I think War Elephant is overpowered because:

- It has the highest base CS in the Era

- It has Trample ability which always procs because it has the highest base CS in the Era

- It is heavy cavalry and therefore benefits from Charge making the CS difference even more absurd (it can one-shot a Swordsman from a high ground)

- As a cavalry it is supposed to be countered by an anti-cavalry unit, but the nearest counter are pikemen which belong to the next Era

- Its Trample ability for some reason works for defense as well

- It is unlocked too early through Mounted Warfare tech which immediately follows the Bronze-Working and Standing Army tech, which automatically ensures you have copper exploitation for the unit and results in a very small window of opportunity to make a preemptive strike against the empire

- The unit is cheap and trades 1 for 2 (or even 3) units

I think the unit needs a nerf! As of now you either need an Era Jump into Mongols to counter it or you need to play extremely defensively with garrison spam and cripple your development.

Yeah agreed. The fact that it's overpowered is less a problem to me than the fact that it's just not a fun ability to play with or against as it asks no effort from the user to proc it. My preferred alternatives are:

Trample (reworked): Deals some damage to units adjacent to both the unit and target, unless separated by cliffs.

Intimidation: -1 Combat Strength to all adjacent enemies.

I prefer the latter as it makes room for the Franci Milites to have the former, which is another unit that has a very strong yet dull ability.

Yeah, I had no idea how strong they were until I was trapped on a continent with hostile Carthaginians.  Thankfully they didn't have many of them, so I had the numbers advantage, but they are brutal.  It made for a good single-player story, but I'm not sure how they'd fare in multiplayer balance.

In my game, I had luck advancing to the Taino before I should have been through the Classic Era.  The Taino, like the Mongols, have an EU that doesn't require technology to unlock, so I could suddenly field CS31 archers who excelled on river tiles to slowly turn the tide of war, and thankfully the areas we were fighting were full of rivers.  There's no good counter within that era except maybe Greek/Roman/Achaemenid EQs themselves.

shasho wrote:

Trample (reworked): Deals some damage to units adjacent to both the unit and target, unless separated by cliffs.

Intimidation: -1 Combat Strength to all adjacent enemies.

Oh, I like both of these.  They feel "Amplitudish" from Endless Legend and could fit in well in HK.

I made a very long post here (which really should have been its own thread) in which I briefly mention the War Elephant: https://www.games2gether.com/amplitude-studios/humankind/forums/168-general/threads/48883-going-first-is-broken-and-the-ai-knows-it?page=2#post-361404

The TLDR is that I also think the relative Combat Strength difference of pretty much every unit probably needs another pass. I don't think there's a good reason for these massive base Combat Strength differences between units contemporaneous to each other, let alone the strong Emblematic bonus. The base CS difference between a War Elephant and a Swordsman probably should not exceed 5, nearly half of the current 9. It basically nullifies the effects of terrain, fortification, rear attack, and anything else engaging about combat, and excessively rewards strong culture picks and tech.

Franci Milites is another good example. Its base CS is enough to make it even with a Pikeman with the Anti-Cavalry bonus, meaning it has no real counter. And that's before the Heavy Charge bonus.

On my point of view, they are not overpowered. 

- There are other elephants on this era. The Mauryans culture has the Saṃnāhya. They also have 30 base strength. 

- So the War Elephant can reach most of the time a strength of 34 and with the heavy cavalry type it can get additional +3 strength. If they attack first, your enemy units have +2 strength by defending. So it's just a +1 strength bonus. After your first attack, it is hard to use the heavy cavalry ability again. Especially if the are is crowded by area or tons of units. 

- You forget to consider other emblematic units. On this era, there are two other anti-cavalry units. These anti-cavalry units can basically reach around 36-38 combat strength aginst War Elephants. So they are even in strength, but most of the time stronger. 

- Additionally, you forget to consider the production costs. You say they are cheap. No, they are not. They are the with the Saṃnāhya the most expensive units of this era. The War Elephant costs 360 production and 2 population, while the anti-cavalry units have halve the cost with 180 production and only 1 population. So you get with the same investment 2 anti-cavalry units. 2 of these units are way stronger than one War Elephant. 

- Also, you have to consider other aspects of the game, like how you get these units. Typically, you will not have heavy cavalry units when you enter the classical era, because they have an unfavorable technology position and you can change your era before you hit that technology and invest the production to produce heavy cavalry units beforehand. Maybe you can get War Elephants really fast by buying them with gold if you plan it correctly. 

- A big problem is that heavy-cavalry units are not really useful for attacking cities, because they can not climb fortifications. Your enemy can just interrupt your sieging, and sieging right now is not really impressive. Most of the time, you take cities without sieging. 

- The Mounted Warfare technology is indeed earlier compared to the ancient era, but it is still one technology later. The game changes if you play on a slower or faster speed. If you play on a slower speed, your enemy has more time to prepare their emblematic units with units from the Standing Army technology. Also, their units are cheaper to produce. Moreover, their units are easier to get, because they are likely upgraded units from the ancient era. In the ancient era, you mostly likely have melee units or you can have a good amount of anti-cavalry units if you had a culture that had anti-cavalry units as emblematic unity or you had a militarist culture that can just create 4 anti-cavalry units. 

- To be fair, three of the four melee emblematic units of the classical era are not really good. They will probably struggle against the War Elephants, but maybe they get the momentum because you get them easier and earlier. On the other hand the fourth melee emblematic unit the Preatorian Guards rock. They basically have 32 strength when attacking and have a base strength of 29. Also, they only cost 180 production and 1 pop. With them, you can easily conquer cities. Also, there is another emblematic unit that is comparable to the War Elephants. The Gothic Cavalry. They basically have 5 less strength, but they only cost 90 production. There are other good emblematic units too. For example, the Huns have the Hunnic Horde with 22 strength. They have range attacks, they have Multi-Move, they multiply and they can be bought with influence. Also, if you play the Bantu culture, you most likely reach the next era really fast, so you can abuse their power. They have a really good momentum in comparison to the War Elephants. Also, the Javelin Riders are a good range unit.   

So if you compare all cultures, you see that at least 7 cultures of 11 cultures can keep up with War Elephants or dominate the War Elephants culture. 2 Cultures have anti-cavalry, 1 culture has their own elephant, there is one good range unit culture, the Romans and the heavy-cavalry gothic culture and least the Hunnic Horde that can cripple you before you get your War Elephants. 

I'll be chalking this one down as yet another argument why unit types should merge, but should never be benched for a whole era, and Classical is main culprit here, because, Emblematics aside, half of a roster gets to sit on a bench.

GladiusArdens wrote:

- Additionally, you forget to consider the production costs. You say they are cheap. No, they are not. They are the with the Saṃnāhya the most expensive units of this era. The War Elephant costs 360 production and 2 population, while the anti-cavalry units have halve the cost with 180 production and only 1 population. So you get with the same investment 2 anti-cavalry units. 2 of these units are way stronger than one War Elephant.

By cheap I didn't mean industry and population cost. It costs around 300 gold to upgrade a chariot into a War Elephant. You always want to go for upgrades that save you population instead of building the unit, except when you have armory and exceptional industry. Same rule applies to line infantry which costs 4 pop - building it is detrimental to upgrading for it.

I am not sure that 2 units can beat a war elephant. What units and what scenario do you have in mind, in particular? Keep in mind that with 6 MS an elephant can easily take favourable position in battle and can retreat to the city walls or a garrison when injured.

neprostoman wrote:

GladiusArdens wrote:

- Additionally, you forget to consider the production costs. You say they are cheap. No, they are not. They are the with the Saṃnāhya the most expensive units of this era. The War Elephant costs 360 production and 2 population, while the anti-cavalry units have halve the cost with 180 production and only 1 population. So you get with the same investment 2 anti-cavalry units. 2 of these units are way stronger than one War Elephant.

By cheap I didn't mean industry and population cost. It costs around 300 gold to upgrade a chariot into a War Elephant. You always want to go for upgrades that save you population instead of building the unit, except when you have armory and exceptional industry. Same rule applies to line infantry which costs 4 pop - building it is detrimental to upgrading for it.

I am not sure that 2 units can beat a war elephant. What units and what scenario do you have in mind, in particular? Keep in mind that with 6 MS an elephant can easily take favourable position in battle and can retreat to the city walls or a garrison when injured.

If the wiki is correct, it costs 360 gold to upgrade chariots to War Elephants. In comparison, you can upgrade your warriors to swordsmen for 90 gold or to Praetorian Guards for 270 gold. Spearman need 180 gold to upgrade to Immortals or Hoplites. So again, War Elephants are expansive, but they have the advantage that you can reduce the pop cost by upgrading instead of building them for 2 pops. In addition, you also need chariots, but where do you have them from? Most likely you have warriors, Spearman or archers but not chariots. Because as I already said, the technology wheel has an unfavorable location. You get them too late. Also, you have to consider that chariots are expensive to build. Chariots cost 180, Spearman cost 90 and warriors cost 45 production. Again you have the same formal there with the production cost. Melee units are the cheapest units than you have to double their cost for Spearman or archers and heavy-cavalry cost double the amount of Spearman or archers. So by the time you get the wheel technology, you already have a good army with warriors and archers or Spearman. Then you want to invest into heavy-cavalry units? Most likely you can just go to the next era to upgrade your army with less money and more units and these units would destroy your heavy-cavalry units from the ancient era. By the time you reach Mounted Warfare to construct War Elephants, you can't any longer produce the cheaper chariot version to upgrade from them. Upgrading units is always a really good and solid strategy. Especially in the earlier eras. Later it becomes more and more expensive while you also have to maintain a large army. Where do you have all the money to upgrade your expansive chariot to War Elephants? 

The following examples show you how much gold you could have on standard speed when you can change to the next era. They are no optimal because I pressed the last stars out of them and I guess it is not worth to do that for tier 1 stars because they just give a small amount of fame. It's better to rush to the next era to crush your neighbors. Especially in the early game because the difference of the combat strength between the eras is massive. 

My Bantu save has 580 gold (6 gold per turn), turn 26, needs 6 turns for the Wheel, 10 for Standing Army and 19 for Mounted Warfare.

My Assyrians save has 227 gold (82 gold per turn), turn 36, has Wheel, 3 turns for Standing Army and 5 for Mounted Warfare

My Egyptians save has 93 gold (22 gold per turn), turn 37, has Wheel, 6 turns for Standing Army, 11 for Mounted Warfare.

My Harappans save has 227 gold (53 gold per turn), turn 31, has Wheel (could have), Standing Army in 6 turns and Mounted Warfare in 11 turns.

My Hittites save has 897 gold (44 gold per turn), turn 30, has Wheel (could have), Standing Army in 19 and Mounted Warfare in 35 turns

My Mycenaeans save has 190 gold (20 gold per turn), turn 28, needs 7 turns for Wheel, 12 for Standing Army and 23 for Mounted Warfare. 

My Nubians save has 1417 gold (137 gold per turn), turn 42, has Wheel, 8 turns for Standing Army and 15 for Mounted Warfare.

My Olmecs save has 2 gold (26 per turn), turn 33, has Wheel (could have), Standing Army in 10 and Mounted Warfare in 19 turns.

Most of these culture will manage to upgrade one or two units to War Elephants, and less culture can hit three to four upgrades. Well, the Nubians could upgrade 10 units in this example, but they are really slow with turn 42 and 15 more turns to reach Mounted Warfare. But I am not using gold instead of science jobs right now, so the Nubians would actually hit the technology faster but with less money. 

What can beat a War Elephant? So Immportals will have 36 combat strength or 39 combat strength while having high ground or a fortified position and the Hoplites will have at least 37 combat strength vs War Elephants. War Elephants on the other hand have only 34 combat strength and can get up to 37 while charging. So one Anti-Cavalry is stronger than one War Elephant. But you will have two of them vs one War Elephant if you invest the same amount. One time my enemy had one of these two Anti-Cavalry units, and It fells bad to attack them. They could just defend their position or go on the aggressive, while range units hurt the War Elephants. The same applies to the Romans. But they are slightly weaker with 29 or 32 combat strength, but more viable vs. a lot of other units. The Saṃnāhya Elephant or the Javelin Riders can make your life hard with War Elephants. They are strong range units. The Saṃnāhya do not even need melee defenses. But the Javelin Riders with other defending units could be a good matchup. And the Gothic Cavalry with just 90 production and 29 combat strength are weaker but really cheap. So they could challenge the War Elephants with a larger army.

What's about your 6 movement? Other units with 4 movement can also retreat behind the second line. The battlefield is an unclear variable. Favorable positions are most of the time determined when the battle starts. So if your War Elephants retreat, you already lost the fight you started. Where is your overpowered unit? Battlefield can be crowded. So it can be hard to use your charge ability with your War Elephants. It's more likely a one time attack bonus. After that, your enemy can just close the gap, so your War Elephants can no longer use their charge ability. It gets more unlikely with more units. By the way, your War Elephants do not ignore zone of control, so they can not really reach your enemy back lines. 

Overall, I think War Elephants are decent. I would rate them like this tier list on Reddit with slight differences "https://www.reddit.com/r/HumankindTheGame/comments/xb1n0o/humankind_emblematic_units_tierlists_and_guide/".