The Rider unit

[Harlan]

Transcend,
From a book I got called the history of China. I just finished reading most of it, and yes An Lushan was hardly the only rebellion of that nature. The comment is certainly not racist. Its a general rule throughout history that mercenaries are less loyal to the state. They're from out of the state, and you pay them good money to try and keep them loyal, but it doesn't always work. An interesting phenomenon with barbarians near China is they could be incredibly loyal, but to a leader, not the state, since in tribal politics there was no stable nation-state, but people swore loyalty to specific leaders. When a leader would come along who commanded their respect, like Genghis Khan, they would be fiercely loyal, but when that person died, often their kingdom would die with them.

So my point is not that barbarians were inherently backstabbing people, but that their societies had different conceptions of what one expressed loyalty towards. Just one of many profound differences between nomadic, non-literate and agricultural, mostly literate (in medieval China) peoples.

Fred,
The Chin came from one of the northern border provinces, and as such, were better at cavalry than most Chinese. But their opponents lived in many walled cities, so to conquer China they used Chinese tactics: huge armies of infantry and crossbowmen, with plenty of siege weapons. You'll find infantry and crossbowmen make up the vast majority of figures in the First Emperor's tomb.

[Harlan]

Oh,
And as for what unit China should have instead, as mentioned above, Crossbowmen is the natural choice. It was the main archery weapon in China from around 300 BC, while in Europe it didn't really catch on until 1000 AD! Being such old hands at it, they really honed it to a level of high expertise.

Some other options. The Chinese developed gunpowder early, but didn't have the metal skills to make good guns and cannons. So they came up with a whole range of wierd explosive weapons, like rockets and even handgrenades (little known fact, but handgrenades, basically a lit ball of gunpowder, were big weapons in the middle ages by all except Christian nations. For instance, they were heavily used against the Crusaders by the Muslims). These were unique weapons used by the Chinese for hundreds of years.

Another one could be the Junk warship. China having many long and navigable rivers, they developed river warfare to a high degree.

Finally, what's with the name Rider, anyways? It sounds as artifically made up as the rest of the unit. I challenge anyone to come up with a book that ever refers to the Chinese cavalry as "Riders".

[Transcend]

Originally posted by Harlan
Transcend,
From a book I got called the history of China. I just finished reading most of it, and yes An Lushan was hardly the only rebellion of that nature. The comment is certainly not racist. Its a general rule throughout history that mercenaries are less loyal to the state. They're from out of the state, and you pay them good money to try and keep them loyal, but it doesn't always work. An interesting phenomenon with barbarians near China is they could be incredibly loyal, but to a leader, not the state, since in tribal politics there was no stable nation-state, but people swore loyalty to specific leaders. When a leader would come along who commanded their respect, like Genghis Khan, they would be fiercely loyal, but when that person died, often their kingdom would die with them.

So my point is not that barbarians were inherently backstabbing people, but that their societies had different conceptions of what one expressed loyalty towards. Just one of many profound differences between nomadic, non-literate and agricultural, mostly literate (in medieval China) peoples.

You just read one book, ONE BOOK, and jumped to the conclusion that Chinese didn't have cavalry and only employed mercenaries. It appears to me that this is just another attempt by Eurocentrists to diminish the abilities and accomplishments of non-European cultures. It's in the same category as saying that Egyptian Pyramids wered build by the Aliens.

I would recommend you reading from sources such as "The Cambridge History of China". To base your impression of an old and complex civilization on a single book is wrong. You are likely to develope false stereotypes and offend potential friends.

Excuse me if my words sound offensive to you, but I'm a very direct and out-spoken person.

[Harlan]

Chill. Don't worry, I've read plenty of books on China - the quotes I had earlier were pulled from several in fact. I'm very familiar with the Cambridge series, and though I haven't read the whole thing (what a task that would be!) I've read parts.

This has absolutely NOTHING to do with Eurocentrism or racism, or aliens for that matter! If you look around my posts, you'll see I'm one of the biggest knockers of Eurocentric attitudes, and I push attempts to get more aspects of more cultures in the game. The Chinese were, hands down, the most advanced civilization on the planet until the Mongols wiped out half their population. I'm merely arguing that any special cavalry unit in Eastern Asia should belong to the Mongols not the Chinese. I didn't say the Chinese had no cavalry at all, just that it didn't compare to those of their northern neighbors and was hardly the highlight of their armies. There are many other great units that could have been chosen for the Chinese. Geez! How that equals Eurocentrism and racism I have no idea.

[Transcend]

Harlan, we probably misunderstood each other. At no point do I claim you to have racist attitudes, but I didn't know you well and I have read many books trying to diminish the achievement of non-european cultures before. I thought you read one of these books as well and drew your conclusion just from them.

As to an alternative Chinese special unit, I think crossbowman is definitely a choice. But I had enough of the Chu-Ko-Nu unit from Age of Empires 2.

[Fiil]

Originally posted by Harlan

Its a general rule throughout history that mercenaries are less loyal to the state. They're from out of the state, and you pay them good money to try and keep them loyal, but it doesn't always work.

In many medieval empires kings or emperors would use foreign troops to build up an elite force or a bodyguard, mostly because they were more loyal.
IIRC the janissaries (sp?) were christian knights, they were selected to form the most trusted part of the army because the sultan knew a succesful janissary could make no claims to the throne or parts of the country (you had to be muslim).
The viking bodyguard of the byzantine emperors and norman kings and the swiss guards of France and the Vatican are similar examples of mercenaries who were loyal to the last drop of blood.
Of cause there were some exceptions, mercenaries troops have betrayed their commanders and so have non-mercenaries. But I really don't think foreign troops were more prone to betrayal. Most often it has been the most powerful part of the army which was disloyal - mercenary or not!
I believe that the idea of foreign troops being less reliable has something to do with todays nationalism, before this concept was 'invented' most people didn't care about nationality if they got their part of the loot.
The idea also originates from Machiavelli who adviced not to use mercenaries because they could betray you. He was however comparing professional soldiers (on the lookout for booty) with conscripts (who just wanted to return to their farms), which have nothing to do with nationality.

Feel free to correct me, I might be wrong!

[Harlan]

Transcend,
In the future please be more cautious before making accusations. I try to give people the benefit of the doubt.

Fiil,
Indeed, the mercenary situation is more complicated than my statement implies. There are so many different times and places where they have been used that one can't easily make a general rule. My point was specifically that with barbarian mercenaries who'd grown up in a tribal culture, their sense of loyalty usually lies with the leader, not with the nation-state. So this could lead to fanatic loyalty to leaders. As a result, they were often made bodyguards of kings and emperors. But, should something go wrong, for instance that leader dies and is replaced by his enemy, that loyalty could die just as fast. The bigger problem this caused was when the leader they're supposed to be loyal to is far away, and they're under a popular general - its easy to switch loyalty to the general instead.

Of course native troops would rebel as well sometimes, and there are lots of variables that come into play. But native troops were normally less likely to loot and pillage their own countryside. Many an upstart general failed in power plays because their soldiers didn't want to attack other soldiers of their own kind. For the same reason, any intelligent leader wouldn't have say, German mercenaries for the Roman army fight against Germans in Germany, but instead they'd send them to the African or Persian fronts.

All things being equal, its better to have your own populace be your soldiers than foreigners. Doesn't that just make sense?!? For instance, the late Roman empire and early Byzantine empire had constant security problems because of their own barbarian armies. This was only solved in the 600's by the establishment of the theme system, which reestablished the non-barbarian army and is widely recognized as the main reason for the long survival of the Byzantine Empire.

Even when mercenaries were famously used, for instance the Swiss Guards in Italy, that was largely because countries were unable to find soldiers in their own country able to put up a good fight. Usually the mercenaries have to be a lot better at fighting than locals to be worth the risk. That's why, for instance, the Chinese had lots of barbarian cavalry, but rarely or never barbarian infantry or crossbowmen.

Can we get back to the topic? Namely, do people agree with the Riders unit, and if not, then what?

[fred]

I think the main problem is that UU are based on counterparts of the real game. So that the Chinese were limited to a few units. Since there was not a middle age 600ad-900ad 1300-1600ad unit thta fit the chinese military besides a calvary type unit, employed by the chinese military the dev team chose it. Also i think the dev team is trying to sperate the golden ages and UU units so theres not a whole clump at beginning and end.

Also Im not sure if there is a bowman type unit to be represented. As well a basic Infantry unit is not interesting, and was so widely used it doesnt become special like a hopolite persay.

Fred,
The Chin came from one of the northern border provinces, and as such, were better at cavalry than most Chinese. But their opponents lived in many walled cities, so to conquer China they used Chinese tactics: huge armies of infantry and crossbowmen, with plenty of siege weapons. You'll find infantry and crossbowmen make up the vast majority of figures in the First Emperor's tomb.

I am aware of the composition of the pits.... I went to them and got the full tour .... Also the organization of kingdoms put the Qin kingdom not on the border of "barbarian" tribes but was surrounded in the north and west by chinese kingdoms as well as east and south.

Also what army ever based their base of military force in Calvary? Army not roving hordes. If there has been armies that were totaly calvary they are very rare. I dont think the team picked the UU by which was most used. Rather what they felt was used most effectively during the period of time they picked the golden age.

I believe they picked the Tung Dynasty as the golden age. So possibly the raider was used more as a police unit\ raiding unit for the Sung Dynasty. This period was remembered more as a time of peace and trade. And the main problem for the Sung dynasty was protecting the trade routes. So a fast mobile raiding unit would
suit the dynasty best.


Only thing i dont like is the name "raider" specifically. and the fact that they chose a golden age in the 600-1400 ad range, yet had mao as the leader. Would it not be more fitting to chose the leader from the golden age? As well as the city names... Tung dynasty capital was Chang'an (Xi'an during Qin-Han [Capital] presently called Xi'an, Capital of Shanxi Province)

[Melios]

Originally posted by Fiil
Conclusion:
Attack 4: This is low compared to the hoplite!

Call me crazy, but the Hoplites stats were 1/3/1 and 4 is much larger than 1 and is bigger than 3......

Originally posted by Harlan
Can we get back to the topic? Namely, do people agree with the Riders unit, and if not, then what?

I think it is sufficient. There is no Mongol civilization so the closest thing for this unit would be Chinese. Even though the name is quite generic.

[Urban Ranger]

Harlan,

The main reason for An Lushan's rebellion was politics. The other reason was he could rebel (instead of fleeing) because he was given total control over 3 provinces, both administratively and militarily.

"The Chinese were, hands down, the most advanced civilization on the planet until the Mongols wiped out half their population."

Still were afterwards. Only after those Ming bastards got progressively more repressive did things got all screwed up.

"That's why, for instance, the Chinese had lots of barbarian cavalry, but rarely or never barbarian infantry or crossbowmen.

It didn't appear that Imperial China used a lot of foreigners for cavalry.

"The Chin came from one of the northern border provinces, and as such, were better at cavalry than most Chinese."

Qin was at what today is Xinxi. Though the country with the biggest cavarly at the time was Zhao. Neither of these countries used any significant number of "barbarians" as they were also constantly at war with them.

[Urban Ranger]

The Chinese didn't have any outstanding units.

Not the rider. Not the crossbowmen - crossbow was never in widespread use. The archer is taken by the Babylonians and the Egyptians took the chariots.

I got it. Some kind of beefed up infantry with increased attack and movement. Also cheaper to produce.

[Comrade Tribune]

A rider better defensively than a knight?
Although knights were wearing armour?

Hogwash!!!

[Transcend]

Originally posted by Comrade Tribune
A rider better defensively than a knight?
Although knights were wearing armour?

Hogwash!!!

Defensive values should also be determined by the mobility. A static metal pillbox is far easier to hit than a M1A2 moving at 45 miles/hour. Same with Rider and Knight: An English Lowbowman should have it easier to hit a slow-moving French Knight than a fast riding Mongolian Horse Archer. Avoid being hit is halfway to combat survivability.

Also, Riders are supposed to have ranged weapons such as composite bows which make them far more effective against melee attackers.

With all these factors combined, Riders naturally get a better defense value than Knights.