Elite Cataphract

[KaedenCraft]

I'm sure it's been brought up before, but I'm at my whit's end. I play in a small group of friends, and ever since one of them discovered the Byzantine civ and Elite Cataphracts, there has been no stopping him. I've read up on counters, tried strategies, watched videos, tried rushing, EVERYTHING but they saw through it all like it's not there. Even if you win an engagement with them, you don't really win, as you have the tattered remnants of an army to show for it.

The only real effective strategy I've found is "Don't let them get Elite Cataphracts" but...isn't that the definition of OP? When the only way to win is to prevent it from happening? What if their teammate rushes you? What if they hold you off from eco disruption? Do they simply get a "win" card?

I've heard over and over how balanced this game is, but Elite Cataphracts seem to be the closest thing to a trump card. Arlebasts, Paladins, Longbowmen (Brit), Samurai (Japanese), Halbrediers, they all just get ripped to shreds.

Any light on this?? I'm at the point where I don't even want to play anymore, 'cause he gets out Elite Cataphract and might as well resign now. At least that's what it feels like.

[Tanooki]

Cataphracts are good against infantry (and oddly, not weak to camels as many may tell you) pretty much anything else works.

Paladins work (although unless upgrading for another reason, would not be the best choice since it's pretty expensive to upgrade). Massed scorpions work well, Archers/gunman seem to work best in most cases, however you'll need to mass quite a few, and put in spread formation if they get close. Don't make just archers. You'll need something to block, if you can, put the archers behind buildings/trees or spam trash units (halb/skirm/hussars) to make it hard for them to get all the way to the archers. I would just move slow, building castles and buildings as I move, since they have difficulty pushing back. Eventually you'll get to their castles and just take it out with trebs protected by archers or similar.

Just don't loose your economy and you should be able to win. Cataphracts are not very good at buildings. If they're just running around your base, building houses/barracks/walls to make walls and protect your important villagers, garrison when possible, and just kind of start picking them off with archers or whatever, they shouldn't last too long.

[Dragunsky]

I dont have much play time nor am I a pro, but the last time I remember facing Byzantines, they werent much trouble. I was Korean in this instance. Black Forest, used siege onagers to push through the forest into his base (the main road was walled by the both of us). Had my onagers in the front, wagons and ranged units middle and a bunch of infantry off to the side. The guy was decimated. I forgot he even had an army. So, in short, add siege units into the mix. Im sure I lost a lot of units but in the end his defense folded.

[Woodynator]

Paladins fair well against them. But the argument you bring up (dont let them get cataphracts), is most effective :P Although thats not what you want to hear...

They take alot of resources to fully upgrade, alot of castles and in large ALOT of time. Thats why you wont see them that often in games with decent players. Its the same case like with war elephants. If you let them mass up a large amount, you deserve to lose.

Would help if you specify which map we're talking about.

[Jonas]

I usually create 6-ish barracks, and then throw halb/pikemen in his face until he caves.. They are cheaper, and created faster - especially if you are goths.. You will need a good econ though..
If you back halb/pikemen with som archers behind, you should be fine..

You could also take persians.. elefants fare quite well against cataphract

Saracens special unit counters mounted, that should work as well..

Vikings have an upgrade that gives them an attack bonus vs. mounted, but since they are infantry, and created slowly, I would not recommend it =)

[MrWoodster]

Byz are definitely tricky. My buddy plays them all day every day coz he loves their tough buildings and the catas... My fav civ was Saras but it is vrazy because mamelukes and camels can't actually stand up to catas like they probably should, the melee armour is too high...

I now play mongols and exploit their poor pierce armour. Mangudai and rapid movement scorps, onagers and rams backed up with a hussar front line purely to slow them down works effevtively.

Their poor building attack means a good forward build can also help.

[The O.G. Manbeast]

Mass archers work well, as do mamalukes. Massic cav archers with huns is probably the esiest way to go as they're so cheap and easy to mass!

[Merek]

paladin > cataphract 1 on 1

[FE_HockeySam18]

Ranged units are the best counter to Cats due to Cats poor pierce armor. This includes scorpions (particularly effective as they do moderate splash pierce damage). Just make sure you have something to protect them with.

Another reason massed ECats are so powerful is due to their area damage from Logistica tech. If your enemy gets enough of them, they may even beat paladins due to that area damage.

Frankly Woodynator has the best advice here- I'll quote him below:

Originally posted by Woodynator:

Paladins fair well against them. But the argument you bring up (dont let them get cataphracts), is most effective :P Although thats not what you want to hear...

They take alot of resources to fully upgrade, alot of castles and in large ALOT of time. Thats why you wont see them that often in games with decent players. Its the same case like with war elephants. If you let them mass up a large amount, you deserve to lose.

Would help if you specify which map we're talking about.

[Telenil]

Someone posted numbers in a similar thread, I think it's an interesting read:
Base bonus against cavalry: spearman +15, pikeman +22, halberdier +32, camel +10, heavy camel +18, mameluk +9, elite mameluk +12
Against non-elite cataphracts: spearman +3, pikeman +10, halberdier +20, heavy camel +6.
Against elite cataphracts: pikeman +6, halberdier +16, heavy camel +2.
Cataphracts deal 9/12 damage with a +12 bonus against infantry that increases to +18 with Logistica, for a whopping total of 32 with full upgrades.

What this tells us is:
- Forget camels. Not only do they completely fail to counter cataphracts, but they also suck against anything the Byzantine might support them with.
- Halberdiers sort of work, but you need them en masse and they get killed in two hits once Logistica adds its trample damage.
- Paladins are stronger and slightly cheaper, though again, Logistica is said to even the scales.
- On the flip side, cataphracts have only 1 pierce armor when a paladin has 3. Arbalest do 6 damage, heavy cavalry archers do 7, so *they* will be much more effective than they would against paladins. Which is why, as everyone said, ranged units are the way to go.
That's one thing I like with cataphracts. They are not the easiest to get, but they work differently and Logistica is a very original way to make them work in the imperial age.

There are a few details I'd like to know, like if cataphracts also negate the samurai damage bonus and how armor affects trample damage. The trample damage is said to be base damage/2, but I don't know if that makes 4/6 or 5/6. Did anyone do any testing?

[TerminallyGrill]

Any AoE troop damage (Logistica, Druzhina) is always set to 5.

[TheBattler]

Originally posted by Taka:

The only real effective strategy I've found is "Don't let them get Elite Cataphracts" but...isn't that the definition of OP? When the only way to win is to prevent it from happening? What if their teammate rushes you? What if they hold you off from eco disruption? Do they simply get a "win" card?

Most of AoE2 is resource management, so preventing your opponent from massing very expensive troops is very much a part of the game.

Cataphracts are slightly more expensive than Knights, and come from Castles. So you should work harder to prevent your friend from massing them.

I've heard over and over how balanced this game is, but Elite Cataphracts seem to be the closest thing to a trump card. Arlebasts, Paladins, Longbowmen (Brit), Samurai (Japanese), Halbrediers, they all just get ripped to shreds.

Well, I don't know why your Paladins aren't doing so well because Paladins beat Cataphracts pretty soundly and you should be able to throw more Paladins at your opponent than he can throw Cataphracts at you.

As many people have pointed out, the Cataphract's main weakness is Archery. A Cataphract costs 70 F and 75 G but dies to 30 Arbalest arrows. Compare that to a Paladin who dies to 60 Arbalest arrows and costs 60 F and 75 G.

One thing people aren't really telling you is that you should always remember to counter very strong units with numbers. Skirmishers can be outnumbered and defeat Archers, same thing with Camels and Paladins. But you've never tried to beat 40 Paladins with 40 Halberdiers, right? You always try to make like 55 or 60? Same concept with Cataphracts.

Archers are way cheaper than Catas so you should have like 60 Arbalests for every 40 Cataphracts your opponent puts on the field. Or 60 Hand Cannoneers. 30 Heavy Scorpions can work as long as they have 10, tough units in front of them (Camels, Knights, even Hussars).

[Mamba]

After playing a lot with friend who ALWAYS dominated me with mayans because i could never beat his plumed archer + elite eagle warrior combination, I realized that it wasn't so much the units he was using, but that he was simply a far better player than I was so no matter what i made, he was able to outmass me even if I was "countering". Maybe ask him to play against you with a civ that isn't Byzantines while you play as the Byzantines and see how you go. It may just be that you need to improve your overall gameplay. Because there are a few units, already mentioned here, that should counter the Cataphract.

[DarK | Adélie]

By the way, Cataphracts even if they're a very good unit overall, they're almost never seen in 1v1's as it's so much expensive to get the Elite upgrade and Logistica + they're easily countered. In TG's (even 2v2's) though, if one player sling Byzantines to get E Cataphracts (seen that in a recent game with TheViper), they're so deadly, and much more fast to upgrade that Paladins.

Plus believe it or not, but they're much better than Byzantines and Celtic Paldins.

Well to finish I'd say that basically every massed ranged units + scorpions counter Cataphracts with ease. They're basically just ultra-expensive and buffed mounted Jaguar Warriors 11.

[xBBQx]

If you keep making pushes in the castle age to damage your opponent's economy, they should never have the resources to make Elite Cataphracts

[hot_gril]

"Arlebasts, Paladins, Longbowmen (Brit)" get killed? Cataphracts have weak pierce armor, so you should be using ranged units against them… not sure how he was killing your longbowmen! Or skirmishers, lots of skirmishers, works. They cost nothing and make him waste his gold on cataphracts.

The only thing to watch out for when using archers is that cataphracts with Logistica researched do trample damage, so you can't clump them up too much.