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Today we are going to spend some more time with the Indians in Age 2. The Indians are designed to spike around Age 3, and to do so, they need a powerful Age 2 to get them into position.

Age 2 Analysis
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By Age 2, AoEO civs have on average about 11 units. There are about 7 shared units -- five basic units (Villager, Scout, Fishing Boat, Merchant Transport, and Caravan) a Spearman, and an arrow Ship (Trireme, Galley, Swanship, Bireme, Longship, Liburnian). Then every civ usually has about three more military units and possibly a priest and/or a unique unit (Ox Cart, Sacred Deer, Engineer, etc.).

With 12 units each, the Norse and Babylonians presently have the most units in Age 2. The Indians, however, will have 14. Having that many units to choose from will give the Indians all sorts of options and advantages. (And that flexibility will only be amplified by their Choose One Techs, which will allow players to further specialize the civ in the middle of a game.)

As for their Age 2 military units, we have already revealed the Bowman (anti-infantry ranged), Turanga (anti-ranged melee cavalry), and their two-pronged unique harassment units, the Club Monkey (anti-Villager melee) and Fire Monkey (anti-building ranged).

Barracks
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Today, we are revealing their Barracks and its two units, the Spearman (who is exactly what you would expect: anti-cavalry melee appearing in Age 1) and their Gada Warrior.

Every Barracks in Age of Empires Online has a distinct shape that lets it stand out from other military buildings. This shape, while slightly different for every civilization, still looks more or less the same everywhere and lets players recognize this building instantly. Let's have a look at this building for every civilization below:

Spearman
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As mentioned previously, every civilization has (at latest, by Age 2) one anti-cavalry Spearman unit that helps them deal with Cavalry units. The Indians are no exception to this rule.

The Indian Spearman is another Age 1 infantry units that is highly effective against Cavalry. Once upgraded, its effectiveness against Cavalry will be increased further while also giving it extra survivability against enemy Pierce attacks, letting it survive long enough to take out the flanking Cavalry from the opponent.

Much like most other Spearmen, he will be using a Heavy Spear, a Medium Armor and a Soldier's Gear for its gear slots. We shortly considered using a Cloth Armor for its armor slot, but ultimately decided to go with Medium Armor.

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Gada Warrior
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The Gada Warrior is one of the standout Indian units who shape the tone of the civ. He wields a club (called a Gada), which is particularly appealing for us as civ designers. First, the Gada is a very common ancient Indian weapon and is still used today. It appears all over the place in modern media, particularly Bollywood historical epics, such as Baahubali.
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PF2K's Personal Note: If you want to see this epic movie scene yourself, check out THIS link!​

Second, the game has always had a Heavy Club gear class, but it so far appears only on a couple of AI units, such as the the Clubman and Barbarian Clubman, as well as the Chieftains of both Bandits and the Sea People. Those units fly under the radar and generally appear only in low level quests as units for nonplayable factions, the Followers of Autolycus (Clubman) and the Barbarians (Barbarian Clubman). Since the Heavy Club is the only unused gear class in the game, it feels natural that a civilization would eventually use them, and the Indians appear to be the perfect candidate
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Third, not only is the Gada Warrior authentically Indian, but he gives the Indians a truly unique infantry unit. (Were the Indians to have a swordsman, they would really run the risk of watering down the Greeks, Romans, and Celts. Meanwhile, the Indians already have an anti-infantry Bowman, so they don’t need another anti-infantry specialist, and every infantry swordsman in the game has a bonus v. infantry.)​

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On the other side, we also need the Gada Warrior to be distinct from other Non-spearman infantry, such as the Persian Sparabara, the Babylonian Shield Bearer (that are both very tanky against pierce damage, but have little damage output on their own), Egyptian Axeman (anti-infantry that gets Area Damage in Age 3) , and Norse Throwing Axeman (anti-infantry and a uniquely ranged unit that does melee damage). His two-handed Gada gives him this ability – once upgraded to champion, he will have additional melee attack range which allows him to attack enemy units from a very short distance, rather than point blank melee range, and even over walls. Presently, only very few units have this small melee range, namely the Babylonian Lancer and the Greek Advisor unit Phalanx.

For those interested in more in-depth analysis of the Gada Warrior and its stat distribution:

Every civilization has, by Age 3, one melee counter to Infantry units. The Greek Hypaspist, Egyptian Axeman, Celtic Long Swordsman, Babylonian Lancer, Norse Throwing Axeman (while attacking from range, it still deals Melee damage) and Roman Legionary are all anti-infantry Infantry units available in Age 2. The Persian Immortal and Norse Harjar are Age 3 units that deal with Infantry units. The Celts and Babylonians also have the Champion and the Royal Guard units in Age 4 that are both incredibly effective anti-infantry Infantry units.

The Indian Gada Warrior is currently planned to be just effective enough against Infantry units (in Age 2) to be able to overcome all non-anti-infantry Infantry units, such as the Sparabara, Shield Bearer, Spearman, etc. while still losing to units such as Hypaspists and Legionaries.

In Age 3, however, this will change quite drastically. When Gada Warriors are upgraded to Champion status, they will receive additional Health, Ignore Armor and most importantly, additional Melee Attack Range. While additional Health is obviously helpful in every situation, the other two effects play a slightly different role in how they help the Gada Warrior overcome its enemies.

Ignore Armor: If you look at the stats of anti-infantry Infantry units, you will notice that nearly all of them have a considerable amount of melee-infantry Armor. Instead of getting additional bonus damage vs Infantry, the Gada Warrior gets Ignore Armor. This allows him to shatter through enemy units' melee-infantry Armor. This is particularly useful units that rely more on their armor statistic than their damage output to come out victorious in fights, such as the Roman Legionary (that has 0.40 Melee-Infantry Armor) or the Norse Harjar Champion (that gets a huge increase of +50% Melee-Infantry Armor with its Champion upgrade) or the Celtic Champion (that has a baseline Melee-Infantry Armor of 0.50).

Additional Melee Attack Range: One of the main reasons why large groups of Ranged units are so effective in battles is how they can all actively engage enemy units at the same time, something that melee units cannot do, particularly in larger groups. You may have noticed that units such as Babylonian Lancers are amazingly effective when they surround enemy units, and one big reason for this is because they can engage from a slightly farther distance, and sometimes even from one row behind the front line. When upgraded to Champion status, the Indian Gada Warrior will also be able to do the same. This will let them smash through enemy front lines with ease. This does not come without its own risks, though. When clumped up together, they are more susceptible to splash damage, so be very careful when engaging armies with splash damage, especially ones like the Egyptian Axeman army in Age 3, that can easily tear down clumped up groups of Infantry to shreds. Luckily, the Indians can fall back on Bowmen instead of large groups of Gada Warriors to deal with such armies. The Indians excel at adapting to their environment and their enemy, and this is no exception.

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Max, Eamon, and Phillus began working on this unit's model back in March. We love how he looks and particularly love the icon that Hans made. We love the Gada Warrior so much that we elected him to be the face of the civ on the selection screen. Natsata drew the model, Cain did the background, and PF2K made the border (complete with elephant icon).

Finally, the Gada Warrior is also the first unit whose vocals are finalized. Zawnius is his voice. Congratulations, Zawnius!

Indian Civilization Card
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Civilization cards are what you see in the Civilization selection menu when launching the game. They are the first visual representative of a civilization and the first thing that players associate with that civilization when they first start playing.

All pro civilizations (that start in Level 20) share the same golden border (with slightly different designs and also different icons at the top) while the other civilizations that start at Level 1 (or 3) have different colors of stone borders. Have a look for yourself below:

Warehouses
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While not slaying foes and collecting treasure in quests, players can store their newfound items in their civilizations' inventory. Players' inventory is saved in Warehouse buildings. Each civilization has 5 different Warehouses, that are 8-slot, 12-slot, 16-slot, 20-slot and 24-slot in capacity. The first four are built on land, and the 24-slot ones are built on water.

As we stated on the Roman Warehouse spotlight blog, each warehouse has its own unique name that carries the flavor of the civilization while also being a play on English words together with names that are relevant to that civilization (such as Lokeep for the Norse being a play on the word Keep and the Norse god Loki). Have a look at the Indian Warehouses below, as well as a full list of all civilizations' warehouse names:

Blog Wrap-up
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To summarize everything we've shown in this blog, and the one before, here's a quick lineup of all the units made in the Indian Barracks, Archery Range and Stables and also a sneak peek at their Military Tech tree.

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Thanks for reading, and we look forward to revealing more of the Indians again shortly as we pick up the pace. Please let us know your thoughts and questions below!

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