but considering the present battle system you can say goodbye to your shaman who ventured to near to the front-lines. Better not to bring him to battle at all.



The only way they happen to be useful for me is that I have a main stack (or a group of stacks) and a bunch of supporters nearby. The main stack does the dirty work and the supporters pop out as reinforcements when I consider their chances of survival are non zero or their assistance is necessary for some reason.

in b4 an initiative stack of nothing but dust bishops wipe your army off the map

They can made good replacement archers for factions who don't start with them.





Playing as the cult my support people were buffing my cavalry, who all had the regen item, buffing them to give like a 10% increase to all their stats.





Those porcelain cavalry were unstoppable.

I haven't faced that yet.

I really think Low damage trait should be -20-30% damage instead of -60% attack. This way support damage will be much more consistent while not being as powerful as primary combat units. Most of the supports don't even have abilities powerful enough to justify the low damage trait they have though. That's smth to look at as well.