hey guys Spirit of the law here in this video we're going to be taking a close look at a very
interesting unique unit the janissary they've enjoyed a reputation as a great Castle unique
unit with tons of Firepower while requiring very few upgrades of course they recently had their
range in Castle age reduced from eight to seven making this a very topical topic and a good time
to deep dive the unit and see where it stands the hand Cannoneer is by far the most natural
comparison in the late game and we will look at the janissary as an alternative to hand cannons
in depth though I think we should start things off instead by looking at what janissaries have
to offer in Castle age admittedly it almost feels like cheating to have a gunpowder unit
in age early even before researching chemistry and at a glance their attack especially stands
out at 17 compared to the crossbow 7. now while their attack looks great on paper it's slightly
misleading as even before thumb ring they take about 70 percent longer to reload than a crossbow
and they have just 50% accuracy compared to the crossbows 85% another important consideration is
they're fairly expensive for a ranged unit at 60 food and 55 gold compared to the crossbow 70 Total
Resource cost digging deeper into their Firepower at point-blank range when all of their shots are
landing they end up doing surprisingly only a little more damage output than a crossbow with
thumb ring ending up a bit behind the Conquistador in the battle for gunpowder Supremacy if anything
this is even overselling the janissary as well as it has the lowest accuracy out of this group
and at a distance they pretty clearly like the other two in damage that said the advantage of
high attack is they're less impacted by enemy Pierce armor than the crossbow even with a very
modest three enemy pure summer the janissary is already better at a distance this is the
main advantage of gunpowder units and within reason the higher the Pierce armor the better a
gunpowder unit should look relative to an Archer with the biggest gap coming against units with 6
or 7 pure summer like an elite skirmisher now as for a few hidden things note that janissaries are
not affected by thumb ring ballistics or Archer attack upgrades and are only improved in Castle
age with archer armor while that might sound like they're missing out on something actually
this should be seen instead as a significant cost savings fully upgrading crossbows takes over 2100
resources worth of techs between the blacksmith University and archery range on top of all of
the research time as well while Janissaries after building a castle just have to pick up
armor and frankly armor isn't even that critical in many cases and can be delayed if you're short
on food they also have a pretty quick 17 second creation time compared to crossbows at 27 and
skirmishers at 22 which to some extent makes up for the castle requirement next in terms of
bonus damage their only attack bonus is plus two against Rams meaning they do two instead of the
expected one damage but on the flip side they take extra damage from anything anti-archer anti-gun
powder or the samurai now just quickly I want to address the recent impact of their decreased range
previously janissaries in Castle age had a nearly unmatched eight range whereas now they have just
seven same as a crossbow Elite skirmisher mangonel or scorpion all of these are significant threats
to your janissaries and don't forget the Town Center Cavalry Archer and elephant Archer which
were previously outraged by two and are now outraged by just one this was a significant
Nerf and means the castle age janissary is now not as good as its reputation would suggest for
example without micro janissaries are pretty easily beaten by crossbows with equal resources
whereas previously by outranging them you could probably make it close with micro
even with equal numbers it's a basically balanced fight despite the janissary costing over 60
percent more in total resources the point is janissaries in a shootout just don't perform that
well against archers in general now that they're limited to having the same range let's not give up
on them quite yet though and let's see how they do against some other units right away there's
a potential misconception in thinking that since the hand Cannon ear is anti-infantry the janissary
will be equally good in that role as well as it turns out though they don't have any bonus damage
against infantry and while their High attack seems promising doing roughly double the damage
per attack is a crossbow the issue comes down to accuracy in fact a single janissary can't reliably
beat a Pikeman any faster than a crossbow because it misses nearly half the time at long range even
close up though with balanced resources crossbows still perform better despite being the softer unit
right away this reinforces that janissaries are not especially anti-infantry and the crossbow with
its plus 3 versus spear units and far less wasted Overkill damage is the Clear Choice here that
maybe shouldn't be unexpected though as remember the point of gunpowder is to overwhelm High armor
targets and not to deal with large numbers of low HP units unless you're the organ gun but that's a
different story altogether for janissaries against Pikeman even with micro you're just losing so much
of your attack to Overkill and Miss shots that it ends up being a more prolonged fight than you
might expect so if they aren't that impressive against infantry then what about against Cavalry
well here things start looking up as remember three Pierce armor was the point that janissary
starred to outshine crossbows and knights have four Pierce armor with all upgrades again accuracy
is the major concern though and here you can see at long range a single janissary is only about
as effective as a crossbowman at beating a knight emphasizing that high attack is in everything that
said up close where accuracy goes to near nearly 100 percent with balance resources janissaries
outperformed crossbows though neither appears particularly impressive against Knights without
micro instead where janissaries start to stand out is when we use an equal number of janissaries and
crossbows here with double the night's starting numbers in this case Janus series can win whereas
crossbows lose assuming we aren't using micro the main takeaway is value-wise the janissary
isn't giving a tremendous amount of Firepower compared to the crossbow even against the unit
as heavily armored as a knight but if you can funnel these saved resources from eating fewer
upgrades into amassing even a moderately sized group of janissaries they do start to earn the
reputation against Knights ideally you really want to get to that 10 or 12 critical mass where you
can start to micro and one shot them performing similar to a much larger ball of crossbows
course where they should do their best is against units with high pure summer though unfortunately a
lot of those are still counters either value-wise or because they Excel against groups of low HP
units which would include janissaries mangonels and scorpions for example are a threat to a group
of janissaries and even Elite skirmishers are cost effective against skirmishers specifically you're
doing more than three times the damage over time that a similar sized group of crossbows would do
so while you shouldn't purposefully go out of your way to fight skirmishers because of their bonus
damage that's probably the matchup you'll notice the janissery's advantages most dramatically
so far this has all just been for Castle H though where the biggest advantages have been against
High armor targets and they're relatively cheap Tech switch but now let's move on to the Imperial
Age first off Turks don't have arborlaster so at this point the most natural comparison switches
to the hand Cannon ear which remember Turks already have a few bonuses to enhance right away
janissaries are at a disadvantage and that their Imperial age upgrade costs roughly the same as
17 hand cannons making the hand Cannon feel like the janissary of Imperial age and that it's ready
without a lot of upgrades much like the janissary was in Castle age for that Elite upgrade cost you
get six more HP 5 more attack the removal of frame delay meaning they're incredibly responsive and
clean to micro plus one range a hidden 15 accuracy Boost Plus One melee armor and your bonus against
Rams goes from two to three side by side with hand cannoniers Elite janissary is 20 resources more
expensive and the two are actually quite similar to glance with the same HP and fire rate and the
janissary having a bit more attack and range behind the scene scenes though the hand Cannon
ear has a sneaky 75 accuracy and of course its signature plus 10 bonus against infantry remember
Turks get free chemistry so hand cannonier is easier to produce than usual in fact you get the
sense power spikes into gunpowder units is kind of the Turk's whole deal of course the easiest
rule of thumb here is that the hand Cannon here is better against infantry while the elite janissary
is more well-rounded against everything else but let's put that comparison to the test to start
against Champions the hand cannonier defeats them one attacked sooner on top of having a
bit more accuracy certainly in terms of Firepower the hand Cannon ear is better but as it turns out
in close quarters fighting the elite janissary's extra HP and melee armor make up for its lower
damage leading to a very similar outcome when balancing resources usually you'll want a meat
shield in front of your gunpowder units but in a pinch the janissary's toughness can clearly help
them step up and give something very comparable to a hand cannonier in this particular matchup
moving on against halberdiers it's fairly similar where hand can is taking out one attack sooner and
three instead of four hits this time though it's a big enough advantage that even up close the hand
Cannon air comes out looking significantly better so certainly as a unit to pair with
hussar if you're worried about halberdiers the hand Cannon ear makes a bit more sense another
important case worth pointing out is the elite huskarl where the hand cannoniers plus 10 versus
infantry is naturally more impactful than the elite genus series plus 5 attack up close it's
a massive difference and against a modest group of eight test girls which is admittedly probably
fewer than you'll actually run into in this case the hand cannoniers Come Away with a nice Victory
while the elite Janna series are quickly overwhelmed remember Hess girls are also
doing their own bonus damage against both of these units as they are technically considered archers
clearly though the rule of picking hand cannoniers against infantry holds true so far that is except
for one case the condottiero actually ignores the anti-infantry bonus of the hand Cannon ear
as part of its anti-gun powder specialty the janissary doesn't rely on anti-inventory bonus
damage though so it's unaffected and in fact takes them out two shots sooner this translates into a
pretty big Advantage for janissaries in practice able to defeat small groups of condottieri where
a similar or larger group of hand cannoniers lose it's a quirky example over the rule of hand
cannons against infantry breaks down and Sicilian infantry is another case where ignoring some of
the hand cannoniers bonus makes the janissary perform relatively better but to be clear as a
general rule hand cannoniers are the better choice against infantry getting away from infantry now
though it's pretty clear Elite genus series are a considerably more versatile unit against paladins
for example their extra 5 attack means they in fact do 50 more damage per shot this is probably
the best example of where Mass janissary can Thrive when combined with a meat Shield as the
Paladin's High armor in HP means you're losing a lot less damage to Overkill than you usually
would with the elite upgrade janissaries are also among the cleanest units to micro in the game so
this is exactly the kind of situation where they thrive similarly they also hold up comparably
well against skirmishers again thanks to higher attack hitting them in three instead of 4 hits
in theory skirmishers are still cost effective but especially with the elite upgrade janissaries are
going to have a lot more success there than say an arbalaster would and of course speaking of art
blasters technically they are a cost-effective counter to lead janissaries and this definitely
isn't a fight to seek out against a good Archer civ but in a battle with equal sizes the janissary
can come out on top which again highlights its population efficiency and flexibility so to give
a few closing thoughts as we've seen Janna series and hand cannoneers have some surface similarities
but do fundamentally different things and certainly the janissary isn't just a replacement
for the hand Cannonier generally you go with one or the other a castle drop into Janna series is a
popular self-contained strategy with the advantage that you have basically no upgrades needed while
even a group as small as 8 or 10 are going to be a threat to one shot most enemies in Castle age by
going with Janna series you're getting a flexible generalist unit that tends to hold up reasonably
well to the traditional anti-archer counter units like skirmishers in contrast the hand cannonier
and a bombard Cannon pairing is more associated with the classic fast Imperial this way you can
skip the cost of a castle and benefit from the Turks getting chemistry instantly and of course
with their bonus damage they're obviously better choice against infantry units as well aside from
the condottiero really though either works well with Turk Cavalry and especially hussar helping
them deal with spear units while the hazard deals with things like skirmishers and onagers bombard
cannons also complement this role focusing down onagers generally the decision comes down to
whether you want the anti-infantry bonus or if you prefer the more population efficient and flexible
janissary which already does just fine against infantry in a pinch I realize I fired a lot of
information at you in this video but hopefully it helps put the two units into a bit better
perspective that'll do it for this one thanks for watching guys and I'll see you next time