Armenia with their Cataphract Horse Archers and Legionaries make a really good contender for op horse archer faction, since they have great heavy infantry to support the pathfinding nerfed but still best horse archers
Their temples are S+. They have health (which is pop growth + happienes), law (which is happieness + reducing corruption) and the experience temple (0/1/2/3/sth to all stats). Julii have pop growth (which is half of health), happieness (which is just dogshit, AND dionisos makes your generals drunk) and some other throwaway temple I forgor. Don't make me even mention the Scipii sea temple.
@@Gritty1983 They also have the expendable trait, which means losing them won't affect the leadership of nearby units if routed or destroyed. Eastern Infantry were infamous for causing mass routs.
Dude, talking about the Roman specialist units. I remember as a kid noticing that war dog instantly replace casualties as long as the dog handlers don't die. So i just had a full stack of war dogs following the army, pop a hole into the wall, and let the horde of fluffs murder everyone. Use the regular army to mop up any survivors lol Only thing is you have to be sure to order the handlers back after the dogs charge, once the dogs start fighting the handlers try to engage again so gotta pull em back twice.
Always left them as garrisons, and if a town came under siege, I would sally out every turn, release the dogs, and then quit the battle with everyone inside the city. The AI always takes forever to assault cities, so you could do a lot of damage for cheap upkeep
@@goldflame3390 Learned a lot from this comment! Just started Rome 1 and I only heard that dogs were OP. Didn't get an explanation why. Didn't help that it was pricy haha. Now I know :D
Yeah also only 50 denarii upkeep and lowest manpower draw so really economically too minimise casualties. But they can't turn the tide of the battle and they happily chase a single routing entity of the map and the edge of the world. Also they take 2 turns to recruit which is a real big dowside especially given in Rome I every city no matter the size can only recruit one unit a turn. But yeah nice unit which certainly has it's uses. I think it's the cheapest unit (together with the diplomat) which makes them a good option to put in forts (especially depleted units).
@@badonkadonk6655 - Dogs also weaken enemy morale so if you combine them with a charge from a cavalry unit or two you can pretty easily route certain units. This is especially true on normal difficulty, but I'll admit normal difficulty readily allows the player to get away with field armies comprised entirely of cavalry units. I remember smashing entire Roman armies in the late game with light cavalry since I never went through the Marian reforms during my first global conquest run on that difficulty level. In fact, one of my most famous generals during those battles was a hypochondriac.
he just doesn't want to cover WH3 until the DLC since he has no early access and everyone wants to see content covering the DLC so the WH3 videos wouldn't perform well.
Yeah that was the good old time I agree, so much more freedom than what Rome2 did after. But there was technical reasons if I recall, and it was too easy to cheat the movement as well. Probably would have been better to let the player decide but well, we got used to it.
Germans just have too good of a roster to be put on D tier. Tier 1 spammable phalanx, ok axe and shield infantry, big axe bois, berserkers, good archers and even good cavalry
For battles / lategame they are definetely super beasts, but their starting location is quite terrible. If not for player advantage when you are playing them against dumb AIs, Gaul would stomp them. They have like 4 poor cities and Gaul has like 7 or 8.
@@MajkaSrajka funly enough it's the britons who come after germans first. And phalanxes are just too good at defending, no amount of warband spam can beat it. That alone gives enough time to build an offensive army.
at 12:18 correction: Macedon starts with the province with Statue of Zeus (Corinth), not Greek City States, but players with the GCS are able to very easily take said province
Germania gets one of the best unit rosters in the game with Chosen Archers, Chosen Axemen, Gothic Cavalry and ever hilarious but effective Berserkers. They should at least be C Tier. Also all factions in BI can reach tier 5 settlements. The Alemani and its copies get one of the best rosters in the game (i would honestly argue the best). They get chosen axemen who are an absolute wrecking ball against other all infantry in that game, their first tier archer unit Lombard Archers are a great long range units, Burgundian Lancers are one of the best fast shock cav units. The only thing they don't get is horse archers.
I was curious what he thinks about German berserkers, but then he didnt even mention them. May not be as powerful on highest difficulty, but they were the first doomstacks of my childhood. Had such a fun watching cavemen with big clubs beating up entire armies whilst rampaging and barely lose models.
D Tier for Germania ist Madness indeed, their roster is insane, Chosen axemen destroy everything and both Cav as well as archers are really good as well. Not to mention having by far the best Spear unit of it's tier.
Yeah, the argument for C as Gauls but D for Germania doesn't make sense. Sure, Gaul starts with a bunch of territory, but it is guaranteed to fight the Julii, the Britons tend to attack you, the spaniards do too from memory, and Germania is a fourth possible enemy. Not to mention the distance to cover versus the Julii. Germania has a far easier early game by comparison, even if they're nominally weaker. Gauls do have foresters which are better than chosen archers, and chosen swordmen are pretty good. But chosen axemen are no joke and they have far better cavalry in the gothic cavalry. And most critically, the German early game is far better thanks to phalanx warband. So, with an arguably comparable roster and just easier time as Germania, it would be better reflected with inverted rankings in my opinion.
Also he didn't mention the fact that their spear warband are phalanx units and if I remember correctly they are the highest entity phalanx unit in the game and definitely not the worst stat wise. It means even late game they can utilise their early game units to hold the line pretty well for heavy cav or shock infantry to do the damage
Man I used to love playing the Seleucid and the only non-Roman faction I did a world conquest with. Storming Egypt early game and heading up to cap Greece before the Roman’s establish a foothold gives you a massive advantage.
AND cataphract archers, which are the game's tanks, killing every other missile they can't catch, and destroying almost any melee unit when correctly used (unless egiptyan light axe horses appear, those guys are a pain in the ...)
Last comment: The Saxons also can't become a horde, like the Celts. And the Franks while not having strong cavalry, are able to build some of the highest tech buildings, and paladins from Christian abbey buildings, as you saw years ago in the "Last Frank Saving Disaster Campaign" are actually pretty good cavalry
The thing is though those historically speaking weren’t horde migrating during the period, it’s a in game disadvantage but it was the design for historical purposes
@@wolfgangroddewig of them only the Celts didnt mass migrate: Anglo-Saxons had large movement across the North Sea into Britain, and Allemani had a mass movement south and west into Southern France and Switzerland (fascinating period of abandoned Romanised Germanic villas left behind in the old Alleman territory)
Seleucids were always my favorite faction to play, mostly for the reasons you outlined. Very challenging starting position with lots of fires to put out early on, but once you consolidated things you could push to monopolize the SE corner of the map and get ready to deal with Rome. That and their very strong roster, idk I just always had the most fun with them. That said, definitely not easy street the way the S tier factions are, so fair enough on the ranking.
Gotta disagree about Macedon. Their infantry can punch way above their tier and you never have to actually lose a settlement because you have tier zero and tier one units. Ready access to steal all the world’s wonders is a nice touch, and can be really strong to get early. I don’t think they’re S tier but I think they’re better than Carthage
Dacia's Falx troops absolutely wreck for the price. Germania was always the best Barbarian faction. Their infantry is incredibly powerful and varied... I mean their Spear Warband is a phalanx and OP AND cheaper than Hoplites. German Chosen Axemen have proven to slice trough even heavy Roman Infantry and one unit of Berserkers will smash most weak infantry. Seleucid were always my favorite Greek faction. They are a challenge for the location, but have the most amazing roster potential and money making location.
Yeah, their placement is kinda weird. Spear Warband can hold the line much better than other basic barbarian Warband, they have access to decent heavy cav in the form of Gothic Cavalry (although if i recall correctly they are a temple unit, not a stable one) and Chosen Axemen is the only infantry unit in the game along with Spartans that can beat Urbans 1 to 1. Strictly tactically, the best "orthodox" barbarian roster.
@@Vandelberger Yeah, Germanic cataclysm of Western Europe 600 years early is always fun! I'm not sure about B though, more inclined towards best of C. A lot of trash territories, so the player has to beeline towards Italy to get going, which means a lot of ongoing wars.
@@StavrosGiol Ah, I try and conquer all of Gaul and British before I ever push south. England has the Stone hedge buff but it has been so long since I played. It’s true the buildings and technical development are meh. I feel like they should all get access to level 4 buildings just make Barbarians take longer.
This is a blast from the past…I played Rome as a kid. I remember using commands to cheat more money, and the spartan phalanxes being insane LOL. It’s the only total war I played from then until Warhammer 2
If you like the total war formula theres some real gems in the interum but i think the only one your missing that maxes out the fun is medieval 2 total war and fall of the samurai
I couldn't play that game pass Marian Reform. Once I got it I already became invincible... There was no challenge. But at the same time, I didn't feel like playing Barbarians because it doesn't make sense to me to go backwards on things.
Regarding the original RTW, the Dacians deserve C tier IMHO. A lot of people seem to be sleeping on the fact that they are THE ONLY FACTION (along with Scythians, but they don't need them) that can train archers from initial practice range, and archers can provide a massive boost in early game. Also, quick access to Thessalonica and Chosen Swordsmen. In terms of BI, if i remember correctly, Huns can't build ports (at least in the original), and if that stands they should be getting a B for shit economy.
Ah.. dacia.. usually i would abandon my settlements and migrate them to greece.. get a macedon city and you're pretty much have the whole of dacia roster.
I normally put the Seleucids into S tier, simply because it cannot be understated just how powerful it is overlapping a unit of their legion units with a unit of pikemen covering them. The legionary shields mixed amongst the pikes plus the slight overlap of legions covering the pike's flanks is extremely hard for the enemy factions to overcome. Specially with cavalry in the mix.
I must protest, Armenia has their own legionaries and also cataphracts and cataphract archers. Pretty good roster PS The best Britannian unit are head hurlers, I just anihilated whole legions with them on my road to Italy
Honestly Scipii is favourite: Greece is almost exactly as close as for Brutii, and your military bonuses start at temple level 1 and add up quickly, even your early game fresh recruit hastati wipe the floor because of the weapons bonus, and by the Marian Reforms and Civil War your Legionaries will come out with buffs so big they'll take on Urbans and Praetorians
11:45 I will never forget your Europa Babaoreum Seleucid playthrough! Good times. 14:00 Surprising pick 21:20 Finsih 24:45 Yeah, I remember how frightened you were when dealing with Clibernarii in your western Roman Empire campaign. 28:20 Legend confused 33:25 When I played the Romans, my super expensive army got smashed by babarians. After that, I only used my only cav armies to conquer Germania:D Surely, it was my fast time playing a TW game but I still think that pikes are just more intuitiv and beginner friendly. Therefore, I would give Greeks S tier because they are easy to handle.
Appreciated, I dabbled with the franchise as back as the first Shogun, but I don't have the playtime you do by any means, so really appreciating the chance to hear your thoughts!
13:33 im noticing alot of historical inaccuracies in the total war games as I learn more history, but it doesn’t take away my enjoyment. I’m sure they had their reasons
The Julii have a bug where the pantheon has worse modifier then the previous building level... Brutii has a pantheon that grants health that increases both population growth and happiness.
I just feel like Scythia should have been much higher. You can world conquest using only one unit in all directions at once because its so cost effective
I would win every battle in this game by getting a single pike unit as the Greek City States and putting them in the gate opening and enemies just instantly die 😊
I further improved on this technique by destroying the walls. You can also just choke them in a city street close to your plaza. Then the AI wont siege and you get to keep your entire unit instead of losing them to attrition. Its how I always defend the northern border of the Seleucid Empire 😂.
@@rickrockreggae3719 why dont you just position a fitting army(enough hoplites and archers+ 1or2 cav) on the bdidges along the northern rivers(danube etc) i never had a peoblem with invasions afterwards. You obly need to know which crossings has how many ri ercrossings.
@@1krauterquark88 well that means more expensive army + i still need soldiers to keep the peace in cities. So I minimise costs in the north to quickly squash egypt. Then send a force to the Parthia settlement and consolidate my position in the east. From there I only have to defend against the numidians, which will never be that scary. Then reshift the focus to north. Yours is a good one to, but to expensive for my taste, plus that army will have to refresh from time to time. But I do love me some bridge fights so I'll try it out next time. Nothing more delish then thousands of corpses strewn across the bridge and floating over the river 🤣
@@rickrockreggae3719 if necessary you can go eith 2 units of hopltes/pikes and 1 cav per crossing/bridge on battemap. But against scythia you need something hat can deal damage.
I so wish to see you play some Greek or Macedon RTW 1 campaign utilizing those long spears and pikes instead of usual cavalry... that would be really a heroic victory on your channel in my eyes!
Germania is definitely at least C tier, if not B tier. Having Phalanx units in the early game against civilizations that do not (IE Gaul and Britannia and Julii primarily for early game) is an immense advantage. Not to mention their higher tear units dominating in categories of infantry with Berserkers, Cavalry with Gothic Cavalry, and Archers with their Archer Warband.
Sleeping on Thrace getting Bastarnae which have 2 hitpoints per model, the only faction that can natively recruit them, and one of the few infantry units with 2 hitpoints. Way tougher than they seem, as well as having greek cultural buildings
Thrace really seems to be a faction ahead of it's time, since the player is supposed to use shock infantry as flankers instead of cav (falxmen with war cry are just brutal). A shame cav is so prevalent in RTW.
Watching this list and the Medieval II one despite not playing either game. I watch because he clearly knows his stuff and highlights the differences between each faction very well.
I only recently realized the Pontus icon is a Sassanid headpiece; I'm not sure if the Parthians ever used that, but you can see that used as a banner template for the Sassanids in Attila.
Some corrections (its ok Legend og Rome was a long long long time ago): Greek Cities has hoplites not pikemen. Spain has 4 iberian settlements, Gaul has 1. Saxons alongside Celts and Allemani can't horde. Anyone spot anymore?
@@ippolit4262 some of it is just Legend's opinion, as is the nature of such rankings. He likes cavalry and handwaves all except the top 5 elite infantry and archers in any game, so I can see why he's be unimpressed by Armenian heavy spearmen and legionaries (although I agree they are the strongest eastern infantry in the game)
@@Rynewulf Parthia has only eastern infantry and hillmen, armenia has legionaries and hoplites - and they have a pretty dope Vanhang temple too (battleforge - it gives combat xp and some weapon&armor).
Great list. I would only make 2 modifications. The Franks do have heavy cavalry, Paladins! I think they can get some stronger buildings by converting too. Bump to at least B. The second is the Alemanni because the berserkers are sooo broken for sieges. If you can get them blood thirst on the walls they will kill anything. Top tier roman units, dead, for a fraction of the cost. I've charged my own heavy Calvary into the backs of the berserks and then they turn around they just mow down heavy cavalry. Of course their weakness is archers. Their starting position is brutal also. I would bump to C at least.
I feel like the germans in RTW are really underrated to play. You're the only barbarians to get phalanxes (very early too) so you can expand very quickly while your cities are still well defended while the rest of your roster promotes all out aggression and quick decisive battles with morale breaks. Surprisingly good archers too
See, when i play the 3 Roman factions, yes i expand in the direction you're guided to, but i also send units around the other 2 to snipe territory from them. basically I try and limit their expansion as much as possible so that the civil war is much easier
Fun stuff, I adored the o.g. RTW + Barbarian Invasion back in the day. With the powerhouse S & A tier factions you had, the Seleucids had the rough start with a crisis that can easily pile up. The Seleucids can make some good money, have a good roster, but they're in a central position with rivals at every major compass direction.
Why would anyone think the Greek Cities are S tier? They have a completely one dimensional army roster. Sure it's strong, but you WILL discover the limits of what Hoplites are able to do once you play a full Greek Cities campaign. The Romans are definitely a tier above them just because of how much more versatile their unit roster is. If any of the Hellenic factions have an argument for being S tier, it would be the Seleucids.
Some things I'd personally change: - Seleucids in S above Egypt, or at the very least at the top of A tier. Their roster is awesome, apart from camels they have access to everything (chariots, melee inf, hoplites, pikes, heavy cav, they have it all). Their starting position is weak, but Greeks have an easy time defending with the pikemen so you'll really unlikely lose any cities even if the whole world around you attacks you. They also start with 2 wonders and have easy access to 2 more, and another 2 when you defeat Egypt: so you'll easily own 6 of the 7 wonders. And their culture allows for big empires easily as well. - Goths are alright in B tier, but I'd say at the bottom or top of C. They can horde, and should since all other horde factions (Huns, Vandals, Roxolani, Sarmatians) will walk past your only settlement and probably want to raid it. So you're better off packing your things and leaving straight away. This causes another issue, since the Goths are the only barbarian faction in the game that start Christian, while pretty much the whole world around you is still Pagan. - I'd switch Germania and Britannia around. The brits do have chariots, but no other cav. Also no archers, heavy spears or pikes so their heavy inf is a bit without support (only slingers and head hurlers). Germania on the other hand has pikes, as well as a bunch of different infantry units and heavy cav (Gothic Cav). With Night Raiders and Screaching Women you can lower enemy morale and boost your own, which is very important in a game like Rome 1 where morale can often be the deciding factor. - Franks should be in B tier I think. Even though they don't have horse archers, their melee infanty selection is really good and their Paladin cavalry is among the best in the game. They also have easy access to Western Roman lands or take out the Saxons and/or Allemani who both cannot horde. - Spanish above Dacians. Dacians are bland beyond bland, at least with Scutarii and Bull Warriors the Spanish have some more punch and flavour than the genericness of Dacia. Other than that agreed with the rest. P.S. The barbarians in BI can build up to tier 5.
Egyptian cavalry is cheap, has extra large unit size and is armour piercing. Combine with cheap phallanx and archers for a strong, flexible army that can be recruited early game.
Correct, Egyptian cavalery secretely slaps. They are so good they are cost-effective against catraphacts, and are one of ~4 things that have Armor Piercing in RTW (thrown Pillas, Scythias Headhunter Cavalery, Chosen Axemen, Catraphacts secondary attack and maybe some random things like head throwers / chariots / elephants / berserker special attacks).
13:49 no jokes once I charged a unit of Pharaoh's archers with some Triaii, at close range, and they beat them at melee. Pharaohs archers are so bloody strong 😂
Germania has an interesting roster that’s much better than - for example - Gaul’s. Their basic spear unit has phalanx ability which makes settlement defense child’s play against other non-roman factions, and it’s axe wielding units are made to open up legionaries like tin cans. And they get berserkers, night raiders, gothic cav. Sure they are a barbarian faction so don’t get anything past T3 settlements, but they are hardly a bottom tier faction.
I disagree on Germania in Rome, because they have their pikemen which can fend of many enemy units if you put them in good positions. In the early midgame, you can use a decent cavalry and berserkers. One unit of berserkers might be able to kill of a whole army on its own if used correctly. The Franks in Barbarian Invasion are actually a bit distinct from other germanic factions as they are able to build high tier religious buildings and can also recruit very good units in the later game.
By the way, I also thought the Selecids were "really good". But the moment I found that Cataphracts have an alternative attack (with maces) that is AP, they definitely moved to the S tier. They chew through armored units, including Romans, very effectively, and with Seleucids' not terrible infantry, one can do hammer and anvil very nicely (unlike the Parthians, where the only good option is pretty much dual-Cataphract hammer and hammer, after the opponent was devastated/tired by horse archers)
Egypt: "They've got the best archers in the game" Forester Warband: Am I a joke to you? Honestly though great video, well explained. Enjoyed this a lot
I slightly disagree with the Franks position, their infantry is much better than most of the other barbarians, having throwing axes b4 charge, and access early to heavy infantry. Also in the later stage if in a Christian settlement, they can recruit paladins, which were super good last I remember, though hard produce due to religion and recruit time.
Was nodding along until you got to Germania. Armor piercing chosen axemen, wrecking ball berserkers, long range archers, even their warbands ability to form a phalanx gives them a massive advantage over early game Gaul, Britain and even Hastati. Clear A tier faction. Tier 3 max just mean you get the good stuff faster too. Go play a Germania campaign and come back to me. Edit: How did i forget Gothic cav??
All that, but you will be struggling with either money or population for most of the campaign. No point in mentioning awesome units if you won't be able to afford them on the campaingn map.
I personally think Germania should be at least C tier. The spear warbands (albeit not as good as Greek hoplites) are pretty effective if you know how to use them. The chosen axemen can hack up heavily armored units easily when you get a good hammer and anvil going on. Not the best faction by any stretch, but at least worthy of C tier.
Couldnt a faction like Parthia just siege any place, and either wait for an army to reinforce or wait out the siege, which would force the defending army to fight in open field anyways ? I’ve beaten entire factions just doing that lol
the thing with scythia, their entire playstyle is about being fast, your cavalry is fast in campaign and in battle, you develop fast and you recruit fast. it is better to bring strong tier 3(the roster level would be 4 and the settlement is the value of 2) in masses against tier 4/5 or 1:1 against tier 2 than to bring tier 5 against tier 5. a battle between high level units is costly and not what you would want, and with scythia’s speed in easy mode you can win the campaign before your faction leader dies(he is starts fifty years old or so) without much effort.
I didn't play any other barbarians in BI, but I found the Saxons to be quite good. I think they have an experience shrine and a ranged weapons shrine, so by building hunters in one city and moving them into another you can get hunters with +5 damage pretty early, giving them 12 missile damage. Since archer units are larger than horse archers, you can slap down hordes pretty well like that, definitely much better than WRE can.
4 cities with 200 pop, no eco and a spear infantry that whilst good, it costs 520, IIRC has high upkeep and has no warcry (warcry buffs your attack by 10 for like a minute, which is why barbs can slap).
Armenia has access to mid tier phalanx units, and medium infantry, which in my opinion makes them comparable to parthia because you at least get access to units that can do things in sieges and phalanx units allow for an actual anvil to hammer. I feel like it's a worthy trade off compared to elephants when you already have top level calv handled.
Another factor that I might consider in making the tier list is how much each faction is "autoresolve friendly". Using partia or mecedonia are terrible for autoresolve, you will most of the times declared as defeated while in battle you can easily win by using different simple legit tactics. You may use some naked warriors vs archers and autoresolve to victory. I hate playing as factions that need manual war for every single tiny war. Player can do a lot with horse archers of partians and levy long spears of mecedonians but because their general stats are poor, the game tends to auto-declare defeat for such armies.
I would put the Britons at C; the enemies they will tend to face don't have a lot of great anti-heavy calvary options, and I've seen a *ton* of games where their AI paints the north of the map, and even sometimes push to northern Italy. Yes, poor settlement choices and weak infantry in general, but having good Heavy Calvary makes a *lot* of other problems go away.
The Scipii have two big advantages: gold-gold upgrades (the only romans that can do this) and by far the most powerful fleet. This is especially important in the remaster since the campaign AI is significantly more challenging. Stoping those invasion fleets and blockading ports is a must.
So i think there are a couple of missplaces here, and that’s mainly because of one or two missed factors. Things to factor are So legend considers Economy, roster, building options (especially city size and public order maintenance) However, i think there are 3 other factors that have been missed out, that would personally have me downgrade the seleucids, gaul, and maybe carthage; and push up germania Proximity to rome: In general there are 3 phases to how you would fight the roman factions, based on when you encounter them, so I’ve categorised factions by these phases, but with an a and b based on whether i think, if you expand towards them quickly enough, you can encounter them in an earlier phase. 1-early game- hastati, velites and equites are almost all you’ll encounter, with a few principes thrown in. The easiest time to fight rome though also when you’re at your weakest: carthage, greek cities, gaul 2- Rome’s getting into it’s stride, principes, cavalry auxilia, archers and a smattering of siege weapons and triarii. More importantly they can throw multiple full stacks your way, so it can get pretty sloggy 2a: numidia, spain, germania, dacia, macedon, thrace 2b: britannia, egypt 3- Final form, full roster, whichever faction/s you’re not fighting probably own most of the far side of the map. Legionary cohorts, archer auxilia. Whichever faction you’re playing, this is pain. Hopefully you’ve met them at the start of this point and most of their frontier armies are the old model, or you’re strong enough to match their multiple stacks with yours 3a: pontus, scythia, 3b- seleucids, parthia, armenia This is important because rome is the biggest challenge of the game, and whether what you’ve got matches up to what they’ve got at the point when you meet is a massive factor in the difficulty of the game. For example Carthage has an excellent roster. Lots of heavy cavalry, elephants, a strong high tier infantry unit, and some ok skirmishers, as well as economy that can maintain expensive stacks. But you’re at war with Rome on turn 5 at the latest. What you actually have are iberian infantry, round shield cavalry and any mercenaries you can scrounge up. You start with one elephant unit and you *cannot* be wasting your mobile battering ram on some hastati. Once you’ve passed the hurdle and strangled rome in its cradle then it’s mostly plain sailing but your big difficulty spike is right at the start of the game. By contrast Egypt and the Seleucids get to deploy their best units against Rome, but by then you’re probably going to be fighting a queue of blue/green full stacks in libya/greece that will each take a good bite out of even your best doomstack. Who you’re up against at the start is also important. I think Gaul needs a downgrade and germania an upgrade for 2 reasons. 1 is that germania’s standard infantry are basically militia hoplites, and will steamroll early, mainly melee, gaulish and britannian armies with little fuss (in my gaul playthrough i was having to manoeuvre skirmish running battles with warbands, defeating a full stack took me the better part of an hour and a half). The other is that germania starts off with one front, 2 enemies that it can fight, and eventually a third that is also easy (dacia). In a gaul playthrough you are at war on 3 fronts against 8 enemies (4 of which are rome) by turn 10. Keeping that empire together takes a lot more skill imo. The same goes for seleucia. Fighting 4-5 pretty strong factions almost immediately, when more than half of your settlements can only produce militia hoplites, is challenging. In my playthrough it took me about 20 turns before I’d stabilised enough to actually expand (this is why imo the seleucids cannot get to rome until the late game. I actually maintain, though I’ve yet to manage it, that destroying all the romans before the marian reforms is possible as parthia or armenia). So IMO the Seleucids should be a B or even a C class. And, more controversially, i think germania should be a B.
Pikeman are really strong offensive units. Put some low quality pikeman with proffesional ones on top of each other and they beat almost every unit in the game. It demands some micromanagemnt, but in M2 which is the same engine I could beat every fullstack with my 4 militia pikeman and 4 royal pikeman. They just need support from other unit but man, they rule battlefield
My favourite faction was either Julii or Egypt for gameplay and colour scheme. I also enjoyed doing a lot of roleplaying as the British and I'm quite fond of starting in the British isles and expanding from there rather than a central spawn.
I remember sweeping through Gaul and Spain with my initial faction leader, who by then was pretty old so I let him just hold up in Marbella whilst his sons ran the show- proper British expat retirement plan! I'd made peace with the Romans and was happy just to chill when the bastards betrayed me and started marching round the Alps to invade us. Had to get my big man to down his beer and come out of his retirement to sort them out! Loved that campaign.
I would put Armenia at A tier with Parthia, due to them having Armenian Legionary, which is about equivalent as a Roman Early Legionary. While it's not much, but it definitely helps with their siege battles.
@@Rynewulf Yeah, it's definitely a trade off when comparing to Parthia, since both have cataphracts and cataphract archers. Parthia get Persian Cavalry, which are probably the best early-mid game field battle units, but I think having dependable infantry is more important to the far east factions than another horse archer unit, since the pajama bois are a liability.
Germania should really be in Weird 🤣 I distinctly recall them being absolutely broken in the campaign if you can rush berserkers and train their experience up fast. Cause at that point they shred early armies from Gaul and Rome. I'm pretty sure I claimed Rome from SPQR before they even reached the point they get their updated unit roster. You just roll over everything and can snowball hard across the map so long as your replenishment is good enough.
@@MajkaSrajka My friend, it is called enslaving everyone you fight and shunting the population back to you, or taking a bigger settlement from someone else 🤣
The sad thing about the Seleucids is that they have arguably the coolest roster with many shiny toys, but have to fight their most decisive battles with milita hoplites, milita cavalry and some forced levy pikemen.
Cannot agree more about thrace. Playing as Macedom recently nd they beat me to Byzantium, but then wanted to fight me. Their units were realgangerous, but light lancers with their chage bonus were able to punch holes all over the line.
Correct call on Egypt. Those Pharoah's bowmen aren't just lethal at range, they'll happily go toe to toe with most other infantry units in melee (assuming those units can even close the gap on them without being wiped out)- best unit in the game IMO.
I think most of it is pretty accurate but Germania really deserved better because of their roster having good archers, pikes, and berserkers unlike a lot of other barbaric factions
Pikemen are definitely not bad at assaulting settlements, much the opposite. Unless the enemy has comparable phalanx units defending, you can just clog the street with spears and walk to the town center easy. Even just basic hoplites will usually work. It’s practically a hack, even on VH difficulty.
Legend I know you didn’t like Rome total war remastered, but you would absolutely love the Imperium Serectum mod. It is the absolute peak total war experience in my opinion and it’s not even done yet, would love to see you do some challenge campaigns on it
Oh I do NOT like Spartans in RTW1. Here's the problem. They are hard to recruit, because you can only get them from 2 places and they take 2 turns to recruit. So it's hard to get a lot of them. Now, since they are the most powerful unit the Greeks have, archers will focus on them, and they actually hold up to arrows less well than armored hoplites do. AND, by the time you can field them in any quantity, your prime enemy ought to be Egypt, which fields a ton of archers!
don’t forget the other major enemy greece(macedon or ggs) will face: scythia, scythia just simply doesn’t die in the game, because it would require war at 4 fronts and at least 2, but probaly 4, enemies with success at the same time to get them dead. since scythia AI is so longlived, if either you or they punch through thrace, you and in continuous war. and (elite) horse archers are even worse than normal archers when fighting them with hoplites
@@MichaelThomas-p6q i don't remember ever having special problems with the scythians, a stack of armored hoplites + archers/cretans/rhodians held them off just fine in my experience...
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a Defensive Campaign for a Germania or Scythia is some of the most fun I've had playing Rome 1, especially when the romans show up at your borders.
Scythia would be SSS+ tier if the unit pathfinding properly worked half the time :D
Trueee
Armenia with their Cataphract Horse Archers and Legionaries make a really good contender for op horse archer faction, since they have great heavy infantry to support the pathfinding nerfed but still best horse archers
hey spiff!
Did not expect the Brit to roll into Rome.
Scythia is unironically OP tier. With their basic tier 1 unit you can massacre across the entire campaign map in all directions
Brutii are the best. When you hire mercenaries, they actually are part of your color scheme still.
Invincible argumentation my silver tounged friend
@@goodguyjack you wanna say they are a Seleucid
Me when I hire every unit of Samnites, peltasts, and slingers I can get my hands on
To me that's a disadvantage, when it's harder to tell where your expensive throwaway units are 🤣
Their temples are S+.
They have health (which is pop growth + happienes), law (which is happieness + reducing corruption) and the experience temple (0/1/2/3/sth to all stats).
Julii have pop growth (which is half of health), happieness (which is just dogshit, AND dionisos makes your generals drunk) and some other throwaway temple I forgor.
Don't make me even mention the Scipii sea temple.
Eastern Infantry were the OG Skavenslaves.
Id argue even skaven slaves last longer in combat which is sad
Honestly skavenslaves are just better in every single way than eastern infantry but still kind of right
@@Gritty1983 They also have the expendable trait, which means losing them won't affect the leadership of nearby units if routed or destroyed. Eastern Infantry were infamous for causing mass routs.
@@Gritty1983 If you have a general with a lot of stars nearby, they will fight near to the death. I used them to guard the flanks of hoplites.
Most important, skavenslaves are eeeextremely chep and costs u about 0-30 gold per unit.
Pijamaboyz cost u for 100 dinars((
Dude, talking about the Roman specialist units. I remember as a kid noticing that war dog instantly replace casualties as long as the dog handlers don't die. So i just had a full stack of war dogs following the army, pop a hole into the wall, and let the horde of fluffs murder everyone. Use the regular army to mop up any survivors lol
Only thing is you have to be sure to order the handlers back after the dogs charge, once the dogs start fighting the handlers try to engage again so gotta pull em back twice.
Yeah war dogs were OP as fuck if you knew how to use them. Amazing.
Always left them as garrisons, and if a town came under siege, I would sally out every turn, release the dogs, and then quit the battle with everyone inside the city. The AI always takes forever to assault cities, so you could do a lot of damage for cheap upkeep
@@goldflame3390 Learned a lot from this comment! Just started Rome 1 and I only heard that dogs were OP. Didn't get an explanation why. Didn't help that it was pricy haha. Now I know :D
Yeah also only 50 denarii upkeep and lowest manpower draw so really economically too minimise casualties. But they can't turn the tide of the battle and they happily chase a single routing entity of the map and the edge of the world.
Also they take 2 turns to recruit which is a real big dowside especially given in Rome I every city no matter the size can only recruit one unit a turn. But yeah nice unit which certainly has it's uses. I think it's the cheapest unit (together with the diplomat) which makes them a good option to put in forts (especially depleted units).
@@badonkadonk6655 - Dogs also weaken enemy morale so if you combine them with a charge from a cavalry unit or two you can pretty easily route certain units. This is especially true on normal difficulty, but I'll admit normal difficulty readily allows the player to get away with field armies comprised entirely of cavalry units.
I remember smashing entire Roman armies in the late game with light cavalry since I never went through the Marian reforms during my first global conquest run on that difficulty level. In fact, one of my most famous generals during those battles was a hypochondriac.
Is Mr. Legend currently experiencing a bout of sweet nostalgia?
Lack of cash😢
Nostalgia for that paycheck
I believe It all started when he play manor lord
he just doesn't want to cover WH3 until the DLC since he has no early access and everyone wants to see content covering the DLC so the WH3 videos wouldn't perform well.
I assumed it was desire to take a break from WH3 until the DLC comes out. But his bank account doesn't want to take a break from content creation :).
I really miss being able to just have armies without generals, so convenient
Yeah that was the good old time I agree, so much more freedom than what Rome2 did after. But there was technical reasons if I recall, and it was too easy to cheat the movement as well.
Probably would have been better to let the player decide but well, we got used to it.
Some of the features were just better in Rome and medieval mostly that casualties actually count
I dont miss the just infinite ai money cheat death stacks though
Agreed. So agreed.
@@Kilen_BE I didn't get used to it, I stopped playing Total War :P
Only a fool would meet The Parthian in an open field.
aka Crassus xD
The light red square can do it !
One army, a real army united behind one leader with one purpose
Corbulo did it pretty successfully. Absolute madlad.
Huns cares not.
Germans just have too good of a roster to be put on D tier. Tier 1 spammable phalanx, ok axe and shield infantry, big axe bois, berserkers, good archers and even good cavalry
best barbarian cavalry :)
For battles / lategame they are definetely super beasts, but their starting location is quite terrible. If not for player advantage when you are playing them against dumb AIs, Gaul would stomp them. They have like 4 poor cities and Gaul has like 7 or 8.
I cried when he placed them at the bottom. They are my favorite ever
The German roster is overrated and their economy sucks. Their starting regions are shit, surrounded by potential enemies
@@MajkaSrajka funly enough it's the britons who come after germans first. And phalanxes are just too good at defending, no amount of warband spam can beat it. That alone gives enough time to build an offensive army.
Every time Legend shaves his balls we get another tier list 🤣
*sighs* fine, I'll load up Rome 1 and add to my 6000+ hours
at 12:18 correction: Macedon starts with the province with Statue of Zeus (Corinth), not Greek City States, but players with the GCS are able to very easily take said province
Yeah. The Greeks start with the Colossus of Rhodes. Which is good for them since they rely on ships a lot early game too
I was about to say same thing but then I was wait a second I am pretty sure it's not only me how notice that Error from LegendofTotalWar
Germania gets one of the best unit rosters in the game with Chosen Archers, Chosen Axemen, Gothic Cavalry and ever hilarious but effective Berserkers. They should at least be C Tier. Also all factions in BI can reach tier 5 settlements. The Alemani and its copies get one of the best rosters in the game (i would honestly argue the best). They get chosen axemen who are an absolute wrecking ball against other all infantry in that game, their first tier archer unit Lombard Archers are a great long range units, Burgundian Lancers are one of the best fast shock cav units. The only thing they don't get is horse archers.
I was curious what he thinks about German berserkers, but then he didnt even mention them. May not be as powerful on highest difficulty, but they were the first doomstacks of my childhood. Had such a fun watching cavemen with big clubs beating up entire armies whilst rampaging and barely lose models.
D Tier for Germania ist Madness indeed, their roster is insane, Chosen axemen destroy everything and both Cav as well as archers are really good as well.
Not to mention having by far the best Spear unit of it's tier.
Yeah, the argument for C as Gauls but D for Germania doesn't make sense. Sure, Gaul starts with a bunch of territory, but it is guaranteed to fight the Julii, the Britons tend to attack you, the spaniards do too from memory, and Germania is a fourth possible enemy. Not to mention the distance to cover versus the Julii. Germania has a far easier early game by comparison, even if they're nominally weaker.
Gauls do have foresters which are better than chosen archers, and chosen swordmen are pretty good. But chosen axemen are no joke and they have far better cavalry in the gothic cavalry. And most critically, the German early game is far better thanks to phalanx warband.
So, with an arguably comparable roster and just easier time as Germania, it would be better reflected with inverted rankings in my opinion.
Also he didn't mention the fact that their spear warband are phalanx units and if I remember correctly they are the highest entity phalanx unit in the game and definitely not the worst stat wise. It means even late game they can utilise their early game units to hold the line pretty well for heavy cav or shock infantry to do the damage
@@genericcommenter1267 successor state pikes have the inflated entity size as well.
Can’t believe legend didn’t mention Britannia’s most OP unit, head hurlers
Man I used to love playing the Seleucid and the only non-Roman faction I did a world conquest with. Storming Egypt early game and heading up to cap Greece before the Roman’s establish a foothold gives you a massive advantage.
The Selucid Empire is amazing to play as
well obviously they are the best late game faction but very boring to play at the beginning
Armenia has decent infantry in the form of Heavy Spearmen and Legionaries. Not the best, but certainly a step up from Parthia.
AND cataphract archers, which are the game's tanks, killing every other missile they can't catch, and destroying almost any melee unit when correctly used (unless egiptyan light axe horses appear, those guys are a pain in the ...)
Last comment: The Saxons also can't become a horde, like the Celts. And the Franks while not having strong cavalry, are able to build some of the highest tech buildings, and paladins from Christian abbey buildings, as you saw years ago in the "Last Frank Saving Disaster Campaign" are actually pretty good cavalry
I think the Remastered version and most mods give Saxons and Allemani horde ability, he might not have remembered what was in the vanilla og
Forgot that about saxons, but remembered about allemani
The thing is though those historically speaking weren’t horde migrating during the period, it’s a in game disadvantage but it was the design for historical purposes
@@wolfgangroddewig of them only the Celts didnt mass migrate: Anglo-Saxons had large movement across the North Sea into Britain, and Allemani had a mass movement south and west into Southern France and Switzerland (fascinating period of abandoned Romanised Germanic villas left behind in the old Alleman territory)
Seleucids were always my favorite faction to play, mostly for the reasons you outlined. Very challenging starting position with lots of fires to put out early on, but once you consolidated things you could push to monopolize the SE corner of the map and get ready to deal with Rome. That and their very strong roster, idk I just always had the most fun with them. That said, definitely not easy street the way the S tier factions are, so fair enough on the ranking.
Gotta disagree about Macedon. Their infantry can punch way above their tier and you never have to actually lose a settlement because you have tier zero and tier one units. Ready access to steal all the world’s wonders is a nice touch, and can be really strong to get early. I don’t think they’re S tier but I think they’re better than Carthage
Macedon is like Greece+
Longer spears
Better cav
Centralized location
Actual heirs of Alexander
@@J4R0D pretty much. Basically unite Greece simulator
Light Lancer spam is insane ngl
Oh no, step horde, what are you doing?
Steppe daddy right from Mongolia 😆
Well, if a horde can settle down, than they are definitely a step horde. And it's going to do funny things with your back door.
Dacia's Falx troops absolutely wreck for the price. Germania was always the best Barbarian faction. Their infantry is incredibly powerful and varied... I mean their Spear Warband is a phalanx and OP AND cheaper than Hoplites. German Chosen Axemen have proven to slice trough even heavy Roman Infantry and one unit of Berserkers will smash most weak infantry. Seleucid were always my favorite Greek faction. They are a challenge for the location, but have the most amazing roster potential and money making location.
Yeah, their placement is kinda weird. Spear Warband can hold the line much better than other basic barbarian Warband, they have access to decent heavy cav in the form of Gothic Cavalry (although if i recall correctly they are a temple unit, not a stable one) and Chosen Axemen is the only infantry unit in the game along with Spartans that can beat Urbans 1 to 1. Strictly tactically, the best "orthodox" barbarian roster.
@@StavrosGiol You are correct. Germania is at least a B in my opinion. I conquered the whole world as Germania once lol.
@@Vandelberger Yeah, Germanic cataclysm of Western Europe 600 years early is always fun!
I'm not sure about B though, more inclined towards best of C. A lot of trash territories, so the player has to beeline towards Italy to get going, which means a lot of ongoing wars.
@@StavrosGiol Ah, I try and conquer all of Gaul and British before I ever push south. England has the Stone hedge buff but it has been so long since I played. It’s true the buildings and technical development are meh. I feel like they should all get access to level 4 buildings just make Barbarians take longer.
This is a blast from the past…I played Rome as a kid. I remember using commands to cheat more money, and the spartan phalanxes being insane LOL. It’s the only total war I played from then until Warhammer 2
The remastered version has a great version, called RTR Imperium Surrectum, go check it out if you dont know about it.
If you like the total war formula theres some real gems in the interum but i think the only one your missing that maxes out the fun is medieval 2 total war and fall of the samurai
I couldn't play that game pass Marian Reform. Once I got it I already became invincible... There was no challenge. But at the same time, I didn't feel like playing Barbarians because it doesn't make sense to me to go backwards on things.
No Med2?
Regarding the original RTW, the Dacians deserve C tier IMHO. A lot of people seem to be sleeping on the fact that they are THE ONLY FACTION (along with Scythians, but they don't need them) that can train archers from initial practice range, and archers can provide a massive boost in early game. Also, quick access to Thessalonica and Chosen Swordsmen.
In terms of BI, if i remember correctly, Huns can't build ports (at least in the original), and if that stands they should be getting a B for shit economy.
Oh, yeah! The reason why I played Dacia was the early archers, now I remember! It was great :)
Ah.. dacia.. usually i would abandon my settlements and migrate them to greece.. get a macedon city and you're pretty much have the whole of dacia roster.
Numidia also gets archers out of their practice range. It's one the reasons the faction isn't entirely trash in my opinion.
Never forget my first total war epic campaign painting the map glorious silver with the selucids! Thanks for the memories and nostalgia Legend!
5:01 Scipii had the best navy because they can build Neptun temple, god of oceans.
I normally put the Seleucids into S tier, simply because it cannot be understated just how powerful it is overlapping a unit of their legion units with a unit of pikemen covering them. The legionary shields mixed amongst the pikes plus the slight overlap of legions covering the pike's flanks is extremely hard for the enemy factions to overcome. Specially with cavalry in the mix.
I must protest, Armenia has their own legionaries and also cataphracts and cataphract archers. Pretty good roster
PS The best Britannian unit are head hurlers, I just anihilated whole legions with them on my road to Italy
AFAIK they're the only ones who get Cataphract Archers.
Head hurlers are great because of armor penetration, but they have really low number of shots to give IIRC
Yea I love playing Armenia because of its roster. It's basically an i.oroved Parthia with a worst starting position.
Armenia is probably strongest faction in the game if you stack full horse archers, you can win almost every battle without losses
And bribing the parthian cataphracts into your service early on 😂, an expensive way, but you cripple your main threat right away
Legends been absolutely killing it recently, mans a reverse Samson, the more hair he loses the greater he becomes
Was actually hoping for a Legend Rome tier list the other day. Nice
Honestly Scipii is favourite: Greece is almost exactly as close as for Brutii, and your military bonuses start at temple level 1 and add up quickly, even your early game fresh recruit hastati wipe the floor because of the weapons bonus, and by the Marian Reforms and Civil War your Legionaries will come out with buffs so big they'll take on Urbans and Praetorians
Is it the Vulcan buffs that are better than the Mars ones?
@@thomasriccio4873 yeah Vulcan temples give blacksmith upgrades starting at tier 1 temples, its pretty sweet
LEGEND MAKING HISTORICAL TIER LIST??? HELL YEAH!!!
11:45 I will never forget your Europa Babaoreum Seleucid playthrough!
Good times.
14:00 Surprising pick
21:20 Finsih
24:45 Yeah, I remember how frightened you were when dealing with Clibernarii in your western Roman Empire campaign.
28:20 Legend confused
33:25 When I played the Romans, my super expensive army got smashed by babarians. After that, I only used my only cav armies to conquer Germania:D
Surely, it was my fast time playing a TW game but I still think that pikes are just more intuitiv and beginner friendly. Therefore, I would give Greeks S tier because they are easy to handle.
At last, the tier list we've all been waiting for!
Appreciated, I dabbled with the franchise as back as the first Shogun, but I don't have the playtime you do by any means, so really appreciating the chance to hear your thoughts!
13:33 im noticing alot of historical inaccuracies in the total war games as I learn more history, but it doesn’t take away my enjoyment. I’m sure they had their reasons
Could you do a tierlist for total war attila factions
I second this
I third it
The Julii have a bug where the pantheon has worse modifier then the previous building level... Brutii has a pantheon that grants health that increases both population growth and happiness.
I just feel like Scythia should have been much higher. You can world conquest using only one unit in all directions at once because its so cost effective
Also their bare chest horses archers have +3 armor for some unknown reason.
This game was my childhood and got me into history.
I would win every battle in this game by getting a single pike unit as the Greek City States and putting them in the gate opening and enemies just instantly die 😊
I further improved on this technique by destroying the walls. You can also just choke them in a city street close to your plaza. Then the AI wont siege and you get to keep your entire unit instead of losing them to attrition. Its how I always defend the northern border of the Seleucid Empire 😂.
@@rickrockreggae3719 why dont you just position a fitting army(enough hoplites and archers+ 1or2 cav) on the bdidges along the northern rivers(danube etc) i never had a peoblem with invasions afterwards. You obly need to know which crossings has how many ri ercrossings.
@@1krauterquark88 well that means more expensive army + i still need soldiers to keep the peace in cities. So I minimise costs in the north to quickly squash egypt. Then send a force to the Parthia settlement and consolidate my position in the east. From there I only have to defend against the numidians, which will never be that scary. Then reshift the focus to north. Yours is a good one to, but to expensive for my taste, plus that army will have to refresh from time to time.
But I do love me some bridge fights so I'll try it out next time. Nothing more delish then thousands of corpses strewn across the bridge and floating over the river 🤣
@@rickrockreggae3719 if necessary you can go eith 2 units of hopltes/pikes and 1 cav per crossing/bridge on battemap. But against scythia you need something hat can deal damage.
I so wish to see you play some Greek or Macedon RTW 1 campaign utilizing those long spears and pikes instead of usual cavalry... that would be really a heroic victory on your channel in my eyes!
Germania is definitely at least C tier, if not B tier. Having Phalanx units in the early game against civilizations that do not (IE Gaul and Britannia and Julii primarily for early game) is an immense advantage. Not to mention their higher tear units dominating in categories of infantry with Berserkers, Cavalry with Gothic Cavalry, and Archers with their Archer Warband.
Sleeping on Thrace getting Bastarnae which have 2 hitpoints per model, the only faction that can natively recruit them, and one of the few infantry units with 2 hitpoints. Way tougher than they seem, as well as having greek cultural buildings
Thrace really seems to be a faction ahead of it's time, since the player is supposed to use shock infantry as flankers instead of cav (falxmen with war cry are just brutal). A shame cav is so prevalent in RTW.
Bastarne have really shit like 6 defence and they build 2 turns. Falxmen basically outperform them two tiers lower.
Watching this list and the Medieval II one despite not playing either game. I watch because he clearly knows his stuff and highlights the differences between each faction very well.
He did undervalue Germainia and the Franks in my opinion.
I only recently realized the Pontus icon is a Sassanid headpiece; I'm not sure if the Parthians ever used that, but you can see that used as a banner template for the Sassanids in Attila.
Britons are most OP faction if you use them properly, the chariots obliterate entire roman armies 1v4 no doubt about that
All the way back to Rome Total War. Now this great. Hopefully this will lead to more historical tier lists in the future.
Some corrections (its ok Legend og Rome was a long long long time ago): Greek Cities has hoplites not pikemen. Spain has 4 iberian settlements, Gaul has 1. Saxons alongside Celts and Allemani can't horde.
Anyone spot anymore?
In BI all factions can build tier 5 settlements, even the barbarians, not tier 4 like mentioned in the video
It was a pretty cringe ranking if you ask me with the amount of mistakes...Armenia has way better infantry than Parthia
@@ippolit4262 some of it is just Legend's opinion, as is the nature of such rankings. He likes cavalry and handwaves all except the top 5 elite infantry and archers in any game, so I can see why he's be unimpressed by Armenian heavy spearmen and legionaries (although I agree they are the strongest eastern infantry in the game)
@@Rynewulf Parthia has only eastern infantry and hillmen, armenia has legionaries and hoplites - and they have a pretty dope Vanhang temple too (battleforge - it gives combat xp and some weapon&armor).
Ohh buddy some old school Total War tier lists? I'm so down for that
Great list.
I would only make 2 modifications. The Franks do have heavy cavalry, Paladins! I think they can get some stronger buildings by converting too. Bump to at least B.
The second is the Alemanni because the berserkers are sooo broken for sieges. If you can get them blood thirst on the walls they will kill anything. Top tier roman units, dead, for a fraction of the cost. I've charged my own heavy Calvary into the backs of the berserks and then they turn around they just mow down heavy cavalry. Of course their weakness is archers. Their starting position is brutal also. I would bump to C at least.
Manscaped product tier list when?
I feel like the germans in RTW are really underrated to play. You're the only barbarians to get phalanxes (very early too) so you can expand very quickly while your cities are still well defended while the rest of your roster promotes all out aggression and quick decisive battles with morale breaks. Surprisingly good archers too
Sassanid empire should be on S+ strongest faction in RTW
Romans stuck in the walls be like: What are you doing step-horde?
See, when i play the 3 Roman factions, yes i expand in the direction you're guided to, but i also send units around the other 2 to snipe territory from them. basically I try and limit their expansion as much as possible so that the civil war is much easier
Ze Gemania are always awesome in mowing down cavalery with their uber cheap pikemen. And the fact they use phalanx will not stop being funny :)
I played this game for like an hour but I'm watching because I just love tier lists and your vids.
Fun stuff, I adored the o.g. RTW + Barbarian Invasion back in the day. With the powerhouse S & A tier factions you had, the Seleucids had the rough start with a crisis that can easily pile up. The Seleucids can make some good money, have a good roster, but they're in a central position with rivals at every major compass direction.
Why would anyone think the Greek Cities are S tier? They have a completely one dimensional army roster. Sure it's strong, but you WILL discover the limits of what Hoplites are able to do once you play a full Greek Cities campaign. The Romans are definitely a tier above them just because of how much more versatile their unit roster is. If any of the Hellenic factions have an argument for being S tier, it would be the Seleucids.
Scipii is strongest since you can speedrun to gold equipment upgrades very early to steamroll the other roman factions. Along with water control
Some things I'd personally change:
- Seleucids in S above Egypt, or at the very least at the top of A tier. Their roster is awesome, apart from camels they have access to everything (chariots, melee inf, hoplites, pikes, heavy cav, they have it all). Their starting position is weak, but Greeks have an easy time defending with the pikemen so you'll really unlikely lose any cities even if the whole world around you attacks you. They also start with 2 wonders and have easy access to 2 more, and another 2 when you defeat Egypt: so you'll easily own 6 of the 7 wonders. And their culture allows for big empires easily as well.
- Goths are alright in B tier, but I'd say at the bottom or top of C. They can horde, and should since all other horde factions (Huns, Vandals, Roxolani, Sarmatians) will walk past your only settlement and probably want to raid it. So you're better off packing your things and leaving straight away. This causes another issue, since the Goths are the only barbarian faction in the game that start Christian, while pretty much the whole world around you is still Pagan.
- I'd switch Germania and Britannia around. The brits do have chariots, but no other cav. Also no archers, heavy spears or pikes so their heavy inf is a bit without support (only slingers and head hurlers). Germania on the other hand has pikes, as well as a bunch of different infantry units and heavy cav (Gothic Cav). With Night Raiders and Screaching Women you can lower enemy morale and boost your own, which is very important in a game like Rome 1 where morale can often be the deciding factor.
- Franks should be in B tier I think. Even though they don't have horse archers, their melee infanty selection is really good and their Paladin cavalry is among the best in the game. They also have easy access to Western Roman lands or take out the Saxons and/or Allemani who both cannot horde.
- Spanish above Dacians. Dacians are bland beyond bland, at least with Scutarii and Bull Warriors the Spanish have some more punch and flavour than the genericness of Dacia.
Other than that agreed with the rest.
P.S. The barbarians in BI can build up to tier 5.
Egyptian cavalry is cheap, has extra large unit size and is armour piercing. Combine with cheap phallanx and archers for a strong, flexible army that can be recruited early game.
Correct, Egyptian cavalery secretely slaps. They are so good they are cost-effective against catraphacts, and are one of ~4 things that have Armor Piercing in RTW (thrown Pillas, Scythias Headhunter Cavalery, Chosen Axemen, Catraphacts secondary attack and maybe some random things like head throwers / chariots / elephants / berserker special attacks).
Winning with Gaul on vh/vh was probably my most satisfying campaign I ever played
13:49 no jokes once I charged a unit of Pharaoh's archers with some Triaii, at close range, and they beat them at melee. Pharaohs archers are so bloody strong 😂
Germania has an interesting roster that’s much better than - for example - Gaul’s. Their basic spear unit has phalanx ability which makes settlement defense child’s play against other non-roman factions, and it’s axe wielding units are made to open up legionaries like tin cans. And they get berserkers, night raiders, gothic cav. Sure they are a barbarian faction so don’t get anything past T3 settlements, but they are hardly a bottom tier faction.
I disagree on Germania in Rome, because they have their pikemen which can fend of many enemy units if you put them in good positions. In the early midgame, you can use a decent cavalry and berserkers. One unit of berserkers might be able to kill of a whole army on its own if used correctly.
The Franks in Barbarian Invasion are actually a bit distinct from other germanic factions as they are able to build high tier religious buildings and can also recruit very good units in the later game.
A Tierlist about the Playable Historical battles please ^.^
By the way, I also thought the Selecids were "really good". But the moment I found that Cataphracts have an alternative attack (with maces) that is AP, they definitely moved to the S tier. They chew through armored units, including Romans, very effectively, and with Seleucids' not terrible infantry, one can do hammer and anvil very nicely (unlike the Parthians, where the only good option is pretty much dual-Cataphract hammer and hammer, after the opponent was devastated/tired by horse archers)
Egypt has AP on their Desert Cavalery - which is cheap and way earlier in the techtree. They slap too!
Egypt: "They've got the best archers in the game"
Forester Warband: Am I a joke to you?
Honestly though great video, well explained. Enjoyed this a lot
I slightly disagree with the Franks position, their infantry is much better than most of the other barbarians, having throwing axes b4 charge, and access early to heavy infantry. Also in the later stage if in a Christian settlement, they can recruit paladins, which were super good last I remember, though hard produce due to religion and recruit time.
Was nodding along until you got to Germania. Armor piercing chosen axemen, wrecking ball berserkers, long range archers, even their warbands ability to form a phalanx gives them a massive advantage over early game Gaul, Britain and even Hastati.
Clear A tier faction.
Tier 3 max just mean you get the good stuff faster too.
Go play a Germania campaign and come back to me.
Edit: How did i forget Gothic cav??
All that, but you will be struggling with either money or population for most of the campaign. No point in mentioning awesome units if you won't be able to afford them on the campaingn map.
I personally think Germania should be at least C tier. The spear warbands (albeit not as good as Greek hoplites) are pretty effective if you know how to use them. The chosen axemen can hack up heavily armored units easily when you get a good hammer and anvil going on. Not the best faction by any stretch, but at least worthy of C tier.
Couldnt a faction like Parthia just siege any place, and either wait for an army to reinforce or wait out the siege, which would force the defending army to fight in open field anyways ? I’ve beaten entire factions just doing that lol
the thing with scythia, their entire playstyle is about being fast, your cavalry is fast in campaign and in battle, you develop fast and you recruit fast. it is better to bring strong tier 3(the roster level would be 4 and the settlement is the value of 2) in masses against tier 4/5 or 1:1 against tier 2 than to bring tier 5 against tier 5. a battle between high level units is costly and not what you would want, and with scythia’s speed in easy mode you can win the campaign before your faction leader dies(he is starts fifty years old or so) without much effort.
I didn't play any other barbarians in BI, but I found the Saxons to be quite good. I think they have an experience shrine and a ranged weapons shrine, so by building hunters in one city and moving them into another you can get hunters with +5 damage pretty early, giving them 12 missile damage. Since archer units are larger than horse archers, you can slap down hordes pretty well like that, definitely much better than WRE can.
That parthia bias lol
Thought cant blame him, pink pajama guys is just too good to not blatantly uptier them
Germania at D tier is criminal- Gothic cav, berserkers, good archers, a good spear unit in early game, etc. Should be bottom of B. Good vid tho
4 cities with 200 pop, no eco and a spear infantry that whilst good, it costs 520, IIRC has high upkeep and has no warcry (warcry buffs your attack by 10 for like a minute, which is why barbs can slap).
Armenia has access to mid tier phalanx units, and medium infantry, which in my opinion makes them comparable to parthia because you at least get access to units that can do things in sieges and phalanx units allow for an actual anvil to hammer. I feel like it's a worthy trade off compared to elephants when you already have top level calv handled.
I sense a Rome total war campaign in the future
Another factor that I might consider in making the tier list is how much each faction is "autoresolve friendly". Using partia or mecedonia are terrible for autoresolve, you will most of the times declared as defeated while in battle you can easily win by using different simple legit tactics. You may use some naked warriors vs archers and autoresolve to victory. I hate playing as factions that need manual war for every single tiny war. Player can do a lot with horse archers of partians and levy long spears of mecedonians but because their general stats are poor, the game tends to auto-declare defeat for such armies.
Playing as Julii and going up against bull warriors for the first time was a shock
I would put the Britons at C; the enemies they will tend to face don't have a lot of great anti-heavy calvary options, and I've seen a *ton* of games where their AI paints the north of the map, and even sometimes push to northern Italy. Yes, poor settlement choices and weak infantry in general, but having good Heavy Calvary makes a *lot* of other problems go away.
The only reason Bitons sometimes slap is because autobattle (which all AI vs AI is) overvalues Chairiots (which is all their Generals).
The Scipii have two big advantages: gold-gold upgrades (the only romans that can do this) and by far the most powerful fleet. This is especially important in the remaster since the campaign AI is significantly more challenging. Stoping those invasion fleets and blockading ports is a must.
I'd take +3 experience (+3 attack +3 defense) over +1 weapon +1 armor since you can get silver-silver just from the top tier foundry
So i think there are a couple of missplaces here, and that’s mainly because of one or two missed factors.
Things to factor are
So legend considers Economy, roster, building options (especially city size and public order maintenance)
However, i think there are 3 other factors that have been missed out, that would personally have me downgrade the seleucids, gaul, and maybe carthage; and push up germania
Proximity to rome:
In general there are 3 phases to how you would fight the roman factions, based on when you encounter them, so I’ve categorised factions by these phases, but with an a and b based on whether i think, if you expand towards them quickly enough, you can encounter them in an earlier phase.
1-early game- hastati, velites and equites are almost all you’ll encounter, with a few principes thrown in. The easiest time to fight rome though also when you’re at your weakest: carthage, greek cities, gaul
2- Rome’s getting into it’s stride, principes, cavalry auxilia, archers and a smattering of siege weapons and triarii. More importantly they can throw multiple full stacks your way, so it can get pretty sloggy
2a: numidia, spain, germania, dacia, macedon, thrace
2b: britannia, egypt
3- Final form, full roster, whichever faction/s you’re not fighting probably own most of the far side of the map. Legionary cohorts, archer auxilia. Whichever faction you’re playing, this is pain. Hopefully you’ve met them at the start of this point and most of their frontier armies are the old model, or you’re strong enough to match their multiple stacks with yours
3a: pontus, scythia,
3b- seleucids, parthia, armenia
This is important because rome is the biggest challenge of the game, and whether what you’ve got matches up to what they’ve got at the point when you meet is a massive factor in the difficulty of the game.
For example Carthage has an excellent roster. Lots of heavy cavalry, elephants, a strong high tier infantry unit, and some ok skirmishers, as well as economy that can maintain expensive stacks. But you’re at war with Rome on turn 5 at the latest. What you actually have are iberian infantry, round shield cavalry and any mercenaries you can scrounge up. You start with one elephant unit and you *cannot* be wasting your mobile battering ram on some hastati. Once you’ve passed the hurdle and strangled rome in its cradle then it’s mostly plain sailing but your big difficulty spike is right at the start of the game.
By contrast Egypt and the Seleucids get to deploy their best units against Rome, but by then you’re probably going to be fighting a queue of blue/green full stacks in libya/greece that will each take a good bite out of even your best doomstack.
Who you’re up against at the start is also important. I think Gaul needs a downgrade and germania an upgrade for 2 reasons. 1 is that germania’s standard infantry are basically militia hoplites, and will steamroll early, mainly melee, gaulish and britannian armies with little fuss (in my gaul playthrough i was having to manoeuvre skirmish running battles with warbands, defeating a full stack took me the better part of an hour and a half). The other is that germania starts off with one front, 2 enemies that it can fight, and eventually a third that is also easy (dacia). In a gaul playthrough you are at war on 3 fronts against 8 enemies (4 of which are rome) by turn 10. Keeping that empire together takes a lot more skill imo. The same goes for seleucia. Fighting 4-5 pretty strong factions almost immediately, when more than half of your settlements can only produce militia hoplites, is challenging. In my playthrough it took me about 20 turns before I’d stabilised enough to actually expand (this is why imo the seleucids cannot get to rome until the late game. I actually maintain, though I’ve yet to manage it, that destroying all the romans before the marian reforms is possible as parthia or armenia).
So IMO the Seleucids should be a B or even a C class. And, more controversially, i think germania should be a B.
Numidian Light Cav spam allowed me to beat every AI field army with ease.
Pikeman are really strong offensive units. Put some low quality pikeman with proffesional ones on top of each other and they beat almost every unit in the game. It demands some micromanagemnt, but in M2 which is the same engine I could beat every fullstack with my 4 militia pikeman and 4 royal pikeman. They just need support from other unit but man, they rule battlefield
My favourite faction was either Julii or Egypt for gameplay and colour scheme.
I also enjoyed doing a lot of roleplaying as the British and I'm quite fond of starting in the British isles and expanding from there rather than a central spawn.
I remember sweeping through Gaul and Spain with my initial faction leader, who by then was pretty old so I let him just hold up in Marbella whilst his sons ran the show- proper British expat retirement plan!
I'd made peace with the Romans and was happy just to chill when the bastards betrayed me and started marching round the Alps to invade us. Had to get my big man to down his beer and come out of his retirement to sort them out! Loved that campaign.
Rome Total War, my beloved.
So Parthia's pink pyjama-wearing infantry are no good? Who would have guessed?
I would put Armenia at A tier with Parthia, due to them having Armenian Legionary, which is about equivalent as a Roman Early Legionary. While it's not much, but it definitely helps with their siege battles.
Along with their Cataphracts and horse archers (both top tier) they have Cataphract Horse Archers- arguable one of the best units in the game!
@@Rynewulf Yeah, it's definitely a trade off when comparing to Parthia, since both have cataphracts and cataphract archers. Parthia get Persian Cavalry, which are probably the best early-mid game field battle units, but I think having dependable infantry is more important to the far east factions than another horse archer unit, since the pajama bois are a liability.
@@athras8822 all good points: Armenia has the best eastern infantry so i agree its still the top eastern faction
aaaah good old time Rome Total War was my first TW game, such good memories.
Bro didn't include rebels. So fun to play with them and u get to combine different units from all around the map.
Germania should really be in Weird 🤣
I distinctly recall them being absolutely broken in the campaign if you can rush berserkers and train their experience up fast. Cause at that point they shred early armies from Gaul and Rome. I'm pretty sure I claimed Rome from SPQR before they even reached the point they get their updated unit roster. You just roll over everything and can snowball hard across the map so long as your replenishment is good enough.
IDK how you'd rush T3 temple with a villages starting with 200 pop but you do you lol
@@MajkaSrajka My friend, it is called enslaving everyone you fight and shunting the population back to you, or taking a bigger settlement from someone else 🤣
The sad thing about the Seleucids is that they have arguably the coolest roster with many shiny toys, but have to fight their most decisive battles with milita hoplites, milita cavalry and some forced levy pikemen.
Cannot agree more about thrace. Playing as Macedom recently nd they beat me to Byzantium, but then wanted to fight me. Their units were realgangerous, but light lancers with their chage bonus were able to punch holes all over the line.
Correct call on Egypt.
Those Pharoah's bowmen aren't just lethal at range, they'll happily go toe to toe with most other infantry units in melee (assuming those units can even close the gap on them without being wiped out)- best unit in the game IMO.
They'll also eat a charge from a lot of cavalry units out there and send the horsemen packing! Very difficult guys to deal with.
I think most of it is pretty accurate but Germania really deserved better because of their roster having good archers, pikes, and berserkers unlike a lot of other barbaric factions
Pikemen are definitely not bad at assaulting settlements, much the opposite. Unless the enemy has comparable phalanx units defending, you can just clog the street with spears and walk to the town center easy. Even just basic hoplites will usually work. It’s practically a hack, even on VH difficulty.
Legend I know you didn’t like Rome total war remastered, but you would absolutely love the Imperium Serectum mod. It is the absolute peak total war experience in my opinion and it’s not even done yet, would love to see you do some challenge campaigns on it
Oh I do NOT like Spartans in RTW1. Here's the problem. They are hard to recruit, because you can only get them from 2 places and they take 2 turns to recruit. So it's hard to get a lot of them. Now, since they are the most powerful unit the Greeks have, archers will focus on them, and they actually hold up to arrows less well than armored hoplites do. AND, by the time you can field them in any quantity, your prime enemy ought to be Egypt, which fields a ton of archers!
don’t forget the other major enemy greece(macedon or ggs) will face: scythia, scythia just simply doesn’t die in the game, because it would require war at 4 fronts and at least 2, but probaly 4, enemies with success at the same time to get them dead. since scythia AI is so longlived, if either you or they punch through thrace, you and in continuous war. and (elite) horse archers are even worse than normal archers when fighting them with hoplites
So you're telling me that they must fight in the shade?
@@MichaelThomas-p6q i don't remember ever having special problems with the scythians, a stack of armored hoplites + archers/cretans/rhodians held them off just fine in my experience...