Are Mangonels and Scorpions worth it?

[Silver]

I never seem to make these units work. They are expensive, take long to build, they move slowly, and can be destroyed very quickly, that's why I call them glass cannons. Sure, if the shot lands perfectly you will do massive damage, but even the A.I. isnt that stupid and a wrong attack stance can mean your own units get deleted.

And Scorpions only work well against enemy blobs since their shots "go through" and unlike mangonels/onagers they dont harm your own units, but even they feel too light and too flimsy for me.

And neither of these siege weapons are particularly useful against buildings, so they do not fill a niche like the rams do to support the rest of your troops. What is the strategy here or are they forgettable?

[WSlord]

Situational per usual.

Mongols, more then scorpions.

Massing them, mainly mangs: Mongols, celts, Koreans (part of Korean death ball, very strong late game strat).
Forwarding with Ongar line through black forest, especially as Celts.

Going against archer spam, especially against archer heavy civ.
Monk Spam (better when mixed with scout line or teuton), though learning what nations have or do not have redemption can be the ace in the hole here.
Catching a archer into xbow rush off guard.

Scorpions:
The Khmer scorpion swarm is a lot more viable due to the double shot, when supported by other units this is excellent such a smaller elephant screen mixed in.

If the enemy player is ballsy enough to use heal box [monks, pike, and archers on stand ground box formation] (rare in PVP but they do have their place) scorpions with a mang will shut him down fast.

Scorpions fast attack speed and damage often is used as screening for other units to soften up targets as they do not do AOE damage.

Mostly such siege is used in a supporting roll as that is where a units weight can pull through the most instead of a main attacking force (Korean death ball being the main exception to this roll).

It takes 10 Ongars to kill a castle in one shot, so that is something to keep in mind.

Good players will out micro scorps and mangs, so yes, they usually should not be your main area of focus.

[Yorok]

I play against AI.
I don't use mangonels because enemy units avoid their shots perfectly and they kill my own units.
I use scorpions a lot, because they have high pierce damage which means they shoot through pretty much any non-siege unit armor. Normal scorpions is kinda equal to arbalest but scorpion is available from castle age with no upgrades. Heavy scorpion is even much better.

My favorite army combination is 66% heavy cavalry + 33% scorpions. Heavy cavalry is a universal unit, which works great against most units. They fight in front of the scorpions, which shoot to death all kinds of units. It is very important to not let enemy units reach scorpions, because scorpions have low defensive abilities. If the scorpions can fire at enemy units without enemy units reaching them, they absolutely cause havoc and munch whole armies. Their ability to cause damage to several units behind each other really helps against big armies.

It is good idea to hold scorpions on stand ground in order to avoid them trying to slowly move away from enemy melee units, which are closer than minimum attacking range. They are too slow for escaping and it is better if they keep on shooting other units.

To show an example of heavy cavalry + scorpions strength I made a test in scenario editor, where I had 60 cavaliers + 30 scorpions vs enemy 96 halberdiers. I won with 71 units remaining, although halberdier is hard counter for cavalier.

[Lord Commander]

Vs the AI, the mangonel is not too effective because the AI will have its units spread all over the place and will control each unit separately, something a human player can not do.
In multiplayer, mangonels are one of the most dangerous units, you don't pay attention to your army for 2 seconds and a mangonel can one shot all of your crossbows. Even if you see the mangonel, trying to dodge its shot is hard and risky, dodging 2 or 3 mangonels is almost impossible at low to mid skill level.

One thing you can do both vs the AI and in multiplayer is use mangonels to destroy town centers, its the best way to destroy town centers in castle age, all you need is some units like pikemen to protect the mangonels.


Scorpions have a lower attack, but they are cheaper and much harder to dodge than mangonels.
They are not used as much as mangonels, but they're still effective against most ranged units.
They are also a good way to deal with pikemen if you're going knights.

[b00nish]

Scorpions aren't seen very often in multiplayer matches. Mangonels (& onagers) however are a very important and destructive weapon that is used very often and with good reasons.

There's not much as useful against massed archers/hand canoneers than mangonels/onagers. One good siege onager shot basically can win you a game by killing 10 - 20 expensive enemy units.

[T-West]

Scorpions actually are really useful. They are a pretty common defense against small groups of skirms/archers/xbow. You can't micro to avoid scorpion fire as easily as you can to avoid mangonel fire. They're also pretty useful vs pikemen.

[GepardenK]

Mangonels/onagers are frequently used in high level play. They're the perfect counter to massed archers and can turn games around on a dime. Scorpions are more situational and don't see too much use. These weapons aren't meant to be good against buildings though; they're anti-unit siege.