How to beat
Holy Roman Empireas Ayyubid
Matchup tips
Ayyubids can go for reinforcement wing in Feudal Age and drop a ram with a Desert Raider to take down an early dock.
Ayyubids can also go advancement wing, double dock drop, and open with an archer ship to deny early water.
Ayyubid needs about 10 crossbows to stabilize against HRE Men-at-Arms with Marching Drills; a handful won't hold it.
HRE can drop relics inside docks on ponds for much quicker gold generation.
Meinwerk always gives you a good amount of value, especially when you age up to Castle Age. Like the steel barding is just such a big upgrade to have on your knights when you're up against a really good knight counter like the Camel Lancer or the Desert Raider. Having an additional two armor means that the Desert Raider, their ranged attack suddenly deals a lot less damage to you. They're not going to be able to kite you indefinitely with their ranged attack.
I'd say HRE used to have a slight favorite, but I think ayyubid looks kind of better now, especially with the dervish build, because I don't think HRE can stop them from just fast-castling, the dervishes are so stupid. If ayyubid has back gold, there's not much HRE can do to stop them specifically because the dervishes combined with the back spawn, it's a lot.
If you're going to fast castle as HRE, I build one desert raider, two dervishes, and I die because the heal is ridiculous. It offsets all damage and means you have to scale to a point where you can eliminate a dervish, which is really slow. That's what allows the fast castle so freely.
The HRE Men-at-Arms, with the +6 damage against heavy units, are going to be quite competitive even against knights or Camel Lancers.
It's not just that Ayyubids can pick up relics quickly with dervishes; it's also that HRE needs those relics if they want to play the Regnitz build.
Even if Ayyubid gets the golden age in a rush, it's a little bit worse than Abbasid's, so the economic gap is still huge at 30% efficiency in favor of HRE.
Desert Raiders trying to kite HRE spearmen is risky because the spearmen's gap close is insanely fast.
HRE's gather buff means they deplete resources super quick, so if Ayyubid keeps them pinned inside their base, they can easily starve them out of resources.
Ayyubids can delay booming civilizations like HRE with their initial units: Desert Raiders and early camel lancers, buying time to secure relics and build up a large camel lancer force.
Holy Roman Empire Unique Units
Holy Roman Empire Landmarks
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